1 Weep with me, all you that read
2 This little story:
3And know, for whom a tear you shed
4 Death's self is sorry.
5'Twas a child, that so did thrive
6 In grace and feature,
7As heaven and nature seem'd to strive
8 Which own'd the creature.
9Years he number'd scarce thirteen
10 When fates turn'd cruel,
11Yet three fill'd zodiacs had he been
12 The stage's jewel;
13And did act (what now we moan)
14 Old men so duly,
15As, sooth, the Parcæ thought him one,
16 He play'd so truly.
17So, by error, to his fate
18 They all consented;
19But viewing him since (alas, too late)
20 They have repented;
21And have sought (to give new birth)
22 In baths to steep him;
23But being so much too good for earth,
24 Heaven vows to keep him.
From Ben Jonson's Epigrams: An Epitaph on S.P.
A Child of Queen Elizabeth's Chapel
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