Emblemes by Francis Quarles.

XV.

[illustration]

PSALM 30. 10.

My life is spent with grief, and my years with sighing.

WHat sullen Starre rul'd my untimely birth, That would not lend my dayes one houre of mitth! How oft have these bare knees been bent, to gain The slender alms of one poore smile, in vain! How often, tir'd with the fastidious light, Have my saint lips implor'd the shades of night? How often have my nightly torments praid For lingring twilight, glutted with the shade? Day worse then night, night worse then day appears, In fears I spend my nights; my dayes in tears: I moan unpitt•…•…'d, grone without relief, There is nor end, nor measure of my grief. The smiling flow'r salutes the day; it growes Untouch'd with care; it neither spins nor sowes: O that my tedious life, were like this flow'r, Or freed from grief, or finish'd with an houre: Why was I born? Why was I born a man? And why proportion'd by so large a span? Or why suspended by the common lot, And being born to dy, why dy I not? Ah me! why is my sorrow-wasted breath Den•…•…'d the easie priviledge of death? The branded slave, that tugs the weary oare, Obteins the Sabbath of a welcome shore; His ransom'd stripes are heal'd; his native soyl Sweetens the mem'ry of his forrein toyl:

But ah! my sorrows are not half so blest; My labour finds no point, my pains no rest: I batter sighs for tears, and tears for grones, Still vainly rolling Sisyphean stones: Thou just Observer of our flying houres, That, with thy Adamantine fangs, devours The brazen monuments of renowned Kings, Doth thy glasse stand? Or be thy moulting wings Unapt to fly? If not why dost thou spare A willing breast; a breast that stands so fair? A dying breast, that hath but onely breath To beg a wound, and strength to crave a death? O that the pleased Heav'ns would once dissolve These sleshly fetters, that so fast involve. My hamp'red soul; then should my soul be blest From all these ills, and wrap her thoughts in rest: Till then, my dayes are months, my months are years, My years are ages to be spent in tears: My grief's entail'd upon my wastfull breath, Which no recov'ry can cut off, but death; Breath drawn in cottages, puft out in thrones, Begins, continues, and concludes in grones.

INNOCENT. de vilitate condit. humanae.

O who will give mine eyes a fountain of tears, that I may bewail the miserable ingresse of mans condition; the sinfull pregresse of mans conversation, the damnable egresse in mans dissolution? I will consider with tears, whereof man was made, what man doth, and what man is to do: Alas, he is formed of earth, conceived in sinne, born to punishment: He doth evil things, which are not lawfull; He doth •…•…ilthy things, which are not decent; He doth vain things, which are not •…•…pedient.

EPIG. 15.

My heart, Thy life's a debt by Bond, which bears Asecret date; the use is Grones and Tears: Plead not; usurious Nature will have all, As well the Int'rest as the Principall.