The World 379 A FAREWELL TO ARMS (TO QUEEN ELIZABETH) His golden locks Time hath to silver turned; O Time too swift, O swiftness never ceasing! His youth 'gainst time and age hath ever spurned, But spurned in vain; youth waneth by increasing: Beauty, strength, youth, are flowers but fading seen; Duty, faith, love, are roots, and ever green. His helmet now shall make a hive for bees; And feed on prayers, which are Age his alms: And when he saddest sits in homely cell, He'll teach his swains this carol for a song,"Blest be the hearts that wish my sovereign well, Curst be the souls that think her any wrong." Goddess, allow this aged man his right To be your beadsman now that was your knight. George Peele [1558?-1597?] THE WORLD THE World's a bubble, and the life of Man In his conception wretched,-from the womb, Curst from his cradle, and brought up to years Who then to frail mortality shall trust, But limns on water, or but writes in dust. Yet whilst with sorrow here we live oppressed, Courts are but only superficial schools To dandle fools; The rural parts are turned into a den Of savage men; And where's a city from foul vice so free, But may be termed the worst of all the three? Domestic cares afflict the husband's bed, Those that live single, take it for a curse, Some would have children; those that have them moan What is it, then, to have, or have no wife, Our own affections still at home to please To cross the scas to any foreign soil, Peril and toil; Wars with their noise affright us; when they cease, -What then remains, but that we still should cry For being born, or, being born, to die? Francis Bacon [1561-1626] "WHEN THAT Į WAS AND A LITTLE TINY BOY" From "Twelfth Night" WHEN that I was and a little tiny boy, With hey, ho, the wind and the rain, A foolish thing was but a toy, For the rain it raineth every day. But when I came to man's estate, With hey, ho, the wind and the rain, 'Gainst knaves and thieves men shut their gate, But when I came, alas! to wive, With hey, ho, the wind and the rain, By swaggering could I never thrive, For the rain it raineth every day. A Lament But when I came unto my beds, A great while ago the world begun, And we'll strive to please you every day. 381 William Shakespeare [1564-1616] OF THE LAST VERSES IN THE BOOK WHEN we for age could neither read nor write, The soul, with nobler resolutions decked, The seas are quiet when the winds give o'er; The soul's dark cottage, battered and decayed, As they draw near to their eternal home. Leaving the old, both worlds at once they view That stand upon the threshold of the new. Edmund Waller [1606-1687] A LAMENT THE NIGHT BEFORE HIS EXECUTION My prime of youth is but a frost of cares; The day is fled, and yet I saw no sun; The spring is past, and yet it is not sprung; The fruit is dead, and yet the leaves be green; I saw the world, and yet I was not seen; I sought my death, and found it in my womb; TOMORROW IN the down-hill of life, when I find I'm declining, Than a snug elbow-chair will afford for reclining, With an ambling pad-pony to pace o'er the lawn, And blithe as the lark that each day hails the dawn, Look forward with hope for Tomorrow. With a porch at my door, both for shelter and shade too, As the sunshine or rain may prevail, And a small spot of ground for the use of the spade too, With a barn for the use of the flail: A cow for my dairy, a dog for my game, And a purse when a friend wants to borrow; I'll envy no Nabob his riches or fame, Nor what honors may wait him Tomorrow. From the bleak northern blast may my cot be completely And at night may repose steal upon me more sweetly Youth and Age And while peace and plenty I find at my board, With a heart free from sickness and sorrow, 383 With my friends may I share what Today may afford, And when I at last must throw off this frail covering, But my face in the glass I'll serenely survey, And with smiles count each wrinkle and furrow; And this old worn-out stuff, which is threadbare Today, May become everlasting Tomorrow. John Collins [1742?-1808] LATE WISDOM WE'VE trod the maze of error round, And all the faults discern in those. Now, 'tis our boast that we can quell And their impetuous wrath assuage.— YOUTH AND AGE VERSE, a breeze 'mid blossoms straying, Where Hope clung feeding like a bee,— With Nature, Hope, and Poesy When I was young! |