MEMENTO MORI   outline of tombstone, which surrounds text, often including depictions of emblems of Death  
AN ELEGY Upon the Death of M r. WILLIAM LILLY The ginger.  

OUR Prophet's gone: No longer may our Ears  
Be charmed with Music of th' harmonious Spheres.  
Let Sun and Moon withdraw, leave gloomy Night  
To show their Nuncio's Fate, who gave more Light  
To th' erring World, than all the feeble Rays  
Of Sun or Moon; taught us to know those Days  
Bright Titan makes; followed the hasty Sun  
Through all his Circuits; knew the unconstant Moon,  
And more unconstant Ebb of the Flood,  
And what is most uncertain, th' factious Brood,  
Flowing in civil Broils; by th' Heavens could date  
The Flux and Reflux of our dubious State.  
He saw th' Eclipse of Sun, and change of Moon:  
He saw, but seeing would not shun his own.  
Eclipsed he was, that he might shine more bright,  
And only changed to give a fuller Light.  
He having viewed the Sky, and glorious Train  
Of gilded Stars, scorned longer to remain  
In earthly Prisons. Could he a Village love,  
Whom the twelve Houses waited for above?  
The grateful Stars a heavenly Mansion gave  
TO his heavenly Soul, nor could he be a Slave  
To mortal Passions, whose immortal Mind,  
Whilst here on Earth, was not to Earth confined.  
He must be gone: The Stars had so decreed,  
As he of them, so they of him had need.  
This Message 'twas the blazing Comet brought,  
I saw the palefaced Star, and seeing thought  
(For we could guests; but only Lily know)  
It did some glorious Hero's Fall foreshow.  
A Hero's fallen, whose death more than a War  
Or Fire, deserved a Comet. Th' obsequious Stars  
Could do no less than his sad Fate unfold,  
Who had their Risings, and their Setting told.  
Some thought a Plague, and some a Famine near,  
Some Wars from France, some Fires at home did fear.  
Nor did they fear too much, scarce kinder Fate.  
But Plague of Plagues befell th' unhappy State,  
When Lily died. Now Swords may safely come  
From France or Rome, fanatics plot at home;  
Now an unseen and unexpected Hand,  
By guidance of ill Stars, may hurt our Land.  
Unsafe, because Secure, there's none to show  
How England may avert the fatal Blow.  
He's dead, whose Death the weeping Clouds deplore:  
I wish we did not owe to him that Shower,  
Which long expected was, and might have still  
Expected been, had not our Nation's ill  
Drawn from the Heavens a Sympathetick Tear.  
England hath cause a second Drought to fear;  
We have no second Lily, who may die,  
And by his Death may make the Heavens cry.  
Then let your Annals, Coley, want this day,  
Think every Year, Leapyear, or if't must stay,  
Cloth it in Black, let a sad Note stand by,  
And stigmatize it to Posterity.   
FINIS.   

LONDON, Printed for Obadiah Blagrave, at the Bear in St. Paul's Churchyard, near the little North Door. 1681. July 11