| I | F mightie TROIE,
with gates of steele, and brasse,
Bee
worne awaie, with tracte of stealinge time :
|
If CARTHAGE, raste : if THEBES be growne with grasse.
If BABEL stoope : that to the cloudes did clime :
If ATHENS, and NVMANTIA suffered spoile :
If ÆGYPT spires, be euened with the soile.
Then, what maye laste, which time dothe not impeache,
Since that wee see, theise monumentes are gone :
Nothinge at all, but time doth ouer reache,
It eates the steele, and weares the marble stone :
But writinges laste, thoughe yt doe what it can,
And are preseru'd, euen since the worlde began.
And so they shall, while that they same dothe laste,
Which haue declar'd, and shall to future age :
What thinges before three thousande yeares haue paste,
What martiall knightes, haue march'd vppon this stage :
Whose actes, in bookes if writers did not saue,
Their fame had ceaste, and gone with them to graue.
Of SAMSONS strengthe, of worthie IOSVAS might.
Of DAVIDS actes, of ALEXANDERS force.
Of CÆSAR greate; and SCIPIO noble knight,
Howe shoulde we speake, but bookes thereof discourse :
Then fauour them, that learne within their youthe :
But loue them beste, that learne, and write the truthe.
[@
Whitney 131]
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