Poem by John Dryden

Epitaph on Sir Palmes Fairborne's Tomb in Westminster Abbey

Ye sacred relics, which your marble keep,
Here, undisturbed by wars, in quiet sleep;
Discharge the trust, which, when it was below,
Fairborne's undaunted soul did undergo,
And be the town's palladium from the foe.
Alive and dead these walls he will defend:
Great actions great examples must attend.
The Candian siege his early valour knew,
Where Turkish blood did his young hands imbrue.
From thence returning with deserved applause,
Against the Moors his well-fleshed sword he draws;
The same the courage, and the same the cause.
His youth and age, his life and death, combine,
As in some great and regular design,
All of a piece throughout, and all divine.
Still nearer heaven his virtues shone more bright,
Like rising flames expanding in their height;
The martyr's glory crowned the soldier's fight.
More bravely British general never fell,
Nor general's death was e'er revenged so well;
Which his pleased eyes beheld before their close,
Followed by thousand victims of his foes.
To his lamented loss, for time to come,
His pious widow consecrates this tomb. 

1. Epitaph on a Nephew in Catworth Church, Huntingdonshire
2. Epilogue to Henry II
3. On Mrs. Margaret Paston, of Barningham, in Norfolk
4. Upon Young Mr. Rogers, of Gloucestershire
5. To the Lady Castlemaine, upon Her incouraging his first Play

Print

1432 Views

Last Poems

To Russian version