AN ELEGY, In Memory of that Famous, Learned, Reverend and Religious Doctor OLDSWORTH, late Chaplain to the ever living Majesty of CHARLES the MARTYR, and sometime vicechancellor to the now dying University of Cambridge, a principal sufferer in Stormy-beaten Zion, but a stout maintainer of the purity of the PROTESTANT PROFESSION.  

AMongst th' train of Friends (good Sir) I bring  
Religious Anthems, but want breath to sing.  
Infuse my Muse with some religious fire  
Of Thine, that I may blaze, and then expire.  
But rather doth it seem to blaze in wet,  
Then with an ardent heat, for Oldsworth's set.  
Then who can hope to build for him a shrine,  
Or speak him dead in Verse? but in the crystalline  
Of every eye he is entombed, each tear  
Like staved torches wait upon his bier.  
Then, what need I attend thy Reverend hearse  
With Elegies, when eyes drop balm and verse?  
But least the heat of grief be drowned in wet,  
Here's my Sun dial (though the Sun be set).  
Then busy grief, let's pass upon Parole  
To Register his worth in verse; control  
No more my senses: under the notion,  
His worth is best known in corruption.  
What though his worth hath built his worth a Shrine?  
His worthiness may be interred in mine.  
Who knows not? but day nights a tapers light,  
And the Meridian justles night from sight.  
Th' enamelled floor in which the gold doth lie,  
Is rather waste, than grace to its purity.  
What need a Diamond lustre have a foil?  
Or Oldsworth lines, to show he was divine,  
Let a skilled Lapidary ope the tomb  
Of a rich Diamond, and a womb  
Of rare production summons every sense  
To aid its lustre in a rich defence.  
Then graced, not wast, when divers stones are placed  
In golden quarries, as if from thence razed.  
How can the world truly pen thee divine,  
When thy bright beams to us through crannies shine,  
As if thy graces could comprised be,  
In such a room, where thou art laid to be?   

I love the Limner which can draw the man,  
With each proportion, in a ten-inch span:  
But I dislike the liar, when his talk  
Unshapes the shape by saying it can walk.  
Some of thy worth, sweet Soul, let me impart,  
For soul dumb sense, to show more what thou art.  
Selected gems all thy set graces were,  
Of grace and goodness. O forbear, forbear.  
To promulgate! impiety 'twould be:  
That thou shouldst die, and none ask what was he?  
What tongue can answer give for such a loss?  
But words would lose themselves in their own choice.  
Wert thou a man morally good, or so,  
No other Elegy, but thy dust should show:  
But every soul that knew thy gifts can tell,  
Channels must change, and the vast centre reel  
Of every soul, where can they fixed be,  
Since doctrine and the doctor both agree  
(I fear) to leave us. Oh may you here be found  
In every pulpit! though y'are under ground.  
And there my Fancy spies him, while I see  
Him drawn an Angel to eternity.  
How grave? How sweet? How roselike was each look  
Of his? as if his Saviour in his book  
H''ve met with face to face, and not by faith,  
The promise promised glorified he hath.  
Still more reviving life sprang in each cheek,  
Whilst nearer to his text through's prayer he would break,  
And when concluded his, he would rejoice,  
And sound his maker's praise with cheerful voice  
In Christ's own prayer: that done, he would begin  
Again to chime his lips, not heard but seen,  
Then taking up his bible by the strings,  
he'd turn the leaves as if he'd spread Christ's wings:  
Under which he, and those that did believe,  
The comforts there contained might receive  
A Paul, A Moses, and Elias, three,  
Zealously one, and so divine was he.  
Emphatically would be press a point,  
As if his senses moved were out of joint,  
Which in his hearers such impress did take,  
As if all senses did their place forsake,  
And centre in the eye. There every ear  
Was turned into the sight, whilst looks did hear.  
His lips had kissed the God of Love, for jars  
Were sweetly reconciled, though with his tears.  
Oh pious soul! melodious are those pleasures,  
Which are constrained with unconstrained measures.  
His birth took part with wit, each age graced he,  
As if his cradle had been his library.  
The Church (when present he) lacked not a head,  
The State confessed that he in Court was bred.  
A Pastor, Citizen, dwelled amongst many,  
Yet of their factions favoured he not any.  
Free in discourse, moral, as well divine:  
Who knew thy worth? must know all worth was thine.  
Not like sun-dyalls', when the Sun is gone,  
Can show no more of day, 's if day were done:  
But like the dial of the day, the Sun  
That posts through this, or that Meridian.  
Each Climate to his Genius was as fit,  
As if he had the universal wit;  
That called him to the Court, where every one,  
Like a court-dial cast reflection,  
So useful in the fortunes of each Peer  
Were shadows cast, he'd shape a substance clear.  
In all the solitudes of the deceased King,  
No going to chapel, but when he rung in.  
Oldsworth the man, Oldsworth the mouth from whence,  
He drew the comfort of soul-influence,  
Oh glorious Star! that shined in Charles his Court,  
By which the wisest Charles had beams of comfort,  
Though dipped in deepest depths of woe, yet shined  
His tears for pity, when his tongue declined.  
But dimmed in shining! Left this earthly state.  
Whither? to attend the Martyr to inaugurate.  
That's done already, no sooner born again,  
But of four Kingdoms was he crowned a King.  
A lane, ye holy Guard! since he is gone,  
To attend heavens Court, glad not with such connexion;  
Since thou art gone, who moans not this his fate?  
For Doctors, Dunces; so unfortunate  
Each University! they suffer, by  
Passion each member, Church by sympathy.  
Blessed is that man, who when he lived, was loved,  
And missed with sighs, when from earth's centre moved.  
Why moves this Bell? what means this dolesome knell?  
Tolling out tones, as if it bade farewell  
To some one parting hence? why rings it out?  
Oldsworth is dead, than faces turn about.  
Who could be confident of this? but goes,  
Whilst on the way, the pavement fresh he strews  
With pearly showers of tears, and being come,  
The Bel's the man, whilst that the man's struck dumb.  
In louder strokes it tells the world the News  
Whom 'tis heaven gains, and whom the earth doth lose.  
Departing hence, each party rings a knell,  
In the domestic Steeples where they dwell;  
The difference none, their metals melt away  
Like mine; and I contemplate what they say.  
Since thou art dead (oh reveverend Ghost) I bring  
A Pillow stuffed with down of angel's wing  
To rest thy sleepy head on; for its fit,  
Rest should it now, which could not rest for wit,  
Then in the Mansion of thy dust I'll now  
Here take my leave (Sir): But Heaven allow  
My heart's expansion to contemplate, what  
Thou art, I am satisfied in knowing not:  
Or what 'tis where thou art. I know not what  
I know in knowing not, Thy place is that.   
W. F.  
FINIS.