I.

Cruel disease! ah, could it not suffice, Thy old and constant spite to exercise Against the gentlest and the fairest sex, Which still thy depredations most do vex? Where still thy malice, most of all (Thy malice or thy lust) does on the fairest fall, And in them most assault the fairest place, The throne of empress beauty, ev'n the face. There was enough of that here to assuage, (One would have thought) either thy lust or rage; Was't not enough, when thou, profane disease, Didst on this glorious temple seize: Was't not enough, like a wild zealot, there, All the rich outward ornaments to tear, Deface the innocent pride of beauteous images? Was't not enough thus rudely to defile, But thou must quite destroy the goodly pile? And thy unbounded sacrilege commit On th'inward holiest holy of her wit? Cruel disease! there thou mistook'st thy power; No mine of death can that devour, On her embalmed name it will abide An everlasting pyramide, As high as heav'n the top, as earth, the basis wide.