EPITAPHIUM CHEMICUM.

1791.

Here lieth to digest, macerate, and amalgamate with clay, In balneo arenæ,

stratum super stratum,

The residuum, terra damnata, and caput mortuum
OF A CHEMIST.

A man who in his earthly Laboratory
Pursued various processes to obtain
The ARCANUM VITE,

Or the secret to Live;

Also the AURUM VITÆ, or
The Art of getting, not making, Gold.
Alchemist-like, he saw all

His labor and projection,

As mercury in the fire, evaporated in fume.
When he dissolved to his first principles,
He departed as poor

As the last drops of an alembic.
Though fond of novelty, he carefully avoided
The fermentation, effervescence,

Among the elect of the Flowers of Benjamin; Never to be saturated till the general resuscitation, Deflagration, calcination,

And sublimation of all things.

MISCELLANEOUS.

ON SIR JOHN VANBRUGH, THE ARCHITECT.
Lie heavy on him, earth; for he

Laid many heavy loads on thee.-EVANS.

THE ORATOR'S EPITAPH.

Here, reader, turn your weeping eyes,

My fate a useful moral teaches;

The hole in which my body lies

Would not contain one-half my speeches.

LORD BROUGHAM.

ON A WATCHMAKER, 1802, ET. 57.

Here lies, in horizontal position,
the outside Case of

GEORGE ROUTLEIGH, Watchmaker; Integrity was the Mainspring, and prudence the Regulator,

of all the actions of his life.

Humane, generous, and liberal,
his Hand never stopped,

till he had relieved distress.

So nicely regulated were all his Motions,

that he never went wrong,
except when set a-going
by people

who did not know his Key:

Even then he was easily

set right again.

He had the art of disposing his time so well, that his Hours kept running on

in a continual round of pleasure, till an unlucky Minute put a stop to his existence.

He departed this life

in hopes of being taken in hand
by his Maker;

and of being thoroughly Cleaned, Repaired,
Wound up, and Set a-going

in the world to come.

ON A SAN FRANCISCO MONEY-LENDER.

Here lies old thirty-five per cent.:
The more he made, the more he lent;
The more he got, the more he craved;
The more he made, the more he shaved;
Great God! can such a soul be saved?

ON A MISER.

Here crumbling lies, beneath this mould,
A man whose sole delight was gold.
Contentment never was his guest,

Though thrice ten thousand filled his chest;
For he, poor man, with all his store,
Died in great want,-the want of more.

ON AN IMPORTUNATE TAILOR.

Here lies W. W.,

Who never more will trouble you, trouble you.

ON AN AFFECTIONATE COUPLE.

In this cold bed here consummated are
The second nuptials of this happy pair,

Whom envious Death once parted, but in vain ;
For now himself hath made them one again,
Here wedded in the grave; and 'tis but just

That they who were one flesh should be one dust.

Suggested as a fitting epitaph for the author of "Sweet Home," who was an American by birth, and died at Tunis, Africa.

IN MEMORIAM.

J. Howard Payne,

The author of "Sweet Home."

A wanderer in life: he whose songs were sung
by every tongue, and found an echo

in every heart,
never had a home.

He died
in a foreign land.

ON AN INFIDEL.

From the Latin.

Beneath this stone the mouldering relics lie
Of one to whom Religion spoke in vain;

He lived as though he never were to die,

And died as though he ne'er should live again.

PROPOSED BY A FRENCH THEOLOGIAN FOR VOLTAIRE.

In poesi magnus,

In historia parvus,

In philosophia minimus,

In religione nullus.

Hume, the classic historian of England, denied the existence of matter, and held that the whole congeries of material things are but impressions and ideas in the mind, distinguishing an impression from an idea by its stronger effect on the thinking faculty. Dr. Beattie sufficiently exposed the absurdity; but his famous essay has nothing more pointed than the witty epitaph that somebody wrote on the marble shaft that stands over the infidel's grave:—

Beneath this circular idea, vulgarly called tomb,

Impressions and ideas rest, which constituted Hume.

ON TOM PAINE.

Tom Paine for the Devil is surely a match.

In leaving old England he cheated Jack Ketch;

In France (the first time such a thing had been seen)
He cheated the watchful and sharp guillotine;

And at last, to the sorrow of all the beholders,

He marched out of life with his head on his shoulders.

EARTH TO EARTH.

Few persons have met with the following poem, now nearly four centuries old; but many will recognise in some of the stanzas, particularly the first four and the last four, the source of familiar monumental inscriptions. The antiquary can refer to many a dilapidated stone on which these quaint old lines can yet be traced.

Vado mori Rex sum, quid honor quid gloria mundi,
Est vita mors hominum regia-vado mori.

Vado mori miles victo certamine belli,

Mortem non didici vincere vado mori.

Vado mori medicus, medicamine non relevandus,
Quicquid agunt medici respuo vado mori,

Vado mori logicus, aliis concludere novi,
Concludit breviter mors in vado mori.

Earth out of earth is worldly wrought;

Earth hath gotten upon earth a dignity of nought;
Earth upon earth has set all his thought,

How that earth upon earth might be high brought.

Earth upon earth would be a king,

But how that earth shall to earth he thinketh no thing
When earth biddeth earth his rents home bring,
Then shall earth from earth have a hard parting.

Earth upon earth winneth castles and towers,
Then saith earth unto earth this is all ours; .
But when earth upon earth has builded his bowers,
Then shall earth upon earth suffer hard showers.

Earth upon earth hath wealth upon mould;
Earth goeth upon earth glittering all in gold,
Like as he unto earth never turn should;

And yet shall earth unto earth sooner than he would.

Why that earth loveth earth wonder I think,

Or why that earth will for earth sweat and swink.

For when earth upon earth is brought within the brink,

Then shall earth for earth suffer a foul stink.

As carth upon earth were the worthies nine,

And as earth upon earth in honor did shine;

But earth list not to know how they should incline,

And their gowns laid in the earth when death hath made his fine.

As earth upon earth full worthy was Joshua,

David, and worthy King Judas Maccabee,

They were but earth none of them three;

And so from earth unto earth they left their dignity.

Alisander was but earth that all the world wan,

And Hector upon earth was held a worthy man,
And Julius Cæsar, that the Empire first began ;
And now as earth within earth they lie pale and wan.

Arthur was but earth for all his renown,

No more was King Charles nor Godfrey of Boulogne;
But now earth hath turned their nobleness upside down,
And thus earth goeth to earth by short conclusion.

Whoso reckons also of William Conqueror,
King Henry the First that was of knighthood flower,
Earth hath closed them full straitly in his bower,—
So the end of worthiness,-here is no more succor.