A sad and deplorable loving Elegy consecrated to the living memory of his best assured friend, the generally beloved, M. Richard Wyan deceased, late his Majesties Proctor for the high Court of the Admiralty. Who departed this life at his house at Bryl in Buckinhamshire, on thursday the 16. of August last. 1638.
IT may be good to live, but well to live
Is such a Good, as few men can Achieve:
The more we live, the more we do offend,
The way to Heav'n's a good and speedy end:
Th' Almighty Landlord (who doth all
things sway,
Doth let mans Soule a Tenement of clay,
And Man is no Free-holder, but is still
A Tenant only at the Landlords will.
They are but Leases, till our Lives expire,
And
thankes is all the Rent God doth require.
And such a one was He, of whom I write,
Who liv'd as ever in His makers sight:
Who day and night did
humbly pay
his rent
Of
thankes and
praise for
his fraile Tenement.
Not only words, but reall deedes declar'd
His love, His zeale, obedience and regard
He ow'd to God and Man, to each degree
His Heart,
his Hand,
his pen and purse were free.
The poore mans Patron in distressed state,
The rich mans patterne, how to imitate.
Religion was His Pilot, and did steere
His course of life, and all
his actions here.
With courage daily
he did
Death defie,
His
heart was fix'd on immortality;
And one good precept, never
he forgot,
To use the World, as if hee us'd it not.
Wherefore th' Almighty (in His gracious Doome,)
Hath pluck'd
him hence, from ills that are to come.
The poore
have greatest losse,
they weeping know,
He would not say
God helpe, but
help'd their woe.
The State
hath lost a Servant of great Trust,
His friends have lost a friend assured, just.
His vertuous wife and children, great and small,
Brother and sisters, Kin, in generall
Have all receiv'd a losse, so great that we
Can never
hope that it repair'd shalbe.
But I have lost a friend, beyond a brother,
For I nere had, nor shall have such another.
But here's our comfort, though grim
Death assail'd
him,
His
Faith, his trust, and
confidence nere fail'd
him:
And though we all have lost
him, God hath found
him,
And with eternall
happinesse hath crown'd him.
Iohn Taylor.