Dear reliques of a dislodg'd sovl, whose lack
Makes many a mourning paper put on black!
O stay a while, ere thou draw in thy head
And wind thy self vp close in thy cold bed.
Stay but a little while, vntill I call
A summon's worthy of thy funerall.
Come then, Youth, Beavty, Blood! all ye soft powres,
Whose sylken flatteryes swell a few fond howres
Into a false aeternity. Come man;
Hyperbolized nothing! know thy span;
Take thine own measure here, down, down, and bow
Before thy self in thine idaea; thou
Huge emptynes! contract thy bulke; and shrinke
All thy wild circle to a point. O sink
Lower and lower yet; till thy leane size
Call Heaun to look on thee with narrow eyes.
Lesser and lesser yet; till thou begin
To show a face, fitt to confesse thy kin,
Thy neighbourhood to Nothing!
Proud lookes, and lofty eyliddes, here putt on
Your selues in your vnfaign'd reflexion;
Here, gallant ladyes! this vnpartiall glasse
(Through all your painting) showes you your true face.
These death-seal'd lippes are they dare giue the ly
To the lowd boasts of poor Mortality;
These curtain'd windows, this retired eye
Outstares the liddes of larg-look't Tyranny.
This posture is the braue one, this that lyes
Thus low, stands vp (me thinkes) thus and defies
The World. All-daring dust and ashes! only you
Of all interpreters read Nature true.
NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.
These various readings are worthy of record:
Line 7 in our text (1652) is misprinted as two lines, the first ending
with 'blood,' a repeated blunder of the Paris printer. It reads also
'the' for 'ye' of 1646. I adopt the latter. I have also cancelled 'and'
before 'blood' as a misprint.
Line 8 in 1652 is misprinted 'svlken' for 'sylken.'
" 12, ib. 'thy self,' and so in 1648 and 1670: 'bulke' from
1646 is preferable, and so adopted.
Line 15, 1646 has 'small' for 'lean,' which is inferior.
" 16, our text (1652) misspells 'norrow.'
" 19, in 1646 the readings here are,
'Thy neighbourhood to nothing I here put on
Thy selfe in this unfeign'd reflection.'
1648 and our text as given. 'Nothing' is intended to rhyme with 'kin'
and 'begin,' and so to form a triplet.
Line 23, our text (1652), 1648 and 1670 read 'Though ye be painted:'
1646 reads 'Through all your painting,' which is much more powerful,
and therefore adopted by us. It reminds us (from line 22, 'gallant
ladyes') of Hamlet's apostrophe to the skull of poor Yorick.
Line 25, 1646 reads poorly,
'To the proud hopes of poor Mortality.'
" 26, in 1646 reads curiously, 'this selfe-prison'd eye.' G.