ON THE DEATH OF MR. WILLIAM

HERVEY

It was a dismal and a fearful night,

Scarce could the morn drive on the unwilling light,

When sleep, death's image, left my troubled breast,

By something liker death possessed.

My eyes with tears did uncommanded flow,
And on my soul hung the dull weight
Of some intolerable fate.

What bell was that? Ah me! too much I
know.

My sweet companion, and my gentle peer,
Why hast thou left me thus unkindly here,
Thy end for ever, and my life, to moan?

O, thou hast left me all alone!
Thy soul and body, when Death's agony
Besieged around thy noble heart,

Did not with more reluctance part,
Than I, my dearest friend! do part from thee. 16

My dearest friend, would I had died for thee! Life and this world henceforth will tedious be.

Nor shall I know hereafter what to do,

If once my griefs prove tedious too. Silent and sad I walk about all day, As sullen ghosts stalk speechless by Where their hid treasures lie;

Alas! my treasure 's gone! why do I stay? 24

He was my friend, the truest friend on earth;
A strong and mighty influence joined our birth;
Nor did we envy the most sounding name
By friendship given of old to fame.

None but his brethren he and sisters knew
Whom the kind youth preferred to me;
And even in that we did agree,

For much above myself I loved them too.

Say, for you saw us, ye immortal lights,
How oft unwearied have we spent the nights,
Till the Ledaean stars, so famed for love,
Wondered at us from above!

We spent them not in toys, in lusts, or wine;
But search of deep Philosophy,

Wit, Eloquence, and Poetry,

Arts which I loved, for they, my friend, were

thine.

Ye fields of Cambridge, our dear Cambridge,

say

Have ye not seen us walking every day?

Was there a tree about which did not know
The love betwixt us two?

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Henceforth, ye gentle trees for ever fade;
Or your sad branches thicker join,

And into darksome shades combine,
Dark as the grave wherein my friend is laid! 48

Henceforth, no learned youths beneath you sing, Till all the tuneful birds to your boughs they bring;

No tuneful birds play with their wonted cheer, And called the learned youths to hear;

No whistling winds through the glad branches fly:

But all, with sad solemnity,

Mute and unmoved be,

Mute as the grave wherein my friend does lie. 56

To him my Muse made haste with every strain,
Whilst it was new and warm yet from the brain
He loved my worthless rhymes, and, like a friend,
Would find out something to commend.
Hence now, my Muse! thou canst not me
delight:

Be this my latest verse,

With which I now adorn his hearse;

And this my grief, without thy help, shall write.

Had I a wreath of bays about my brow,
I should contemn that flourishing honour now;
Condemn it to the fire, and joy to hear
It rage and crackle there.

Instead of bays, crown with sad cypress me;
Cypress, which tombs does beautify:

Not Phoebus grieved so much as I,

For him who first was made that mournful tree.

Large was his soul: as large a soul as e'er
Submitted to inform a body here;

High as the place 't was shortly in heaven to
have,

But low and humble as his grave:

So high that all the virtues there did come,
As to their chiefest seat

Conspicuous and great:

So low, that for me too it made a room.

He scorned this busy world below, and all
That we, mistaken mortals! pleasure call;
Was filled with innocent gallantry and truth,
Triumphant o'er the sins of youth.

He, like the stars, to which he now is gone,
That shine with beams like flame,
Yet burn not with the same,

Had all the light of youth, of the fire none.

Knowledge he only sought, and so soon caught, As if for him knowledge had rather sought: Nor did more learning ever crowded lie

In such a short mortality.

Whene'er the skilful youth discoursed or writ,

Still did the notions throng

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About his eloquent tongue,

Nor could his ink flow faster than his wit.

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So strong a wit did Nature to him frame,
As all things but his judgment overcame;
His judgment like the heavenly moon did show,
Tempering that mighty sea below.

Oh! had he lived in Learning's world, what

bound

Would have been able to control

His overpowering soul!

We 've lost in him arts that not yet are

found.

His mirth was the pure spirits of various wit,
Yet never did his God or friends forget;
And, when deep talk and wisdom came in view,
Retired and gave to them their due:
For the rich help of books he always took,
Though his own searching mind before
Was so with notions written o'er

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As if wise Nature had made that her book. 112

So many virtues joined in him, as we

Can scarce pick here and there in history;
More than old writers' practice e'er could reach;
As much as they could ever teach.

These did Religion, Queen of Virtues! sway:
And all their sacred motions steer,

Just like the first and highest sphere,

Which wheels about, and turns all heaven one

way.

With as much zeal, devotion, piety,

He always lived, as other saints do die.

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