SECOND Part .

B LEST men, of lowly mind,
In self-opinion poor;
For you, what honour is design'd!
For you, what princely store!

In time's short joys and sighs,
Thankful, or meekly still;
Whate'er he gives you, or denies,
You love your Father's will.

The high and holy One,
Who all his works surveys,

FIRST Part .

W AS pride, alas! e'er made for man?
Blind, erring, guilty creature he,
His birth the dust, his life a span,
His wisdom less than vanity.

If wealth and pow'r with dazzling rays
And pageant state this nothing dress;
On the fair idol shall we gaze?
And envy that as happiness?

Jesus, by thy instruction taught,
Our foolish passions are represt:

Primate [ S ]

Next might I see a rout of noblemen,
Earls, barons, lords, in mourning weeds attir'd:
I cannot paint their passions with my pen,
Nor write so quaintly as their woes requir'd;
Their tears and sighs some Homer's quill desir'd:
But this I know, their grief was for his death
That there had yielded nature, life and breath.

M ILITES

Then came by soldiers trailing of their pikes:
Like men dismay'd their beavers were adown;
Their warlike hearts his death with sorrow strikes:
Yea, War himself was in a sable gown;

Next, from the farthest nook of all the place,
Weeping full sore, there rose a nymph in black,
Seemly and sober, with an angel's face,
And sigh'd as if her heart-strings straight should crack:
Her outward woes bewray'd her inward wrack.
A golden book she carried in her hand;
It was Religion that thus meek did stand.

God wot, her garments were full loosely tuck'd,
As one that careless was in some despair;
To tatters were her robes and vestures pluck'd,
Her naked limbs were open to the air;
Yet, for all this her looks were blithe and fair:

Lame of a leg, as she had lost a limb,
Start up kind Hospitality and wept:
She silent sat awhile and sigh'd by him;
As one half-maimed, to this knight she crept;
At last about his neck, this nymph she leapt,
And, with her cornucopia in her fist,
For very love his chilly lips she kiss'd.

Ay me, quoth she, my love is lorn by death;
My chiefest stay is crack'd, and I am lame:
He that his alms frankly did bequeath,
And fed the poor with store of food, the same,
Even he is dead, and vanish'd is his name,

With open hands, and mourning locks dependant,
Bounty stepp'd forth to wail the dead man's loss:
On her were Love and Plenty both attendant:
Tears in her eyes, arms folded quite across,
Sitting by him upon a turf of moss,
She sigh'd, and said, Here lies the knight deceas'd,
Whose bounty Bounty's glory much increas'd.

His looks were liberal, and in his face
Sat frank magnificence with arms display'd;
His open hands discours'd his inward grace;
The poor were never at their need denied:
His careless scorn of gold his deeds bewray'd:

Then Temperance, with bridle in her hand,
Did mildly look upon this lifeless lord,
And like to weeping Niobe did stand:
Her sorrows and her tears did well accord;
Their diapason was in self-same cord.
Here lies the man, quoth she, that breath'd out this, —
" To shun fond pleasures is the sweetest bliss."

No choice delight could draw his eyes awry'
He was not bent to pleasure's fond conceits;
Inveigling pride, nor world's sweet vanity,
Love's luring follies with their strange deceits,
Could wrap this lord within their baleful slights:

Next Fortitude arose unto this knight,
And by his side sat down with steadfast eyes:
A broken column 'twixt her arms was pight:
She could not weep nor pour out yearnful cries.
From Fortitude such base affects nill rise;
Brass-renting goddess, she cannot lament:
Yet thus her plaints with breathing sighs were spent.

Within the Maiden's Court, place of all places,
I did advance a man of high desert,
Whom nature had made proud with all her graces,
Inserting courage in his noble heart:
No peril's dread could ever make him start;

A wreath of serpents 'bout her lily wrist
Did seemly Prudence wear; she then arose;
A silver dove sat mourning on her fist;
Tears on her cheeks like dew upon a rose;
And thus began the goddess grief-ful glose:
" Let England mourn, for why his days are done
Whom Prudence nursed like her dearest son. "

Hatton, — at that I started in my dream,
But not awoke, " Hatton is dead, " quoth she!
Oh, could I pour out tears like to a stream,
A sea of them would not sufficient be!
For why our age had few more wise than he!

Untoward twins that temper human fate,
Who from your distaff draw the life of man,
Parse, impartial to the highest state,
Too soon you cut what Clotho erst began:
Your fatal dooms this present age may ban,
For you have robb'd the world of such a knight
As best could skill to balance Justice right.

His eyes were seats for mercy and for law,
Favour in one, and Justice in the other:
The poor he smooth'd, the proud he kept in awe;
As just to strangers as unto his brother;
Bribes could not make him any wrong to smother,