Let not my sins, black as the night,
Eclipse the lustre of thy light.
Keep still in my Horizon, for to me,
The Sun makes not the day, but thee.
Thou whose nature cannot sleep,
On my temples sentry keep;
Guard me 'gainst those watchful foes
Whose eyes are open while mine close.
Let no dreams my head infest,
But such as Jacobs temples blest.
While I do rest, my soul advance,
Make my sleep a holy trance
That I may, my rest being wrought,
Awake into some holy thought.
And with as active vigour run
My course, as doth the nimble Sun.
Sleep is a death, O make me try,
By sleeping what it is to die.
And as gently lay my head
my Grave, as now my bed.
How ere I rest, great God let me
Awake again at last with thee.
And thus assur'd, behold I lie
Securely, or to wake or die.

On

These are my drowsy days, in vain
I do now wake to sleep again.

O come that hour, when I shall never
Sleep again, but wake for ever

This is the dormitive I take to bedward, I need no other Laudanum than this to make me sleep; after which I close mine eyes in security, content to take my leave of the Sun, and sleep unto the resurrection.

Religio Medici

144

NOW

Pulvis et umbra sumus

I

TOW since these dead bones have already outlasted the living ones of Methuselah, and in a Yard under Ground, and thin Walls of Clay, outworn all the strong and specious buildings above it, and quietly rested under the drums and tramplings of three Conquests; What Prince can promise such diuturnity unto his Relics, or might not gladly say,

Sic ego componi versus in ossa velim ?

Time which antiquates Antiquities, and hath an art to make dust of all things, hath yet spared these minor Monuments. In vain we hope to be known by open and visible Conservatories, when to be unknown was the means of their continuation, and obscurity their protection. >

II

What Song the Syrens sang, or what name Achilles assumed when he hid himself among Women, though puzzling Questions, are not beyond, all conjecture. What time the Persons of these Ossuaries entered the famous Nations of the dead, and slept with Princes and Counsellors, might admit a wide solution. But who were the proprietaries of these bones, or what bodies these ashes made up, were a question above Antiquarism. Not to be resolved by Man nor easily perhaps by Spirits, except we consult the Provincial Guardians or Tutelary Observators. Had they made as good provision for their Names, as they have done for their Relics, they had not so grossly erred in the art of perpetuation. But to subsist in bones, and be but Pyramidally extant, is a fallacy in duration. Vain

ashes, which in the oblivion of Names, Persons, Times, Sexes, have found unto themselves a fruitless continuation, and only arise unto late posterity as Emblems of mortal vanities; Antidotes against pride, vainglory, and madding vices.

III

But the iniquity of oblivion blindly scattereth her Poppy, and deals with the memory of Men without distinction to merit of perpetuity. Who can but pity the Founder of the Pyramids? Herostratus lives, that burnt the Temple of Diana, he is almost lost that built it; Time hath spared the Epitaph of Adrian's Horse, confounded that of himself. In vain we compute our felicities by the advantage of our good Names since bad have equal durations; and Thersites is like to live as long as Agamemnon. Who knows whether the best of Men be known? or whether there be not more remarkable Persons forgot, than any that stand remembered in the known account of Time? Without the favour of the everlasting Register, the first Man had been as unknown as the last, and Methuselah's long life had been his only Chronicle.

Oblivion is not to be hired: The greater part must be content to be as though they had not been, to be found in the Register of God, not in the Record of Man. Twenty-seven Names make up the first Story, and the recorded Names. ever since contain not one living Century. The number of the dead long exceedeth all that shall live. The night of Time far surpasseth the day, and who knows when was the Equinox? Every hour adds unto unto that current Arithmetick, which scarce stands one moment. And since death must be the Lucina of life, and even Pagans

could doubt whether thus to live were to die; Since our longest Sun sets at right descensions, and makes but Winter arches, and therefore it cannot be long before we lie down in darkness, and have our light in ashes; Since the Brother of death daily haunts us with dying Memento's, and Time that grows old itself bids us hope no long duration : Dfuturnity is a dream and folly of expectation.

IV

There is nothing strictly immortal, but immortality; whatever hath no beginning may be confident of no end... But Man is a Noble Animal, splendid in Ashes, and pompous in the Grave, solemnizing Nativities and Deaths with equal lustre, nor omitting Ceremonies of bravery in the infamy of his Nature...

To subsist in lasting Monuments, to live in their productions, to exist in their names, and predicament of Chimera's, was large satisfaction unto old expectations, and made one part of their Elysiums. But all this is nothing in the Metaphysicks of true belief. To live, indeed, is to be again ourselves, which being not only an hope but an evidence in noble Believers, 'tis all one to lie in S. Innocent's Churchyard, as in the Sands of Egypt; Ready to be anything in the ecstasy of being ever, and as content with six Foot as the Moles of Adrianus.

145

BUT

The Mystic as Gardener

Urn Burial

OUT the Quincunx of Heaven runs low, and 'tis time to close the five ports of knowledge; We are unwilling to spin out our awaking thoughts into the phantasms of sleep, which often continueth

precogitations; making Cables of Cobwebs, and Wildernesses of handsome Groves. Beside, Hippocrates hath spoken so little, and the Oneocriticald Masters have left such frigid Interpretations from Plants, that there is little encouragement to dream of Paradise itself. Nor will the sweetest delight of Gardens afford much comfort in sleep; wherein the dullness of that sense shakes hands with delectable odours; and though in the Bed of Cleopatra can hardly with any delight raise up the ghost of a Rose.

Night, which Pagan Theology could make the Daughter of Chaos, affords no advantage to the description of order; Although no lower than that Mass can we derive its Genealogy. All things began in order, so shall they end, and so shall they begin again; according to the ordainer of order and mystical Mathematicks of the City of Heaven.

Though Somnus in Homer be sent to rouse up Agamemnon, I find no such effects in these drowsy approaches of sleep. To keep our eyes open longer were but to act our Antipodes. The Huntsmen are up in America, and they are already past their first sleep in Persia. But who can be drowsy at that hour which freed us from everlasting sleep? or have slumbering thoughts at that time, when sleep itself must end, and as some conjecture all shall awake again? The Garden of Cyrus

THE Heroical vein of Mankind runs much in the soldiery and courageous part of the World; and in that form we oftenest find men above men. History is full of the gallantry of that Tribe; and when we