“Take, holy earth all that my soul holds dear
Take that best gift which heav’n so lately gave
To Bristol’s fount I bore with trembling care
Her faded form : She bow’d to taste the wave
And died. Does youth, does beauty, read the line?
Does sympathetic fear their breasts alarm?
Speak, dead Maria; breathe a strain divine:
Ev’n from the grave thou shall have power to charm
Bid them be chaste, be innocent like thee
Bid them in duties sphere as meekly move:
And if so fair, from vanity as free
As firm in friendship, and as fond in love
Tell them, tho’ tis an awful thing to die
(‘twas ev’n so to thee) yet, the dread path once trod
Heav’n lifts up its everlasting portals high
And bids “the pure in heart, behold their God”
18th Century
