Tell age it daily wasteth;

Tell honour how it alters; Tell beauty that it blasteth; Tell favour that she falters: And as they do reply, Give every one the lie.

Tell wit how much it wrangles
In tickle points of niceness;
Tell wisdom she entangles
Herself in over-wiseness :
And if they do reply,

Then give them both the lie.

Tell physic of her boldness;
Tell skill it is pretension;

Tell charity of coldness;
Tell law it is contention :
And if they yield reply,
Then give them still the lie.

Tell fortune of her blindness;

Tell nature of decay;
Tell friendship of unkindness;

Tell justice of delay :

And if they do reply,

Then give them all the lie.

So when thou hast, as I

Commanded thee, done blabbing,

Although to give the lie

Deserves no less than stabbing;

Yet stab at thee who will,
No stab the soul can kill!

HYMN."

RISE, O my soul, with thy desires to heaven,

And with divinest contemplation use

Thy time where time's eternity is given,

And let vain thoughts no more thy thoughts abuse;
But down in darkness let them lie:

So live thy better, let thy worse thoughts die!

And thou, my soul, inspir'd with holy flame,
View and review, with most regardful eye,
That holy cross, whence thy salvation came,
On which thy Saviour and thy sin did die!
For in that sacred object is much pleasure,
And in that Saviour is my life, my treasure.

To Thee, O Jesu! I direct my eye,

To Thee my hands, to Thee my humble knees;

To Thee my heart shall offer sacrifice,

To Thee my thoughts, who my thoughts only sees:

To Thee myself, myself and all, I give;

To Thee I die, to Thee I only live.

LINES WRITTEN THE NIGHT BEFORE HIS EXECUTION.

E'EN Such is time, that takes on trust

Our youth, our joys, our all we have,
And pays us but with age and dust;
Who in the dark and silent grave,

When we have wandered all our ways,
Shuts up the story of our days.

But from this earth, this grave, this dust,

The Lord shall raise me up, I trust.