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Title: From "The Mount of Olives"
Author: Henry Vaughan [
More Titles by Vaughan]
1652
1. [DEATH.]
Draw near, fond man, and dress thee by this glass,
Mark how thy bravery and big looks must pass
Into corruption, rottenness and dust;
The frail supporters which betray'd thy trust.
O weigh in time thy last and loathsome state!
To purchase heav'n for tears is no hard rate.
Our glory, greatness, wisdom, all we have,
If mis-employ'd, but add hell to the grave:
Only a fair redemption of evil times
Finds life in death, and buries all our crimes.
2. [HADRIAN'S ADDRESS TO HIS SOUL.]
My soul, my pleasant soul, and witty,
The guest and consort of my body.
Into what place now all alone
Naked and sad wilt thou be gone?
No mirth, no wit, as heretofore,
Nor jests wilt thou afford me more.
3. [PAULINUS. CARM. APP. I. 35-40.]
What is't to me that spacious rivers run
Whole ages, and their streams are never done?
Those still remain: but all my fathers died,
And I myself but for few days abide.
4. [ANEURIN. ENGLYNION Y MISOEDD, III. 1-4.]
In March birds couple, a new birth
Of herbs and flow'rs breaks through the earth;
But in the grave none stirs his head,
Long is the impris'ment of the dead.
5. [INCERTI.]
So our decays God comforts by
The stars' concurrent state on high.
6. [JUVENAL. SATIRE XIII. 86-8.]
There are that do believe all things succeed
By chance or fortune: and that nought's decreed
By a divine, wise Will; but blindly call
Old Time and Nature rulers over all.
7. [INCERTI.]
From the first hour the heavens were made
Unto the last, when all shall fade,
Count--if thou canst--the drops of dew,
The stars of heav'n and streams that flow,
The falling snow, the dropping show'rs,
And in the month of May, the flow'rs,
Their scents and colours, and what store
Of grapes and apples Autumn bore,
How many grains the Summer bears,
What leaves the wind in Winter tears;
Count all the creatures in the world,
The motes which in the air are hurl'd,
The hairs of beasts and mankind, and
The shore's innumerable sand,
The blades of grass, and to these last
Add all the years which now are past,
With those whose course is yet to come,
And all their minutes in one sum.
When all is done, the damned's state
Outruns them still, and knows no date.
8. [VIRGIL. GEORGICS, IV. 12-138.]
I saw beneath Tarentum's stately towers
An old Cilician spend his peaceful hours.
Some few bad acres in a waste, wild field,
Which neither grass, nor corn, nor vines would yield,
He did possess. There--amongst thorns and weeds--
Cheap herbs and coleworts, with the common seeds
Of chesboule or tame poppies, he did sow,
And vervain with white lilies caused to grow.
Content he was, as are successful kings,
And late at night come home--for long work brings
The night still home--with unbought messes laid
On his low table he his hunger stay'd.
Roses he gather'd in the youthful Spring,
And apples in the Autumn home did bring:
And when the sad, cold Winter burst with frost
The stones, and the still streams in ice were lost,
He would soft leaves of bear's-foot crop, and chide
The slow west winds and ling'ring Summer-tide!
9. [VIRGIL. AENEID, III. 515.]
And rising at midnight the stars espied,
All posting westward in a silent glide.
10. [VIRGIL. GEORGICS, II. 58.]
The trees we set grow slowly, and their shade
Stays for our sons, while we--the planters--fade.
[The end]
Henry Vaughan's poem: Henry Vaughan's Poem: From "The Mount of Olives"
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