Classic Poem

Be kind, my deare Rosania, though 'tis true
Thy friendship will become thy penance too;
Though there be nothing can reward the paine,
Nothing to satisfy or entertain;
Though all be empty, wild, and like to me,
Who make new troubles in my company:
Yet is the action more obleiging-great;
'Tis hardship onely makes desert compleat.
But yet, to prove mixtures all things compound,
There may in this be some advantage found;
For a retirement from the noise of Towns,
Is that for which some Kings have left their Crowns:
And Conquerours, whose Laurells prest their Brow,
Have chang'd it for the quiet Mirtle bough.
For titles, honours, and the world's address,
Are things too cheap to make up happiness;
The easy tribute of a giddy race,
And paid less to the person then the place.
So false reflected and so short content
Is that which fortune and opinion lent,
That who most try'd it have of fate complain'd,
With titles burden'd and to greatness chain'd.
For they alone enjoy'd what they possesst,
Who relish'd most and understood it best;
And yet that understanding made them know
The empty swift dispatch of all below.
So that what most can outward things endeare,
Is the best meanes to make them disappeare:
And ev'n that Tyrant (sence) doth these destroy,
As more officious to our grief then Joy
Thus all the glittering world is but a cheat,
Obtruding on our sence things grosse for great.
But he that can enquire and undisguise,
Will soone perceive the sting that hidden ly's:
And find no Joys merit esteem but those
Whose scene ly's wholly at our own dispose
Man, unconcern'd without, himself may be
His own both prospect and security.
Kings may be slaves by their own passions hurl'd,
But who commands himself commands the World
A countrey=life assists this study best,
When no distractions doth the soule arrest:
There heav'n and earth'ly open to our view,
There we search nature and its authour too;
Possess'd with freedome and a reall State
Look down on vice, on vanity, and fate.
There (my Rosania) will we, mingling souls,
Pitty the folly which the world controuls;
And all those Grandeurs which the most do prize
We either can enjoy, or will despise.