1My heart, why dost thou throb so in my breast?

2What, dost thou ail? What causeth thy unrest?

3Dost thou not know that, as the flames ascend,

4So man in sorrow doth begin and end?

5The

sprightly1

lark, how cheerfully she sings,

6Until the hawk her little neck off wrings;

7Yet thou to sigh and sob dost never cease

8Because thy sorrows with thy years increase.

9The milk-white lamb that on the altar lies

10Yields himself up a quiet sacrifice;

11But thou wouldst have the course of nature turn

12Rather than in affliction’s furnace burn.

13The

phoenix2

doth

assume3

her funeral pyre,

14And in those

flagrant4

odors doth expire;

15But thou, my soul, unwilling art to die,

16And in thy grave

obliviated5

lie,

17Although it would thy

drossy6

part

calcine7

18Away, and infinitely refine

19Thy flesh, that it more gloriously may shine.