Sir John Davies (1570-1626). Man. William Stanley Braithwaite, ed. 1907. The Book of Elizabethan Verse

William Stanley Braithwaite, ed. The Book of Elizabethan Verse. 1907.

Man

By Sir John Davies (1570–1626)


I KNOW my soul hath power to know all things,
Yet she is blind and ignorant in all:
I know I’m one of Nature’s little kings,
Yet to the least and vilest things am thrall.
I know my life’s a pain and but a span;	5
I know my sense is mock’d in everything;
And, to conclude, I know myself a Man—
Which is a proud and yet a wretched thing.