ON THE DEATH OF MR. WILLIAM HERVEY It was a dismal and a fearful night, Scarce could the morn drive on the unwilling light, When sleep, death's image, left my troubled breast, By something liker death possessed. My eyes with tears did uncommanded flow, What bell was that? Ah me! too much I My sweet companion, and my gentle peer, O, thou hast left me all alone! Did not with more reluctance part, My dearest friend, would I had died for thee! Life and this world henceforth will tedious be. Nor shall I know hereafter what to do, If once my griefs prove tedious too. Silent and sad I walk about all day, As sullen ghosts stalk speechless by Where their hid treasures lie; Alas! my treasure 's gone! why do I stay? 24 He was my friend, the truest friend on earth; None but his brethren he and sisters knew For much above myself I loved them too. Say, for you saw us, ye immortal lights, We spent them not in toys, in lusts, or wine; Wit, Eloquence, and Poetry, Arts which I loved, for they, my friend, were thine. Ye fields of Cambridge, our dear Cambridge, say Have ye not seen us walking every day? Was there a tree about which did not know 32 40 Henceforth, ye gentle trees for ever fade; And into darksome shades combine, Henceforth, no learned youths beneath you sing, Till all the tuneful birds to your boughs they bring; No tuneful birds play with their wonted cheer, And called the learned youths to hear; No whistling winds through the glad branches fly: But all, with sad solemnity, Mute and unmoved be, Mute as the grave wherein my friend does lie. 56 To him my Muse made haste with every strain, Be this my latest verse, With which I now adorn his hearse; And this my grief, without thy help, shall write. Had I a wreath of bays about my brow, Instead of bays, crown with sad cypress me; Not Phoebus grieved so much as I, For him who first was made that mournful tree. Large was his soul: as large a soul as e'er High as the place 't was shortly in heaven to But low and humble as his grave: So high that all the virtues there did come, Conspicuous and great: So low, that for me too it made a room. He scorned this busy world below, and all He, like the stars, to which he now is gone, Had all the light of youth, of the fire none. Knowledge he only sought, and so soon caught, As if for him knowledge had rather sought: Nor did more learning ever crowded lie In such a short mortality. Whene'er the skilful youth discoursed or writ, Still did the notions throng 72 80 88 About his eloquent tongue, Nor could his ink flow faster than his wit. 96 So strong a wit did Nature to him frame, Oh! had he lived in Learning's world, what bound Would have been able to control His overpowering soul! We 've lost in him arts that not yet are found. His mirth was the pure spirits of various wit, 104 As if wise Nature had made that her book. 112 So many virtues joined in him, as we Can scarce pick here and there in history; These did Religion, Queen of Virtues! sway: Just like the first and highest sphere, Which wheels about, and turns all heaven one way. With as much zeal, devotion, piety, He always lived, as other saints do die. 120 |