The following verse is remarkable to me in its sheer
hedonism.
Coronemus nos Rosis antequam marcescant
by Thomas Jordan. 1612?–1685
LET us
drink and be
merry,
dance,
joke, and
rejoice,
With
claret and
sherry,
theorbo and
voice!
The changeable world to our joy is unjust,
All treasure 's uncertain,
Then down with your dust!
In
frolics dispose your
pounds,
shillings, and
pence,
For
we shall be nothing a hundred years hence.
We'll sport and be free with Moll, Betty, and Dolly,
Have
oysters and
lobsters to cure melancholy:
Fish-dinners will make a man spring like a
flea,
Dame
Venus, love's lady,
Was born of the sea;
With her and with
Bacchus we'll tickle the sense,
For we shall be
past it a hundred years hence.
Your most beautiful bride who with
garlands is
crown'd
And kills with each glance as she treads on the
ground,
Whose lightness and brightness doth shine in such
splendour
That none but the stars
Are thought fit to attend her,
Though now she be pleasant and sweet to the sense,
Will be damnable mouldy a hundred years hence.
Then why should we
turmoil in cares and in fears,
Turn all our tranquill'ty to sighs and to tears?
Let 's eat, drink, and play till the worms do corrupt
us,
'Tis certain, Post mortem
Nulla voluptas.
For health, wealth and beauty, wit, learning and
sense,
Must all come to
nothing a hundred years hence.