A paradise, that has no stint, A painted cask, but nothing in't, Nor wealth, nor pleasure : Vain earth! that falsely thus comply'st With man; vain man! that thou rely'st On earth; vain man, thou dot'st; vain earth, thou ly'st. What mean dull souls, in this high measure, To haberdash In earth's base wares, whose greatest treasure The height of whose enchanting pleasure Are these the goods that thou supply'st DELIGHT IN GOD ONLY. I LOVE and have some cause to love-the earth: I love the air: her dainty sweets refresh My drooping soul, and to new sweets invite me; Her shrill-mouthed quire sustains me with their flesh, And with their polyphonian notes delight me : But what's the air or all the sweets that she Can bless my soul withal, compared to thee? I love the sea she is my fellow-creature, My careful purveyor; she provides me store: She walls me round; she makes my diet greater; She wafts my treasure from a foreign shore: But, Lord of oceans, when compared with thee, What is the ocean or her wealth to me? To heaven's high city I direct my journey, Whose spangled suburbs entertain mine eye; Mine eye, by contemplation's great attorney, Transcends the crystal pavement of the sky : F But what is heaven, great God, compared to thee? Without thy presence heaven's no heaven to me. Without thy presence earth gives no refection; Without thy presence sea affords no treasure; Without thy presence air's a rank infection; Without thy presence heaven itself no pleasure: If not possessed, if not enjoyed in thee, What's earth, or sea, or air, or heaven to me? The highest honours that the world can boast, Are subjects far too low for my desire; The brightest beams of glory are at mostBut dying sparkles of thy living fire : The loudest flames that earth can kindle, be But nightly glowworms, if compared to thee. Without thy presence wealth is bags of cares; Wisdom but folly; joy disquiet-sadness: Friendship is treason, and delights are snares; Pleasures but pain, and mirth but pleasing madness; Without thee, Lord, things be not what they be, Nor have they being, when compared with thee. In having all things, and not thee, what have I ? Not having thee, what have my labours got? Let me enjoy but thee, what further crave I ? And having thee alone, what have I not? I wish nor sea nor land; nor would I be Possessed of heaven, heaven unpossessed of thee. DECAY OF LIFE. THE day grows old, the low pitched lamp hath made And the descending damp doth now prepare Whose western wardrobe now begins to unfold To clothe his evening glory, when the alarms Nature now calls to supper, to refresh The spirits of all flesh; The toiling ploughman drives his thirsty teams, The droiling swineherd knocks away, and feasts The boxbill, ouzle, and the dappled thrush, To cobweb every green; And by the low-shorn rowans doth appear The sapless branches doff their summer suits And stormy blasts have forced the quaking trees Her sprightless flame grown with great snuff, doth turn Her slender inch, that yet unspent remains, And in a silent language bids her guest Now careful age hath pitched her painful plough And snowy blasts of discontented care Have blanched the falling hair : Suspicious envy mixed with jealous spite Disturbs his weary night : He threatens youth with age; and now, alas! Grey hairs peruse thy days, and let thy past Read lectures to thy last : Those hasty wings that hurried them away Will give these days no day : The constant wheels of nature scorn to tire Until her works expire: That blast that nipped thy youth will ruin thee; That hand that shook the branch will quickly strike the tree. FLEEING FROM WRATH. AH! whither shall I fly? what path untrod Where shall I sojourn ? what kind sea will hide What, if my feet should take their hasty flight, What, if my soul should take the wings of day, 'Tis vair to flee, till gentle Mercy show George Herbert. Born 1593. Died 1632. HERBERT Was of noble birth, being descended from the Earls of Pembroke. His elder brother was Lord Herbert of Cherbury. Herbert was born at Montgomery Castle in Wales, on 3d April 1593, and was educated to push his way at court; but in 1626 circumstances induced him to enter into sacred orders, and he was settled as prebend of Layton Ecclesia, near Spalding. In uncertain health, he afterwards was made rector of Bemerton, near Salisbury, where he passed the remainder of his short life in the exercise of the duties of his office, with saintlike zeal and devotion. Here he wrote his poems, which breathe in verse the rules laid down by himself for his own direction as a country parson. He died in 1632. VERTUE. SWEET day, so cool, so calm, so bright, Sweet rose, whose hue angrie and brave Thy root is ever in its grave, And thou must die. Sweet spring, full of sweet dayes and roses, My musick shows ye have your closes, And all must die. Onely a sweet and vertuous soul, Like season'd timber, never gives; But though the whole world turn to coal, Then chiefly lives. LIFE. I MADE a posie, while the day ran by: But Time did becken to the flowers, and they And wither'd in my hand. My hand was next to them, and then my heart; I took, without more thinking, in good part Time's gentle admonition; Who did so sweetly death's sad taste convey, Making my minde to smell my fatall day, Yet sugring the suspicion. Farewell, dear flowers, sweetly your time ye spent, Fit, while ye lived, for smell or ornament, And after death for cures. I follow straight without complaints or grief, Since if my scent be good, I care not, if It be as short as yours. |