EPITAPH INTENDED FOR SIR ISAAC NRWTON.
NATURE and Nature's laws lay hid in night: God said, 'Let Newton be!' and all was light. Pope.
EPITAPH OF DR. FRANCIS ATTERBURY, BISHOP OF ROCHESTER,
WHO DIED IN EXILE AT PARIS, 1732.
[His only daughter having expired in his arms, immediately after she arrived in France to see him.]
She. YES, we have liv'd-One pang, and then we part!
May Heav'n, dear father! now have all thy heart.
Yet, ah! how once we lov'd, remember still,
Till you are dust like me.
....Dear shade! I will: Then mix this dust with thine--O spotless ghost! O more than fortune, friends, or country lost! Is there on Earth one care, one wish beside! Yes-Save my country, Heav'n !'—he said, and
EPITAPH ON EDMUND DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM, WHO DIED IN THE NINETEENTH YEAR OF HIS AGE, 1735. Ir modest youth with cool reflection crown'd, And every opening virtue blooming round, Could save a parent's justest pride from fate, Or add one patriot to a sinking state,
This weeping marble had not ask'd thy tear,
Or sadly told how many hopes lie here!
The living virtue now had shone approv'd;
The senate heard him, and his country lov'd.
Yet softer honours and less noisy fame
Attend the shade of gentle Buckingham:
In whom a race, for courage fam'd and art,
Ends in the milder merit of the heart;
And, chiefs or sages long to Britain giv'n,
Pays the last tribute of a saint to Heav'n. Pope.
EPITAPH FOR ONE WHO WOULD NOT BE BURIED
IN WESTMINSTER-ABBEY.
HEROES and kings! your distance keep;
In peace let one poor poet sleep,
Who never flatter'd folks like you:
Let Horace blush, and Virgil too.
UNDER this marble, or under this sill,
Or under this turf, or e'en what they will;
Whatever an heir, or a friend in his stead,
Or any good creature shall lay o'er my head,
Lies one who ne'er car'd, and still cares not, a pin
What they said, or may say, of the mortal within ;
But who, living and dying, serene still and free,
Trusts in God, that as well as he was he shall be.
EPITAPH ON MRS. CLARKE.
Lo! where this silent marble weeps,
A friend, a wife, a mother sleeps:
A heart within whose sacred cell
The peaceful Virtues lov'd to dwell.
Affection warm, and Faith sincere,
And soft Humanity were there.
In agony, in death resign'd,
She felt the wound she left behind.
Her infant image here below
Sits smiling on a father's wo:
Whom what awaits, while yet he strays
Along the lonely vale of days?
A pang, to secret sorrow dear;
A sigh; an unavailing tear;
Till time shall ev'ry grief remove,
With life, with memory, and with love.
EPITAPH ON LADY LYTTELTON.
MADE to engage all hearts, and charm all eyes;
Though meek, magnanimous; though witty, wise;
Polite, as all her life in courts had been;
Yet good, as she the world had never seen;
The noble fire of an exalted mind,
With gentle female tenderness combin'd.
Her speech was the melodious voice of Love,
Her song the warbling of the vernal grove;
Her eloquence was sweeter than her song,
Soft as her heart, and as her reason strong;
Her form each beauty of her mind express'd,
Her mind was Virtue by the Graces dress'd.
EPITAPH ON MISS STANLEY.
HERE, Stanley, rest! escap'd this mortal strife,
Above the joys, beyond the woes of life.
Fierce pangs no more thy lively beauties stain,
And sternly try thee with a year of pain:
No more sweet patience, feigning oft relief,
Lights thy sick eye, to cheat a parent's grief:
With tender art to save her anxious groan,
No more thy bosom presses down its own:
Now well-earn'd peace is thine, and bliss sincere:
Ours be the lenient, not unpleasing tear!
O born to bloom, then sink beneath the storm;
To show us Virtue in her fairest form;
To show us artless Reason's moral reign,
What boastful Science arrogates in vain;
Th' obedient passions knowing each their part:
Calm light the head, and harmony the heart!
Yes, we must follow soon, will glad obey ; When a few suns have roll'd their cares away, Tir'd with vain life, will close the willing eye: 'Tis the great birthright of mankind to die. Bless'd be the bark! that wafts us to the shore, Where death-divided friends shall part no more: To join thee there, here with thy dust repose, Is all the hope thy hapless mother knows.
ON THE DEATH OF DE. ROBERT LEVET.
Condemn'd to Hope's delusive mine,
As on we toil from day to day,
By sudden blasts or slow decline,
Our social comforts drop away.
Well tried through many a varying year,
See Levet to the grave descend,
Officious, innocent, sincere,
Of every friendless name the friend.
Yet still he fills affection's eye,
Obscurely wise and coarsely kind;
Nor, letter'd Arrogance, deny
Thy praise to merit unrefin'd.
When fainting nature call'd for aid,
And hovering death prepar'd the blow,
His vigorous remedy display'd
The power of art without the show.
In misery's darkest cavern known,
His useful care was ever nigh,
Where hopeless anguish pour'd his groan,
And lonely want retir'd to die.
No summons mock'd by chill delay,
No petty gain disdain'd by pride;
The modest wants of every day
The toil of every day supply'd.
His virtues walk'd their narrow round,
Nor made a pause, nor left a void;
And sure the Eternal Master found
The single talent well employ'd.
The busy day-the peaceful night,
Unfelt, uncounted, glided by;
His frame was firm-his powers were bright, Though now his eightieth year was nigh.
|