As is the fragrant flower in the field,
Which in the spring a pleasant smell doth yield,
And lovely sight, but soon is withered;
So’s Man: to-day alive, to-morrow dead.
And as the silver dew-bespangled grass,
Which in the morn bedecks its mother’s face,
But ere the scorching summer’s passed looks brown,
Or by the scythe is suddenly cut down.
Just such is Man, who vaunts himself to-day,
Decking himself in all his best array;
But in the midst of all his bravery
Death rounds him in the ear, “Friend, thou must die.”
Or like a shadow in a sunny day,
Which in a moment vanishes away;
Or like a smile or spark,—such is the span
Of life allowed this microcosm, Man.
Cease then vain man to boast; for this is true,
Thy brightest glory’s as the morning dew,
Which disappears when first the rising sun
Displays his beams above the horizon.
As the consideration of the uncertainty of human life drew the foregoing lines from me, so the sense I had of the folly of mankind, in misspending the little time allowed them in evil ways and vain sports, led me more particularly to trace the several courses wherein the generality of men run unprofitably at best, if not to their hurt and ruin, which I introduced with that axiom of the Preacher (Eccles. i. 2):
ALL IS VANITY.
See here the state of man as in a glass,
And how the fashion of this world doth pass.
Some in a tavern spend the longest day,
While others hawk and hunt the time away.
Here one his mistress courts; another dances;
A third incites to lust by wanton glances.
This wastes the day in dressing; the other seeks
To set fresh colours on her with red cheeks,
That, when the sun declines, some dapper spark
May take her to Spring Garden or the park.
Plays some frequent, and balls; others their prime
Consume at dice; some bowl away their time.
With cards some wholly captivated are;
From tables others scarce an hour can spare.
One to soft music mancipates his ear;
At shovel-board another spends the year.
The Pall Mall this accounts the only sport;
That keeps a racket in the tennis-court.
Some strain their very eyes and throats with singing,
While others strip their hands and backs at ringing.
Another sort with greedy eyes are waiting
Either at cock-pit or some great bull-baiting.
This dotes on running-horses; t’other fool
Is never well but in the fencing-school.
Wrestling and football, nine-pins, prison-base,
Among the rural clowns find each a place.
Nay, Joan unwashed will leave her milking-pail
To dance at May-pole, or a Whitsun ale.
Thus wallow most in sensual delight,
As if their day should never have a night,
Till Nature’s pale-faced sergeant them surprise,
And as the tree then falls, just so it lies.
Now look at home, thou who these lines dost read,
See which of all these paths thyself dost tread,
And ere it be too late that path forsake,
Which, followed, will thee miserable make.
After I had thus enumerated some of the many vanities in which the generality of men misspent their time, I sang the following ode in praise of virtue:—
Wealth, beauty, pleasures, honours, all adieu;
I value virtue far, far more than you.
You’re all but toys
For girls and boys
To play withal, at best deceitful joys.
She lives for ever; ye are transitory,
Her honour is unstained; but your glory
Is mere deceit—
A painted bait,
Hung out for such as sit at Folly’s gate.
True peace, content, and joy on her attend;
You, on the contrary, your forces bend
To blear men’s eyes
With fopperies,
Which fools embrace, but wiser men despise.
About this time my father, resolving to sell his estate, and having reserved for his own use such parts of his household goods as he thought fit, not willing to take upon himself the trouble of selling the rest, gave them unto me; whereupon I went down to Crowell, and having before given notice there and thereabouts that I intended a public sale of them, I sold them, and thereby put some money into my pocket. Yet I sold such things only as I judged useful, leaving the pictures and armour, of which there was some store there, unsold.
Not long after this my father sent for me to come to him at London about some business, which, when I came there, I understood was to join with him in the sale of his estate, which the purchaser required for his own satisfaction and safety, I being then the next heir to it in law. And although I might probably have made some advantageous terms for myself by standing off, yet when I was satisfied by counsel that there was no entail upon it or right of reversion to me, but that he might lawfully dispose of it as he pleased, I readily joined with him in the sale without asking or having the least gratuity or compensation, no, not so much as the fee I had given to counsel to secure me from any danger in doing it.
There having been some time before this a very severe law made against the Quakers by name, and more particularly prohibiting our meetings under the sharpest penalties of five pounds for the first offence so called, ten pounds for the second, and banishment for the third, under pain of felony for escaping or returning without license—which law was looked upon to have been procured by the bishops in order to bring us to a conformity to their way of worship—I wrote a few lines in way of dialogue between a Bishop and a Quaker, which I called