John Dryden (1631–1700). The Poems of John Dryden. 1913.
Elegies and EpitaphsEpitaph on Sir Palmes Fairbornes Tomb, in Westminster Abbey
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Here, undisturb’d by Wars, in quiet sleep:
Discharge the trust, which (when it was below)
Fairborne’s undaunted soul did undergo:
And be the Towns Palladium from the foe.
Alive and dead these Walls he will defend:
Great Actions great Examples must attend.
The Candian Siege his early Valour knew;
Where Turkish Blood did his young hands imbrew:
From thence returning with deserv’d Applause,
Against the Moors his well-flesh’d Sword he draws;
The same the Courage, and the same the Cause.
His Youth and Age, his Life and Death combine:
As in some great and regular design,
All of a Piece, throughout, and all Divine
Still nearer heaven, his Vertues shone more bright,
Like rising flames expanding in their height;
The Martyrs Glory Crown’d the Soldier’s Fight.
More bravely Brittish General never fell,
Nor General’s death was e’re reveng’d so well;
Which his pleas’d Eyes beheld before their close,
Follow’d by thousand Victims of his Foes.
To his lamented loss for time to come,
His pious Widow consecrates this Tomb.