But Heaven this lafting monument has wrought,
That mortals may eternally be taught,
Rebellion, though fuccefsful, is but vain;
And Kings fo kill'd rife conquerors again.
This truth the royal image does proclaim,
Loud as the trumpet of surviving Fame.
NOT the brave Macedonian Youth alone;
But base Caligula, when on the throne,
Boundless in power, would make himself a God;
As if the world depended on his nod.
The † Syrian King to beafts was headlong thrown,
Ere to himself he could be mortal known.
The meanest wretch, if Heaven should give him line,
Would never stop, till he were thought divine :
All might within difcern the ferpent's pride,
If from ourselves nothing ourselves did hide.
Let the proud peacock his gay feathers spread,
And woo the female to his painted bed :
Let winds and feas together rage and fwell:
This nature teaches, and becomes them well.
Pride was not made for men: a confcious fenfe
Of guilt and folly, and their confequence,
Destroys the claim: and to beholders tells,
Here nothing, but the shape of manhood, dwells.
Alexander.
+ Nebuchadnezzar.
Ecclus. x. 18.
EPITAPH ON SIR GEORGE Speke.
NDER this ftone lies virtue, youth,
Unblemish'd probity, and truth:
Juft unto all relations known,
A worthy patriot, pious fon:
Whom neighbouring towns so often fent,
To give their fenfe in Parliament;
With lives and fortunes trufting one,
Who fo difcreetly us'd his own.
Sober he was, wife, temperate;
Contented with an old eftate,
Which no foul avarice did increase,
Nor wanton luxury make lefs.
While yet but young, his father dy'd,
And left him to an happy guide:
Not Lemuel's mother with more care
Did counsel or inftruct her heir;
Or teach with more fuccefs her fon
The vices of the time to fhun.
An heiress fhe; while yet alive,
All that was her's to him did give:
And he just gratitude did fhow
To one that had oblig'd him so :
Nothing too much for her he thought,
By whom he was fo bred and taught,
So (early made that path to tread,
Which did his youth to honour lead)
His fhort life did a pattern give,
How neighbours, husbands, friends, fhould live.
The virtues of a private life
Exceed the glorious noife and ftrife,
The folid intereft of mankind.
Approv'd by all, and lov'd fo well,
Though young, like fruit that 's ripe, he fell.
EPITAPH on Colonel CHARLES CAVENDISH.
HERE lies Charles Ca'ndifh let the marble
That hides his afhes, make his virtue known.
Beauty and valour did his fhort life grace;
The grief and glory of his noble race!
Early abroad he did the world furvey,
As if he knew he had not long to stay :
Saw what great Alexander in the East,
And mighty Julius conquer'd in the Weft.
Then, with a mind as great as theirs, he came
To find at home occafion for his fame:
Where dark confufion did the nations hide,
And where the jufter was the weaker fide.
Two loyal brothers took their Sovereign's part,
Employ'd their wealth, their courage, and their art:
The elder did whole regiments afford;
The younger brought his conduct and his fword.
William Earl of Devon fhire.
Born to command, a leader he begun,
And on the rebels lafting honour won:
The Horse, inftructed by their General's worth,
Still made the King victorious in the North:
Where Ca'ndifh fought, the Royalifts prevail'd;
Neither his courage nor his judgment fail'd:
The current of his victories found no stop,
Till Cromwell came, his party's chiefest prop.
Equal fuccefs had fet thefe champions high,
And both refolv'd to conquer or to die:
Virtue with rage, fury with valour, ftrove;
But that muft fall which is decreed above!
Cromwell, with odds of number and of fate,
Remov'd this bulwark of the Church and State:
Which the fad iffue of the war declar'd,
And made his tafk, to ruin both, lefs hard.
So when the bank neglected is o'erthrown,
The boundless torrent does the country drown.
Thus fell the young, the lovely, and the brave;
Strew bays and flowers upon his honour'd grave!
EPITAPH ON THE LADY SEDLEY,
HERE lies the learned Savil's heir;
So early wife, and lafting fair!
That none, except her years they told,
Thought her a child, or thought her old.
All that her father knew, or got,
His art, his wealth, fell to her lot:
And the fo well improv'd that stock,
Both of his knowledge and his flock;
II. His kingdom come. For this we pray in vain, Unless he does in our affections reign:
Abfurd it were to wish for fuch a King,
And not obedience to his fceptre bring;
Whofe yoke is eafy, and his burthen light;
His fervice freedom, and his judgments right.
III. His will be done. In fact 'tis always done;
But, as in heaven, it must be made our own :
His will should all our inclinations sway,
Whom nature and the universe obey.
Happy the man! whose wishes are confin'd
To what has been eternally defign'd:
Referring all to his paternal care,
To whom more dear, than to ourfelves, we are.
IV. It is not what our avarice hoards up;
'Tis he that feeds us, and that fills our cup;
Like new-born babes, depending on the breaft,
From day to day, we on his bounty feast.
Nor fhould the foul expect above a day,
To dwell in her frail tenement of clay :
The fetting fun fhould feem to bound our race,
And the new day a gift of special grace.
V. That he should all our trefpaffes forgive,
While we in hatred with our neighbours live;
Though fo to pray may feem an easy task,
We curfe ourselves when thus inclin'd we ask.
This prayer to use, we ought with equal care
Our fouls, as to the Sacrament, prepare.
The nobleft worship of the Power above,
Is to extol, and imitate, his love:
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