AN elegy offered UP TO THE Memory of his excellency ROBERT Earl of Essex and Ewe, Viscount Hereford, Lord Ferrer of Chartley, Bourchier and Louvain, late general of the PARLIAMENTS Forces.  

THE MOST NOBLE ROBERT Earl OF ESSEX AND LO: GEN: OF THE FORCES FOR K: & PARL.   portrait of Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex, Lord General  
AS some tall oak 'gainst whom the envious Wind  
Oft in impetuous Hurricans combined  
Does stand unmoved, although assailed by all  
The angry Gales, yet of itself does fall  
When there's scarce Breath enough i'th' sullen air  
To ravel or disturb a virgin's hair:  
So this brave Lord who like a swelling Rock  
At Keynton, Newbury, had stood the Shock  
Of death, unmoved, where he himself had flung  
Amidst his Troops with all his Terrors Hung  
This death at last did like a drowsy sleep  
O'er his becalmed unguarded senses creep.  
What Springs of tears shall we disburse? what Terse  
Curled Metaphors now stick upon his Hearse?  
Tears are but dull and, common rights they are  
The stipend of each vulgar sepulchre  
Here Seas themselves should be laved out, and streams  
Be licked up by the Sun's refulgent Beams  
That in the day's great Eye there might appear  
For this great ruin too, a funeral Tear  
Whole Cataracts should be exhaled, and then  
Distilled in liquid Obsequies again,  
Such showers are most proportioned to his Fate  
And to his loss such tears Commensurate,  
What Shrine or Trophies shall our lavish Art  
As Tribute to his Ashes now impart?  
What Dole of obelisqus shall we entrust  
To stand as Alphabets unto his Dust?  
Alas (Great Lord) what urn is fit for thee?  
Who to thyself art urn and elegy  
And for Supporters we ourselves become  
Congealed with Sighs Supporters to his tomb.  
What gums or Spices shall we now prepare  
T'enshrine his Dust? since they but fluid are  
And obvious to Decay so soon, they'll be  
Transformed themselves into more Dust than he,  
No, he has left his Name, which shall embalm  
His Earth, and all Corruption so becalm  
This when, his searcloath is dissolved and Spent,  
Shall to itself be its own Monument;  
What Tapers now shall we afford his Shrine?  
About the Chaos of his Dust to shine  
〈…〉 his honoured Breast  
And is locked up now in his Marble Chest  
Shall fill their room, and from the gloomy Night  
Of his dark Vault, Dart a perpetual Light.  
What Heaps of palm and laurel shall we lay  
As Chaplets dropped upon his liveless Clay?  
No let us rather Sprigs of Olives strew  
Upon his Monument, which there will grow,  
And by our tears manured shall so increase  
It shall be styled by all the ark of Peace.  
How Crippled now Nature does seem, her Frame  
Is disproportioned and her Junctures lame  
Since from her bulk this mighty Limb is lop'd;  
And as when Flowers by early Fate are croped  
From off their stalk the mourning Stem appears  
As if it wept their loss bathed o'er with tears:  
So now when he that seemed even to Cement  
Nature's vast fabric, from her Building's rent  
By Death's unthrifty Hand, the whole Compact  
By this one Blow is so resolved and slacked  
'Tis feared 'twill languish into Dust, and all  
The heap of Men entomb too in its fall,  
For at that Breach thy Soul flew out at, we  
Ourselves (Great Lord) must bleed to Death with Thee  
Since then (Fair Soul) thou by thy Fate dost gain  
Triumphs and palms, and we alone sustain  
The loss, and Death attempting to benight  
With his blind Clouds the Glory of thy Light  
With which so long amidst our orb you shone  
Has fixed thee now a Constellation  
In Heaven above, look from thy brighter Sphere  
On us, who like dull Ants lie grovelling here  
Maimed by thy Death, and if lean envy dare  
To rake or paddle in thy sepulchre  
May she grope out her way to that, and find  
Thou with thy spotless Beams didst strike her Blind;  
Enjoy thy crown of Glory then, and be  
As from all Guilt, so from all envy free,  
And if in after ages, any Stone  
Shall be by bold Detractors at thee thrown  
'Twill turn a precious one, and so combine  
To make this crown of Glory brighter shine.  
Thomas Philipot.