Life and Existence

His body to that pleasant country’s earth, And his pure soul unto his captain Christ, Under whose colors he had fought so long.

His body to that pleasant country’s earth, And his pure soul unto his captain Christ, Under whose colors he had fought so long.

I’ll give my jewels for a set of beads, My gorgeous palace for a hermitage, My gay apparel for an almsman’s gown.

And my large kingdom for a little grave, A little little grave, an obscure grave.

As is my grief, or lesser than my name, Or that I could forget what I have been, Or not remember what I must be now.

Comes at the last, and with a little pin Bores through his castle wall, and farewell king!

And nothing can we call our own but death, And that small model of the barren earth Which serves as paste and cover to our bones. For God’s sake, let us sit upon the ground And tell sad stories of the death of kings: How some have been depos’d, some slain in war, Some haunted by the ghosts they have depos’d, Some poison’d by their wives, some sleeping kill’d; All murder’d: for within the hollow crown That rounds the mortal temples of a king Keeps Death his court.

Let’s talk of graves, of worms, and epitaphs; Make dust our paper, and with rainy eyes Write sorrow on the bosom of the earth; Let’s choose executors and talk of wills.

The worst is death, and death will have his day.

O! call back yesterday, bid time return.

I see thy glory like a shooting star Fall to the base earth from the firmament.

The ripest fruit first falls.

For violent fires soon burn out themselves; Small showers last long, but sudden storms are short.

The setting sun, and music at the close, As the last taste of sweets, is sweetest last, Writ in remembrance more than things long past.

All places that the eye of heaven visits Are to a wise man ports and happy havens. Teach thy necessity to reason thus; There is no virtue like necessity. Think not the king did banish thee, But thou the king.

I am the cygnet to this pale faint swan, Who chants a doleful hymn to his own death.

Unthread the rude eye of rebellion, And welcome home again discarded faith.

We cannot hold mortality’s strong hand.

We cannot hold mortality’s strong hand.

When Fortune means to men most good, She looks upon them with a threatening eye.

Death, death: O, amiable lovely death!

Look, who comes here! a grave unto a soul.

Make us heirs of all eternity.

Spite of cormorant devouring Time.