LXXVI. Joshua Sylvester

A Funeral Elegie upon the all-lamented Death of the all-admired (late) Prince.

HOWEVER short of other’s art and witt,

I knowe my powers for such a part unfitt;

And shall but light my candle in the sunne,

To doe a work shalbe so better donne:

Could teares and feares give my distractions leave

Of sobbing words a sable webbe to weave,—

Could sorrowe’s fulnes give my voice a vent,

How would, how should my saddest verse lament

(In deepest sighs, instead of sweetest songs,)

This losse (alas!) which unto all belongs;

To all the godly now, and future, farr,

To all the world (except S. P. Q. R.):

To all together, and to each a-part,

That liues, and loves religion, armes, or art:

To all abroad, but to us most of all,

That nearest stood to my high cedar’s fall;

But more than most to mee, that had no prop

But Henry’s hand, and, but in him, no hope.

O deerest Henry, heav’n and earth’s delight!

O cleerest beame of vertue’s rising bright!

O purist spark of pious princely zeale!

O surest ark of justice’ sacred weale!

O grauest presage of a prudent kinde!

O bravest message of a valliant mynde!

O, all-admired, benign and bounteous!

O all-desired (right) Panaretus!

Panaretus (all-vertuous) was thy name,

Thy nature such; such ever be thy fame.