Page:Essays - Abraham Cowley (1886).djvu/136

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134
COWLEY'S ESSAYS.

The sword still hangs over your head.
No tide of wine would drown your cares,
No mirth or music over-noise your fears;
The fear of death would you so watchful keep,
As not to admit the image of it, sleep.

IV.

Sleep is a god too proud to wait in palaces;

And yet so humble, too, as not to scorn
The meanest country cottages;
His poppy grows among the corn.
The halcyon sleep will never build his nest
In any stormy breast.
'Tis not enough that he does find
Clouds and darkness in their mind;
Darkness but half his work will do,
'Tis not enough; he must find quiet too.

V.

The man who, in all wishes he does make,

Does only Nature's counsel take,
That wise and happy man will never fear