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Farewel dear babe, my hearts too much content,
Farewel sweet babe, the pleasure of mine eye,
Farewel fair flower that for a space was lent,
Then ta’en away unto Eternity.
Blest babe, why should I once bewail thy fate,
Or sigh the dayes so soon were terminate;
Since thou art settled in an Everlasting state.
By nature Trees do rot when they are grown,
And Plumbs and Apples thoroughly ripe do fall,
And Corn and grass are in their season mown,
And time brings down what is both strong and tall.
But plants new set to be eradicate.
And buds new blown, to have so short a date,
Is by his hand alone that guides nature and fate.
Anne Bradstreet, “In memory of my dear grand-child Elizabeth Bradstreet, who deceased August, 1665. Being a year and half old,” in The Works of Anne Bradstreet in Prose and Verse. (Charlestown: A. E. Cutter, 1867). New-York Historical Society Library.
*The eldest child of her son Samuel.
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With troubled heart & trembling hand I write,
The Heavens have chang’d to sorrow my delight.
How oft with disappointment have I met,
When I on fading things my hopes have set?
Experience might ‘fore this have made me wise,
To value things according to their price.
Was ever stable joy yet found below?
Or perfect bliss without mixture of woe?
I knew she was but as a withering flower,
That’s here to day, perhaps gone in an hour;
Like as a bubble, or the brittle glass,
Or like a shadow turning as it was.
More fool then I to look on that was lent,
As if mine own, when thus impermanent.
Farewell dear child, thou ne’re shall come to me,
But yet a while, and I shall go to thee;
Mean time my throbbing heart’s chear’d up with this
Thou with thy Saviour art in endless bliss.
Anne Bradstreet, “In memory of my dear grandchild Anne Bradstreet.* Who deceased June 20, 1669. Being three years and seven Months old,” in The Works of Anne Bradstreet in Prose and Verse. (Charlestown: A. E. Cutter, 1867). New-York Historical Society Library.
*”June. 20. 69 My Br Samuels eldest child which was a daughter, between 3 & four yeares old dyed. He buried ye first yt ever had (w’ch also was a daughter) about 4 yeares since. The Ld teach him, and me, and all who it espec. concernes good thereby.”—Rev. Simon Bradstreet’s Manuscript Diary