Poem by Henry King, Bishop of Chichester

My Midnight Meditation

Ill busi'd man! why should'st thou take such care
To lengthen out thy life's short calendar?
When ev'ry spectacle thou lookst upon
Presents and acts thy execution.
Each drooping season and each flower doth cry,
'Fool! as I fade and wither, thou must die.

'The beating of thy pulse (when thou art well)
Is just the tolling of thy Passing Bell:
Night is thy Hearse, whose sable Canopy
Covers alike deceased day and thee.
And all those weeping dews which nightly fall,
Are but the tears shed for thy funeral.' 

1. Madam Gabrina, Or The Ill-Favourd Choice
2. To the Queen at Oxford
3. The Short Wooing
4. Upon A Table-Book Presented To A Lady
5. To His Friends of Christ-Church upon the Mislike of the Marriage of the Arts Acted at Woodstock

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