| Henry Charles Beeching, ed. (1859–1919). Lyra Sacra: A Book of Religious Verse. 1903. | | | | Soul and Body | | By William Shakespeare (1564–1616) |
| | | POOR soul! the centre of my sinful earth, | |
| Fool’d by 1 these rebel powers that thee array, | |
| Why dost thou pine within and suffer dearth, | |
| Painting thy outward walls so costly gay? | |
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| Why so large cost, having so short a lease, | 5 |
| Dost thou upon thy fading mansion spend? | |
| Shall worms, inheritors of this excess, | |
| Eat up thy charge? is this thy body’s end? | |
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| Then, soul, live thou upon thy servant’s loss, | |
| And let that pine to aggravate thy store; | 10 |
| Buy terms divine in selling hours of dross; | |
| Within be fed, without be rich no more; | |
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| So shalt thou feed on Death, that feeds on men, | |
| And Death once dead, there’s no more dying then. | |
| | | Note 1. Malone: “starved by,” Steevens. The first two words are lost, and have been variously supplied. [back] | | |
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