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And first within the porch and jaws of hell

Sat deep Remorse of Conscience, all besprent

With tears; and to herself oft would she tell

Her wretchedness, and cursing never stent

To sob and sigh; but ever thus lament,

With thoughtful care, as she that, all in vain,

Would wear and waste continually in pain.

Next saw we Dread, all trembling: how he shook

With foot uncertain, proffered here and there,

Benumbed of speech, and, with a ghastly look,

Searched every place, all pale and dead for fear,

His cap borne up with staring of his hair,

’Stoin’d and amazed at his own shade for dread

And fearing greater dangers than he need.

And next, in order sad, Old Age we found,

His beard all hoar, his eyes hollow and blind,

With drooping cheer still poring on the ground,

As on the place where Nature him assigned

To rest, when that the sisters had untwined

His vital thread, and ended with their knife

The fleeting course of fast-declining life.

These stanzas are from the Induction. Or take the following from the Complaint of the Duke of Buckingham: