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<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=408458" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>AN ELEGY Upon the most victorious King of Sweden Gustavus Adolphus</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0">Like a cold fatal sweat which ushers death <br>My thoughts hang on me, & my lab'ring breath <br>Stopt up with sighs, my fancie big with woes, <br>Feels two twinn'd mountains struggle in her throws, <br>Of boundless sorrow one, t'other of sin; <br>For less let no one rate it to begin <br>Where honour ends. In Great Gustavus flame <br>That style burnt out, and wasted to a name, <br>Does barely live with us. As when the stuff <br>That fed it failes, the Taper turns to snuff. <br>With this poor snuff, this ayerie shadow, we <br>Of Fame and Honour must contented be; <br>Since from the vain grasp of our wishes fled <br>Their glorious substance is, now He is dead. <br>Speak it again, and louder, louder yet; <br>Else whil'st we hear the sound we shall forget <br>What it delivers. Let hoarse rumor cry <br>Till she so many ecchoes multiply, <br>Those may like num'rous witnesses confute <br>Our unbelieving soules, that would dispute <br>And doubt this truth for ever. This one way <br>Is left our incredulity to sway; <br>To waken our deaf sense, and make our ears <br>As open and dilated as our fears; <br>That we may feel the blow, and feeling grieve, <br>At what we would not feign, but must believe. <br>And in that horrid faith behold the world <br>From her proud height of expectation hurl'd, <br>Stooping with him, as if she strove to have <br>No lower Center now then Swedens grave. <br>O could not all thy purchas'd victories <br>Like to thy Fame thy Flesh immortalize? <br>Were not thy vertue nor thy valour charmes <br>To guard thy body from those outward harmes <br>Which could not reach thy soul? could not thy spirit <br>Lend somewhat which thy frailty might inherit <br>From thy diviner part, that Death nor Hate <br>Nor envy's bullets ere could penetrate? <br>Could not thy early Trophies in stern fight <br>Torn from the Dane, the Pole, the Moscovite? <br>Which were thy triumphs seeds, as pledges sown, <br>That when thy honours harvest was ripe grown, <br>With full-summ'd wing thou Falcon-like wouldst fly <br>And cuff the Eagle in the German sky: <br>Forcing his iron beak and feathers feel <br>They were not proof 'gainst thy victorious steel. <br>Could not all these protect thee? or prevaile <br>To fright that Coward Death, who oft grew pale <br>To look thee and thy battails in the face? <br>Alas they could not: Destiny gives place <br>To none; nor is it seen that Princes lives <br>Can saved be by their prerogatives. <br>No more was thine; who clos'd in thy cold lead, <br>Dost from thy self a mournful lecture read <br>Of Mans short-dated glory: learn you Kings, <br>You are like him but penetrable things; <br>Though you from Demi-Gods derive your birth, <br>You are at best but honourable earth: <br>And howere sifted from that courser bran <br>Which does compound and knead the common man, <br>Nothing's immortal or from earth refin'd <br>About you, but your Office and your Mind. <br>Here then break your false Glasses, which present <br>You greater then your Maker ever meant: <br>Make truth your Mirrour now, since you find all <br>That flatter you confuted by his fall. <br>Yet since it was decreed thy lifes bright Sun <br>Must be eclips'd ere thy full course was run, <br>Be proud thou didst in thy black Obsequies <br>With greater glory set then others rise. <br>For in thy death, as life, thou heldest one <br>Most just and regular proportion. <br>Look how the Circles drawn by Compass meet <br>Indivisibly joyned head to feet, <br>And by continued points which them unite <br>Grow at once Circular and Infinite: <br>So did thy Fate and honour now contend <br>To match thy brave beginning with thy end. <br>Therefore thou hadst instead of Passing bells <br>The Drums and Cannons thunder for thy knells; <br>And in the Field thou did'st triumphing dy, <br>Closing thy eye-lids with a victory: <br>That so by thousands who there lost their breath <br>King-like thou might'st be waited on in death. <br>Liv'd Plutarch now, and would of Cæsar tell, <br>He could make none but Thee his parallel; <br>Whose tide of glory swelling to the brim <br>Needs borrow no addition from Him. <br>When did great Julius in any Clime <br>Atchieve so much and in so small a time? <br>Or if he did, yet shalt Thou in that land <br>Single for him and unexampled stand. <br>When ore the Germans first his Eagle towr'd <br>What saw the Legions which on them he pour'd? <br>But massie bodies, made their swords to try <br>Subjects not for his fight, but slavery. <br>In that so vast expanded peece of ground <br>(Now Swedens Theater and Tom he found <br>Nothing worth Cæsars valour, or his fear, <br>No conqu'ring Army, nor a Tilley there, <br>Whose strength nor wiles, nor practice in the warre <br>Might the fierce Torrent of thy triumphs barre, <br>But that thy winged sword twice made him yield, <br>Both from his trenches beat, and from the field. <br>Besides the Romane thought he had done much <br>Did he the bank of Rhenus onely touch. <br>But though his march was bounded by the Rhine <br>Not Oder nor the Danube Thee confine; <br>And but thy frailty did thy fame prevent, <br>Thou hadst thy conquests strecht to such extent, <br>Thou might'st Vienna reach, and after span <br>From Mulda to the Baltick Ocean. <br>But death hath spann'd thee: nor must we divine <br>What heir thou leav'st to finish thy design, <br>Or who shall thee succeed as Champion <br>For liberty and for religion. <br>Thy task is done; as in a Watch the spring <br>Wound to the height, relaxes with the string: <br>So thy steel nerves of conquest, from their steep <br>Ascent declin'd, lie slackt in thy last sleep. <br>Rest then triumphant soul! for ever rest! <br>And, like the Phœnix in her spicy nest, <br>Embalm'd with thine own merit, upward fly, <br>Born in a cloud of perfume to the sky. <br>Whil'st, as in deathless Urnes, each noble mind <br>Treasures thy ashes which are left behind. <br>And if perhaps no Cassiopeian spark <br>(Which in the North did thy first rising mark) <br>Shine ore thy Herse: the breath of our just praise <br>Shall to the Firmament thy vertues raise; <br>Then fix, and kindle them into a Starre, <br>Whose influence may crown thy glorious warre.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">---O Famâ ingens ingentior armis <br>Rex Gustave, quibus Cœlo te laudibus æquem? <br>Virgil. Æneid. lib. 2.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br /></a><br />poem by <a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/by.php?a=Henry+King">Henry King</a><div class=q>
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My thoughts hang on me, & my lab'ring breath 
Stopt up with sighs, my fancie big with woes, 
Feels two twinn'd mountains struggle in her throws, 
Of boundless sorrow one, t'other of sin; 
For less let no..."></div>
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