Page:Poetical Works of John Oldham.djvu/52

43 Thy soul so willing from thy body went, As if both parted by consent, No murmur, no complaining, no delay. Only a sigh, a groan, and so away. Death seemed to glide with pleasure in. As if in this sense too 't had lost her sting. Like some well-acted comedy, life swiftly passed, And ended just so still and sweet at last. Thou, like its actors, seemedst in borrowed habit here beneath, And couldst, as easily As they do that, put off mortality. Thou breathedst out thy soul as free as common breath, As unconcerned as they are in a feignèd death. Go, happy soul, ascend the joyful sky, Joyful to shine with thy bright company: Go, mount the spangled sphere, And make it brighter by another star: Yet stop not there, till thou advance yet higher, Till thou art swallowed quite In the vast unexhausted ocean of delight: Delight, which there alone in its true essence is, Where saints keep an eternal carnival of bliss; Where the regalios of refinèd joy, Which fill, but never cloy; Where pleasure's ever growing, ever new, Immortal as thyself, and boundless too; There mayst thou learnèd by compendium grow, For which in vain below We so much time, and so much pains bestow. There mayst thou all ideas see, All wonders which in knowledge be, In that fair beatific mirror of the deity. Meanwhile, thy body mourns in its own dust, And puts on sables for its tender trust.