The Poems of Henry Howard :: :: University of Virginia Library

I, Salamon, Dauids sonne, King of Ierusalem,
Chossen by God to teach the Iewes and in his lawes to leade them,
Confesse vnder the sonne that euery thing is uayne,
The world is false, man he is fraile, and all his pleasures payne.
Alas! what stable frute may Adams children fynde
In that, they seke by sweate of browes and trauill of their mynde.
We that liue on the earthe, drawe toward our decay;
Ower childeren fill our place a whille, and then they fade awaye.
Such chaunges maks the earthe, and doth remoue for none,
But sarues us for a place too play our tragedes vppon.
When that the restles sonne, westwarde his course hathe ronne,
Towards the east he hasts as fast, to ryse where he begonne.
When hoorrey Boreas hathe blowen his frosen blaste,
Then Zephirus, with his gentill breathe, dissolues the ise as fast.
Ffludds that drinke vpp smale broks and swell by rage of rayne,
Discharge in sees which them repulse, and swallowe strayte againe.
These worldly pleasures, Lord, so swifte they ronne their race
That skace our eyes may them discerne, they bide so littell space.
What hathe bin, but is now, the like hereafter shall.
What new deuice grounded so suer, that dreadeth not the fall?
What may be called new, but suche things in tymes past
As time buryed and dothe reuiue, and tyme agayne shall waste?
Things past right worthey fame, haue now no brute at all;
Euen so shall dey suche things as now the simple, wounders call.
I that, in Dauides seate, sit crowned and reioyce,
That with my septer rewle the Iewes and teache them with my uoyce,
Haue serchied long to know all things vnder the sonne,
To see how, in this mortall lyef, a suerty might be wonne.
This kyndled will to knowe, straunge things for to desyer,
God hathe grafte in our gredye breasts, a torment for our hier.
The end of eache trauell, furthwith I sought to knoo;
I found them uaine, mixed with gall, and burdend with muche woo.
Defaults of natures wourke no mans hand may restore,

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Whiche be in nomber like the sandes vppon the salte floods shore.
Then, vaunting in my witte, I gan call to my mynd
What rewles of wysdom I hadde taught, that elders could not find;
And as, by contraries, to treye most things, we use,
Mens follies and ther errors, eke, I gan them all peruse,
Thyerby with more delight, to knowledge for to clime.
But this I found an endles wourke of payne and losse of tyme,
Ffor he, to wisdomes skoole, that doth applie his mynd,
The further that he wades ther in, the greater doubts shall find.
And such as enterprice, to put newe things in ure,
Of some, that shall skorne their deuise, may well them selfes assure.