Man is a stranger to himself, and knows Nothing so naturally as his woes. He loves to travel countries, and confer The sides of Heaven's vast diameter: Delights to sit in Nile or Bætis' lap, Before he hath sail'd over his own map; 10 By which means he returns, his travel spent, Less knowing of himself than when he went. Who knowledge hunt kept under foreign locks, May bring home wit to hold a paradox, Yet be fools still. Therefore, might I advise, I would inform the soul before the eyes: Make man into his proper optics look, And so become the student and the book. With his conception, his first leaf, begin; What is he there but complicated sin? 20 When riper time, and the approaching birth Ranks him among the creatures of the earth, His wailing mother sends him forth to greet The light, wrapp'd in a bloody winding sheet; As if he came into the world to crave No place to dwell in, but bespeak a grave. Thus like a red and tempest-boding morn His dawning is: for being newly born He hails th' ensuing storm with shrieks and cries, And fines for his admission with wet eyes. 30 How should that plant, whose leaf is bath'd in tears, Bear but a bitter fruit in elder years? Just such is this, and his maturer age Teems with event more sad than the presage. For view him higher, when his childhood's span Is raised up to youth's meridian; When he goes proudly laden with the fruit Which health, or strength, or beauty contribute; Yet,--as the mounted cannon batters down The towers and goodly structures of a town,-- 40 So one short sickness will his force defeat, And his frail citadel to rubbish beat. How does a dropsy melt him to a flood, Making each vein run water more than blood? A colic wracks him like a northern gust, And raging fevers crumble him to dust. In which unhappy state he is made worse By his diseases than his Maker's curse. God said in _toil and sweat_ he should earn bread, And without labour not be nourished: 50 There, though like ropes of falling dew, his sweat Hangs on his lab'ring brow, he cannot eat. Thus are his sins scourg'd in opposed themes, And luxuries reveng'd by their extremes. He who in health could never be content With rarities fetch'd from each element, Is now much more afflicted to delight His tasteless palate, and lost appetite.