SIR ,

A Loss like yours must needs excite our Grief,
And prompt each mourning Muse to bring Relief;
Ardently striving, in exalted Lays,
To charm your Woe, and lasting Honours raise,
To him whose Worth transcends our highest Praise.
But you so happily that Part supply,
That now 'twere Arrogance in us to try:
For none, like you, his matchless Worth could tell,
None knew him better; and none write so well.

But, since the glorious Name of Friend I bear,
Permit my Friendship in your Grief to share.
I mourn your Loss, but dare not mourn his Fate,
Whom Heav'n saw fit so early to translate;
And finding us unworthy such a Prize,
Remov'd the bright Example from our Eyes.
Nor dare I much lament that dreadful Pain,
Which he with such Sereneness did sustain,
Such Constancy, such Courage, so resign'd,
That all admir'd his Fortitude of Mind.

So Heav'n, when pleas'd to raise up for our View
A Virtue shining and instructive too,
With wondrous Gifts, it does this Man adorn,
Yet wond'rous Tryals must by him be born:
Not such as commonly Mankind befall,
But something, cruelly emphatical:
Such as may make his Piety more bright,
And set his Virtues in the fairest Light.
So Job's vast Wealth makes not his Story shine,
But 'twas his Suff'rings render'd it divine.

O happy youth! thou'st finish'd well the Strife,
And reach'd the Goal of everlasting Life;
There rest, and in unbounded Pleasure reign,
Eternally secur'd from Grief and Pain:
Thy Father round the Globe has spread thy Fame,
And now, in deathless Verse, embalm's thy fragrant Name.

And thou celestial Bard! whose heav'n-born Muse
Does such heroick Piety infuse,
That we no longer at his Death repine,
But, taught by you, to Providence resign.

Illustrious Friend! what Wonders dost thou shew,
At once th' Afflicted, and Condoler too!
Oh' may the great Creator hear our Pray'r,
And with his Presence still thy Loss repair:
Thro' sad and num'rous Tryals hast thou past;
But this the Greatest, may it be the Last.