Pene? quid hoc pene est? Vicinia saeva salutis! O quam tu malus es proximitate boni! Ah, portu qui teste perit, bis naufragus ille est; Hunc non tam pelagus, quam sua terra premit. Quae nobis spes vix absunt, crudelius absunt: Pene sui felix, emphasis est miseri. _Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian._ _Almost?_ What word is this we hear? O doubly lost, with heaven so near! To perish in the neighbourhood Of vast but unavailing good! He shipwreck undergoes twice o'er Who perishes in sight of shore, And less by ocean is o'ercome Than by that hopeless glimpse of home. The hopes that almost seem our own Leave all the keener sting when gone; And just to miss felicity Is but emphatic misery. CL. LXIII. _Lux venit in mundum, sed dilexerunt homines magis tenebras quam lucem._ Joan. iii. 19. Luce sua venit ecce Deus, mundoque refulget; Pergit adhuc tenebras mundus amare suas. At Stygiis igitur mundus damnabitur umbris: Pergit adhuc tenebras mundus amare suas? _But men loved darkness rather than light._ The world's Light shines: shine as it will, The world will love its darknesse still. I doubt though, when the world's in hell, It will not love its darknesse halfe so well. CR. ANOTHER VERSION. Behold the day of Christ! God comes with light; Yet the world loves the darkness of the night. Therefore the world to Stygian darkness will Be damn'd: and doth the world love darkness still? B. ANOTHER RENDERING. Lo, God comes girt with light, and all the world o'ershines: The world abides in night, nor watcheth for the signs. To Stygian darkness hurl'd on the great Day of Doom, Shalt thou, night-loving world, still love thy lightless gloom? G. LXIV. _Dives implorat guttam._ Luc. xvi. 24. O mihi si digito tremat et tremat unica summo Gutta! ô si flammas mulceat una meas! Currat opum quocunque volet levis unda mearum; Una mihi haec detur gemmula, Dives ero. _Dives asking a drop._ A drop, one drop! how sweetly one faire drop Would tremble on my pearle-tipt finger's top! My wealth is gone: O, goe it where it will, Spare this one iewell, I'le be Dives still. CR. LXV. _Quomodo potest homo gigni qui est senex?_ Joan. iii. 4. Dic, Phœnix unde in nitidos novus emicat annos, Plaudit et elusos aurea penna rogos? Quis colubrum dolus insinuat per secula retro, Et jubet emeritum luxuriare latus? Cur rostro pereunte suam praedata senectam Torva ales, rapido plus legit ore diem? Immo, sed ad nixus praestat Lucina secundos? Natales seros unde senex habeat. Ignoras, Pharisaee? sat est: jam credere disces: Dimidium fidei, qui bene nescit, habet. _How can a man be born when he is old?_