Her nation's ornament and praise ! 20

But when a storm disturbed our rest,

The port and refuge of the oppressed.
This made her fortune understood,

And looked on as some public good.
So that (her person and her state, 25

Exempted from the common fate)

In all our civil fury she

Stood, like a sacred temple, free.
May here her monument stand so.
To credit this rude age ! and show 30

To future times, that even we

Some patterns did of virtue see ;

And one sublime example had

Of good, among so many bad.
244 POEMS OF

EPITAPH UNFINISHED.
Great soul ! for whom Death will no longer stay,
But sends in haste to snatch our bliss away.
O cruel Death 1 to those you take more kind,
Than to the wretched mortals left behind !
Here beauty, youth, and noble virtue shined, 5

Free from the clouds of pride that shade the mind.
Inspired verse may on this marble live,
But can no honour to thy ashes give



UPON A LADY'S FISHING WITH AN
ANGLE.
See where the fair Clorinda sits, and seems
Like new-born Venus risen from the streams ;
In vain the beauties of the neighbouring field,
In vain the painted flowers' pride
With their faint colours strive to hide 5

That flower to which Flora herself would yield.
Each object's pleasant to the sight.
The streams, the meadows yield delight,
But nothing fair as her you can espy
Unless i' th' brook (her looking-glass) you chance to
cast your eye. lo

See how she makes the trembling angle shake,
Touched by those hands that would make all men

quake.
