XXII. Sir John Beaumont

AH! who would loue a creature, who would place

His heart, his treasure, in a thing so base?

Which time consuming, like a moth, destroyes,

And stealing death will rob him of his ioyes.

Why lift we not our minds aboue this dust?

Haue we not yet perceiu’d that God is iust,

And hath ordain’d the obiects of our loue

To be our scourges, when we wanton proue?

Go, carelesse man, in vaine delights proceed,

Thy fansies and thine outward senses feede;

And bind thyselfe, thy fellow-seruant’s thrall:

Loue one too much, thou art a slaue to all.

Consider when thou follow’st seeming good,

And drown’st thyselfe too deepe in flesh and blood,

Thou making sute to dwell with woes and feares,

Art sworne their souldier in the vale of teares:

The bread of sorrow shall be thy repast;

Expect not Eden in a thorny waste,

Where grow no faire trees, no smooth riuers swell,

Here onely losses and afflictions dwell.

These thou bewayl’st with a repining voyce,

Yet knew’st before that mortall was thy choyse.

Admirers of false pleasures must sustaine

The waight and sharpnesse of insuing paine.