Page:Oxford Book of English Verse 1250-1918.djvu/282

 LORD HERBERT OF CHERBURY 230 Elegy over a Tomb

MUST I then see, alas! eternal night Sitting upon those fairest eyes, And closing all those beams, which once did rise

So radiant and bright, That light and heat in them to us did prove Knowledge and Love?

Oh, if you did delight no more to stay

Upon this low and earthly stage, But rather chose an endless heritage, Tell us at least, we pray, Where all the beauties that those ashes ow'd Are now bestow' d?

Doth the Sun now his light with yours renew?

Have Waves the curling of your hair? Did you restore unto the Sky and Air,

The red, and white, and blue? Have you vouchsafed to flow'rs since your death That sweetebt breath?

Had not Heav'ns Lights else in their houses slept,

Or to some private life retired? Must not the Sky and Air have else conspir'd?

And in their Regions wept? Must not each flower else the earth could breed

Have been a weed?

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