Classic Poem

CHAPTER V.

As these two slumbers have two contraries,
One slumber in the face, one in the mind;
So their two casements two varieties,
One unto heaven, and one to hell combin'd:
The face is flattery, and her mansion hell;
The mind is just, this doth in heaven dwell.

The face, heaving her heavy eyelids up
From forth the chamber of eternal night,
Sees virtue hold plenty's replenish'd cup,
And boldly stand in God's and heaven's sight;
She, opening the windows of her breast,
Sees how the wicked rest in their unrest.

Quoth she, Those whom the curtain of decay
Hath tragically summoned to pain,
Were once the clouds and clouders of my day,
Depravers and deprivers of my gain.
The wicked hearing this descending sound,
Fear struck their limbs to the pale-clothed ground.

Amazed at the freedom of her words,
Their tongue-tied accents drove them to despair,
And made them change their minds to woe's records,
And say within themselves, Lo, what we are!
We have had virtue in derision's place,
And made a parable of her disgrace.

See where she sits enthronis'd in the sky!
See, see her labour's crown upon her head!
See how the righteous live, which erst did die,
From death to life with virtue's foadstar led!
See those whom we derided, they are blest,
They heaven's, not hell's, we hell's, not heaven's guest!

We thought the righteous had been fury's son,
With inconsiderate speech, unstayed way;
We thought that death had his dishonour won,
And would have made his life destruction's prey:
But we were mad, they just; we fools, they wise;
We shame, they praise; we loss, they have the prize.

We thought them fools, when we ourselves were fools;
We thought them mad, when we ourselves were mad;
The heat which sprang from them, our folly cools;
We find in us which we but thought they had:
We thought their end had been dishonour's pledge;
They but survey'd the place, we made the hedge.

We see how they are blest, how we are curst;
How they accepted are, and we refus'd;
And how our bands are tied, their bands are burst;
Our faults are hourly blam'd, their faults excus'd;
See how heavens gratulate their welcom'd sight,
Which comes to take possession of their right!

But O too late we see our wickedness,
Too late we lie in a repentant tomb,
Too late we smooth old hairs with happiness,
Too late we seek to ease our bodies' doom!
Now falsehood hath advanc'd her forged banner,
Too late we seem to verify truth's manner.

The sun of righteousness, which should have shin'd,
And made our hearts the cabins of his east,
Is now made cloudy night through vice's wind,
And lodgeth with his downfall in the west;
That summer's day, which should have been night's bar,
Is now made winter in her icy car.

Too much our feet have gone, but never right;
Much labour we have took, but none in good;
We wearied ourselves with our delight,
Endangering ourselves to please our mood;
Our feet did labour much, 'twas for our pleasure;
We wearied ourselves, 'twas for our leisure.

In sin's perfection was our labour spent,
In wickedness' preferment we did haste;
To suffer perils we were all content
For the advancement of our vices past:
Through many dangerous ways our feet have gone,
But yet the way of God we have not known.

We which have made our hearts a sea of pride,
With huge risse billows of a swelling mind,
With tossing tumults of a flowing tide,
Leaving our laden bodies plung'd behind;
What traffic have we got? ourselves are drown'd,
Our souls in hell, our bodies in the ground.

Where are our riches now? like us consum'd;
Where is our pomp? decay'd; where's glory? dead;
Where is the wealth of which we all presum'd?
Where is our profit? gone; ourselves? misled:
All these are like to shadows what they were;
There is nor wealth, nor pomp, nor glory here.

The dial gives a caveat of the hour;
Thou canst not see it go, yet it is gone;
Like this the dial of thy fortune's power,
Which fades by stealth, till thou art left alone:
Thy eyes may well perceive thy goods are spent,
Yet can they not perceive which way they went.

Lo, even as ships sailing on Tethys' lap
Ploughs up the furrows of hard-grounded waves,
Enforced for to go by Æol's clap,
Making with sharpest team the water graves;
The ship once past, the trace cannot be found,
Although she digged in the water's ground:

Or as an eagle, with her soaring wings,
Scorning the dusty carpet of the earth,
Exempt from all her clogging jesses, flings
Up to the air, to show her mounting birth;
And every flight doth take a higher pitch,
To have the golden sun her wings enrich;

Yet none can see the passage of her flight,
But only hear her hovering in the sky,
Beating the light wind with her being light,
Or parting through the air where she might fly;
The ear may hear, the eye can never see
What course she takes, or where she means to be:

Or as an arrow which is made to go
Through the transparent and cool-blowing air,
Feeding upon the forces of the bow,
Else forceless lies in wanting her repair;
Like as the branches when the tree is lopt,
Wanteth the forces which they forceless cropt;

The arrow, being fed with strongest shot,
Doth part the lowest elemental breath,
Yet never separates the soft air's knot,
Nor never wounds the still-foot winds to death;
It doth sejoin and join the air together,
Yet none there is can tell or where or whither:

So are our lives; now they begin, now end,
Now live, now die, now born, now fit for grave;
As soon as we have breath, so soon we spend,
Not having that which our content would have:
As ships, as birds, as arrows, all as one,
Even so the traces of our lives are gone:

A thing not seen to go, yet going seen,
And yet not showing any sign to go;
Even thus the shadows of our lives have been,
Which shows to fade, and yet no virtues show;
How can a thing consum'd with vice be good?
Or how can falsehood bear true virtue's food?

Vain hope, to think that wickedness hath bearing
When she is drowned in oblivion's sea
Yet can she not forget presumption's wearing,
Nor yet the badge of vanity's decay:
Her fruits are cares, her cares are vanities,
Two both in one destruction's liveries.

Vain hope is like a vane turn'd with each wind;
'Tis like a smoke scatter'd with every storm;
Like dust, sometime before, sometime behind;
Like a thin foam made in the vainest form:
This hope is like to them which never stay,
But comes and goes again all in one day.

View nature's gifts; some gifts are rich, some poor;
Some barren grounds there are, some cloth'd with fruit;
Nor hath all nothing, nor hath all her store;
Nor can all creatures speak, nor are all mute;
All die by nature, being born by nature;
So all change feature, being born with feature.

This life is hers; this dead, dead is her power,
Her bounds begins and ends in mortal state;
Whom she on earth accounteth as her flower
May be in heaven condemn'd of mortal hate;
But he whom virtue judges for to live,
The Lord his life and due reward will give.

The servant of a king may be a king,
And he that was a king a servile slave;
Swans before death a funeral dirge do sing,
And waves their wings again ill fortune's wave:
He that is lowest in this lowly earth
May be the highest in celestial birth.

The rich may be unjust in being rich,
For riches do corrupt and not correct;
The poor may come to highest honour's pitch,
And have heaven's crown for mortal life's respect:
God's hands shall cover them from all their foes,
God's arm defend them from misfortune's blows:

His hand eternity, his arm his force,
His armour zealousy, his breast-plate heaven,
His helmet judgment, justice, and remorse,
His shield is victory's immortal steven;
The world his challenge, and his wrath his sword,
Mischief his foe, his aid his gospel's word;

His arm doth overthrow his enemy,
His breast-plate sin, his helmet death and hell,
His shield prepar'd against mortality,
His sword 'gainst them which in the world do dwell:
So shall vice, sin, and death, world and the devil,
Be slain by him which slayeth every evil.

All heaven shall be in arms against earth's world;
The sun shall dart forth fire commix'd with blood,
The blazing stars from heaven shall be hurl'd,
The pale-fac'd moon against the ocean-flood;
Then shall the thundering chambers of the sky
Be lighten'd with the blaze of Titan's eye.

The clouds shall then be bent like bended bows,
To shoot the thundering arrows of the air;
Thick hail and stones shall fall on heaven's foes,
And Tethys overflow in her despair;
The moon shall overfill her horny hood
With Neptune's ocean's overflowing flood.

The wind shall be no longer kept in caves,
But burst the iron cages of the clouds;
And Æol shall resign his office-staves,
Suffering the winds to combat with the floods:
So shall the earth with seas be paled in,
As erst it hath been overflow'd with sin.

Thus shall the earth weep for her wicked sons,
And curse the concave of her tired womb,
Into whose hollow mouth the water runs,
Making wet wilderness her driest tomb;
Thus, thus iniquity hath reign'd so long,
That earth on earth is punish'd for her wrong.