Through patient sufferance; and doth apprehend,
Not as they seeming are, but as they end.
To bear affliction with a bended brow,
Or stubborn heart, is but to disallow
The speedy means to health; salve heals no sore,
If misapplied, but makes the grief the more.
Who sends affliction, sends an end, and he
Best knows what's best for him, what's best for
'Tis not for me to carve me where I like;
Him pleases when he list to stroke or strike.
I'll neither wish nor yet avoid temptation,
But still expect it, and make preparation :
If he think best, my faith shall not be tried,
Lord, keep me spotless from presumptuous pride:
If otherwise with his trial, give me care,
By thankful patience to prevent despair:
Fit me to bear whate'er thou shalt assign;
I kiss the rod, because the rod is thine.
Howe'er, let me not boast, nor yet repine,
With trial, or without, Lord, make me thine.
AMONG the noble Greeks it was no shame
To lose a sword; it but deserv'd the name
Of war's disastrous fortune; but to yield
The right and safe possession of the shield,
Was foul reproach, and manless cowardice,
Far worse than death to him that scorn'd to prize
His life before his honour: honour's won
Most in a just defence; defence is gone,
The shield once lost. The wounded Theban cried, "How fares my shield?" which safe, he smiled,
True honour bides at home, and takes delight
In keeping, not in gaining, of a right;
Scorns usurpation, nor seeks she blood,
And thirsts to make her name not great, as good:
God gives a right to man; to man, defence
To guard it given; but when a false pretence
Shall ground her title on a greater might,
What doth he else but war with heav'n, and fight
With Providence? God sets the princely crown
On heads of kings; who then may take it down?
No juster quarrel, or more noble fight,
Than to maintain where God hath given a right:
There's no despair of conquest in that war,
Where God's the leader: policy's no bar,
To his designs; no power can withstand
His high exploits, within whose mighty hand
Are all the corners of the earth; the hills
His fensive bulwarks are, which when he wills,
His lesser breath can bandy up and down,
And crush the world, and with a wink, can drown
The spacious universe in suds of clay,
Where heav'n is leader, heav'n must win the day;
God reaps his honour hence; that combat's safe,
Where he's a combatant, and ventures half.
Right's not impair'd with weakness, but prevails
In spite of strength, when strength and power fails:
Frail is the trust reposed on troops of horse;
Truth in a handful finds a greater force.
Lord, mail my heart with faith, and be my shield,
And if a world confront me, I'll not yield.
THE Egyptians, amidst their solemn feasts,
Used to welcome, and present their guests
With the sad sight of man's anatomy,
Served in with this loud motto, "All must die."
Fools often go about, when as they may
Take better vantage of a nearer way.
Look well into your bosoms; do not flatter
Your known infirmities; behold what matter
Your flesh was made of; man, cast back thine eye
Upon the weakness of thine infancy;
See how thy lips hang on thy mother's breast,
Bawling for help, more helpless than a beast.
Liv'st thou to childhood? then behold what toys
Do mock the sense, how shallow are thy joys!
Com'st thou to downy years? See how deceits
Gull thee with golden fruit, and with false baits
Slily beguile the prime of thy affection.
Art thou attained at length to full perfection
Of ripened years? Ambition hath now sent
Thee on her frothy errand? Discontent
Pays thee thy wages. Do thy grizzly hairs
Begin to cast account of many cares
Upon thy head? The sacred lust of gold
Now fits thy spirit, for fleshly lust too cold;
Makes thee a slave to thine own base desire,
Which melts and hardens at the self-same fire.
Art thou decrepit? Then thy very breath
Is grievous to thee, and each grief's a death.
Look where thou list, thy life is but a span,
Thou art but dust, and, to conclude-a man.
Thy life's a warfare, thou a soldier art,
Satan's thy foe-man, and a faithful heart
Thy two-edg'd weapon, patience thy shield,
Heaven is thy chieftain, and the world thy field.
To be afraid to die, or wish for death,
Are words and passions of despairing breath:
Who doth the first, the day doth faintly yield;
And who the second, basely flies the field.
Man's not a lawful steersman of his days,
His bootless wish nor hastens nor delays:
We are God's hired workmen; he discharges
Some late at night, and (when he list) enlarges
Others at noon, and in the morning some:
None may relieve himself, till he bid, Come:
If we receive for one half day, as much
As they that toil till evening, shall we grutch?
THE wisest men that nature e'er could boast,
For secret knowledge of her power, were lost,
Confounded, and in deep amazement stood,
In the discovery of the chiefest good:
Keenly they hunted, beat in every brake,
Forwards they went, on either hand, and back
Return'd they counter; but their deep-mouth'd
art,
(Though often challeng'd scent, yet) ne'er could
In all the enclosures of philosophy,
That game, from squat,' they term felicity:
They jangle, and their maxims disagree;
As many men, to many minds there be.
Squat signifies the cowering of a hare, on her form.
One digs to Pluto's throne, thinks there to find Her grace, rak'd up in gold: another's mind Mounts to the courts of kings, with plumes of honour
And feather'd hopes, hopes there to seize upon
A third unlocks the painted gate of pleasure,
And ransacks there, to find this peerless treasure ;
A fourth, more sage, more wisely melancholy,
Persuades himself, her deity's too holy
For common hands to touch; he rather chooses
To make a long day's journey to the muses:
To Athens, gown'd, he goes, and from that school
Returns unsped, a more instructed fool.
Where lies she then? or lies she any where?
Honours are bought and sold, she rests not there;
Much less in pleasures hath she her abiding,
For they are shar'd to beasts, and ever sliding;
Nor yet in virtue, virtue's often poor,
And (crush'd with fortune) begs from door to
Nor is she sainted in the shrine of wealth;
That makes men slaves, is unsecur'd from stealth.
Conclude we then, felicity consists
Not in exterior fortunes, but her lists
Are boundless, and her large extension
Outruns the pace of human apprehension;
Fortunes are seldom measur'd by desert:
The fairer face has oft the fouler heart;
Sacred felicity doth ne'er extend
Beyond itself: in it all wishes end:
The swelling of an outward fortune can
Create a prosperous, not a happy man :
A peaceful conscience is the true content,
And wealth is but her golden ornament.
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