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These vows to thee! for since great Talbot's gone
Down to thy silence, I commerce with none
But thy pale people; and in that confute
Mistaken man, that dead men are not mute.
Delicious beauty, lend thy flatter'd ear,
Accustom'd to warm whispers, and thoul't hear
How their cold language tells thee, that thy skin
Is but a beautious shrine, in which black sin
Is idoliz'd; thy eyes, but spheres where lust
Hath its loose motion; and thy end is dust.
Great Atlas of the state, descend with me
But hither, and this vault shalt furnish thee
With more avisos, than thy costly spies,
And show how false are all those mysteries
Thy sect receives; and though thy palace swell
With envied pride, 'tis here that thou must dwell.
It will instruct you, courtier, that your art
Of outward smoothness and a rugged heart
But cheats yourself, and all those subtle ways
You tread to greatness, is a fatal maze

Where you yourself shall lose; for though you breathe

Upward to pride, your center is beneath.

And 'twill thy rhetoric, false flesh! confound,
Which flatters my frail thoughts; no time can wound
This unarm'd frame. Here is true eloquence
Will teach my soul to triumph over sense,
Which hath its period in a grave, and there
Shows what are all our pompous surfeits here.
Great orator! dear Talbot! Still to thee
May I an auditor attentive be,
And piously maintain the same commerce
We held in life! and if in my rude verse
I to the world may thy sad precepts read,
I will on earth interpret for the dead.

"MY HARP IS TURNED TO MOURNING."-JOB.

LOVE! I no orgies sing
Whereby thy mercies to invoke:

Nor from the East rich perfumes bring
To cloud thy altars with the precious smoke.

Nor while I did frequent
Those fanes by lovers rais'd to thee,
Did I loose heathenish rites invent,
To force a blush from injur'd chastity.

Religious was the charm

I us'd affection to entice :

And thought none burnt more bright or warm; Yet chaste as winter was the sacrifice.

But now I thee bequeath

To the soft silken youths at court;
Who may their witty passions breathe,

To raise their mistress' smile, or make her sport.

They'll smooth thee into rhyme,

Such as shall catch the wanton ear:
And win opinion with the time,

To make them a high sail of honour bear.

And may a powerful smile

Cherish their flatteries of wit!

While I my life of fame beguile,

And under my own vine uncourted sit.

For I have seen the pine,

Fam'd for its travels o'er the sea,
Broken with storms and age decline,
And in some creek unpitied rot away.

I have seen cedars fall,

And in their room a mushroom grow:
I have seen comets, threat'ning all,
Vanish themselves-I have seen princes so.

Vain trivial dust! weak man! Where is that virtue of thy breath, That others save or ruin can,

When thou thyself art call'd to account by Death?

When I consider thee,

The scorn of Time, and sport of Fate;
How can I turn to jollity

My ill-strung harp, and court the delicate?

How can I but disdain

The empty fallacies of mirth;

And in my midnight thoughts retain,
How high soe'er I spread, my root's in earth ?-

Fond youth! too long I play'd

The wanton with a false delight;

Which when I touch'd, I found a shade,
That only wrought on th' error of my sight.

Then since pride doth betray

The soul to flatter'd ignorance,
I from the world will steal away,
And by humility my thoughts advance.

"LET ME KNOW THE NUMBER OF MY DAYS."

DAVID.

TELL me, O great All-knowing God!

What period

Hast thou unto my days assign'd?

Like some old leafless tree, shall I

Wither away, or violently

Fall by the axe, by lightning, or the wind?

Here, where I first drew vital breath,
Shall I meet death?

And find in the same vault a room
Where my forefathers' ashes sleep?
Or shall I die, where none shall weep
My timeless fate, and my cold earth entomb?

Shall I 'gainst the swift Parthians fight,

And in their flight

Receive my death? Or shall I see
That envied peace, in which we are
Triumphant yet, disturb'd by war,
And perish by the invading enemy?

Astrologers, who calculate
Uncertain fate,

Affirm my scheme doth not presage
Any abridgment of my days:
And the physician gravely says,
I may enjoy a reverent length of age.

But they are jugglers, and by sleight
Of art the sight

Of faith delude; and in their school

They only practise how to make
A mystery of each mistake,

And teach strange words credulity to fool.

For thou, who first didst motion give,
Whereby things live,

And time hath being, to conceal
Future events, didst think it fit

To check the ambition of our wit,
And keep in awe the curious search of zeal.

Therefore, so I prepar'd still be,

My God, for thee,

O' th' sudden on my spirits may
Some killing apoplexy seize,

Or let me by a dull disease,

Or weaken'd by a feeble age, decay.

And so I in thy favour die,

No memory

For me a well-wrought tomb prepare:
For if my soul be 'mong the blest,
Though my poor ashes want a chest,
I shall forgive the trespass of my heir.

"NOT UNTO US, O LORD.”—DAVID.

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