Contents
-BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD
Henry Charles Beeching, ed. (1859–1919). Lyra Sacra: A Book of Religious Verse. 1903.
By William Shakespeare (15641616)
Soul and Body
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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. | |
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Note 1. Malone: “starved by,” Steevens. The first two words are lost, and have been variously supplied. [back] |
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