The first great web is woven, the court described enough,

Time now to flee to Hofwijk. Who knows the thread of life

How short, how strong it is? The loudest sounding string

Will often break the first, in life and on the lute,

Being tuned too high, too taut, abraded by the times.

Such tension I have known, but safely have endured it,

It comes down to attrition. And this has two signs

(I were a fool denying it): my years and my grey hairs.

When the stretched lutestring frays, abraded, split and worn,

It shows that it is ready, quite suddenly, to go.

Who knows if the sudden hour of your going forth, my soul,

Lies not before you now? And if it should please God

To take me, would my house outlive my days unsung,

Be outdone by my Tempe? Would I stint my own,

Who have so often lent my pen to others’ work?

Justly I’d be accused of negligence, when dead,

With justice would my epitaph begin, ‘Here lies

A man who thought it would suffice to plant and dig,

Who followed farmer's arts and never took the time

To ornament his own creation with a song.’

My death I can't postpone simply by living long,

But, if I live a while, I will prevent that charge:

That which I plant I’ll sing, and rhyme all that I grow,

Before my voice grows hoarse, before my pen grows old.

I’d make the stranger see and make the Dutchman read

Hofwijk as it stands now, the Hofwijk that shall be.

So frail are human works, paper outlasts them all,

Time wears the shrub and stone: in time it will be said,

‘Here once his Hofwijk stood, now rubble, weeds and spoil.’

And then shall Hofwijk stand, still flowering in its pride

If any words that come, my reader, from my hand

Have ever braved the years and conquered ruinous time.

Ick will u Hofwijck doen aenschouwen, of 't te nacht,

Gelijck als duijvels-brood, te voorschijn waer gebracht.

Jae meer, ick will het u, en mij oock, doen betreden

Als waer ons gisteren een’ gansche eew geleden

’Kwill met kinds kinderen goed deelen voor mijn’ dood,

Als waer ick Grootevaer en twee drij mael soo groot.