Classic Poem

Gratious Is the End that Ends All Our Paines

When, when, o when shall I bid life farewell
Wherein my Soule, and Body so ill fares?
My Soule within my Body, Loathes to dwell
Sith it doth dwell in such a World of Cares.
Wherein the best are Briers, that scratching, hold
Whatere they catch vnto anothers harme:
Whose Tenter hookt Armes do, in Loue, infold
No one but whome they spoile, and quite disarme:
Where Men loue Men, not for that Men they are
But simply for themselues; all whose respect
Is swallowed vp with self respecting Care,
And commonly the Common good neglect.
Where Fashions are, then Formes, more various:
(Though scarse among a Million two are like)
Where the most iust are less iniurious
Though Iustice their iniustice doth dislike
Where Faces want no graces to allure
The Mynd to loue, so to betray the Mind:
An holy kisse, in show, showes to assure
The rather to faile Hope that seeks to find
Where oft Religion palliates Policy,
And Saints are made a Sacrifice for State:
Yea, heaunly Powres for Earthly Maiesty,
Away goes all that lets Ambitions gate.
Where holy Fathers do vnholy Deeds
While yet they blesse their Sons that cloak their shame:
And so the Hart of Piety still bleeds
Because Hypocrisie still wounds the same
Where all is seeming, and Nought reall is:
For all do couet only but to seeme
Ill seemeth good, and sorrow seemeth Blisse.
And Men, but by their show do men esteem
Where the whole frame of Natur's out of frame.
And at the point to be dissolued quite:
Where Wit and Learning are both blind, and lame,
Yet scorne, through pride, a Guide to leade them right.
Where no man hath an Eare to heare, sith Eares
Are now turned all to Tongues, or Teeth, to gnaw:
If one haue Eares none but himselfe he heares,
As bound thereto by self-loues lawlesse law,
Where Loue, and Lordship can no Riualls beare,
That yet should beare with all that Grace doth brooke.
Where euery thinge amisse is euery where
And nought found good vnlesse it be in looke
Where vertue is despised though bright she bee,
If she be bare; Yet Venus, bare, is lou'd:
Where nought hath tast els, that is bare to see
Yea, Truth it self if bare, is not approud.
Where all and some make but the sum of al
Vainst Vanities; for so at best they be:
Where each one riseth by anothers fal,
Yet mounts in vaine, for quickly fal must he.
So on this Sorrowes Sea [this World of Woe]
Al falls to Earth, that riseth from the same:
And so all Earthly Things do ebb and flo,
And ebb in nature, as they flo in name.
Then o haue I not reason to desire
My Natures dissolution, sith it is
With these Ills conuersant, which do conspire
To make it [like them] more then most amisse?
Then, Death (the end of Ill vnto the good)
Enshore my Soule neer drownd in flesh, and bloud.English