Classic Poem

Must he dye thus? has an eternal sleep
Seiz'd on each muse that it can't sing nor weep?
Had he no friends? no merits? or no purse
To purchase mourning? or had he that curse
Which has the scraping worldling still frequented,
To live unlov'd and perish unlamented?
No; none of these; but in this Atlas fall
Learning for present found its funeral
Nor was't for want of grief, but scope and vent;
Not sullennesse, but deep astonishment;
Small griefs are soon wept out; but great ones come
With bulk, and strike the straight lamenters dumb
This was the schoolmaster that did derive
From parts and piety's prerogative,
The glory of that good, but painful art;
Who had high learning yet an humble heart.
The Drake of Grammer learning, whose great pain
Circled that globe, and made that voyage plain.
Time was, when th'artless paedagogue did stand
With his vimineous scepter in his hand,
Raging like Bajazet o're the tugging fry,
Who though unhors'd were not of th'infantry;
Applying, like a glister, hic haec hoc ,
Till the poor Lad's beat to a whipping block;
And schoold so long to know a Verb and Nown,
Till each had Propria maribus of his own:
As if not fit to learn As in praesenti ,
But legally, when they were one and twenty
Those few that went to th'Univers'tys then,
Went with deliberation, and were men.
Nor were our Academies in those dayes
Fill'd with chuck-farthing Batchelours and boyes,
But schollers with more beard and age went hence,
Then our new lapwing-Lect'rers skip from thence.
By his industrous labour now we see
Boyes coated borne to th'Universitie,
Who suck'd in Latine , and did scorn to seek
Their scourge and top in English but in Greek .
Hebrew the general puzler of old heads,
Which the gray dunce with pricks and comments reads,
And dubs himself a schoollar by it, grew
As natural t'him as if he'd been a Jew
But above all he timely did inspire
His Scholars breasts with an aetherial fire
And sanctify'd their early learning so,
That they in grace, as they in wit did grow:
Yet neither's grace nor learning could defend him
From that mortality that did attend him;
Nor can there now be any difference known,
Between his learned bones and those with none.
For that grand Lev'ler death hurles to one place
Rich, poor, wise, foolish, noble and the base.
This only is our comfort and defence,
He was not immaturely ravish'd hence
But to our benefit, and to his own
Undying fame and honour, let alone
Till he had finish'd what he was to do,
Then naturally split himself in two
And that's one cause he had so few moyst eyes,
He made men learned, and that made them wise,
And overrule their passions, since they see
Tears would but shew their own infirmitie
And 'tis but loving madness to deplore
The fate of him, that shall be seen no more.
But only I cropt in my tender years,
Without a tongue, or wit, but sighs and tears;
And yet I come to offer what is mine,
An immolation to his honour'd shrine;
And retribute what he confer'd on me,
Either to's person or his memory.
Rest pious soul and let that happy grave
That is intrusted with thy Relicks have
This just inscription, that it holds the dust
Of one that was Wise, Learned, Pious, Just