MEMENTO MORI:   outline of tombstone including emblems of Death which surrounds text  
AN ELEGY On the Death of JAMES HOARE, Esq Master Controller of his Majesties Mint at the Tower, Who departed this Life November the 24th, 1696.  

HARK now, methinks I hear a dismal Cry,  
As if some fatal Tragedy drew nigh:  
Alas, What means this tingling in my Ears  
These doleful Sounds, that fill my Breast with Cares.  
The fatal Omen must protend some Ill;  
Surely some sacred Saint to Day is fell.   


Alas! It is too True, the worthy Hoare,  
This Day has launched Eternity's wide Shore,  
Never to rise, till Time shall be no more:   
Oh! How could he so soon bequeath his Breath,  
Without a Comet to protend his Death.   

Yet so it is, Fate often proves unkind;  
To take the Best, and leave the Worst behind.  
Let us then mourn in Eleagic Verse,  
And weep in Brine o'er his renowned Hearse:  
For Death, his most Tyrannic Force imparts,  
That we with melting Grief may break our Hearts.  
Oh! Let this Melancholy Hour be  
Griefs everlasting Day of Jubilee:  
For he is gone untimely ravished hence,  
Who lived in Love, and died in Innocence:  
Admired and beloved by all Mankind;  
The poor Man's Father, and the rich Man's Friend.  

Great was his Worth, but his Compassion more,  
Dispencing liberally to the Poor,  
A sort of daily Pension from his Store:   
Nor was his Virtues only here confined;  
For large was the Endowments of his Mind:  
Stade in his Judgement, and approved in Sense,  
Fit for the Service of so great a Prince.   

Stay daring Muse, Oh! whither wilt thou fly;  
Alas thou canst not reach his Piety,  
He was so Great, so Good, and yet he fell:  
Thus died that worthy Saint who lived so well.   

Weep! wring your Hands, and bitterly Lament,  
The Fall of this departed Innocent;  
And let your mournful Accents upwards fly,  
And with repeated Terror rend the Sky:  
Mourn as that Prophet mourned when Saul did lay,  
Weltering in Gore on the Mount Gilboa;  
Or as that doleful Lamentation fell,  
In Aggamemnon's melancholy Vale.  
Yet hold my Muse, forbear thy melting Tears,  
Alas! He's fled above the reach of Cares;  
Whose pious Shade with singing Cherubs ly's,  
Reposed in everlasting Paradise,  
Where joyful Them to their God they sing,  
And praise the Name of Heaven's Almighty King.   

Crowned with the fearful Labours of his Life,  
He's exiled from a wretched World of Grief,  
To Life for ever in that bright abode,  
Prepared to entertain the Just and Good.    

EPITAPH.  

Within this dark and gloomy Monument,  
Behold there lies the Relics of a Saint:  
Who left these fadeing Glories, to possess  
An everlasting Seat of Happiness.  
When in this moving World he lived, his Life  
Was free from Broils and vain tumultuous Strife.  
In Deeds of Charity he did excel,  
And took his chief Delight in doing well.  
So here he lived beloved, and at his Fall,  
He died lamented and bewailed of all.