MONODIA.   printer's or publisher's device 
Imprinted by Peter short.   

MONODIA.  
An Elegy, in commemoration of the Virtuous life, and Godly Death of the right Worshipful & most religious Lady, Dame Helen Branch Widow, (late Wife to the right worshipful Sir john Branch knight, sometimes L. Mayor of this Honourable City, and daughter of M. W. Nicholson sometimes of London Draper) who deceased the 10. of April last, and lieth interred in Saint Mary Abchurch in London, the 29. of the same, 1594.  

Sigh unto me unworthy, you commit  
This worthy task (for better muses fit)  
To sing (nay rather sadly to deplore)  
This common loss, that nothing can restore:  
You sacred brood, borne of celestial race,  
You virgin Ladies which power down the grace  
Of Arts and learning on your servants decree,  
Vouch safe assistance to my moornings here.  
Teach me sad accents & a weeping measure  
To strain forth pity, not to stir-up pleasure.   

And you my private cares, (although the cause  
Of your despairs do never, never pause)  
Pause you a little, and give leave awhile,  
Mid public griefs my private to beguile;  
Give leave I pray you; for a private case  
Unto a public ever must give place.   

Alas how fitly is this life of ours  
Compared to field-grasse and to fading flowers,  
Fresh, green and gallant, in the morning sun;  
Withered and dead before the day be done.  
Did ever yet the world's bright eye behold,  
(Since first th'Eternal, earthly slime en-sowld)  
A frame of flesh so glorious here beneath,  
But hath been ruynde by the rage of Death?  
Of Death dread victor of all earthly things,  
Who in a moment equals clowns with kings.  
For majesty can nothing him dismay,  
No strength nor courage can his coming stay,  
No wealth can wage him, nor no wit prevent him,  
No lovely beauty can at all relent him,  
Nay (which is more) no virtue can avail  
Ay me, that death on virtue should prevail.  
But 'tis decreed, death is the meed for sin,  
This by ambition did our grand sire win;  
And we the heirs both of his work and wages  
Must all die once, throughout all after ages.   

And here for instance see this sable hearse  
Shrouding the subject of my mournful verse,  
The breathless body of a worthy Dame,  
The Lady Branch, a Nicholson by name:  
A godly, virtuous and religious Matron  
For maids, and wives, and widows all a pattern.  
Worship and wealth adorned her parentage,  
Favour and beauty graced her parsonage,  
But virtuous manners, by good education,  
Brought to her youth the greatest commendation,  
Wherein so well she spent her virgin-days  
That envies self saw nothing to dispraise.   

Now when her age had made her apt to marry,  
With friends advise that of her choice were chary,  
She was espoused to one of special sort,  
Wealthy in purse, and worship full in port,  
Master John Minors, praised for zeal & piety,  
One of the Draper's worshipful society:  
To him she bore four children, one a boy,  
The rest all daughters, all, their parent's joy.  
But all these joys (alas) but little lasted,  
All these fair blossoms were untimely blasted.  
All died young; for what draws lively breath  
But young or old must yield at last to death?   

But they, long morning for their mutual loss,  
Frame mutual comforts to each others cross,  
Till time, that all things wears had worn away  
Their sorrows edge, uneasy to allay.  
Then happily many fair days they spent,  
To others comfort and their own content,  
In all the practise of a christian life,  
And mutual duties meet for man and wife,  
He happy in his chance, she in her choice,  
Both jointly blessed in themselves rejoice.  
But ah these earth-ioys do not ever last.  
After long clearness clouds will over cast:  
After long calms still follows stormy weather.  
When they had lived full forty years together,  
He died alas; for what draws lively breath,  
But young or old, must yield at last to death?   

Then desolate and comfortless alone,  
Like to the Turtle when her mate is gone,  
With sigh-swolne heart and sorrow-clouded eyes:  
She wails her lost love in a woeful wise  
Till time that allthings wears, had worn away  
Her sorrow's edge, uneasy to allay.   

Then after modest and meet intermision,  
Becoming well her years, and her codition,  
In second wedlock she was linked again  
Unto another wealthy Citizen,  
To Master Branch who after wards became  
Lord Mayor of London, worthy well the same,  
In which high office he him so acquighted,  
That for his service he was after knighted.  
He was her husband twenty years, or more,  
And much increased her style, her state, and store.  
But boughs & Branches, shrubs, & Cedars tall  
Wither and die and into ashes fall,  
So fell this Branch, for what draws lively breath  
But old or young must yield at last to death?   

Then all forlorn, thus having lost her knight,  
This doleful Lady left all world's delight,  
All shows of pleasure, and all pomp forsaking,  
Herself to sadness and to soleness taking,  
with inward sighs & outward tears lamenting  
His death, whose life was all her lives contenting.  
Even like unto the sad and woeful Winter,  
Who (soon as ever the bright season-stinter  
Hath left her widow of his wont rays,  
Whilst to another world he takes his ways)  
Casting aside her rich enameled crowns,  
Flower-powdred mantles, & embroidered gowns  
Of gras-green silk-shag, and the gaudy pride  
Of all her jewels and her gems beside,  
Her mirthless self in moornfull manner shrouds  
Down to the ground in rob of sable clouds,  
And from her swoln-hart sighs a thousand stowres  
And from her drowned eyes weeps a thousand showers.   

But now become herself, hir selfes commander,  
To shield her life safe from all shot of slander,  
(As 'twere) sequestered from much conversation,  
She passed her time in holy meditation,  
In thanks and prayer unto Christ our Lord,  
And often hearing of his sacred word;  
In godly alms, and liberal pensions rife,  
And all the duties of a christian life,  
Laying up treasure with the joyful just,  
Safe from the force of the eves, and fret of rust.  
So that her threefold godly life alludeth  
To virgin Ruth, wife Sara, widow Judith,  
This life she led; but this life will away,  
We are but pilgrims, here we may not stay.  
No more might she: for when thrice thirty year  
(A goodly age) she had expired here  
She also died; for what draws lively breath,  
But young or old must yield at last to death?   

Such life, such death: well ends the well begun,  
And by the even the fair days praise is won.  
Well she began and wundrous well she ended,  
Fair rose this sun, and fairly it descended,  
To rise again to glory at the last,  
At that great angels al-awaking blast   

And therefore (dear friends) do not wail nor weep,  
For her that is so happy fallen asleep,  
But wail our loss, our common cause of grief,  
The riches load-star, & the poors relief,  
For to the rich in life she gave example,  
And to the poor in life and death was ample.  
Weep rich, weep poor, let high and low lament  
But most you poor, let your salt tears be spent,  
For you alas have lost your liberal Lady,  
Your nurse, your mother, but alas why wade I  
With my poor style in so profound a stream?  
You springs of arts, eyes of this noble Realm,  
Cambridge & Oxford, lend your learned tears,  
To wail your own loss, and to witness theirs:  
Tell you, that have the voice of eloquence,  
This bounteous Ladies large beneficence,  
First to yourselves, for love unto your lore,  
Then severally to every kind of poor,  
Within this City. To the Draper's Hall,  
To every Prison, every Hospital,  
To lunatics, and poor maids marriages,  
And many other worthy leagacies,  
And when you have drawn all your tear-springs dry;  
For her decease, here let your comfort lie,  
That of this Phoenix ashes there revives  
Another, where her virtue still survives.   
Ios. Silvester.  
FINIS.