Whose worth, whose loss, should we but truly rate,
'Twould puzzle our arithmetic to state
Th' accompt of vertu's so transcendent high,
Number and value reach infinity.
Did I pronounce him dead! no, no! he lives,
And from his aromatique cell he gives
Spice-breathed fumes, whose odoriferous scent
(In zephre-gales which never can be spent)
Doth spread it self abroad, and much out-vies
The eastern bird in her self-sacrifice;
Or Father Phoebus, who to th' world derives
Such various and such multiformed lives,
Took notice that brave Lovelace did inspire
The universe with his Promethean fire,
And snatcht him hence, before his thread was spun,
En'ving that here should be another Sun. T. L.<113.1>

<113.1> Thomas Lovelace, one of the poet's brothers.

ON THE DEATH OF MY DEAR BROTHER.

EPITAPH.

Tread (reader) gently, gently ore
The happy dust beneath this floor:
For in this narrow vault is set
An alablaster cabinet,
Wherein both arts and arms were put,
Like Homers Iliads in a nut,
Till Death with slow and easie pace
Snatcht the bright jewell from the case;
And now, transform'd, he doth arise
A constellation in the skies,
Teaching the blinded world the way,
Through night, to startle into day:
And shipwrackt shades, with steady hand,
He steers unto th' Elizian land.
Dudley Posthumus-Lovelace.

THE END.

Comments on the preparation of the E-Text:

ANGLE BRACKETS:

Any place where angle brackets are used, i.e. < >, it is
a change made during the preparation of this E-Text.
The original printed book did not use this character at all.

SQUARE BRACKETS:

The square brackets, i.e. [ ] are copied from the printed book,
without change.

FOOTNOTES:

For this E-Text version of the book, the footnotes have been
consolidated at the end of each section of the introduction,
and at the end of each poem.

Numbering of the footnotes has been changed, and each footnote
is given a unique identity in the form <XX.YY>, where XX is
a poem or a section of the introduction, and YY is the number
of the note within that poem or section.

Some footnote markers are missing. I have inserted markers where
I believe they should go. All such markers are identified by
double brackets. e.g. <<9.2>>

There were 5 footnotes in an "Additional Notes" section of the
book, and one footnote in the Table of Contents. These footnotes
have been identified as <<AN.1>> to <