COWLEY.
xciii
see just and noble thoughts defrauded of their praise by inelegance of language:
Where honour or where conscience does not blind,
No other law shall shackle me;
Slave to myself I ne'er will be;
Nor shall my future actions be confin'd
By my own present mind.
Who by resolves and vows engag'd does stand
For days, that yet belong to fate,
Does like an unthrift mortgage his estate,
Before it falls into his hand,
The bondman of the cloister so,
All that he does receive does always owe.
And still as Time comes in, it goes away,
Not to enjoy, but debts to pay;
Unhappy slave, and pupil to a bell!
Which his hour's work as well as hours does tell:
Unhappy till the last, the kind releasing knell.
No other law shall shackle me;
Slave to myself I ne'er will be;
Nor shall my future actions be confin'd
By my own present mind.
Who by resolves and vows engag'd does stand
For days, that yet belong to fate,
Does like an unthrift mortgage his estate,
Before it falls into his hand,
The bondman of the cloister so,
All that he does receive does always owe.
And still as Time comes in, it goes away,
Not to enjoy, but debts to pay;
Unhappy slave, and pupil to a bell!
Which his hour's work as well as hours does tell:
Unhappy till the last, the kind releasing knell.
His heroick lines are often formed of monosyllables; but yet they are sometimes sweet and sonorous.
He says of the Messiah,
Round the whole earth his dreaded name shall sound,
And reach to worlds that must not yet be found.
And reach to worlds that must not yet be found.
