OBSEQUIES: ON That Vnexemplar Champion of chivalry and perfect pattern of true prowess, ARTHUR, Lord Capell.  

— In Trepidus mea Fata ●●quor  lovell fecit  

'tIS false Astronomy: we are not yet  
In utter-darkness, though the Sun be set;  
Since thy star-beaming-influence proves all  
Those Rules Excentrique, and apocryphal.  
Thou be heighthned by thy Fall; and dost now shine  
With doubled lustre, since thy last Decline.   

Bright mirror of our sphere! who were't no less  
Than valour's wonder: virtue's masterpiece;  
Filling whole Volumes with thy Fame; to tell  
The World Thy Worth was her own Chronicle.  
To tell the World, those praises in the Wars  
Thou've purchased, might be numbered with the Stars;  
And had thy well-proportion'd-Dayes been spun  
Out by thy Deeds, thou hadst outlived the sun;  
Forcing the world's great Luminary t' have  
His Chaos climacterick with thy Grave.   

Thus thy renowned Meeds like Incense hurled  
On flaming Altars have perfumed the World,  
With such rich Odours, that scarce envy knew  
Whether thou wert to King, or realm most true;  
Let State-Chronographers admire, and plead  
Those Rites they owe to Honour; when they read  
Thy rare achievements; studying to refine  
The truth of modern history by Thine.  
Carthage be dumb! our Colchester stands now  
Corrival with thee, and dares more than Thou;  
And all those Punic wars thy walls could boast,  
Have o'er and o'er been traversed on her coast.  
Rome's three Horatij are posed; our Isle  
Hath bred a Capell, Lucas, and a Lisle:  
Whose matchless Deeds have dubbed them with that late  
And glorious title of Triumvirate;  
Whiles their transcendent merit struts, and strives  
To stand on tiptoe in Superlatives.   

And still there's something more; for, what was mixed  
Promiscuously in these, in Thee was fixed.  
In Thee that Pythagorean Maxime's true;  
And what was State philosophy, proves new  
divinity, since th' souls of all those Nine  
Renowned Ones Transmigrated to Thine.   

But why do we Adore thee, made immense  
And far sublimed above our sphere of sense?  
Scorning bright obelisks of brass, or Stone  
Should raise thy Monument, who art thine own.  
Yet shouldst thou expect a shrine on Earth, we must  
Make Colchester th' Exchequer of thy dust.  
Nor is it more than Reason, since 'twere pity  
To give thee a less churchyard than that City  
T' inter thee in her Breaches, and o'erturn  
Her stately Bulwarks, and support thine urn;  
Whilst the thronged streets would justle to make room  
And spread their towers, as Trophies, o'er thy tomb.   

But this grand task I recommend to those  
Who can limb Fancies in more lively Prose;  
Whose rhetoric may richly guild this Pile  
And raise Invention to a lofty stile;  
Such as may Conjure horror, and oblige  
Belief (from our nice zealots) of that Siege,  
That fatal Siege, whose tre●ches were o'erspread  
With mangled trunks, and Bodies of the Dead,  
Till the discoloured Earth, thus died in grain,  
Blushed to behold such Shambles of the slain:  
And the pale Furies stood, like heartless Elves,  
Trembling; to see Men do more than Themselves.  
The center-shaking-brass grew hot, and spoke  
In Flames of Lightning, and in clouds of smoke;  
And Charon fainted, Ferrying souls to Hell,  
When Hecatombs of the Besiegers fell.   

Amidst these tragic triumphs didst thou rear  
Thy brave Top-gallant 'bove the reach of fear,  
Undauntedly exposing thy bold Head  
To shock of Thunder, and thick showers of Lead.  
Those Bullets were then Tame; and we may tax  
The partial Sword that spared thee for the Axe.  
The Field (th' Asylum of great Spirits) clean  
Is now transferred; the City is the scene;  
The Cannon showed fairplay; But thou wert packed  
Away, not by an Ordnance but an Act.  
The Scaffold turned a Stage: Where, 'tis confessed,  
The last Act (though most Bloody) proved Thy Best:  
It proved Thy solemn Coronation, since  
The Yard's thy palace; and a glorious Prince  
Thy precedent: Who after Him art hurled  
To meet thy sovereign in another World.   

Where Thou art fixed a glorious star, to gain  
Nearer access, and wait on CHARLES his wain.