Rest then, triumphant soul! for ever rest! And, like the Ph[oe]nix in her spicy nest, Embalm'd with thine own merit, upward fly, Born in a cloud of perfume to the sky. Whilst as in deathless urns, each noble mind Treasures thy ashes which are left behind.
And if perhaps no Cassiopeian spark (Which in the North did thy first rising mark) 130 Shine o'er thy hearse; the breath of our just praise Shall to the firmament thy virtues raise; Then fix, and kindle them into a star, Whose influence may crown thy glorious war.
_----O Famâ ingens, ingentior armis, Rex Gustave, quibus Coelo te laudibus aequem?_ Virgil. _Aeneid. lib. 2._ [11?]
[_Gustavus Adolphus._] This piece had been previously printed in the _Swedish Intelligencer_, 1633, with other elegies on the subject, one of which (in Malone MS. 21) is also ascribed to King, but without any other evidence, and (as Hannah seems to be right in thinking) very improbably. He gives some variants, only two of which seem to me important enough to reproduce. There are also versions in Rawlinson Poetic MS. 26, fol. 51, and 160, fol. 39.]
[Lines: 6-7 Hannah in his note, though in his text he had followed _1657_, as above, prefers the reading of the _Intelligencer_--a full-stop at 'it', and 'To begin', which is to a certain extent supported by a capitalized 'To' in his MS., though there is not a full-stop. He has two notes on the subject, and for a moment I was perplexed. But I feel certain that the _1657_ text is right. Hannah's parallel from King's prose, 'I begin there where all must end', is specious, but not convincing. On the other hand, 'To begin, &c.' is wanted to complete 'for less' and to explain 'sin'. Honour, as the next sentence further tells us, perished with Gustavus, and it is a solecism to attempt to continue it in verse. This is, in the Archdeacon's words elsewhere, 'frigid and artificial' enough; but it is also sufficiently 'metaphysical'.]
[Line: 10 Orig. has full-stop at 'snuff', but this (which Hannah keeps and does not comment on) leaves nothing to complete 'as'.]
[Line: 11 airy] For the 'ayerie' of edition and Malone MS., the _Intelligencer_, and Rawlinson MS. 160 have 'fiery'--I think, in the context, better.]
[Line: 96. Orig. note. _Magis triumphati quam victi_. Tacit. _de Mor. Ger._]