| CAN we not force from widdowed Poetry, | |
| Now thou art dead (Great DONNE) one Elegie | |
| To crowne thy Hearse? Why yet dare we not trust | |
| Though with unkneaded dowe-bak't prose thy dust, | |
| Such as the uncisor'd Churchman from the flower | 5 |
| Of fading Rhetorique, short liv'd as his houre, | |
| Dry as the sand that measures it, should lay | |
| Upon thy Ashes, on the funerall day? | |
| Have we no voice, no tune? Did'st thou dispense | |
| Through all our language, both the words and sense? | 10 |
| 'Tis a sad truth; The Pulpit may her plaine, | |
| And sober Christian precepts still retaine, | |
| Doctrines it may, and wholesome Uses frame, | |
| Grave Homilies, and Lectures, But the flame | |
| Of thy brave Soule, that shot such heat and light, | 15 |
| As burnt our earth, and made our darknesse bright, | |
| Committed holy Rapes upon our Will, | |
| Did through the eye the melting heart distill; | |
| And the deepe knowledge of darke truths so teach, | |
| As sense might judge, what phansie could not reach; | 20 |
| Must be desir'd for ever. So the fire, | |
| That fills with spirit and heat the Delphique quire, | |
| Which kindled first by thy Promethean breath, | |
| Glow'd here a while, lies quench't now in thy death; | |
| The Muses garden with Pedantique weedes | 25 |
| O'rspred, was purg'd by thee; The lazie seeds | |
| Of servile imitation throwne away; | |
| And fresh invention planted, Thou didst pay | |
| The debts of our penurious bankrupt age; | |
| Licentious thefts, that make poëtique rage | 30 |
| A Mimique fury, when our soules must bee | |
| Possest, or with Anacreons Extasie, | |
| Or Pindars, not their owne; The subtle cheat | |
| Of slie Exchanges, and the jugling feat | |
| Of two-edg'd words, or whatsoever wrong | 35 |
| By ours was done the Greeke, or Latine tongue, | |
| Thou hast redeem'd, and open'd Us a Mine | |
| Of rich and pregnant phansie, drawne a line | |
| Of masculine expression, which had good | |
| Old Orpheus seene, Or all the ancient Brood | 40 |
| Our superstitious fooles admire, and hold | |
| Their lead more precious, then thy burnish't Gold, | |
| Thou hadst beene their Exchequer, and no more | |
| They each in others dust had rak'd for Ore. | |
| Thou shalt yield no precedence, but of time, | 45 |
| And the blinde fate of language, whose tun'd chime | |
| More charmes the outward sense; Yet thou maist claime | |
| From so great disadvantage greater fame, | |
| Since to the awe of thy imperious wit | |
| Our stubborne language bends, made only fit | 50 |
| With her tough-thick-rib'd hoopes to gird about | |
| Thy Giant phansie, which had prov'd too stout | |
| For their soft melting Phrases. As in time | |
| They had the start, so did they cull the prime | |
| Buds of invention many a hundred yeare, | 55 |
| And left the rifled fields, besides the feare | |
| To touch their Harvest, yet from those bare lands | |
| Of what is purely thine, thy only hands | |
| (And that thy smallest worke) have gleaned more | |
| Then all those times, and tongues could reape before; | 60 |
| But thou art gone, and thy strict lawes will be | |
| Too hard for Libertines in Poetrie. | |
| They will repeale the goodly exil'd traine | |
| Of gods and goddesses, which in thy just raigne | |
| Were banish'd nobler Poems, now, with these | 65 |
| The silenc'd tales o'th'Metamorphoses | |
| Shall stuffe their lines, and swell the windy Page, | |
| Till Verse refin'd by thee, in this last Age | |
| Turne ballad rime, Or those old Idolls bee | |
| Ador'd againe, with new apostasie; | 70 |
| Oh, pardon mee, that breake with untun'd verse | |
| The reverend silence that attends thy herse, | |
| Whose awfull solemne murmures were to thee | |
| More then these faint lines, A loud Elegie, | |
| That did proclaime in a dumbe eloquence | 75 |
| The death of all the Arts, whose influence | |
| Growne feeble, in these panting numbers lies | |
| Gasping short winded Accents, and so dies: | |
| So doth the swiftly turning wheele not stand | |
| In th'instant we withdraw the moving hand, | 80 |
| But some small time maintaine a faint weake course | |
| By vertue of the first impulsive force: | |
| And so whil'st I cast on thy funerall pile | |
| Thy crowne of Bayes, Oh, let it crack a while, | |
| And spit disdaine, till the devouring flashes | 85 |
| Suck all the moysture up, then turne to ashes. | |
| I will not draw the[e] envy to engrosse | |
| All thy perfections, or weepe all our losse; | |
| Those are too numerous for an Elegie, | |
| And this too great, to be express'd by mee. | 90 |
| Though every pen should share a distinct part, | |
| Yet art thou Theme enough to tyre all Art; | |
| Let others carve the rest, it shall suffice | |
| I on thy Tombe this Epitaph incise. | |
| |
| Here lies a King, that rul'd as hee thought fit | 95 |
| The universall Monarchy of wit; | |
| Here lie two Flamens, and both those the best, | |
| Apollo's first, at last, the true Gods Priest. | |
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