TRUTH.

(From "Hymenai, or the Solemnities of Masques and Barriers at the Marriage of the Earl of Essex, 1606.")

UPON her head she wears a crown of stars,
Through which her Orient hair waves to her waist,
By which believing mortals hold her fast,

And in those golden cords are carried even,
Till with her breath she blows them up to heaven.
She wears a robe enchased with eagles' eyes,
To signify her sight in mysteries:

Upon each shoulder sits a milk-white dove,
And at her feet do coilly serpents move:
Her spacious arms do reach from east to west,

And you may see her heart shine through her breast.
Her right hand holds a sun with burning rays,
Her left a curious bunch of golden keys,

With which heaven's gates she locketh and displays.
A crystal mirror hangeth at her breast,

By which men's consciences are searched and drest,
On her coach-wheels Hypocrisy lies racked;
And squint-eyed Slander with Vainglory backed,
Her bright eyes burn to dust, in which shines Fate:
An angel ushers her triumphant gait,

Whilst with her fingers fans of stars she twists,
And with them beats back Error, clad in mists.
Eternal Unity behind her shines,

That fire and water, earth and air combines.
Her voice is like a trumpet loud and shrill,

Which bids all sounds in earth and heaven be still.

EPITAPH ON MY FIRST DAUGHTER.

HERE lies, to each her parents ruth,

Mary, the daughter of our youth;

Yet, all Heaven's gifts being Heaven's due,

It makes the father less to rue.

At six months' end, she parted hence

With safety of her innocence;

Whose soul Heaven's Queen-whose name she bears

In comfort of her mother's tears,

Hath placed among her virgin train:

Where, while that severed doth remain,

This grave partakes the fleshly birth,

Which cover lightly, gentle earth,

EPITAPH ON ELIZABETH L. H.

WOULDST thou hear what man can say
In a little? Reader, stay.

Underneath this stone doth lie
As much beauty as could die:
Which in life did harbour give
To more virtue than doth live.
If at all she had a fault,
Leave it buried in this vault.
One name was Elizabeth;

The other, let it sleep in death,

Fitter, where it died to tell,

Than that it lived at all. Farewell!

EPITAPH ON MASTER PHILIP GRAY.

(From" Underwoods.")

READER, stay;

And if I had no more to say

But "Here doth lie, till the last day,
All that is left of Philip Gray,"
It might thy patience richly pay:
For if such men as he could die,
What surety o' life have thou and I?

EPITAPH ON MARGARET RATCLIFFE.

MARBLE, weep! for thou dost cover
A dead beauty underneath thee,
Rich as nature could bequeath thee:
Grant, then, no rude hands remove her!
All the gazers on the skies
Read not in fair heaven's story
Expresser truth or truer glory

Than they might in her bright eyes.

Rare as wonder was her wit,

And, like nectar, overflowing;
Till Time, strong by her bestowing,
Conquer'd hath both life and it ;

Life whose grief was out of fashion
In these times. Few so have rued
Fate in another. To conclude,-
For wit, feature, and true passion,
Earth! thou hast not such another.

SONG.

How near to good is what is fair,
Which we no sooner see,

But with the lines and outward air
Our senses taken be.

We wish to see it still, and prove
What ways we may deserve;

We court, we praise, we more than love,
We are not grieved to serve.

FAME.

HER house is all of echo made,
Where never dies the sound;
And as her brows the clouds invade,
Her feet do strike the ground.

ODE TO HIMSELF.

WHERE dost thou careless lie
Buried in ease and sloth?
Knowledge that sleeps, doth die;
And this security,

It is the common moth

That eats on wits and arts, and so destroys them both.

Are all the Aonian springs

Dried up? Lies Thespia waste?
Doth Clarius' harp want strings,
That not a nymph now sings?

Or droop they as disgraced,

To see their seats and bowers by chattering pies defaced?

If hence thy silence be,

As 'tis too just a cause.

Let this thought quicken thee;
Minds that are great and free

Should not on fortune pause;

'Tis crown enough to virtue still, her own applause.

CHIVALRY.

THE house of Chivalry decayed,

Or rather ruined seems, her buildings laid

Flat with the Earth, that were the pride of Time;
Those obelisks and columns broke and down,
That strook the stars, and raised the British Crown
To be a Constellation.

When to the structure went more noble names
Than to the Ephesian Temple lost in flames,
When every stone was laid by virtuous hands.

SONG.

THE faery beam upon you,
And the stars to glister on you,
A moon of light

In the noon of night,

Till the fire-drake hath o'ergone you :

The wheel of Fortune guide you,

The boy with the bow beside you

Run aye in the way, till the bird of day
And the luckier lot betide you.

TRANSLATION OF COWLEY'S EPIGRAM ON FRANCIS DRAKE.

THE stars above will make thee known,

If man were silent here;

The sun himself cannot forget

His fellow-traveller.

NATURE.

How young and fresh am I to-night,

To see't kept day by so much light,

And twelve of my sons stand in their Maker's sight!
Help, wise Prometheus, something must be done,
To show they are the creatures of the sun.

That each to other

Is a brother,

And Nature here no stepdame, but a mother.
Come forth, come forth, prove all the numbers then,
That make perfection up, and may absolve you men,