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The Whole Works of William Browne

of Tavistock ... Now first collected and edited, with a memoir of the poet, and notes, by W. Carew Hazlitt, of the Inner Temple

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And now from all at once my leaue I take
With this petition, that when thou shalt wake,
My teares already spent may serue for thine,
And all thy sorrowes be excus'd by mine!
Yea rather then my losse should draw on hers,
(Heare, Heauen, the suit which my sad soule prefers!)
Let this her slumber, like Obliuions streame,
Make her beleeue our loue was but a dreame!
Let me be dead in her as to the earth,
Ere Nature lose the grace of such a birth.
Sleepe thou sweet soule from all disquiet free,
And since I now beguile thy destinie,
Let after patience in thy brest arise,
To giue his name a life who for thee dies.

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He dyes for thee that worthy is to dye,
Since now in leauing that sweet harmonie
Which Nature wrought in thee, he drawes not to him
Enough of sorrow that might streight vndoe him.
And haue for meanes of death his parting hence,
So keeping Iustice still in Innocence.