Thomas Carew, Gentleman of the Bed chamber to King Charles the First. From a Medal by Varin.  
POEMS, With a MASK, BY THOMAS CAREW Esq  
One of the Gent. of the Privy-Chamber, and Sewer in Ordinary to his late Majesty.  
The Songs were set in Music by Mr. HENRY LAW Gent. of the King's Chapel, and one of his late Majesty's Private-Musick.  
The third Edition revised and enlarged.  
LONDON Printed for H. M. and are to be sold by I: Martin, at the sign of the Bell in St. Pauls-Church-Yard. 1651.   

POEMS  

The Spring.  

NOw that the winter's gone, the earth hath lost  
Her snow-white robes, and now no more the frost  
Candy's the grass, or casts an icy cream  
Upon the Silver Lake, or Crystal stream:  
But the warm Sun thaws the benumbed Earth,  
And makes it tender, gives a sacred birth  
To the dead Swallow, wakes in hollow tree  
The drowsy Cuckoo, and the Humblebee.  
Now do a choir of chirping Minstrels bring  
In triumph to the world, the youthful Spring.  
The valleys, hills, and woods, in rich array,  
Welcome the coming of the longed for May.  
Now all things smile; only my Love doth lower:  
Nor hath the scalding Noon-day-Sun the power,  
To melt that marble ice, which still doth hold  
Her heart congealed, and makes her pity cold.  
The Ox which lately did for shelter fly  
Into the stall, doth now securely lie  
In open fields; and love no more is made  
By the fire side; but in the cooler shade  
Amyntas now doth with his Cloris sleep  
Under a Sycamore, and all things keep  
Time with the season, only she doth carry  
june in her eyes, in her heart january.    

To A. L. Persuasions to love.  

Think not, 'cause men flattering say  
Y'are fresh as April, Sweet as May,  
Bright as is the Morning star,  
That you are so; or though you are,  
Be not therefore proud, and doem  
All men unworthy your esteem:  
For being so, you lose the pleasure  
Of being fair, since that rich treasure  
Of rare beauty, and sweet feature,  
Was bestowed on you by Nature  
To be enjoyed, and 'twere a sin  
There to be scarce, where she hath been  
So prodigal of her best graces;  
Thus common beauties, and mean faces  
Shall have more pastime, and enjoy  
The sport you lose by being coy,  
Did the thing for which I sue  
Only concern myself, not you;  
Were men so framed as they alone  
Reaped all the pleasure, women none,  
Then had you reason to be scant;  
But 'twere a madness not to grant  
That which affords (if you consent)  
To you the giver, more content,  
Than me the beggar; Oh then be  
Kind to yourself, if not to me;  
Starve not yourself, because you may  
Thereby make me pine away;  
Nor let brittle beauty make  
You your wiser thoughts forsake:  
For that lovely face will fail;  
beauty's sweet, but beauties frail;  
'tis sooner passed, 'tis sooner done  
Than Summer's rain, or Winter's Sun;  
Most fleeting when it is most dear;  
'tis gone while we but say 'tis here.  
These curious locks so aptly twined,  
Whose every hair a soul doth bind,  
Will change their abroun hue, and grow  
White, and cold as winter's snow.  
That eye which now is Cupid's nest  
Will prove his grave, and all the rest  
Will follow; in the cheek; chin, nose,  
Nor Lily shall be found, nor Rose;  
And what will then become of all  
Those, whom now you servants call?  
Like Swallows when your summers done,  
They'll fly, and seek some warmer Sun.  
Then wisely choose one to your friend,  
Whose love may (when your beauty's end)  
Remain still firm: be provident  
And think before the summer's spent  
Of following winter; like the Ant  
In plenty hoard for time of scant.  
Cull out amongst the multitude  
Of Lovers, that seek to intrude  
Into your favour, one that may  
Love for an age, not for a day;  
One that will quench your youthful fires,  
And feed in age your hot desires.  
For when the storms of time have moved  
Waves on that check which was beloved,  
When a fair Lady's face is pined,  
And yellow spread where red once shined,  
When beauty, youth, and all sweets leave her,  
Love may return, but Lover never:  
And old folks say there are no pains  
Like itch of love in aged veins.  
Oh love me then, and now begin it,  
Let us not lose this present minute:  
For time and age will work that wrack  
Which time or age shall ne'er call back.  
The snake each year fresh skin resumes,  
And Eagles change their aged plumes;  
The faded Rose each spring receives  
A fresh red tincture on her leaves:  
But if your beauties once decay,  
You never know a second May.  
Oh, then be wise, and whilst your season  
Affords you days for sport, do reason;  
Spend not in vain your lives short hour,  
But crop in time your beauty's flower:  
Which will away, and doth together  
Both bud and fade, both blow and wither.    

Lips and Eyes.  

IN Celia's face a question did arise  
Which were more beautiful, her Lips or Eyes:  
We (said the Eyes) send forth those pointed darts  
Which pierce the hardest adamantine hearts.  
From us (replied the Lips) proceed those blisses,  
Which Lovers reap by kind words, and sweet kisses.  
Then wept the Eyes, and from their springs did power  
Of liquid oriental pearl a shower.  
Whereat the Lips moved with delight and pleasure,  
Through a sweet smile unlocked their pearlie treasure;  
And bade Love judge, whether did add more grace,  
Weeping, or smiling, pearls in Celia's face.    

A Divine Mistress.  

IN Nature's pieces still I see  
Some error, that might mended be;  
Something my wish could still remove,  
Alter or add; but my fair Love  
Was framed by hands far more divine;  
For she hath every beauteous line:  
Yet I had been far happier  
Had Nature that made me, made her;  
Then likeness might (that love creates)  
Have made her love what now she hates:  
Yet I confess I cannot spare,  
From her just shape the smallest hair;  
Nor need I beg from all the store  
Of heaven, for her one beauty more:  
She hath too much divinity for me,  
You gods teach her some more humanity.    

SONG. A Beautiful Mistress.  

IF when the sun at noon displays  
His brighter rays,  
Thou but appear,  
He then all pale with shame and fear,  
Quencheth his light.  
Hides his dark brow, flies from thy sight,  
And grows more dim  
Compared to thee, than stars to him.  
If thou but show thy face again,  
When darkness doth at midnight reign,  
The darkness flies, and light is hurled,  
Round about the silent world:  
So as alike thou driv'st away,  
Both light and darkness, night and day.    

A Cruel Mistress.  

WE read of Kings, and Gods, that kindly took  
A pitcher filled with water from the Brook:  
But I have daily tendered without thanks  
Rivers of tears that overflow their banks.  
A slaughtered Bull will appease angry love.  
A Horse the Sun, a Lamb the God of love:  
But she disdains the spotless sacrifice  
Of a pure heart, that at her altar lies.  
Vesta is not displeased if her chaste urn  
Do with repaired fuel ever burn;  
But my Saint frowns, though to her honoured name  
I consecreate a never-dying flame.  
Th' Assyrian King did none i'th' furnace throw,  
But those that to his Image did not bow;  
With bended knees I daily worship her,  
Yet she consumes her own Idolater.  
Of such a Goddess no times leave record,  
That burned the Temple, where she was adored.    

SONG. Murdering Beauty.  

I'll gaze no more on her bewitching face,  
Since ruin harbours there in every place:  
For my enchanted soul alike she drowns  
With calms and tempests of her smiles and frowns  
I'll love no more those cruel eyes of hers,  
Which pleased, or angered, still are Murderers:  
For if she dart (like lightning) through the air  
Her beams of wrath, she kills me with despair;  
If she behold nice with a pleasing eye,  
I surfeit with excess of joy, and die.    

My Mistress commanding me to return her letters.  

SO grives th'adventurous Merchant, when he throws  
All the long-toyld-for treasure his ship stows,  
Into the angry main, to save from wrack  
Himself and men; as I grieve to give back  
These letters: yet so powerful is your sway,  
As if you bid me die, I must obey.  
Go then blest papers, you shall kiss those-hands  
That gave you freedom, but hold me in bands;  
Which with a touch did give you life, but I,  
Because I may not touch those hands, must die.  
Me thinks, as if they knew they should be sent  
Home to their native soil from banishment,  
I see them smile, like dying Saints, that know  
They are to leave the earth, and towered heaven go.  
When you return, pray tell your Sovereign,  
And mine, I gave you courteous entertain;  
Each line received a tear, and then a kiss,  
First bathed in that, it scaped unscorched from this:  
I kissed it, because your hand had been there,  
But 'cause it was not now, I shed a tear.  
Tell her no length of time, nor change of air,  
No cruelty, disdain, absence, despair,  
No nor her steadfast constancy can deter  
My vassal heart from ever honouring her.  
Though these be powerful arguments to prove  
I love in vain; yet I must ever love.  
Say if she frown when you that word rehearse,  
Service in prose, is oft called love in verse:  
Then pray her, since I send back on my part  
Her papers, she will send me back my heart.  
If she refuse, warn her to come before  
The God of Love, whom thus I will implore.  
traveling thy Country's road (great God) I spied  
By chance this Lady, and walked by her side  
From place to place, fearing no violence,  
For I was well armed, and had made defence  
In former fights, against fiercer foes, than she  
Did at our first encounter seem to be:  
But going farther, every step revealed  
Some hidden weapon, till that time concealed.  
Seeing those outward arms, I did begin  
To fear, some greater strength was lodged within.  
Looking unto her mind, I might survey  
An host of beauties that in ambush lay;  
And won the day before they fought the field:  
For I unable to resist, did yield.  
But the insulting tyrant so destroys  
My conquered mind, my ease, my peace, my joys;  
Breaks my sweet sleeps, invades my harmless rest,  
Robs me of all the treasure of my breast;  
Spares not my heart, nor yet a greater wrong;  
For having stolen my heart, she binds my tongue.  
But at the last her melting eyes unsealed  
My lips, enlarged my tongue, than I revealed  
To her own ears the story of my harms  
Wrought by her virtues, and her beauty's charms.  
Now hear (Just judge) an act of savageness,  
When I complain in hope to find redress,  
She bends her angry brow, and from her eye  
Shoots thousand darts, I then well hoped to die;  
But in such sovereign balm, Love dips his shot,  
That though they wound a heart, they kill it not;  
She saw the blood gush forth from many a wound,  
Yet fled, and left me bleeding on the ground,  
Nor sought my cure, nor saw me since; 'tis true,  
Absence, and time, (two cunning Leeches) drew  
The flesh together, yet sure though the skin  
Be closed without, the wound festers within.  
Thus hath this cruel Lady used a true  
Servant, and subject to herself, and you.  
Nor know I (great Love) if my life be lent  
To show thy mercy, or my punishment;  
If this indictment fright her, so as she  
Seem willing to return my heart to me,  
But cannot find it, (for perhaps it may,  
Amongst other trifling hearts, be out o'th' way)  
If she repent, and would make me amends,  
Bid her but send me hers, and we are friends.    

Secrecy protested.  

FEar not (dear Love) that I'll reveal  
Those hours of pleasure we two steal;  
No eye shall see, nor yet the Sun  
Descry, what thou and I have done;  
No ear shall hear our love, but we  
Silent as the night will be;  
The God of love himself (whose dart  
Did first wound mine, and then thy heart)  
Shall never know, that we can tell,  
What sweets in stolen embraces dwell:  
This only means may find it out,  
If when I die, Physicians doubt  
What caused my death, and there to view  
Of all their judgements which was true '  
Rip up my heart, O then I fear  
The world will see thy picture there.    

A prayer to the Wind.  

Go thou gentle whispering Wind,  
Bear this sigh; and if thou find  
Where my cruel fair doth rest  
Cast it in her snowy breast,  
So, inflamed by my desire,  
It may set her heart afire:  
Those sweet kisses thou shalt gain,  
Will reward thee for thy pain.  
Boldly light upon her lip,  
There suck odours, and thence skip  
To her bosom, lastly fall  
Down, and wander over all;  
Range about those Ivory hills  
From whose every part distils  
Amber dew; there spices grow,  
There pure streams of Nectar flow;  
There perfume thyself, and bring  
All those sweets upon thy wing:  
As thou returnest, change by thy power  
Every weed into a flower,  
Turn each Thistle to a Vine,  
Make the Bramble Eglantine.  
For so rich a booty made,  
Do but this, and I am paid.  
Thou canst with thy powerful blast,  
Heat apace, and cool as fast:  
Thou canst kindle hidden flame,  
And again destroy the same:  
Then for pity, either stir  
Up the fire of love in her,  
That alike both flames may shine,  
Or else quite extinguish mine.    

Mediocrity in love rejected. SONG.  

GIve me more Love, or more Disdain,  
The Torrid, or the Frozen Zone  
Bring equal ease unto my pain;  
The Temperate affords me none:  
Either extreme, of Love, or Hate,  
Is sweeter than a calm estate.   

Give me a storm; is it be Love,  
Like Danae in that golden shower  
I swim in pleasure; if it prove  
Disdain, that Torrent will devour  
My Vulture-hopes; and he's possessed  
Of Heaven, that's but from Hell released:  
Then crown my joys, or cure my pain;  
Give me more Love, or more— Disdain.    

SONG. Good counsel to a young Maid:  

GAze not on thy beauty's pride,  
Tender Maid; in the false side  
That from Lover's eyes doth slide.   

Let thy faithful Crystal show,  
How thy colours come, and go,  
Beauty takes a foil from woe.   

Love, that in those smooth streams lies;  
Under pities fair disguise,  
Will thy melting heart suprize.   

Nets, of passions sinest thread,  
Snaring Poems, will be spread,  
All, to catch thy maidenhead.   

Then beware, for those that cure  
Loves disease, themselves endure  
For reward a Calenture.   

Rather let the Lover pine,  
Than his pale cheek should assign  
A perpetual blush to thine.    

TO my Mistress sitting by a River's side. AN EDDY.  

MArk how yond Eddy steals away,  
From the rude stream into the Bay,  
There locked up safe, she doth divorce  
Her waters from the channels course,  
And scorns the Torrent, that did bring  
Her head long from her native spring.  
Now doth she with her new love play,  
Whilst he runs murmuring away.  
Mark how she courts the banks, whilst they  
As amorously their arms display,  
T'embrace, and clip her silver waves:  
See how she strokes their sides, and craves  
An entrance there, which they deny;  
Whereat she frowns, threatening to fly  
Home to her stream, and begins to swim  
Backward, but from the channels brim,  
Smiling, returns into the creek,  
With thousand dimples on her cheek.  
Be thou this Eddy, and I'll make  
My breast thy shore, where thou shalt take  
Secure repose, and never dream  
Of the quite forsaken stream:  
Let him to the wide Ocean haste,  
There lose his colour, name, and taste;  
Thou shalt save all, and safe from him,  
Within these arms for ever swim.    

SONG. Conquest by flight.  

LAdies, fly from Love's smooth tale,  
Oaths steeped in tears do oft prevail;  
Grief is infectious, and the air  
Inflamed with sighs, will blast the fair:  
Then stop your cares, when Lovers cry,  
Lest yourself weep, when no soft eye  
Shall with a sorrowing tear repay  
That pity which you cast away.  
Young men fly, when beauty darts  
Amorous glances at your hearts:  
The fixed mark gives the shooter aim;  
And Lady's looks have power to maim.  
Now'twixt their lips, now in their eyes,  
Wrapped in a smile, or kiss, Love lies;  
Then fly betimes, for only they  
Conquer love that run away.    

SONG. To my inconstant Mistress.  

WHen thou, poor excommunicate  
From all the joys of love, shalt so  
The full reward, and glorious fate,  
Which my strong faith shall purchase me,  
Then curse thine own inconstancy.   

A fairer band than thine, shall cure  
That heart, which thy false oaths did wound;  
And to my soul, a soul more pure  
Than thine, shall by Love's hand be bound,  
And both with equal glory crowned.   

Then shalt thou weep, entreat, complain  
To Love, as I did once to thee;  
When all thy tears shall be as vain  
As mine were then, for thou shalt be  
Damned for thy false Apostasy,    

SONG Persuasions to enjoy.  

IF the quick spirits in your eye  
Now languish, and anon must die;  
If every sweet, and every grace,  
Must fly from that forsaken face:  
Then (Celia) let us reap our joys,  
E'er time such goodly fruit destroys.   

Or, if that golden fleece must grow  
For ever, free from aged snow;  
If those bright Suns must know no shade,  
Nor your fresh beauties ever fade;  
Then fear not (Celia) to bestow,  
What still being gathered still must grow.  
Thus, either Time his Sickle brings  
In vain, or else in vain his wings.    

A deposition from love.  

I Was foretold, your rebel sex,  
Nor love, nor pity knew;  
And with what scorn you use to vex  
Poor hearts that humbly sue;  
Yet I believed, to crown our pain,  
Could we the fortress win,  
The happy Lover sure should gain  
A Paradise within:  
I thought Love's plagues, like Dragons sat,  
Only to fright us at the gate.   

But I did enter, and enjoy  
What happy Lovers prove;  
For I could kiss, and sport, and toy,  
And taste those sweets of love;  
Which had they but a lasting state,  
Or if in Celia's breast  
The force of love might not abate,  
love were too mean a guest.  
But now her breach of faith, far more  
Afflicts, than did her scorn before.   

Hard fate! to have been once possessed,  
As victor, of aheart  
Achieved with labour, and unrest,  
And then forced to depart.  
If the stout Foe will not resign  
When I besiege a Town,  
I lose, but what was never mine;  
But he that is cast down  
From enjoyed beauty, feels a woe,  
Only deposed Kings can know.    

Ingrateful beauty threatened,  

KNow Celia, (since thou art so proud,)  
'Twas I that gave thee thy renown:  
Thou hadst, in the forgotten crowd  
Of common beauties, lived unknown,  
Had not my verse exhaled thy name,  
And with it imped the wings of fame.   

That killing power is none of thine,  
I gave it to thy voice, and eyes:  
Thy sweets, thy graces, all are mine;  
Thou art my star, shinest in my skies;  
Then dart not from thy borrowed sphere  
Lightning on him that fixed thee there.   

Tempt me with such affrights no more,  
Left what I made, I uncreate:  
Let fools thy mystique forms adore,  
I'll know thee in thy mortal state;  
Wise Poets that wrapped Truth in tales,  
Knew her themselves through all her veils.    

Disdain returned.  

He that loves a Rosy cheek,  
Or a Coral lip admires,  
Or from Starlike eyes doth seek  
Fuel to maintain his fires;  
As old Time makes these decay,  
So his flames must waste away.   

But a smooth and steadfast mind  
Gentle thoughts, and calm desires,  
Hearts with equal love combined,  
Kindle never dying fires.  
Where these are not, I despise  
Lovely cheeks, or lips, or eyes.   

No tears, Celia, now shall win,  
My resolved heart, to return;  
I have searched thy soul within,  
And find nought, but pride, and-scorn;  
I have learned thy arts, and now  
Can disdain as much as thou.  
Some power, in my revenge convey  
That love to her, I cast away.    

A Looking-glass.  

THat flattering Glass, whose smooth face wears  
Your shadow, which a Sun appears,  
Was once a river of my tears.   

About your cold heart they did make  
A circle, where the briny lake  
Congealed into a crystal cake.   

Gaze no more on that kill eye,  
For fear the native cruelty  
Doom you, as it doth all, to die.   

For fear lest the fair object move  
Your froward heart to fall in love,  
Than you yourself my rival prove.   

Look rather on my pale cheeks pined,  
There view your beauties, there you'll find  
A fair face, but a cruel mind.   

Be not for ever frozen, coy,  
One beam of love will soon destroy,  
And melt that ice, to floods of joy.    

An Elegy on the La: PEN: sent to my Mistress out of France.  

LEt him, who from his tyrant Mistress did  
This day receive his cruel doom, forbid  
His eyes to weep that loss, and let him here  
Open those floodgates, to bedew this beer;  
So shall those drops, which else would be but brine,  
Be turned to Manna, falling on her shrine.  
Let him, who banished far from her dear sight  
Whom his soul loves, doth in that absence write,  
Or lines of passion, or some powerful charms,  
To vent his own grief, or unlock her arms,  
Take off his pen, and in sad verse bemoan  
This general sorrow, and forget his own;  
So many those Verses live, which else mustdye:  
For though the Muses give eternity,  
When they embalm with verse, yet she could give  
Life unto that Muse, by which others live.  
Oh pardon me (fair soul) that boldly have  
Dropped though but one tear, on thy silent grave;  
And writ on that earth, which such honour had,  
To clothe that flesh wherein thyself was clad.  
And pardon me (sweet Saint) whom I adore,  
That I this tribute pay out of the store  
Of lines, and tears, that's only due to thee;  
Oh, do not think it new Idolatry;  
Though you are only sovereign of this Land,  
Yet universal losses may command  
A subsidy from every private eye,  
And press each pen to write, so to supply,  
And feed the common grief; if this excuse  
Prevail not, take these tears to your own use,  
As shed for you; for when I saw her die,  
I then did think on your mortality;  
For since nor virtue, wit, nor beauty, could  
Preserve from Death's hand, this their heavenly mould,  
Where they were framed all, and where they dwelled,  
I then knew you must die too, and did melt  
Into these tears: but thinking on that day,  
And when the gods resolved to take away  
A Saint from us, I that did know what dearth  
There was of such good souls upon the earth,  
Began to fear lest Death, their Officer,  
Might have mistake, and taken thee for her;  
So hadst thou robbed us of that happiness  
Which she in heaven, and I in thee possess.  
But what can heaven to her glory add?  
The praises she hath dead, living she had.  
To say she's now an Angel, is no more  
Praise than she had, for she was one before;  
Which of the Saints can show more votaries  
Than she had here? even those that did despise  
The Angels, and may her now she is one,  
Did, whilst she lived, with pure devotion  
Adore, and worship her; her virtues had  
All honour here, for this world was too bad  
To hate, or envy her; these cannot rise  
So high, as to repine at Deities:  
But now she's amongst her fellow Saints, they may  
Be good enough to envy her, this way  
There's loss i'th' change 'twixt heaven and earth, if she  
Should leave her servants here below, to be  
Hated of her competitors above;  
But sure her matchless goodness needs must move  
Those blessed souls to admire her excellence;  
By this means only can her journey hence  
To heaven prove gain, if as she was but here,  
Worshipped by men, she be by Angels there.  
But I must weep no more over this urn  
My tears to their own channel must return;  
And having ended these sad obsequies,  
My Muse must back to her old exercise,  
To tell the story of my martyrdom.  
But oh thou Idol of my soul, become  
Once pitiful, that she may change her stile,  
Dry up her blubbered eyes, and learn to smile.  
Rest then blest soul; for as ghosts fly away,  
When the shrill Cock proclaims the infant-day;  
So must I hence, for lo I see from far,  
The minions of the Muses coming are,  
Each of them bringing to thy sacred Hearse,  
In either eye a tear, each hand a Verse.    

To my Mistress in absence.  

THough I must live here, and by force  
Of your command suffer divorce;  
Though I am parted, yet my mind,  
(That's more myself) still stays behind;  
I breath in you, you keep my heart;  
'Twas but a carcase that did part.  
Then though our bodies are dis-joynd,  
As things that are to place confined;  
Yet let our boundless spirits meet,  
And in love's sphere each other greet;  
There let us work a mystique wreath,  
Unknown unto the world beneath;  
There let our clasped loves sweetly twine;  
There let our secret thoughts unseen,  
Like nets be weaved, and inter-twined,  
Wherewith we catch each others mind:  
There whilst our souls do sit and kiss,  
Tasting a sweet, and subtle bliss,  
(Such as gross lovers cannot know,  
Whose hands, and lips, meet here below;)  
Let us look down, and mark what pain  
Our absent bodies here sustain,  
And smile to see how far away  
The one doth from the other stray;  
Yet burn, and languish with desire  
To join, and quench their mutual fire  
There let us joy to see from far,  
Our emulous flames at loving war,  
Whilst both with equal lustre shine,  
Mine bright as yours, yours bright as mine.  
There seated in those heavenly bowers,  
we'll cheat the lag, and lingering hours,  
Making our bitter absence sweet,  
Till souls, and bodies both, may meet,    

To her in absence. A SHIP.  

Tossed in a troubled sea of griefs, I float  
Far from the shore, in a storm-beaten boat,  
Where my sad thoughts do (like the compass) show  
The several points from which cross winds do blow.  
My heart doth like the needle touched with love,  
Still fixed on you, point which way I would move.  
You are the bright Polestar, which in the dark  
Of this long absence, guides my wand'ring bark.  
Love is the Pilot, but overcome with fear  
Of your displeasure, dares not home-wards steer;  
My fearful hope hangs on my trembling sail;  
Nothing is wanting but a gentle gale,  
Which pleasant breath must blow from your sweet lip.  
Bid it but move, and quick as thought, this Ship  
Into your arms, which are my port, will fly,  
Where it for ever shall at Anchor lie.    

SONG. Eternity of Love protested.  

HOw ill doth be deserve a Lover's name,  
Whose pale weak flame  
Cannot retain  
His heat in spite of absence or disdain;  
But doth at once, like paper set on fire,  
Burn and expire;  
True love can never change his seat,  
Nor did he ever love, that could retreat.  
That noble Flame, which my breast keeps alive  
Shall still survive,  
When my soul's fled;  
Nor shall my love die, when my hodye's dead,  
That shall wait on me to the lower shade,  
And never fade  
My very ashes in their urn,  
Shall, like a hallowed Lamp, for ever burn.    

Upon some alterations in my Mistress, after my departure into France.  

OH gentle Love, do not forsake the guide  
Of my frail Bark, on which the swelling tide  
Of ruthless pride  
Doth beat, and threaten wrack from every side.  
Gulfs of disdain do gape to overwhelm  
This boat, nigh sunk with grief, whilst at the helm  
Dispair commands;  
And round about, the shifting sands  
Of faithless love, and false inconstancy,  
With rocks of cruelty,  
Stop up my passage to the neighbour Lands.  
My sighs have raised those winds, whose fury bears  
My sails overboard, and in their place spreads tears,  
And from my tears  
This sea is sprung, where nought but Death appears;  
A misty cloud of anger hides the light  
Of my fair star, and every where black night  
Usurps the place  
Of those bright rays, which once did grace  
My forth bound Ship, but when it could no more  
Behold the vanished shore,  
In the deep flood she drowned her beamy face.    

Good counsel to a young Maid.  

WHen you the Sunburnt Pilgrim see,  
Fainting with thirst, haste to the springs;  
Mark how at first with bended knee  
He courts the crystal Nymphs, and fling,  
His body to the earth, where He  
Prostrate, adores the flowing Deity.   

But when this sweaty face is drenched  
In her cool waves, when from her sweet  
Bosom his burning thirst is quenched;  
Then mark how with disdainful feet  
He kicks her banks, and from the place  
That thus refreshed him, moveth with sullen pace.  
So shalt thou be despised, fair Maid,  
When by the sated lover tasted;  
What first he did with tears invade,  
Shall afterwards with scorn be wasted;  
When all thy Virgin- springs grow dry,  
When no streams shall be left, but in thine eye.    

Celia bleeding, to the Surgeon  

FOnd man, that canst believe her blood  
Will from those purple channels flow;  
Or that the pure untainted flood,  
Can any foul distemper know;  
Or that thy weak steel can incize  
The Crystal case, wherein it lies.   

Know; her quick blood, proud of his seat,  
Runs dancing through her azure veins;  
Whose harmony no cold, nor heat  
Disturbs, whose hue no tincture stains;  
And the hard rock wherein it dwells,  
The keenest darts of Love repels.   

But thou reply'st, behold she bleeds;  
Fool, thou'rt deceived, and dost not know  
The mystique knot whence this proceeds,  
How Lovers in each other grow;  
Thou struckst her arm, but 'twas my heart  
Shed all the blood, felt all the smart.    

To T. H. a Lady resembling my Mistress.  

Fair copy of my Celia's face,  
Twin of my soul, thy perfect grace  
Clayms in my love an equal place.   

Disdain not a divided heart,  
Though all be hers, you shall have part;  
Love is not tied to rules of art.   

For as my soul first to her flew,  
Yet stayed with me; so now 'tis true  
It dwells with her, though fled to you.   

Then entertain this wand'ring guest,  
And if not love, allow it rest;  
It left not, but mistook the nest.   

Nor think my love, or your fair eyes  
Cheaper, 'cause from the sympathise  
You hold with her, these flames arise.   

To Led, or Brass, or some such bad  
Metal, a Prince's stamp may add  
That value, which it never had.   

But to the pure refined Ore,  
The stamp of Kings imparts no more  
Worth, than the metal held before.   

Only the Image gives the rate  
To Subjects, in a foreign State  
'tis prized as much for its own weight.   

So though all other hearts resign  
To your pure worth, yet you have mine  
Only because you are her coin.    

To Saxham  

THough frost, and snow, locked from mine eyes  
That beauty which without door lies,  
The gardens, orchards, walks, that so  
I might not all thy pleasures know;  
Yet (Saxham) thou within thy gate,  
Art of thyself so delicate,  
So full of native sweets, that bless  
Thy roof with inward happiness;  
As neither from, nor to thy store,  
Winter takes aught, or Spring adds more.  
The cold and frozen air had starved  
Much poor, if not by thee preserv'd;  
Whose prayers have made thy Table blest  
With plenty, far above the rest.  
The season hardly did afford  
Corpse cates unto thy neighbour's board,  
Yet thou hadst dainties, as the sky  
Had only been thy Vokirie;  
Or else the birds, fearing the snow  
Might to another deluge grow,  
The Pheasant, Partridge, and the Lark,  
Flew to thy house, as to the Ark.  
The willing Ox, of himself came  
Home to the slaughter, with the Lamb,  
And every beast did thither bring  
Himself, to be an offering.  
The scaly herd, more pleasure took  
Bathed in thy dish, than in the brook.  
Water, Earth, Air, did all conspire,  
To pay their tributes to thy fire,  
Whose cherishing flames themselves divide  
Through every room, where they deride  
The night, and cold abroad; whilst they  
Like Suns within, keep endless day.  
Those cheerful beams send forth their light,  
To all that wander in the night,  
And seem to be cken from aloof,  
The weary Pilgrim to thy roof;  
Where it refreshed, he will away,  
He's fairly welcome, or if stay  
Far more, which he shall hearty find,  
Both from the master, and the Hind.  
The stranger's welcome, each man there  
Stamped on his cheerful brow, doth wear;  
Nor doth this welcome, or his cheer  
Grow less, cause he stays longer here  
There's none observes (much less repines)  
How often this man sups or dines.  
Thou hast no Porter at the door  
T'examin, or keep back the poor;  
Nor locks, nor bolts; thy gates have been  
Made only to let strangers in;  
Untaught to shut, they do not fear  
To stand wide open all the year;  
Careless who enters, for they know,  
Thou never didst deserve a foe;  
And as for thiefs, thy bounty's's such,  
They cannot steal, thou giv'st so much.    

Upon a Ribbon.  

THis silken wreath, which circles in mine arm,  
Is but an Emblem of that mystic charm,  
Wherewith the magic of your beauties binds  
My captive soul, and round about it winds  
Fetters of lasting love; This hath entwined  
My flesh alone, that hath impaled my mind:  
Time may wear out These soft weak bands; but Those  
Strong cheins of brass, Fate shall not discompose.  
This only relic may preserve my wrist,  
But my whole frame doth by That power subsist:  
To That my prayers and sacrifice, to This  
I only pay a superstitious kiss:  
This but the I doll, That's the Deity;  
Religion There is due, Here ceremony.  
That I receive by faith, This but in trust;  
Here I may tender duty, There I must:  
This order as a Layman I may bear,  
But I become Love's Priest when That I wear.  
This moves like air,; That as the Centre stands;  
That knot your virtue tied, This but your hands;  
That Nature framed, but This was made by Art;  
This makes my arm your prisoner, That my heart.    

To the King at his entrance into Saxham, by Master Io: Crofts.  

SIR  
Ere you pass this threshold, stay,  
And give your Creature leave to pay  
Those pious rites, which unto you,  
As to our household Gods, are due.  
In stead of sacrifice, each breast  
Is like a flaming Altar dressed  
With zealous fires, which from pure hearts  
Love mixed with Loyalty imparts.  
Incense, nor gold have we, yet bring  
As rich, and sweet an offering;  
And such as doth both these express,  
Which is our humble thankfulness;  
By which is paid the All we owe  
To gods above, or men below.  
The slaughtered beast, whose flesh should feed  
The hungry flames, we, for pure need,  
Dress for your supper, and the gore  
Which should be dashed on every door,  
We change into the lusty blood  
Of youthful Vines, of which a flood  
Shall sprightly run through all your veins,  
First to your health, than your fair trains.  
We shall want nothing but good fare,  
To show your welcome, and our care;  
Such rarities that come from far,  
From poor men's houses banished are;  
Yet we'll express in homely cheer,  
How glad we are to see you here.  
we'll have what e'er the season yields,  
Out of the neighbouring woods, and fields;  
For all the dainties of your board,  
Will only be what those afford;  
And having supped, we may perchance  
Present you with a country dance.  
Thus much your servants, that bear sway  
Here in your absence, bade me say,  
And beg besides, you'd hither bring  
Only the Mercy of a King,  
And not the Greatness; since they have  
A thousand faults must pardon crave;  
But nothing that is fit to wait  
Upon the glory of your state.  
Yet your gracious favour will,  
They hope, as heretofore, shine still  
‛ On their endeavours, for they swore  
Should love defcend, they could no more.    

Upon the sickness of (E. S.)  

MUst she then languish, and we sorrow thus  
And no kind God help her, nor pity us?  
Is justice fled from heaven? can that permit  
A foul deformed ravisher to sit  
Upon her Virgin cheek, and pull from thence  
The Rosebuds in their maiden excellence?  
To spread cold paleness on her lips, and chase  
The frighted Rubies from their native place?  
To lick up with his searching flames, a flood  
Of dissolved Coral, flowing in her blood;  
And with the damps of his infectious breath,  
Print on her-brow moist characters of death?  
Must the clear light, 'gainst course of nature cease  
In her fair eyes, and yet the flames increase?  
Must fevers shake this goodly tree, and all  
That ripened fruit from the fair branches fall,  
Which Princes have desired to taste? must she  
Who hath preserved her spotlest chastity  
From all solicitation, now at last  
By Agues, and diseases be embraced?  
Forbid it holy Diana; else who shall  
Pay vows, or let one grain of Incense fall  
On thy neglected Altars, if thou bless  
No better this thy zealous Votaress?  
Haste then, O maiden Goddess, to her aid,  
Let on thy quiver her pale cheek be laid;  
And rock her fainting body in thine arms;  
Then let the God of Music, with still charms  
Her restless eyes in peaceful slumbers close,  
And with soft strains sweeten her calm repose.  
Cupid descend; and whilst Apollo sings,  
Fanning the cool air with thy panting wings  
Ever supply her with refreshing wind;  
Let thy fair mother, with her tresses bind  
Her labouring temples, with whose balmy sweat,  
She shall prefume her hairy Coronet,  
Whose precious drops, shall upon every fold  
Hang, like rich Pearls about a wreath of gold;  
Her loser locks, as they unbraded lie,  
Shall spread themselves into a Canopy,  
Under whose shadow let her rest secure  
From chilling cold, or burning Calenture;  
Unless she frieze withyce of chaste desires,  
Only holy Hymen kindle nuptial fires.  
And when at last Death comes to pierce her heart,  
Convey into his hand thy golden dart.    

A New-year's sacrifice. To Lucinda.  

THose that can give, open their hands this day,  
Those that cannot, yet hold them up to pray;  
That health may crown the seasons of this year,  
And mirth dance round the circle, that no tear  
(Unless of joy) may with its briny dew,  
Discolour on your cheek the rosy hue;  
That no access of years presume to abate,  
Your beauties ever-flourishing estate:  
Such cheap and vulgar wishes, I could lay,  
As trivial offerings at your feet this day;  
But that it were Apostasy in me,  
To send a prayer to any Deity  
But your divine self, who have power to give  
Those blessings unto others, such as live  
Like me, by the sole influence of your eyes,  
Whose fair aspects govern our destinies.  
Such Incense, vows, and holy rites, as were  
To the involved Serpent of the year,  
Paid by Egyptian Priests, lay I before  
Lucinda'S sacred shrine, whilst I adore  
Her beauteous eyes, and her pure Altars dress;  
With gums and spice of humble Thankfulness;  
So may my Goddess from her heaven inspire  
My frozen bosom with a Delphique fire,  
And then the world shall by that glorious flame,  
Behold the blaze of thy immortal name.    

SONG. To one, who when I praised my Mistress beauty, said I was blind.  

Wonder not though I am blind,  
For you must be  
Dark in your eyes, or in your mind,  
If when you see  
Her face, you prove not blind like me;  
If the powerful beams that fly  
From her eye  
And those amorous sweets that lie  
Scattered in each neighbouring part,  
Find a passage to your heart,  
Then you'll confess your mortal sight  
Too weak for such a glorious light:  
For if her graces you discover,  
You grow like me a dazzled Lover;  
But if those beauties you not spy,  
Then are you blinder far than I    

SONG. To my Mistress, I burning in love.  

I Burn, and cruel you, in vain  
Hope to quench me with disdain;  
If from your eyes, those sparkles came,  
That have kindled all this flame,  
What boots it me, though now you shroud  
Those fierce Comets in a cloud?  
Since all the flames that I have felt,  
Could your snow yet never melt,  
Nor, can your snow (though you should take  
Alps into your bosom) slake  
The heat of my enamoured heart;  
But with wonder learn Love's art  
No seas of ice can cool desire,  
Equal flames must quench Love's fire;  
Then think not that my heat can die  
Till you burn as well as I.    

SONG. To her again, she burning in a Fever.  

NOw she burns as well as I,  
Yet my heat can never die;  
She burns that never knew desire,  
She that was ice, she that was fire.  
She whose cold heart, chaste thoughts did arm  
So, as Love's flames could never warm  
The frozen bosom where it dwelled,  
She burns, and all her beauties mild:  
She burns, and cries, Loves fires are melt,  
Fevers are Gods, He's a child.  
Love; let her know the difference  
'twixt the heat of soul and sense,  
Touch her with thy flames divine,  
So shalt thou quench her fire, and mine.    

Upon the King's sickness.  

Sickness, the minister of death, doth lay  
So strong a siege against our brittle clay,  
As whilst it doth our weak forts singly win,  
It hopes at length to take all mankind in.  
First, it begins upon the womb to wait,  
And doth the unborn child there uncreate;  
Then rocks the cradle where the infant lies,  
Where ere it fully be alive, it dies.  
It never leaves fond youth, until it have  
Found, or an early, or a later grave.  
By thousand subtle sleights from heedless man  
It cuts the short allowance of a span;  
And where both sober life, and art combine  
To keep it out, Age makes them both resign.  
Thus by degrees it only gained of late,  
The weak, the aged, or intemperate;  
But now the Tyrant hath found out a way  
By which the sober, strong, and young, decay,  
Entering his royal limbs that is our head,  
Through us his mystique limbs the pain is spread.  
That man that doth not feel his part, hath none  
In any part of his dominion,  
If he hold land, that earth is forfeited,  
And he unfit on any ground to tread.  
This grief is felt at Court, where it doth move  
Through every joint, like the true soul of love.  
All those fair stars that do attend on Him,  
Whence they derived their light, wax pale and dim.  
That ruddy morning beam of Majesty,  
Which should the Sun's eclipsed light supply,  
Is overcast with mists, and in the lieu  
Of cheerful rays sends us down drops of dew.  
That curious form made of an earth refined,  
At whose blessed birth, the gentle Planets shined  
With fair aspects, and sent a glorious flame  
To animate so beautiful a frame;  
That Darling of the Gods and men, doth wear  
A cloud on's brow, and in his eye a tear:  
And all the rest (save when his dread command  
Doth bid them move) like liveless statues stand.  
So full a grief, so generally worn,  
Shows a good King is sick, and good men mourn.    

SONG. To a Lady not yet enjoyed by her Husband.  

COme Celia, fix thine eyes on mine,  
And through those Crystals our souls flitting,  
Shall a pure wreath of eye-beams twine,  
Our loving hearts together knitting.  
Let Eaglets the bright Sun survey,  
Though the blind Mole discern not day.   

When clear Aurora leaves her mate,  
The light of her grey eyes despising,  
Yet all the world doth celebrate,  
with sacrifice, her fair uprising.  
Let Eaglets, etc.  
A Dragon kept the golden fruit,  
Yet he those dainties never tasted,  
As others pined in the pursuit  
So he himself with plenty wasted.  
Let Eaglets, etc.    

SONG. The willing Prisoner to his Mistress.  

LEt fools great Cupid's yoke disdain,  
Loving their own wild freedom better;  
Whilst proud of my triumphant chain  
I sit, and court my beauteous fetter.   

Her murdering glances, snaring hairs,  
And her bewitching smiles, so please me,  
As he brings ruin, that repairs  
The sweet afflictions that disease me.   

Hide not those panting balls of snow  
with envious veyls from my beholding;  
Unlock those lips, their pearly row  
In a sweet smile of love unfolding.   

And let those eyes, whose motion wheels  
The restless Fate of every Lover,  
Survey the pains my sick heart feels,  
And wounds themselves have made, discover.    

A Fly that flew into my Mistress her eye.  

When this Fly lived, she used to play  
In the Sunshine all the day;  
Till coming near my Celia's fight,  
She found a new, and unknown light,  
So full of glory, as it made  
The noonday Sun a gloomy shade;  
Then this amorous Fly became  
My rival, and did court my flame.  
She did from hand to bosom skip,  
And from her breath, her cheek and lip,  
Sucked all the incense, and the spice,  
And grew a bird of Paradise:  
At last into her eye she flew,  
There scorched in flames, and drowned in dew,  
Like Phaeton from the Sun's sphere  
She fell, and with her dropped a tear,  
Of which a pearl was strait composed,  
Wherein her ashes lie enclosed.  
Thus she received from Celia's eye,  
Funereall flame, tomb Obsequy.    

SONG. Celia singing  

Hark how my Celia, with the choice  
Music of her hand and voice  
Stills the loud wind; and makes the wild  
Insenced Boar, and Panther mild:  
Mark how those statues like men move,  
Whilst men with wonder statues prove!  
This stiff rock bends to worship her,  
That Idol turns Idolater.   

Now see how all the new inspired  
Images, with love are fired;  
Hark how the tender Marble groans,  
And all the late-transformed stones,  
Court the fair Nymph with many a tear,  
Which she (more stony than they were)  
Beholds with unrelenting mind;  
Whilst they amazed to see combined  
Such matchless beauty with disdain,  
Are all turned into stones again.    

SONG. Celia singing.  

YOu that think Love can convey,  
No other way,  
But through the eyes, into the heart,  
His fatal Dart,  
Close up those casements, and but hear  
This Syrensing,  
And on the wing  
Of her sweet voice, it shall appear  
That Love can enter at the ear:  
Then unveil your eyes, behold  
The curious mould  
where that voice dwells, and as we know,  
when the Cock's crow,  
We freely may  
Gaze on the day:  
So may you, when the Mufick's done,  
Awake and see the rising sun.    

SONG. To one that desired to know my Mistress.  

Sack not to know my love, for she  
Hath vowed her constant faith to me;  
Her mild aspects are mine, and thou  
Shalt only find a stormy brow:  
For if her beauty stir desire  
In me, her kisses quench the fire;  
Or, I can to Love's fountain go,  
Or dwell upon her hills of snow;  
But ' when thou burnest, she shall not spare  
One gentle breath to cool the air;  
Thou shalt not climb those Alps, nor spy  
Where the sweet springs of Venus' lie.  
Search hidden nature, and there find  
A treasure to enrich thy mind;  
Discover Arts not yet revealed,  
But let my Mistress live concealed  
Though men by knowledge wiser grow,  
Yet here'tis wisdom not to know.    

In the person of a Lady to her inconstant servant.  

WHen on the Altar of my hand,  
(Bedewed with many a kiss, and tear,)  
Thy now revolted heart did stand  
An humble Martyr, thou didst swear  
Thus, (and the God of love did hear,)  
By those bright glances of thine eye,  
Unless thou pity me, I die.   

When first those perjured lips of thine,  
Bepaled with blasting sighs, did seal  
Their violated faith on mine,  
From the soft bosom that did heal  
Thee, thou my melting heart didst steal;  
My soul inflamed with thy false breath,  
Poisoned with kisses, sucked in death.   

Yet I nor hand, nor lip will move,  
Revenge, or mercy, to procure  
From the offended God of love;  
My curse is fatal, and my pure  
Love shall beyond thy scorn endure:  
If I implore the Gods, they'll find  
Thee too ingrateful, me too kind.    

Truce in Love entreated.  

NO more, blind God, for see my heart  
Is made thy Quiver, where remains  
No void place for another Dart;  
And alas that conquest gains  
Small praise, that only brings away  
A tame and unresisting prey.   

Behold a nobler foe, all armed,  
Defies thy weak Artillery,  
That hath thy Bow and Quiver charmed,  
A rebel beauty, conquering Thee:  
If thou dar'st equal combat try,  
Wound her, for 'tis for her I die.    

To my Rival.  

HEnce vain Intruder, haste away,  
Wash not with thy unhallowed brine  
The foor-steps of my Celia's shrine;  
Nor on her purer Altars lay  
Thy empty words, accents that may  
Some loser Dame to love incline;  
She must have offerings more divine;  
Such pearly drops, as youthful May  
Scatters before the rising day;  
Such smooth soft language, as each line  
Might stroke an angry God, or stay  
Jove's thunder, make the hearers pine  
With envy; do this, thou shalt be  
Servant to her, Rival with me.    

Boldness in love.  

MArk how the bashful Morn in vain  
Courts the amorous Marigold,  
With sighing blasts, and weeping rain;  
Yet she refuses to unfold:  
But when the Planet of the day,  
Approacheth with his powerful ray,  
Then she spreads, than she receives  
His warmer beams into her virgin leaves.   

So shalt thou thrive in love, fond Boy;  
If thy tears and sighs discover  
Thy grief, thou never shalt enjoy  
The just reward of a bold Lover:  
But when with moving accents thou  
Shalt constant faith, and service vow,  
Thy Celia shall receive those charms  
With open ears, and with unfolded arms.    

A Pastoral Dialogue. Celia. Cleon.  

AS Celia rested in the shade  
With Cleon by her side,  
The Swain thus courted the young Maid,  
And thus the Nymph replied   CL. 
Sweet! let thy Captive fetrers wear  
Made of thine arms, and hands;  
Till such as thraldom scorn, of fear,  
Envy those happy bands.  CE. 
Then thus my willing arms I wind  
About thee, and am so  
Thy prisoner; for myself I bind,  
Until I let thee go.  CL. 
Happy that slave, whom the fair foe  
Ties in so soft a chain,  CE. 
far happier I, but that I know  
Thou wilt break loose again,  CL. 
By thy immortal beauties never,  CE. 
Frail as thy love's thine oath.  CL. 
Though beauty fade, my faith lasts ever.  CE. 
Time will destroy them both.  CL. 
I dote not on thy snow-white skin.  CE. 
What then?  CL. 
Thy purer mind.  CE. 
It loved too soon.  CL. 
Thou hadst not been  
So fair, if not so kind.  CE. 
Oh strange vain fancy!  CL. 
But yet true.  CE. 
Prove it,  CL. 
Then make brade  
Of those loose flames that circled you,  
My sun, and yet your shade.  CE. 
'Tis done.  CL. 
Now give it me.  CE. 
Thus thou  
Shalt thine own error find,  
If these were beauties, I am now  
Less fair, because more kind.  CL. 
You shall confess you err; that hair  
Shall it not change the hue,  
Or leave the golden mountain bare?  CE. 
Ay me! it is too true  CL. 
But this small wreath, shall ever stay  
In its first native prime,  
And smiling when the rest decay,  
The triumphs sing of time.  CE 
Then let me cut from thy fair grove,  
One branch, and let that be  
An emblem of eternal love;  
For such is mine to thee.  CL 
Thus are we both redeemed from time,  
I by thy grace.  CE. 
And I  
Shall live in thy immortal rhyme,  
Until the Muses die.  CL 
By heaven!  CE. 
Swear not; if I must weep,  
jove shall not smile at me.  
This kiss, my heart, and thy faith keep.  CL. 
This breathes my soul to thee.  

Then forth the thicket Thirsis rushed,  
Where he saw all their play:  
The swain stood still, and smiled, and blushed,  
The Nymph fled fast away.    

Grief engrossed.  

Wherefore do thy sad numbers flow  
So full of woe?  
Why dost thou melt in such soft strains,  
Whilst she disdains  
If She must still deny,  
Weep not, but die,  
And in thy Funeral fire,  
Shall all her fame expire:  
Thus both shall perish, and as thou on thy Heause  
Shalt want her tears, so she shall want thy Verse.  
Repine not then at thy blessed state,  
Thou art above thy fate;  
But my fair Celia will not give  
Love enough to make me live;  
Nor yet dart from her eye  
Scorn enough to make me die.  
Then let me weep alone, till her kind breath,  
Or blow my tears away, or speak my death,    

A Pastoral Dialogue. Shepherd, Nymph, Chorus.  SHep. 
This mossy bank they pressed.  Nigh. 
That aged oak  
Did canopy the happy payr  
All night from the damp air.  Cho. 
Here let us sit and sing the words they spoke,  
Till the day breaking their embraces broke.  Shep 
See love, the blushes of the morn appear  
And now she hangs her pearly store  
(Robbed from the Eastern shore)  
I'th' Cowslips bell, and Roses rare:  
Sweet, I must stay no longer here.  Nymph. 
Those streaks of doubtful light usher not day,  
But show my sun must set; no Morn  
Shall shine till thou return;  
The yellow Planets, and the grey  
Dawn, shall attend thee on thy way  Shep 
If thine eyes gild my paths, they may for bear  
Their useless shine.  Nymph. 
My tears will quite  
Extinguish their faint light.  She. 
Those drops will make their beams more clear,  
Love's flames will shine in every tear.  Cho 
They kissed, and wept, and from their lips, and eyes,  
In a mixed dew of briny sweet,  
Their joys, and sorrows meet;  
But she cries out.  Nymph. 
Shepherd arise,  
The Sun betrays us else to spies.  Shep. 
The winged hours fly fast, whilst we embrace,  
But when we want their help to meet,  
They move with leaden feet.  Nym. 
Then let us pinion Time, and chase  
The day for ever from this place.  Shep 
Hark:  Nigh. 
Ay me stay!  She. 
For ever.  Nigh. 
No, arise,  
We must be gone.  Shep. 
My nest of spice.  Nym 
my soul.  Shep 
My Paradise.  cha. 
Neither could say farewell, but through their eyes  
Grief interrupted speech with tears supplies.   

Red and white Roses  

REad in these Roses, the sad story  
Of my hard fate, and your own glory:  
In the White you may discover  
The paleness of a fainting Lover;  
In the Red, the flames still feeding  
On my heart with fresh wounds bleeding.  
The White will tell you how I languish,  
And the Red express my anguish.  
The White my innocence displaying,  
The Red my marty'rdome betraying.  
The frowns that on your brow resided,  
Have those Roses thus divided.  
Oh let your smiles but clear the weather,  
And then they both shall grow together.    

To my Cousin (C. R.) marrying my Lady (A.)  

HAppy Youth, that shalt possess  
Such a springtide of delight,  
As the sated Appetite  
Shall enjoying such excess  
With the flood of pleasure less.  
When the Hymeneal Rite  
Is performed, invoke the night,  
That it may in shadows dress  
Thy too real happiness;  
Else (as Semele) the bright,  
Deity in her full height  
May thy feeble soul oppress.  
Strong perfumes, and glaring light,  
Oft destroy both smell, and sight.    

A Lover upon an Accident necessitating his departure, Consults with reason.  LOVER. 

WEep not, nor backward turn your beams  
Fond eyes; sad sighs lock in your breath;  
Lest on this wind, or in those streams,  
My grieved soul fly, or sail to death.  
Fortune destroys me if I stay,  
Love kills me if I go away:  
Since Love, and Fortune, both are blind,  
Come Reason, and resolve my doubtful mind.   REASON. 

Fly, and blind Fortune be thy guide,  
And against the blinder God rebel,  
Thy lovesick heart shall not reside  
Where scorn, and self-willed error dwell;  
Where entrance unto Truth is bar'rd;  
Where Love and Faith find no reward;  
For, my just hand may sometime move  
The wheel of Fortune, not the sphere of Love.    

Parting, Celia weeps.  

WEep not (my dear) for I shall go  
Loaden enough with mine own woe;  
Add not thy heaviness to mine:  
Since Fate our pleasures must disjoin,  
Why should our sorrows meet? if I  
Must go, and lose thy company,  
I wish not theirs; it shall relieve  
My grief, to think thou dost not grieve.  
Yet grieve, and weep, that I may bear  
Every sigh, and every tear,  
Away with me, so shall thy breast  
And eyes discharged, enjoy their rest.  
And it will glad my heart to see,  
Thou wert thus loath to part with me.    

A Rapture.  

I Will enjoy thee nosy my Celia, come  
And fly with me to Love's Elysium:  
The Giant, Honour, that keeps cowards out,  
Is but a S, and the servile rout  
Of base subjects only bend in vain  
To the vast Idol, whilst the nobler train  
Of valiant Lovers daily sail between  
The huge Colossuses legs, and pass unseen  
Unto the blissful shore; be bold, and wise,  
And we shall enter, the grim Swiss denies  
Only to tame sools a passage, that not know  
He is but form, and only frights in show  
The duller eyes that looked from far; draw near,  
And thou shalt scorn, what we were wont to fear;  
We shall see how the stalking Pageant goes  
With borrowed legs, a heavy load to those  
That made, and bear him; not as we once thought  
The seed of Gods, but a weak model wrought  
By greedy men, that seek t' enclose the common,  
And within private arms impale free woman.  
Come then, and mounted on the wings of love  
we'll cut the flitting air, and sore above  
The Monster's head, and in the noblest seats  
Of those blessed shades quench and renew our heats.  
There, shall the Queen of Love, and Innocence,  
Beauty and Nature, banish all offence  
From our close Ivy Ewines; there I'll behold  
Thy bared snow, and thy unbraded gold;  
There, my enfranchised hand on every side,  
Shall o'er thy naked polished Ivory slide.  
No curtain there, though of transparent jawn,  
Shall be before thy virgin treasure drawn;  
But the rich Mine, to the enquiring eye  
Exposed, shall ready still for mintage jye,  
And we will coin young Cupids. There, a bed  
Of Roses, and fresh Myrtles, shall be spread  
Under the cooler shade of Cypress groves;  
Our pillows, of the down of Venus' Doves,  
Whereon our panting limbs we'll gently lay  
In the faint respites of our active play;  
That so our slumbers may in dreams have leisure  
To tell the nimble fancy our past pleasure;  
And so our souls that cannot be embraced,  
Shall the embraces of our body's taste.  
Mean while the bubbling stream shall court the shore,  
Th'enamoured chirping Wood choir shall adore  
In varied tunes the Deity of Love;  
The gentle blasts of Western winds shall move  
The trembling leaves, and through their close bows  
Still Music, whilst we rest ourselves beneath (breath  
Their dancing shade, till a soft murmur, sent  
From souls entranced in amorous languishment,  
Rouse us, and shoot into our veins fresh fire,  
Till we, in their sweet ecstasy expire.  
Then, as the empty Bee, that lately bore,  
Into the common treasure, all her store,  
Flies 'bout the painted field with nimble wing,  
Deflowering the fresh virgins of the Spring;  
So will I rifle all the sweets that dwell  
In my delicious Paradise, and swell  
My bag with honey, drawn forth by the power  
Of fervent kisses, from each spicy flower.  
I'll seize the Rosebuds in their perfumed bed,  
The Violet knots, like curious Mazes spread  
O'er all the Garden, taste the ripened Cherry,  
The warm, firm Apple, tipped with coral berry;  
Then will I visit, with a wand'ring kiss,  
The vale of Lilies, and the Bower of bliss;  
And where the beauteous Region doth divide  
Into two milky ways, my lips shall slide  
Down those smooth Allies, wearing as I go  
A tract for Lovers on the printed snow;  
Thence climbing o'er the swelling Apennine,  
Retire into thy grove of Eglantine;  
Where I will all those ravished sweets distil  
Though Loves Alimbique, and with Chimique skill  
From the mixtmass one sovereign Balm derive,  
Then bring that great Elixir to thy hive.  
Now in more subtle wreaths I will entwine,  
My snowy thighs, my legs and arms with thine.  
Thou like a sea of milk shalt lie displayed,  
Whilst I the smooth, calm Ocean, invade  
With such a tempest, as when jove of old  
Fell down on Danae in a storm of gold:  
Yet my tall Pine, shall in the Cyprian strait  
Ride safe at Anchor, and unlade her freight;  
My Rudder, with thy bold hand, like a tried,  
And skilful Pilot, thou shalt steer and guide  
My Bark into Love's channel, where it shall  
Dance, as the bounding waves do rise or fall;  
Then shall thy circling arms, embrace and clip  
My willing body, and thy halmie lip  
bath me in juice of kisses, whose perfume  
Like a religious incense shall consume,  
And send up holy vapours, to those powers  
That bless our loves, and crown our sportful hours,  
That with such Haltion caelmeness fix our souls  
In steadfast peace, as no astright controls.  
There, no rude sounds shake us with sudden starts,  
No jealous ears, when we unrip our hearts,  
Suck our discourse in; no observing spies  
This blush, that glance traduce; no envious eyes  
Watch our close meetings, nor are we betrayed  
To Rivals, by the bribed chambermaid.  
No wedlock bonds unwreath our twisted loves;  
We suck no midnight Arbour, no dark groves  
To hide our kisses: there, the hated name  
Of husband, wife, lust, modest, chaste, or shame,  
Are vain and empty words, whose very sound  
Was never heard in the Blizian ground.  
All things are lawful shore, that may delight  
Nature, or unrestrained Appetite:  
Like, and enjoy, to will, and act, is one,  
We only sin when Love's rites are not done.  
The Roman Lucrece there, reads the divine  
Lectures of Love's great master, Aretine,  
And knows as well as Lais, how to move  
Her pliant body in the act of love.  
To quench the burning Ravisher, she hurls  
Her limbs into a thousand winding curls;  
And studies artful postures, such as be  
Carved on the Bark of every neighbouring tree  
By learned hands, that so adorned the rind  
Of those fair Plants, which as they lay enwinde,  
Have fanned their glowing fires. The Grecian Dame,  
That in her endless web toiled for a name  
As fruitless as her work, doth there display  
Herself before the Youth of Ithaca,  
And th'amorous sport of gamesome nights prefer,  
Before dull dreams of the lost Traveller.  
Daphne hath broke her bark, and that swift foot  
Which th'angry God's had fastened with a root  
To the fixed earth, doth now unfetrered run,  
To meet th'embraces of the youthful Sun:  
She hangs upon him, like his Delphique Lyre,  
Her kisses blow the old, and breath new fire;  
Full of her God, she sings inspired Lays,  
Sweet Odes of love, such as deserve the Bays,  
Which she herself was. Next her, Laura lies  
In Petrarch's learned arms, drying those eyes  
That did in such sweet smooth-paced numbers flow,  
As made the world enamoured of his woe.  
These, and ten thousand Beauties more, that died  
Slave to the Tyrant, now enlarged, deride  
His cancelled laws, and for their time misspent,  
Pay into Love's Exchequer double rent.  
Come then my Celia, we'll no more forbear  
To taste our joys, struck with a Pannique fear,  
But will depose from his imperious sway  
This proud Usurper, and walk free, as they  
With necks unyoked; nor is it just that He  
Should fetter your soft sex with Chastity,  
Which Nature made unapt for abstinence;  
When yet this false Impostor can dispense  
With humane justice, and with sacred right,  
And maugre both their laws command me fight  
With Rivals, or with emulous Loves, that dare  
Equal with thine, their Mistress eyes, or hair:  
If thou complain of wrong, and call my sword  
To carve out thy revenge, upon that word  
He bids me fight and kill, or else he brands  
With marks of infamy my coward hands,  
And yet Religion bids from bloodshed fly,  
And damns me for that act. Then tell me why  
This Goblin Honour which the world adores,  
Should make men Atheists, and not women Whores?    

Epitaph on the Lady Mary Villers.  

The Lady Mary Villers lies  
Under this stone; with weeping eyes  
The Parents that first gave her breath,  
And their sad friends, laid her in earth:  
If any of them (Reader) were  
Known unto thee, shed a tear:  
Or if thyself possess a gem,  
As dear to thee, as this to them,  
Though a stranger to this place,  
bewail in theirs, thine own hard case;  
For thou perhaps at thy return  
Mayest find thy Darling in a Vrn.    

An other.  

THe purest Soul that e'er was sent  
Into a clayie tenement  
Informed this dust, but the weak mould  
Could the great guest no longer hold,  
The substance was too pure, the flame  
Too glorious that thither came;  
Ten thousand Cupids brought along  
A Grace on each wing that did throng  
For place there, till they all oppressed  
The seat in which they sought to rest,  
So the fair Model broke for want  
Of room to lodge th'Inhabitant.    

An Other  

THis little Vault, this narrow room,  
Of Love and Beauty is the tomb;  
The dawning beam that 'gan to clear  
Our clouded sky, lies darkened here,  
For ever set to us, by death  
Sent to inflame the world beneath.  
'Twas but a bud, yet did contain  
More sweetness than shall spring again,  
A budding star that might have grown  
Into a Sun, when it had blown.  
This hopeful beauty did create  
New life in Love's declining state;  
But now his Empire ends, and we  
From fire, and wounding darts are free;  
His brand, his bow, let no man fear,  
The flames, the arrows all lie here.    

Epitaph on the Lady S. Wife to Sir W.S.  

THe harmony of colours, features, grace,  
Resulting Airs (the magic of a face)  
Of musical sweet tunes, all which combined  
To crown one Sovereign beauty, lies confined  
To this dark Vault. She was a Cabinet  
Where all the choicest stones of price were set;  
Whose native colours, and purest lustre, lent  
Her eye, cheek, lip, a dazzling ornament;  
Whose rare and hidden virtues did express  
Her inward beauties, and minds fairer dress;  
The constant Diamond, the wise Chrysolite,  
The devout Sapphire, Emerald apt to write  
Records of memory, cheerful Agat, grave  
And serious Onyx, Topaz that doth save  
The brains calm temper, witty Amathist;  
This precious Quarry, or what else the lift  
On Aaron's Ephod planted, had, she wore  
One only Pearl was wanting to her store;  
Which in her Saviour's book she found expressed,  
To purchase that, she sold Death all the rest.    

Maria Went worth, Thomae Comitis Cleveland, filia praemortua prima virginiam animam exhaluit. An Dom. AEt. suae.  

ANd here the precious dust is laid;  
Whose purely-tempered Day was made  
So fine, that it the guest betrayed.   

Else the soul grew so fast within,  
It broke the outward shell of sin,  
And so was hatched a Cherubin.   

In height, it soared to God above;  
In depth, it did to knowledge move,  
And spread in breadth to general love.   

Before, a pious duty shined  
To Parents, courtesy behind,  
On either side an equal mind.   

Good to the Poor, to kindred dear,  
To servants kind, to friendship clear,  
To nothing but herself, severe.   

●● though a Virgin, yet a Bride  
●o every Grace, the justified  
●● chaste Polygamy, and died.   

Learn from hence (Reader) what small trust  
We owe this world, where virtue must  
Frail as our flesh crumble to dust,    

On the Duke of Buckingham  
Beatissimis Manibus charissimi Viri Ill ma Conjunx sic Parent a vit.  

WHen in the brazen leaves of Fame,  
The life, the death, of Buckingham  
Shall be recorded, if Truth's hand  
incize the story of our Land,  
Posterity shall see a fair  
Structure, by the studious care  
Of two Kings raised that no less  
Their wisdom, than their power express;  
By blinded zeal (whose doubtful light  
Made murders scarlet robe seem white,  
Whose vain-deluding phantasms charmed  
A clouded sullen soul, and armed  
A desperate hand, thirsty of blood)  
Torn from the fair earth where it stood;  
So the majestic fabric fell.  
His Actions let our Annals tell:  
We write no Chronicle, this Pile  
Wears only sorrow's face and stile,  
Which, even the envy that did wait  
Upon his flourishing estate,  
Turned to soft pity of his death,  
Now pays his Hearse; but that cheap breath  
Shall not blow here, nor th'unpure brine  
Puddle those streams that bathe this shrine.  
These are the pious Obsequies  
Dropped from his chaste Wife's pregnant eyes  
In frequent showers, and were alone  
By her congealing sighs made stone,  
On which the Carver did bestow  
These forms and Characters of woe;  
So he the fashion only lent,  
Whilst she wept all this Monument.    

Another  
Siste Hospes, sive Indigena, sive Advena vicessitudinis rerum memor, pauca per lege.  

REader, when these dumb stones have told  
In borrowed Speech what Guest they hold;  
Thou shafts confess, the vain pursure  
Of humane Glory yields no fruit,  
But an untimely Grave. If Fare  
Could constant happiness create,  
Her Ministers, Fortune and Worth,  
Had here that miracle brought forth;  
They fixed this child of Honour, where  
No room was left for Hope, or Fear,  
Of more, of less: so high, so great  
His growth was, yet so safe his seat.  
Safe in the circle of his Friends;  
Safe in his Loyal heart, and ends;  
Safe in his native valiant spirit;  
By favour safe, and safe by merit;  
Safe by the stamp of Nature, which  
Did strength, with shape and Grace enrich;  
Safe in the cheerful Courtesies  
Of flowing gestures, speech, and eyes;  
Safe in his Bounties, which were more  
Proportioned to his mind than store;  
Yet, though for virtue he becomes  
Involved Himself in borrowed sums,  
Safe in his care, he leaves betrayed  
No friend engaged, not debt unpaid.  
But though the stars conspire to shower  
Upon one Head th'united power  
Of all their Graces, if their dire  
Aspects, must other breasts inspire  
With vicious thoughts, a Murderer's knife  
May cut (as here) their Darlings life.  
Who can be happy then, if Nature must  
To make one Happy man, make all men just.    

Four Songs by way of Chorus to a Play, at an entertainment of the King and Queen, by my Lord Chamberlain.  

The first of jealousy. Dialogue.  Question. 
FRom whence was first this fury hurled,  
This Jealousy into the world?  
Came she from Hell?  Ans. 
No there doth reign  
Eternal Hatred with Disdain,  
But she the Daughter is of Love,  
Sister of Beauty.  Reply. 
Then above  
She must derive from the third Sphere  
Her heavenly Offspring.  Ans. 
Neither there  
From those immortal flames could she  
Draw her cold frozen Pedigree.  Quest. 
If nor from heaven nor hell, where then  
Had she her birth?  An. 
I'th' hearts of men,  
Beauty, and Fear did her create,  
Younger than Love, Elder than Hate.  
Sister to both, by Beauty's side  
To Love, by Fear to Hate allied:  
Despair her issue is, whose race  
Of fruitful mischiefs drowns the space  
Of the wide earth, in a swollen flood  
Of wrath, revenge, spite, rage, and blood.  Quest. 
Oh how can such a spurious line  
Proceed from Parents so divine?  Ans. 
As streams, which from their Crystal spring  
Do sweet and clear their waters bring,  
Yet mingling with the brackish Main,  
Nor taste, nor colour they retain.  Qu. 
Yet Rivers 'twixt their own banks flaw  
Still fresh, can jealous do so,  An. 
Yes, whilst she keeps the steadfast ground  
Of Hope, and Fear, her equal bound;  
Hope sprung from favour, worth, or chance,  
Towards the fair object doth advance;  
Whilst Fear, as watchful Scentinell,  
Doth the invading Foe repel;  
And jealousy thus mixed, doth prove  
The season, and the salt of live:  
But when Fear takes a larger scope,  
Stifling the child of Reason, Hope  
Then sitting on th'usurped throne,  
She like a Tyrant rules alone,  
As the wild Ocean unconfined,  
And raging as the Northren-wind.   

2. Feminine Honour.  

IN what esteem did the Gods hold  
Fair Innocence, and the chaste bed,  
When scandaled virtue might be bold,  
Bare foot, upon sharp Cultures spread  
O'er burning coals to march, yet feel  
Nor scorching fire, nor piercing steel?   

Why, when the hard edged Iron did turn  
Soft as a bed of Roses blown,  
When cruel flames forgot to burn  
Their chaste pure limbs, should man alone  
'Gainst female Innocence conspire,  
Harder than steel, fiercer than fire?   

Oh hapless sex! Unequal sway  
Of partial Honour! who may know  
Rebels from subjects that obey,  
When malice can on Vestals throw  
Disgrace, and Fame fix high repute  
On the close shameless Prostitute?   

Vain Honour! thou art but disguise,  
A cheating voice, a juggling art,  
No judge of virtue, whose pure eyes  
Court her own Image in the heart,  
More pleased with her true figure there,  
Than her false Echo in the ear.    

3. Separation of Lovers.  

STop the chafed Boar, or play  
With the Lion's paw, yet fear  
From the Lover's side to tear  
Th'idol of his soul away.   

Though Love cries by the sight  
To the heart, it doth not fly  
From the mind, when from the eye  
The fair objects take their flight.   

But since want provokes desire,  
When we lose what we before  
Have enjoyed, as we want more,  
So is Love more set on fire.   

Love doth with an hungry eye  
Glut on Beauty, and you may  
Safer snatch the Tigers pray  
Than his vital food deny.   

Yet though absence for a space,  
Sharpen the keen Appetite,  
Long continuance doth quite  
All Love's characters efface.   

For the sense not fed, denies  
Nourishment unto the mind,  
Which with expectation pined  
Love of a consumption dyers.    

4 Incommunicability of Love.  QVest. 
By what power was Love confined  
To one object? who can bind,  
Or fix a limit to the freeborn mind?  An. 
Nature; for as bodies may  
Move at once but in one way,  
So nor can minds to more than one love stray.  Reply. 
Yet I feel double smart  
Loves twinned flame, his forked dart,  An. 
Then hath wild Lust, not Love-possest thy heart.  Qu. 
Whence springs love '  An. 
From beauty.  Qu. 
why  
Should th'effect not multiply  
As fast i'th'heart, as doth the cause i'th' eye?  An. 
When two Beauties equal are,  
Sense preferring neither fair,  
Desire stands still, distracted 'twixt the pair.  

So in equal distance lay  
Two far Lambs in the Wolf's way,  
The hungry beast will starve ere choose his prey.   

But where one is chief, the rest  
Cease, and that's alone possessed  
Without a Rival Monarch of the breast.      

Songs in the Play.  

A Lover in the disguise of an Amazon, is dearly beloved of his Mistress.  

Cease thou afflicted soul to mourn,  
Whose love and faith are paid with scorn;  
For I am starved that feet the blissrs  
Of dear embraces, smiles, and kisses  
From my soul's Idol, yet complain  
Of equal love more than disdain.   

Cease, Beauty's exile to lament  
The frozen shades of hanishment,  
For I in that fair bosom dwell  
That is my Paradise, and Hell;  
Banished at home, at once at ease  
In the safe Port, and lost on Seas.   

Cease in cold jealous sears to pine  
Sad wretch, whom Rivals undermine:  
For though I hold locked in mine arms  
My life's sole joy, a Traitor's Charms  
Prevail, whilst I may only blame  
Myself, that mine own Rival am.    

Another. A Lady rescued from death by a Knight, who in the instant leaves her, complains thus.  

OH whither is my says Sun fled,  
Bearing his light, not beat away?  
If thou repose in the moist bed  
Of the Sea-Queen, bring back the day  
To our dark clime, and thou shalt lie  
Bathed in the sea flows from mine eye.   

Upon what whirlwind didst thou ride  
Hence, yet remain fixed in my heart,  
From me, and to me; fled, and tied?  
Dark riddles of the amorous art;  
Love lent thee wings to fly, so He  
Unfeathered now must rest with me.   

Helph, help, brave Youth, I burn, I bleed,  
The cruel God with Bow and Brand  
Pursues the life thy valour freed,  
Disarm him with thy conquering hand;  
And that thou mayest the wild boy tame,  
Give me his dart, keep thou his flame.    

TO BEN. JOHNSON. Upon occasion of his Ode of defiance annexed to his Play of the New Inn.  

'tIs true (dear Ben:) thy just chastizing hand  
Hath fixed upon the somed Age a brand  
To their swollen pride, and empty scribbling due,  
It can nor judge, nor Write, and yet 'tis true  
Thy comic Muse from the exalted line  
Touched by the Alchemist, doth since decline  
From that her Zenith, and foretells a red  
And blushing evening, when she goes to bed,  
Yet such, as shall outshine the glimmering light  
With which all stars shall gild the following night.  
Nor think it much (since all thy Eaglets may  
Endure the Sunny trial) if we say  
This hath the stronger wing, or that doth shine  
Tricked up in fairer plumes, since all are thine;  
Who hath his flock of cackling Geese compared  
With thy tuned choir of Swans? or else who dared  
To call thy births desormed? but if thou bind  
By City custom, or by Gavell-kind,  
In equal shares thy love on all thy race,  
We may distinguish of their sex, and place;  
Though one hand form them, & through one brain strike  
Souls into all, they are not all alike.  
Why should the follies then of this dull age  
Draw from thy pen such an immodest rage  
As seems to blast thy (else-immortall) Bays,  
When thine own tongue proclaims thy itch of praise  
Such thirst will argue drought. No, let be hurled  
Upon thy works by the detracting world,  
What malice can suggest; let the Rout say,  
The running sands, that (ere thou make a play)  
Count the slow minutes, might a Goodwin frame  
To swallow when thoust done thy ship- wracked name  
Let them the dear expense of oil upbraid  
Sucked by thy watchful Lamp, that hath betrayed  
To theft the blood of martyred Authors, spilt  
Into thy ink, whilst thou growest pale with guilt;  
Repine not at the Tapers thrifty waste,  
That sleeks thy terser Poem; nor is haste  
Praise, but excuse; and if thou overcome  
A knotty writer, bring the booty home;  
Nor think it theft, if the rich spoils so torn  
From conquered Authors, be as Trophies worn.  
Let others glut on the extorted praise  
Of vulgar breath, trust thou to after days:  
Thy laboured works shall live, when Time devours  
Th'abortive off spring of their hasty hours.  
Thou art not of their rank, the quarrel lies  
Within thine own Verge, then let this suffice,  
The wiser world doth greater Thee confess  
Than all men else, than Thyself only less.    

An Hymeneal Dialogue. Bride and Groom  GRoom. 
Tell me (my Love) since Hymen tied  
The holy knot, hast thou not felt  
A new infused spirit slide  
Into thy breast, whilst thine did melt?  Bride. 
First tell me (Sweet) whose words were those?  
For though the voice your air did break,  
Yet did my soul the sense compose,  
And through your lips my heart did speak.  Groo. 
Then I preceive, when from the flame  
Of love, my scorched soul did retire,  
Your frozen heart in her place came,  
And sweetly melted in that fire.  Bride. 
'Tis true, for when that mutual change  
Of souls, was made with equal gain,  
I strait might feel diffused a strange,  
But gentle heat through every vein.  Chorus. 
Oh blessed dis-union, that doth so  
Our bodies from our souls divide,  
As two do one, and one four grow,  
Each by contraction multiplied.  Bride. 
Thy bosom then I'll make my nest,  
Since there my willing soul doth perch.  Groom. 
And for my heart in thy chaste breast,  
I'll make an everlasting search.  Chorus. 
Oh blessed dis-union, etc.   

Obsequies to the Lady ANNE HAY  

I Herd the Virgin's sigh, I saw the sleek  
And polished Courtier channel his fresh cheek  
With real tears; the new betrothed Maid  
Smiled not that day, the graver Senate laid  
Their business by; of all the Courtly throng,  
Grief sealed the heart, and silence bound the tongue;  
I that ne'er more of private sorrow knew  
Than from my Pen some froward Mistress drew,  
And for the public woe, had my dull sense  
So feared with ever adverse influence,  
As the invaders sword might have unfelt,  
Pierced my dead bosom, yet began to melt:  
grief's strong instinct, did to my blood suggest  
In the unknown loss peculiar Interest.  
But when I heard, the noble Carlit's Gem,  
The fairest branch of Denny's ancient stem,  
Was from that Casket stolen, from this Trunk torn,  
I found just cause, why they, why I should mourn.  
But who shall guide my artless Pen, to draw  
Those blooming beauties, which I never saw?  
How shall posterity believe my story,  
If I, her crowded graces, and the glory  
Due to her riper virtues, shall relate  
Without the knowledge of her mortal state?  
Shall I, as once Apelles, here a feature,  
There steal a Grace, and rifling so whole Nature  
Of all the sweets a learned eye can see,  
Figure one Venus, and say such was she?  
Shall I her legend fill, with what of old  
Hath of the Worthies of her sex been told,  
And what all pens, and times, to all dispense,  
Restrain to her, by a prophetic sense?  
Or shall I, to the Moral, and Divine  
Exactest laws, shape by an even line,  
A life so strait, as it should shame the square  
Left in the rules of Katherine, or Clare,  
And call it hers, say, so did she begin,  
And had she lived, such had her progress been?  
These are dull ways by which base pens, for hire,  
Dawbney glorious vice, and from Apollo's choir  
Steal holy Ditties, which profanely they  
Upon the Hearse of every strumpet lay.  
We will not bathe thy corpse with a forced tear,  
Nor shall thy train borrow the blacks they were;  
Such vulgar spice, and gums, embalm not thee,  
Thou art the theme of Truth, not Poetry.  
Thou shalt endure a trial by thy Peers;  
Virgins of equal birth, of equal years,  
Whose virtues held with thine an emulous strife,  
Shall draw thy picture, and record thy life;  
One shall ensphere thine eyes, another shall  
Impearl thy teeth; a third thy white and small  
Hand shall besnow, a fourth, incarnadine  
Thy rosy cheek, until each beauteous line,  
Drawn by her hand, in whom that part excels,  
Meet in one Centre, where all beauty dwells.  
Others, in task shall thy choice virtue's share,  
Some shall their birth, some their ripe growth declare,  
Though niggard Time left much unhatched by deeds,  
They shall relate how thou hadst all the seeds  
Of every virtue, which in the pursuit  
Of time, must have brought forth admired fruit.  
Thus shalt thou, from the mouth of envy, raise  
A glorious journal of thy thrifty days,  
Like a bright star shot from his sphere, whose race,  
In a continued line of flames, we trace;  
This, if survay'd, shall to thy view impart  
How little more than lore, thou were't, thou art;  
This shall gain credit with succeeding times,  
When nor by bribed pens, nor partial rhymes  
Of engaged kindred, but the sacred truth  
Is storied by the partners of thy youth;  
Their breath shall Saint thee, and be this thy pride,  
Thus even by Rivals to be Deified    

To the Countess of Anglesea upon the immoderately by her lamented death of her Husband.  

MAdam, men say you keep with dropping eyes  
Your sorrows fresh, watering the Rose that lie  
Fallen from your cheeks upon your dear Lords Hearse.  
Alas! those odours now no more can pierce  
His cold pale nostril, nor the crimson dye  
Present a graceful blush to his dark eye.  
Think you that flood of pearly moisture hath  
The virtue fabled of old Esom's bath;  
You may your beauties, and your youth consume  
Over his Vincentio, and with your sighs perfume  
The solitary Vaule, which as you groan  
In hollow Echoes shall repeat your moan;  
There you may wither, and an Autumn bring  
Upon yourself, but not call back his spring.  
Forbear your fruitless grief then, and let those  
Whose love was doubted, gain belief with shows  
To their suspected faith; you, whose whole life  
In every act crowned you a constant Wife,  
May spare the practice of that vulgar trade,  
Which superstitious custom only made;  
Rather a Widow now of wisdom prove  
The pattern, as a Wife you were of love:  
Yet since you surfeit on your grief, 'tis fit  
I tell the world, upon what cates you fit  
Glutting your sorrows, and at once include  
His story, your excuse, my gratitude.  
You, that behold how yond sad Lady blends  
Those ashes with her tears, lest, as she spends  
Her tributary sighs, the frequent gust  
Might scarter up and down i noble dust,  
Know when that heap of Atoms was with blood  
Kneaded to solid flesh, and firmly stood  
On starely Pillars, the rare form might move  
The froward Inne's, or chaste Cynthia's love.  
In motion, active grace, in rest, a calm,  
Attractive sweetness, brought both wound and balm  
To every heart, He was composed of all  
The wishes of ripe Virgins, when they call  
For Hymm's rites, and in their fancies wed  
A shape of studied beauties to their bed.  
Within this curious Palace dwelled a soul  
Gave lustre to each part, and to the whole.  
This dressed his face in courteous smiles; and so  
From comely gestures, sweeter manners flow.  
This courage joined to strength, so the hand, bend,  
Was Valours, opened, Bounty's instrument,  
Which did the scale, and sword of justice hold,  
Knew how to brandish steel, and scatter gold.  
This taught him, not t' engage his modest tongue  
In suits of private gain, though public wrong;  
Nor mis-employ (As is the great man's use)  
His credit with his Master, to traduce,  
Deprave, malign, and ruin Innocence  
In proud revenge of some mis-judged offence:  
But all his actions had the noble end  
T'advance delert, or grace some worthy friend.  
He chose not in the active stream to swim,  
Nor hunted Honour, which, yet hunted him;  
But like a quiet Eddy, that hath found  
Some hollow creek, there turns his waters round,  
And in continual circles, dances free  
From the impetuous Torrent; so did he  
Give others leave to turn the wheel of State,  
(Whose sterless motions spins the subject's fate)  
Whilst he retired from the tumultuous noise  
Of Court, and suitors press, apart, enjoys  
Freedom, and mirth, himself, his time, and friends,  
And with sweet relish tastes each hour he spends.  
I could remember how his noble heart  
First kindled at your beauties, with what Art  
He chased his game through all opposing fears,  
When I his sighs to you, and back your tears  
Conveyed to him, how loyal then, and how  
Constant he proved since to his marriage vow,  
So as his wand'ring eyes never drew in  
One lustful thought to tempt his soul to sin,  
But that I fear such mention rather may  
Kindle new grief, than blow the old away.  
Then let him rest joined to great Buckingham,  
And with his brothers, mingle his bright flame,  
Look up, and meet their beams, and you from thence  
May chance derive a cheerful influence.  
Seek him no more in dust, but call again  
Your scattered beauty's home, and so the Pen  
Which now I take from this sad Elegy  
Shall sing the Trophies of your conquering eye.    

An Elegy upon the death of Doctor Donne, Deane of Paul's.  

CAn we not force from widowed Poetry  
Now thou art dead (Great Donne) one Elegy,  
To crown thy Hearse? Why yet did we not trust,  
Though with unkneaded dough-baked prose, thy dust,  
Such as th'x Lect'rer from the flower  
Of fading Rhetoric, short lived as his hour,  
Dry as the sand that measures it, might lay  
Upon the ashes, on the Funeral day?  
Have we not tune, nor voice? didst thou dispense  
Through all our language both the words and sense?  
'tis a sad truth. The Pulpit may her plain,  
And sober Christian precepts still retain;  
Doctrines it may, and wholesome uses, frame,  
Grave Homilies, and Lectures, but the flame  
Of thy brave soul, that shot such heat, and light,  
As burnt our Earth, and made our darkeness bright,  
Committed holy rapes upon the will,  
Did through the eye the melting hearts distil,  
And the deep knowledge, of dark truths, so teach,  
As sense might judge, what fancy could not reach,  
Must be desired for ever. So the fire  
That fills with spirit and heat the Delphique Choir,  
Which kindled first by thy Promethean breath  
Glowed here a while, lies quenched now in thy death  
The Muse's garden with Pedantic weeds.  
O'r-spread, was purged by thee, the lazy seeds  
Of servile imitation thrown away,  
And fresh invention planted; thou didst pay  
The debts of our penurious bankrupt Age:  
Licentious thefts, that make poetic rage.  
A mimic fury, when our souls must be  
Possessed, or with Anacreon's ecstasy,  
Or Pindar's, not their own, the subtle cheat  
Of sly exchanges, and the juggling seat  
Of two-edged swords, or whatsoever wrong  
By ours was done the Greek or Latin tongue,  
Thou hast redeemed, and opened us a Mine  
Of rich and pregnant fancy, drawn a line  
Of Masculine expression, which had good  
Old Orpheus seen, or all the ancient brood  
Our superstitious fools admire, and hold  
Their Lead more precious than thy burnish Gold?  
Thou hadst been their Exchequer, and no more,  
They each in others dung had searched for Ore.  
Thou shalt yield no precedence, but of Time,  
And the blind fate of Language, whose tuned chime  
More charms the outward sense; yet thou mayst claim  
From so great disadvantage, greater fame,  
Since to the awe of thy imperious wit  
Our troublesome language bends, made only fit  
With her tough thick-ribed hoops, to gird about  
Thy Giant fancy, which had proved to stout  
For their soft melting phrases. As in time  
They had the start, so did they cull the prime  
Buds of invention many a hundred year,  
And left the rifled fields, besides the fear  
To touch their harvest, yet from those bare lands  
Of what was only thine, thy only hands  
(And that their smallest work) have gleaned more  
Than all those times, and Tongues, could reap before  
But thou art gone, and thy strict laws will be  
Too hard for Libertines in Poetry,  
They will recall the goodly exiled train  
Of gods, and goddesses, which in thy just reign  
Was banished nobler Poems; now, with these,  
The silenced tales i'th' Metamorphoses  
Shall stuff their lines, and swell the windy page,  
Till verse refined by thee, in this last Age  
Turn Ballad-rime, or those old Idols be  
Adored again with new Apostasy.  
Oh! pardon me that break with untuned Verse  
The reverend silence, that attends thy Hearse;  
Whose solemn, awful Murmurs, were to thee  
More than these rude lines, a loud Elegy,  
That did proclaim in a dumb Eloquence  
The'death of all the Arts, whose influence  
Grown feeble, in these panting numbers lies  
Gasping shortwinded accents, and so dies.  
So doth the swiftly-turning wheel, not stand  
In th'instant we withdraw the moving hand,  
But some short time retains a faint weak course,  
By virtue of the first impulsive force;  
And so, whilst I cast on thy funeral Pile  
Thy crown of Bays, oh let it crack a while,  
And spit disdain, till the devouring flashes  
Suck all the moisture up, then turn to ashes.  
I will not draw the envy, to engross  
All thy perfections, or weep all the loss,  
Those are too numerous for one Elegy,  
And 'tis too great to be expressed by me:  
Let others carve the rest; it shall suffice,  
I on thy Grave this Epitaph incize.  
Here lies a king, that ruled as he thought fit  
The Universal Monarchy of wit;  
Here lies two Flamens, and both those the best,  
Apollo's first, at last the true God's Priest.    

In answer to an elegiacal Letter upon the death of the King of Sweden from Aurelan Townsend, inviting me to write on that subject.  

WHy dost thou sound my dear Aurelian,  
In so shrill accents, from thy Barbican,  
A loud alarm to my drowsic eyes,  
Bidding them wake in tears and Elegies  
For might Sweden's fall? Alas! how may  
My Lyrique feet, that of the smooth soft way  
Of love, and Beauty, only know the tread,  
In dancing paces celebrate the dead  
Victorious King, or his Majestic Hearse  
Profane with th'humble touch of their low verse?  
Virgil, nor Lucan, no nor Tasso move  
Than both, not Donne, worth all that went before,  
With the united labour of their wit  
Could a just Poem to this subject fit;  
His actions were too mighty to be raised  
Higher by Verse, let him in prose be praised,  
In modest faithful story, which his deeds  
Shall turn to Poems: when the next Age reads  
Of Frankfort, Leipsigh, Worsburgh, of the Rhine,  
The Leek, the Danube, Tilly, Wallestein,  
Bavaria, Dapenbeim, Lutzenfield, where He  
Gained after death a posthume Victory,  
They'll think his Acts things rather feigned than done  
Like our Romances of the Knight o'th'Sun.  
Leave we him then to the grave Chronicler,  
Who though to Annals he can not refer  
His too-briefe story, yet his journals may  
Stand by the Caesar's years, and every day  
Cut into minutes, each shall more contain  
Of great designment than an Emperor's reign;  
And (since 'twas but his Churchyard) let him have  
For his own ashes now no narrower Grave  
Than the whole Germane Continents vast womb,  
Whilst all her Cities do but make his Tomb.  
Let us to supreme providence commit  
The fate of Monarches, which first thought it fit  
To rend the Empire from the Austrian grasp  
And next from sweden, even when he did clasp  
Within his dying arms the Sovereignty  
Of all those Provinces, that men might see  
The Divine wisdom would not leave that Land  
Subject to any one Kings sole command.  
Then let the Germans fear, if Caesar shall,  
Or the United Princes, rise, and fall,  
But let us that in myrtle bowers sit  
Under secure shades use the benefit  
Of peace and plenty, which the blessed hand  
Of our good King gives this obdurate Land,  
Let us of Revels sing, and let thy breath  
(Which filled Fame's trumpet with Gustavus death,  
Blowing his name to heaven) gently inspire  
Thy pastoral pipe, till all our swains admire  
Thy song and subject, whilst they both comprise  
The beauties of the SHEPHERD'S PARADISE;  
For who like thee (whose loose discourse is far  
Moreneat and polished than our Poems are,  
Whose very gate's more graceful than our dance)  
In sweetly flowing numbers may advance  
The glorious night; When not to act foul rapes,  
Like birds, or beasts, but in their Angel-shapes  
A troop of Deities came down to guide  
Our steerless barks in passions swelling tie  
By vetrues Card, and brought us from above  
A pattern of their own celestial love,  
Nor lay it in dark sullen precepts drowned,  
But with rich fancy, and clear Action crowned  
Through a mysterious fable (that was drawn  
Like a transparent veil of purest Lawn  
Before their dazelling beauties) the divine  
Venus, did with her heavenly Cupid shine.  
The stories curious web, the Masculine stile,  
The subt le sense, did Time and sleep beguile,  
Pinioned and charmed they stood to gaze upon  
Th' Angelic forms, gestures, and motion.  
To hear those ravishing sounds that did dispense  
Knowledge and pleasure, to the soul and sense,  
It filled us with amazement to behold  
Love made all spirit, his corporeal mould  
Dissected into Atoms melt away  
To empty air, and from the gross allay  
Of mixtures, & and compounding Accidents  
Refined to immaterial Elements.  
But when the Queen of Beauty did inspire  
The air with perfumes, and our hearts with fire,  
Breathing from her celestial Organ sweet  
Harmonious notes, our souls fell at her feet,  
And did with humble reverend duty, more  
Her rare perfections, than high state adore.  
These harmless pastimes let my Townesend sing  
To rural times; not that thy Muse wants wing  
To soar a loftier pitch, for she hath made  
A noble flight, and placed th'heroic shade  
Above the reach of our faint flagging rhyme;  
But these are subjects proper to our clime.  
Torueyes, Masques, theatres better become  
Our Halcyon days; what though the Germane Drum  
Bellow for freedom and revenge? the noise  
Concerns not us, nor should divert our joys;  
Nor ought the thunder of their Carabins  
Drown the sweet Airs of our tuned Violins;  
Believe me friend, if their prevailing powers  
Gain them a calm security like ours,  
They'll hang their Arms upon the Olive bough.  
And dance, and revel then, as we do now,    

Upon Master W. Montague his return from travel.  

LEad the black Bull to slaughter, with the Boar  
And Lamb, then purple with their mingled gore  
The Ocean's curled brow, that so we may  
The Sea-Gods for their careful waftage pay:  
Send grateful lncense up in pious smoke  
To those mild spirits, that cast a kerbing yoke  
Upon the stubborn winds, that calmly blew  
To the wished shore, ou longed-for Montague,  
Then whilst the Aromantique odours burn,  
In honour of their Darling's safe return  
The Muse's Choir shall thus with voice and hand,  
Bless the fair Gale that drove his ship to land. 
Sweetly breathing Vernal Air  
That with kind warmth dost repair  
Winter's ruins, from whose breast  
All the gums and spice of th'East  
Borrow their perfumes, whose eye  
Gil'ds the morn, and clears the sky,  
Whose dishevelled tresses shed  
Pearls upon the Violet bed,  
On whose brow with calm smiles dressed  
The Haltion sits and builds her nest,  
Beauty, Youth, and endless spring,  
Dwell upon thy rosy wing.  
Thou, if stormy Boreas throws  
Down whole Forests when he blows,  
With a pregnant flowery birth  
‛ Canst refresh the teeming Earth;  
If he nip the early bud,  
If the blast what's fair on good;  
If he scatter our choice flowers,  
If she shake our hills or bowers,  
If his vade breath threaten us,  
Thou canst stroke great Aeolus  
And from him the grace obtain  
To bind him in an Iron chain.   
Thus, whilst you deal your body amongst your friends  
And fill their circling arms, my glad soul sends  
This her embrace: Thus we of Delphos greet,  
As Laymen clasp their hands, we join our feet.    

To Master W. Montague.  

SIR, I arrest you at your Country's suit,  
Who as a debt to her, requires the fruit  
Of that rich stock, which she by Nature's hand  
Gave you in trust, to th'use of this whole Land.  
Next she endites you of a Felony,  
For stealing, what was her Propriety:  
Yourself, from hence, so seeking to convey  
The public treasure of the State away.  
More, y'are accused of Ostracism, the Fate  
Imposed or old by the Athenian state  
On eminent virtue, but the curse which they  
Cast on their men, You on your Country lay:  
For, thus divided from your noble part ˢ  
This Kingdom lives in exile, & all hearts  
That relish worth, or honour, being rend  
From your perfections, suffer banishment  
These are your public injuries; but I  
Have a just private quarrel to defy  
And call you Coward, thus to run away  
When you had pierced my heart, not daring stay  
Till I redeemed my honour; but I swear  
By Celia's eyes, by the same force to tear  
Your heart from you, or not to end this strife,  
Till I or find revenge, or lose my life.  
But as in single fights it oft hath been  
In that unequal equal trial seen,  
That he who had received the wrong at first,  
Came from the Combat oft too with the worst;  
So if you foil me when we meet, I'll then  
Give you fair leave to wound me so again.    

On the Marriage of T. K. and C. C. the morning stormy.  

Such should this day be, so the Sun should hide  
His bashful face, & let the conquering Bride  
Without a Rival shine, whilst He forbears  
To mingle his unequal beams with hers;  
Or if sometimes he glance his squinting eye  
Between the parting clouds, 'tis but to spy,  
Not emulate her glories, so comes dressed  
In veils, but as a S to the feast.  
Thus heaven should lowr, such stormy gusts should blow,  
Not to denounce ungentle Fates, but show  
The cheerful Bridegroom to the clouds and wind,  
Hath all his tears, and all his sighs assigned.  
Let Tempests struggle in the Air, but rest  
Eternal calms within thy peaceful breast.  
Thrice happy Youth; but ever sacrifice  
To that fair hand that dried thy blubbered eyes,  
That crowned thy head with Roses, and turned all  
The plagues of love into a cordial,  
When first it joined her Virgin snow to thine,  
Which when to day the Priest shall recombine,  
From the mysterious holy touch such charms  
Will flow, as shall unlock her wreathed arms,  
And open a free passage to that fruit  
Which thou hast toiled for with a long pursuit.  
But ere thou feed, that thou mayst better taste  
Thy present joys, think on thy torments past.  
Think on the mercy freed thee, think upon  
Her virtues, graces, beauties, one by one,  
So shalt thou relish all, enjoy the whole  
Delights of her fair body, and pure soul;  
Then boldly to the fight of Love proceed,  
'Tis mercy not to pity though she bleed,  
we'll strew no nuts, but change that ancient form,  
For till to morrow we'll prorogue this storm.  
Which shall confound with its loud whistling noise  
Her pleasing shrieks, and fan thy panting joys.    

For a Picture where a Queen Laments over the Tomb of a slain Knight.  

BRave Youth; to whom Fate in one hour  
Gave death, and Conquest, by whose power  
Those chains about my heart are wound,  
With which the Foe my Kingdom bound,  
Freed, and captived by thee, I bring  
For either Act an offering;  
For victory, this wreath of Bay;  
●nsign of thraldom, down I lay  
Sceptre and Crown: Take from my sight  
Those Royal Robes; since fortune's spite  
Forbids me live thy Virtue's prize,  
I'll die thy Valour's sacrifice.    

To a Lady that desired I would love her.  

I.  
NOw you have freely given me leave to love,  
What will you do?  
Shall I your mirth, or passion move,  
When I begin to woo;  
Will you torment, or scorn, or love me too?   

2.  
Each petty beauty can disdain, and I  
Spite of your hate  
Without your leave can see, and die;  
Dispense a nobler Fate,  
'tis easy to destroy, you may create.   

3.  
Then give me leave to love, & love me too  
Not with design  
To raise, as Love's cursed Rebels do,  
When puling Poets whine,  
Fame to their beauty, from their blubbied eyri.   

4.  
Grief is a puddle, and reflects not clear  
Your beauty's rays;  
joys are pure streams, your eyes appear  
Sullen in sadder lays,  
In cheerful numbers they shine bright with praise.   

5.  
Which shall not mention to express you fair  
Wounds, flames, and darts,  
Storms in your brow, nets in your hair,  
Suborning all your parts,  
Or to betray, or torture captive hearts,   

6.  
I'll make your eyes like morning Suns appear,  
As mild, and fair;  
Your brow as Crystal smooth, and clear,  
And your dishevelled hair  
Shall flow like a calm Region of the Ayr.   

7.  
Rich Nature's store, (which is the Poet's Treasure)  
I'll spend, to dress  
Your beauties, if your mine of Pleasure  
In equal thankfulness  
You but unlock, so we each other bless.    

Upon my Lord Chief justice his election of my Lady A. W. for his Mistress.  

1.  
HEar this, and tremble all  
Usurping Beauties, that create  
A government Tyrannical  
In Love's free state,  
justice, hath to the sword of your edged eyes  
His equal balance joined, his sage head lies  
In love's soft lap, which must be just and wise.   

2.  
Hark how the stern Law breathes  
Forth amorous sighs, and now prepares  
No fetters, but of silken wreathes,  
And braded hairs;  
His dreadful Rods and Axes are exiled  
Whilst he sits crowned with Roses, Love hath filled  
His native roughness, justice is grown mild.   

3.  
The golden Age returns,  
Loves bow, and quiver, useless lie,  
His shaft, his brand, nor wounds, nor burns,  
And cruelty  
Is sunk to Hell, the fair shall all be kind,  
Who loves, shall be beloved, the froward mind  
To a deformed shape shall be confined.   

4.  
Astiaea hath postest  
An earthly seat, and now remains  
In Finch's heart, but wentworth's breast  
That Guest contains;  
With her she dwells, yet hath not left the skies,  
Nor lost her Sphere, for new-enthroned she cries  
I know no Heaven but fair wentworth's eyes.    

To A. D. unreasonable distrustful of her own beauty.  

Fair Doris break thy Glass, it hath perplexed,  
With a dark Comment, beauties clearest Text;  
It hath not told thy faces story true,  
But brought false Copies to thy jealous view.  
No colour, feature, lovely air, or grace,  
That ever yet adorned a beauteous face,  
But thou mayst read in thine, or justly doubt  
Thy Glass hath been summoned to leave it our.  
But if it offer to thy nice survey  
A spot, a stain, a blemish, or decay,  
It not belongs to thee, the treacherous light  
Or faithless stone, abuse thy credulous sight.  
Perhaps the magic of thy face hath wrought  
Upon th'enchanted Crystal, and so brought  
Fantastic shadows to delude thine eyes  
With airy re-pereussive sorceries.  
Or else th'enamoured Image pines away  
For love of the fair Object, and so may  
Wax pale and wan, and though the substance grow  
Lively and fresh, that may consume with woe;  
Give then no faith to the false specular stone,  
But let thy beauties by th'effects be known.  
Look (sweetest Doris) on my lovesick heart,  
In that true mirror see how fair thou art.  
There, by Love's never-erring Pencil drawn  
Shalt thou behold thy face, like th'early dawn  
Shoot through the shady covert of thy hair,  
Enameling, and perfuming the calm Air  
With Pearls, and Roses, till thy Suns display  
Their lids, and let out the imprisoned day.  
Whilst Delphique Priests, (enlightened by their Theme)  
In amorous numbers count thy golden beam,  
And from Love's Altars clouds of sighs arise  
In smoking Incense to adore thine eyes.  
If then Love flow from Beauty as th'effect,  
How canst thou the resistless cause suspect?  
Who would not brand that Fool, that should contend  
There were no fire, where smoke and flames ascend?  
Distrust is worse than scorn, not to believe  
My harms, is greater wrong than not to grieve;  
What cure can for my festering sore be found,  
Whilst thou believest thy beauty cannot wound?  
Such humble thoughts more cruel Tyrants prove  
Than all the pride that e'er usurped in Love,  
For Beauty's Herald, here denounceth war,  
There her false spies betray me to a snare.  
If fire disguised in balls of snow were hurled  
It unsuspected might consume the world;  
Where our prevention ends, danger begins;  
So Wolves in Sheep's, Lions in Asses skins  
Might far more mischief work, because less feared,  
Those, the whole stock, these might kill all the herd;  
Appear then as thou art, break through this cloud,  
Confess thy beauty, though thou thence grow proud,  
Be fair, though scornful, rather let me find  
Thee cruel, than thus mild, and more unkind;  
Thy cruelty doth only me defy,  
But these dull thoughts thee to thyself deny;  
Whether thou mean to barter, or bestow.  
Thyself, 'tis fit thou thine own value know.  
I will not cheat thee of thyself, nor pay  
Less for thee than thouart worth, thou shalt not say  
That is but brittle glass, which I have found  
By strict enquiry a firm Diamond.  
I'll trad with no such Indian fool as sele  
Gold, Pearls, and precious stones, for Beads and Bells;  
Nor will I take a present from your hand,  
Which you, or prise not, or not understand;  
It not endears your bounty that I do  
Esteem your gift, unless you do so too;  
You undervalue me, when you bestow  
On me, what you nor care for, nor yet know.  
No (Lovely Doris) change thy thoughts, and be  
In love first with thyself, and then with me.  
You are afflicted that you are not fair,  
And I as much tormented that you are;  
What I admire, you seorn, what I love, hate;  
Through different faiths, both share an equal Fate.  
Fast to the truth, which you renounce, I stick,  
I die a Martyr, you an Heretic.    

To my friend G. N. from Wrest.  

I Breath (sweet Ghibs:) the temperate air of wrest  
Where I no more with raging storms oppressed  
Wear the cold nights out by the banks of Tweed,  
On the bleak Mountains, where fierce rempests breed,  
And everlasting Winter dwells; where mild  
Favonius, and the Vernal winds exiled,  
Did never spread their wings: but the wild North  
Brings sterile Fearn, Thistles, and Brambles forth.  
Here steeped in balmy dew, the pregnant Earth,  
Sends from her teeming womb a flowery birth,  
And cherished with the warm Sun's quickening heat,  
Her porous bosom doth rich odour sweat;  
Whose perfumes through the Ambient air diffuse  
Such native Aromatics, as we use  
No foreign Gums, nor essence, fetched from far,  
No Volatile spirits, nor compounds that are  
Adulterate, but at Nature's cheap expense  
With far more genuine sweets refresh the sense.  
Such pure and uncompounded beauties, bless  
This Mansion with an useful comeliness '  
Devoid of Art, for here the Architect  
Did not with curious skill a Pile erect  
Of carved Marble, Touch, or Porphery '  
But built a house for hospitality;  
No sumptuous Chimney-piece of shining stone  
Invites the stranger's eye to gaze upon,  
And coldly entertains his sight, but clear  
And cheerful flames, cherish and warm him here:  
No Dorique, nor Corinthian Pillars grace  
With Imagery this structures naked face,  
The Lord and Lady of this place delight  
Rather to be in act, than seem in sight;  
In stead of Statues to adorn their wall,  
They throng with living men, their merry Hall,  
Where at large Tables filled with wholesome meats  
The servant, Tenant, and kind neighbour eats.,  
Some of that rank, spun of a finer thread,  
Are with the Women, Steward, and Chaplain fed  
With dainties cares; Others of better note  
Whom wealth, parts, office, or the Herald's coat  
Have severed from the common, freely fit  
At the Lord's Table, whose spread sides admit  
A large access of friends to fill those fears  
Of his capacious sickle, filled with meats  
Of choicest relish, till his Oaken back  
Under the load of pil'd-up dishes crack,  
Nor think, because our Pyramids, and high  
Exalted Turrets threaten nor the sky,  
That therefore wrest of narrowness complains  
Or straightened Walls, for she more numerous trains  
Of Noble guests daily receives, and those  
Can with far more conveniency dipose  
Than prouder Piles, where the vain builder spent  
More cost in outward gay Embellishment  
Than real use: which was the sole design  
Of our contriver, who made things not fine,  
But fit for service. Amalthea's Horn  
Of plenty is not in Effigy worn  
Without the gate, but she within the door  
Empties her free and unexhausted store.  
Nor, crowned with wheaten wreathes, doth Ceres stand  
In stone, with a crooked sickle in her hand:  
Nor, on a Marble Tun, his face besmeared  
With grapes, is curled uncizard Bacchus reared.  
We offer not in Emblems to the eyes,  
But to the taste those useful Deities.  
We press the juicy God, and quaff his blood,  
And grind the Yellow Goddess into food.  
Yet we decline not all the work of Art,  
But where more bounteous Nature bears a part  
And guides her Handmaid, is she but dispense  
Fit matter, she with care and diligence  
Employs her skill, for where the neighbour source  
Powers forth her waters, she directs her course,  
And entertains the flowing streams in deep  
And spacious channels, where they slowly creep  
In snaky windings, as the shelving ground  
Leads them in circles, till they twice surround  
This Island Mansion, which i'th' centre placed,  
Is with a double Crystal heaven embraced,  
In which our watery constellations float.  
Our Fishes, Swans, our Waterman and Boat,  
Envied by those above, which with to slake  
Their starre-burnt limbs in our refreshing lake,  
But they stick fast nailed to the barren Spherl '  
While our increase in fertile waters here,  
Disport, and wander freely where they please  
Within the circuit of our narrow Seas.  
With various Trees we fringe the water's brink,  
Whose thirsty roots the soaking moisture drink.  
And whose extended boughs in equal ranks  
Yield fruit, and shade, and beauty to the banks.  
On this side young Vertumnus sits, and courts  
His ruddy-cheeked Pomono, Zephyre sports  
On th'other, with loved Flora, yielding there  
Sweets for the smell, sweets for the palate here.  
But did you taste the high and mighty drink  
Which from that Fountain flows, you'd think  
The God of Wine did his plump clusters bring,  
And crush the Falern grape into our spring;  
Or else disguised in watery Robes did swim  
To Ceres' bed, and make her big of Him,  
Begetting so himself on Her: for know  
Our Vintage here in March doth nothing owe  
To theirs in Autumn, but our fire boyles here  
As lusly liquor as the Sun makes there.  
Thus I enjoy myself, and taste the fruit  
Of this blessed Peace, whilst toiled in the pursuit  
Of Bucks, and Stags, th'emblem of war you strive  
To keep the memory of our Arms alive.    

A New-year's gift. To the King.  

LOok back old janus, and survey  
From Time's birth, till this newborn day,  
All the successful season bound  
With Laurel wreaths, and Trophies crowned;  
Turn o'er the Annals past, and where  
Happy auspicious days appear,  
Marked with the whiter stone, that cast  
On the dark brow of th' Ages past  
●dazeling lustre, let them shine  
●n this succeeding circles twine,  
Till it be round with glories spread,  
Then with it crown our CHARLES his head,  
That we th'ensuing year may call  
One great continued festival.  
Fresh joys in varied forms apply,  
To each distinct captivity.  
Season his cares by day with nights  
Crowned with all conjugal delights,  
May the choice beauties that inflame  
His Royal breast be still the same,  
And he still think them such, since more  
Thou canst not give from Nature's store  
Then as a Father let him be  
With numerous issue blest, and see  
The fair and Godlike offspring grown  
From budding stars to Suns full blown.  
Circle wish peaceful Olive boughs,  
And conquering Bays, his Regal brows.  
Let his strong virtues overcome,  
And bring him bloodless Trophies home:  
Strew all the pavements, where he treads,  
With loyal hearts, or Rebels heads:  
But Byfront, open thou no more,  
In his blessed reign the Temple door.    

To the Queen.  

THou great Commandress, that dost move  
Thy Sceptre o'er the Crown of Love,  
And through his Empire with the Awe  
Of Thy chaste beams, dost give the Law,  
From his prophaner Altars, we  
Turn to adore Thy Deity:  
He only can wild lust provoke,  
Thou, those impurer flames canst choke;  
And where he scatters loser fires,  
Thou turn'st them into chaste desires:  
His Kingdom knows no rule but this,  
What ever pleaseth lawful is;  
Thy sacred Lore shows us the path  
Of Modesty and constant faith,  
Which makes the rude Male satisfied  
With one fair Female by his side;  
Doth either sex to each unite,  
And form love's pure Hermophradite.  
To this Thy faith, behold the wild  
satire already reconciled,  
Who from the influence of Thine eye  
Hath sucked the deep Divinity;  
O free them then, that they may teach,  
The Centaur and the Horsman preach  
To Beasts and Birds, sweetly to rest  
Each in his proper Lare and nest:  
They shall convey it to the flood,  
Till there Thy law be understood,  
So shalt thou with thy pregnant fire,  
The water, earth, and air, inspire.    

To the New year, for the Countess of Carlisle.  

GIve Lucinda Pearl, nor Stone,  
Lend them light who else have none,  
Let Her beauty shine alone.   

Gums nor spice bring from the East,  
For the Phoenix in Her breast  
Builds his funeral Pile, and nest.   

No tire thou canst invent,  
Shall to grace her form be sent,  
She adorns all ornament,   

Give Her nothing, but restore  
Those sweet smiles which heretofore,  
In Her cheerful eyes she wore.   

Drive those envious clouds away,  
Veils that have o'r-cast my day,  
And eclipsed Her brighter ray.   

Let the royal Goth mow down  
This years' harvest with his own  
Sword, and spare Lucinda's frown,   

janus, if when next I trace  
Those sweet lines, I in her face  
Read the Charter of my grace,   

Then from bright Apollo's tree,  
Such a Garland wreathed shall be,  
As shall Crown both Her and Thee.    

To my Honoured friend, Master Thomas May, upon his Comedy, The Heir.  

THe Heir being born, was in his tender age  
Rocked in the Cradle of a private Stage,  
There lifted up by many a willing hand,  
The child did from the first day fairly stand.  
Since having gathered strength, he dares prefer  
His steps into the public Theatre  
The world: where he despairs not but to find  
A doom from men more able, not less kind.  
I but his Usher am, yet if my word  
May pass, I dare be bound he will afford  
Things must deserve a welcome, if well known,  
Such as best writers would have wished their own.  
You shall observe his words in order meet,  
And softly stealing on with equal feet  
Slide into even numbers, with such grace  
As each word had been moulded for that place.  
You shall perceive an amorous passion, spun  
Into so smooth a web, as had the Sun  
When he pursued the swiftly flying Maid,  
Courted her in such language, she had stayed.  
A love so well expressed, must be the same  
The Author felt himself from his fair flame:  
The whole plot doth alike itself disclose  
Through the five Acts, as doth the Lock that goes  
With letters, for till every one be known,  
The Lock's as fast, as if you had found none;  
And where his sportive Muse doth draw a thread  
Of mirth, chaste Matrons may not blush to read.  
Thus have I thought it fitter to reveal!  
My want of art (dear friend) than to conceal  
My love. It did appear I did not mean  
So to commend thy well-wrought Comick-scene,  
As men might judge my aim rather to be,  
To gain praise to myself, than give it thee;  
Though I can give thee none, but what thou hast  
Deserved and what must my faint breath outlast.  
Yet was this garment (though I skilless be,  
To take thy measure) only made for thee,  
And if it prove too scant, 'tis cause the stuff  
Nature allowed me was not large enough.    

To my worthy friend Master Geo. Sands, on his translation of the Psalms.  

I Press not to the Choir, nor dare I greet  
The holy place with my unhallowed feet;  
My unwashed Muse pollutes not things Divine,  
Nor mingles her prophaner notes with thine;  
Here, humbly at the porch she stays,  
And with glad ears sucks in thy sacred lays.  
So, devout Penitents of Old were wont,  
Some without door, and some beneath the Font,  
To stand and hear the Church's Liturgies,  
Yet not assist the solemn exercise:  
Sufficeth her, that she a lay-place gain,  
To trim thy Vestments, or but bear thy train;  
Though nor in tune, nor wing, she reach thy Lark,  
Her Lyric feet may dance before the Ark.  
Who knows, but that her wand'ring eyes that run,  
Now hunting Glow-worm's, may adore the Sun,  
A pure flame may, shot by Almighty power  
Into her breast, the earthy flame devour.  
My eyes, in penitential dew may steep  
That brine, which they for sensual love did weep.  
So (though against Nature's course) fire may be quenched  
With fire, and water be with water drenched;  
Perhaps my restless soul, tired with pursuit  
Of mortal beauty, seeking without fruit  
Contentment there, which hath not, when enjoyed,  
Quenched all her thirst, nor satisfied, though cloyed;  
Weary of her vain search below, Above  
In the first fair may find th' immortal Love.  
Prompted by thy example then, no more  
In moulds of clay will I my God adore;  
But tear those Idols from my heart, and write  
What his blessed Spirit, not fond Love, shall indite;  
Then I no more shall court the verdant Bay,  
But the dry leaveless Trunk on Golgotha;  
And rather strive to gain from thence one Thorn,  
Than all the flourishing wreaths by Laureates worn.    

To my much honoured friend, HENRY Lord CARY of Lepington, upon his translation of MALVEZZI.  

My Lord,  
IN every trivial work 'tis known  
Translators must be masters of their own,  
And of their Author's language, but your task  
A greater latitude of skill did ask.  
For your Malvezzi first required a man  
To teach him speak vulgar Italian:  
His matter's so sublime, so now his phrase,  
So far above the stile of Bemboe's days,  
Old Varchie's rules, or what the Trusca yet  
For currant Truscan mintage will admit,  
As I believe your Marquis, by a good  
Part of his Natives hardly understood.  
You must expect no happier fate, 'tis true  
He is of noble birth, of nobler you:  
So nor your thoughts, nor words fit common ears,  
He writes, and you translate both to your Peers,    

To my worthy Friend, Master D'AVENANT, Upon his excellent Play, The Just Italian.  

I'll not misspend in praise, the narrow room  
I borrow in this leaf; the Garlands bloom  
From thine own seeds, that crown each glorious page  
Of thy triumphant work; the sullen Age  
Requires a Satire. What star guides the soul  
Of these our froward times, that date control,  
Yet dare not learn to judge? When didst thou fly  
From hence, clear, candid Ingenuity?  
I have beheld, when parched on the smooth brow  
Of a fair modest troop; thou didst allow  
Applause to slighter works; but then the weak  
Spectator, gave the knowing leave to spoke.  
Now noise prevails, and he is taxed for drought  
Of wit, that with the cry, spends not his mouth  
Yet ask him; reason why he did not like;  
Him, why he did; their ignorance will strike  
Thy soul with scorn, and pity: mark the places  
Provoke their smiles, frowns, or distorted faces,  
When they admire, nod, shake the head, they'll be  
A scene of mirth, a double Comedy.  
But thy strong fancies (raptures of the brain,  
Dressed in Poetic flames) they entertain  
As a bold, impious reach; for they'll still slight  
All that exceeds Red Bull, and Cockpit flight,  
These are the men in crowded heaps that throng  
To that adulterate stage, where not a tongue  
Of th'untuned Kennel, can a line repeat  
Of serious sense, but like lips, meet like meat;  
Whilst the true brood of Actors, that alone  
Keep natural unstrained Action in her throne,  
Behold their Benches bare, though they rehearse  
The terser Beaumont's or great Johnson's verse.  
Repine not Thou then, since this churlish fate  
Rules not the stage alone; perhaps the State  
Hath felt this rancour, where men great and good,  
Have by the Rabble been misunderstood.  
So was thy Play; whose clear, yet lofry strain,  
Wisemen, that govern Fate, shall entertain.    

To the Reader of Master William Davenant's Play.  

IT hath been said of old, that Plays are Feasts,  
Poets the Cooks, and the Spectators Guests,  
The Actors Waitors: From this Simile,  
Some have derived an unsafe liberty  
To use their judgements as their Tastes, which choose  
Without control, this Dish, and that refuse:  
But Wit allows not this large Privilege,  
Either you must confess, or feel its edge;  
Nor shall you make a currant inference  
If you transfer your reason to your sense:  
Things are distinct, and must the same appear meet:  
To every piercing Eye, or well-tuned Eare.  
Though sweets with yours, sharps best with my taste  
Both must agree, this meat's, or sharp or sweet:  
But if I sent a stench, or a perfume,  
Whilst you smell nought at all, I may presume  
You have that sense imperfect: So you may  
Affect a sad, merry, or humorous Play,  
If, though the kind distaste or please, the Good  
And Bad, be by your judgement understood:  
But if, as in this Play, where with delight  
I feast my Epicurean appetite  
With relishes so curious, as dispense  
The utmost pleasure to the ravished sense,  
You should profess that you can nothing meet  
That hits your taste, either with sharp or sweet,  
But cry out, 'tis insipid; your bold Tongue  
May do its Master, not the Author wrong;  
For Men of better palate will by it  
Take the just elevation of your Wit.    

TO MY FRIEND WILL: D' AVENANT.  

I Crowded amongst the first, to see the Stage  
(Inspired by thee) strike wonder in our age,  
By thy bright fancy dazzled; Where each Scene  
Wrought like a charm, and forced the audience lean  
To''th' passion of thy Pen; thence Ladies went  
(Whose absence Lovers sighed for) to repent  
Their unkind scorn; And Courtiers, who by art  
Made love before, with a converted heart,  
To wed those Virgins, whom they wooed t'abuse;  
Both rendered Hymen's pros'lits by thy Muse.  
But others who were proof against Love, did sit  
To learn the subtle Dictates of thy Wit;  
And as each profited, took his degree,  
Master, or Bachelor, in Comedy.  
We, of th'adulterate mixture not complain,  
But thence more Characters of Virtue gain;  
More pregnant Patterns of transcendent Worth,  
Than barren and insipid Fruit brings forth:  
So, oft the Bastard nobler fortune meets,  
Than the dull Issue of the lawful shear.    

The Comparison.  

DEarest, thy tresses are not threads of gold,  
Thy eyes of Diamonds, nor do I hold  
Thy lips for Rubies: Thy fair cheeks to be  
Fresh Roses, or thy teeth of Ivory.  
Thy skin that doth thy dainty body sheath,  
Not Alabaster is, nor dost thou breath  
Arabian odours, those the earth brings forth,  
Compared with which, would but impair thy worth.  
Such may be others Mistresses, but mine  
Holds nothing earthly, but is all divine.  
Thy tresses are those rays that do arise  
Not from one Sun, but two; Such are thy eyes;  
Thy lips congealed Nectar are, and such,  
As but a Deity, there's none dare touch;  
The perfect crimson that thy cheek doth cloth  
(But only that it far exceeds them both)  
Aurora's blush resembles, or that red  
That Iris struts in when her mantles spread;  
Thy teeth in white do Leda's Swan exceed,  
Thy skin's a heavenly and immortal weed;  
And when thou breathest, the winds are ready straight  
To filch it from thee, and do therefore wait  
Close at thy lips, and snatching it from thence  
Bear it to Heaven, where 'tis Ioves frankincense.  
Fair Goddess, since thy feature makes the one,  
Yet be not such for these respects alone;  
But as you are divine in outward view,  
So be within as fair, as good, as true.    

The Enquiry.  

AMongst the myrtles as I walked,  
Love and my sighs thus intertalked,  
Tell me (said I in deep distress)  
Where may I find my shepherdess?   

Thou fool (said love) know'st thou not this  
In every thing that's good she is;  
In yonder Tulip go and seek,  
There thou mayst find her lip, her cheek.   

In you ennammeled Pansie by,  
There thou shalt have her curious eye;  
In bloom of Peach, in Rosy bud,  
There wave the streamers of her blood.  
In brightest Lilies that there stands,  
The emblems of her whiter hands.  
In yonder rising hill there smells  
Such sweets as in her bosom dwells.   

'Tis true (said I) and thereupon  
I went to pluck them one by one  
To make of parts a union;  
But on a sudden all was gone.   

With that I stopped, said love these be  
(Fond man) resemblances of thee,  
And as these flowers, thy joys shall die,  
Even in the twinkling of an eye:  
And all thy hopes of her shall wither,  
Like these short sweets, thus knit together.    

The Spark.  

MY first love whom all beauties did adorn,  
Firing my heart suppressed it with her scorn,  
Sunlike, to tinder in my breast it lies,  
By every sparkle made a sacrifice.  
Each wanton eye now kindles my desire,  
And that is free to all that was entire:  
Desiring more, by thee (desire) I lost,  
As those that in consumptions hunger most,  
And now my wand'ring thoughts are not confined  
Unto one woman, but to womankind;  
This for her shape of love, that for her face,  
This for her gesture, or some other grace,  
And where I none of these do use to find,  
I choose there by the kernel not the rind:  
And so I hope since my first hopes are gone,  
To find in many what I lost in one;  
And like to Merchants after some great loss,  
Trade by retail, that cannot now in gross.  
The fault is hers that made me go astray,  
He needs must wander that hath lost his way.  
Guiltless I am, she did this change provoke,  
And made that charcoal which to her was oak,  
And as a Looking-glass from the aspect,  
Whilst it is whole, doth but one face reflect,  
But being cracked, or broken, there are shown  
Many half faces, which at first were one;  
So love unto my heart did first prefer  
Her Image, and there planted none but her,  
But since 'twas broke and martyred by her scorn,  
Many less faces in her face are born;  
Thus like to tinder am I prone to catch  
Each falling sparkle, fit for any match.    

The Compliment.  

O My dearest I shall grieve thee  
When I swear, yet sweet believe me,  
By thine eyes the tempting book  
On which even crabbed old men look,  
I swear to thee, (though none abhor them)  
Yet I do not love thee for them.   

I do not love thee for that fair,  
Rich fan of thy most curious hair;  
Though the wires thereof be drawn  
Finer than the threads of lawn,  
And are softer than the leaves  
On which the subtle spinner weaves.   

I do not love thee for those flowers,  
Growing on thy cheeks (loves bowers)  
Though such cunning them hath spread  
None can paint their white and red:  
Loves golden arrows thence are shot,  
Yet for them I love thee nor.   

I do not love thee for those soft  
Red coral lips I've kissed so oft;  
Nor teeth of pearl, the double guard  
To speech, whence music still is heard:  
Though from those lips a kiss being taken,  
Might tyrants melt and death awakens.   

I do not love thee (O my fairest)  
For that richest, for that rarest)  
Silver pillar which stands under  
Thy found head, that globe of wonder;  
Though that neck be whiter far,  
Than towers of polished Ivory are.   

I do not love thee for those mountains  
Hilled with snow, whence milky fountains,  
(Sugared sweets, as sirropt berries)  
Mu one day run through pipes of cherries;  
O how much those breasts do move me!  
Yet for them I do not love thee.   

I do not love thee for that belly,  
Sleek as satin, soft as jelly,  
Though within that Crystal round  
Heaps of treasure might be found,  
So rich that for the best of them,  
A King might leave his Diadem.   

I do not love thee for those thighs,  
Whose Alabaster rocks do rise  
So high and even that they stand  
Like Sea-marks to some happy land;  
Happy are those eyes have seen them,  
More happy they that sail between them.   

I love thee not for thy moist palm.  
Though the dew thereof be balm:  
Nor for thy pretty leg and foot;  
Although it be the precious root,  
On which this goodly Cedar grows,  
(Sweet) I love thee not for those.   

Nor for thy wit though pure and quick,  
Whose substance no Arithmetic  
Can number down: nor for those charms  
Masked in thy embracing arms.  
Though in them one night to lie,  
Dearest, I would gladly die.   

I love not for those eyes, nor hair,  
Nor cheeks, nor lips, nor teeth so rare;  
Nor for thy speech, thy neck, nor breast,  
Nor for thy belly, nor the rest:  
Nor for thy hand, nor foot so small,  
But wouldst thou know (dear sweet) for all.    

On sight of a Gentlewoman's face in the water.  

STand still you floods, do not deface  
That Image which you bear:  
So Votaries from every place,  
To you shall Altars roar.   

No winds but Lovers sighs blow here  
To trouble these glad streams,  
On which no star from any Sphere  
Did ever dart such beams.   

To Crystal then in haste congeal,  
Left you should lose your bliss:  
And to my cruel fair reveal,  
How cold, how hard she is.   

But if the envious Nymphs shall fear  
Their beauties will be scorned,  
And hire the ruder winds to tear  
That face which you adorned,   

Then rage and foam amain, that we  
Their malice may despise:  
And from your froth we soon shall see,  
A second Venus rise.    

A Song.  

ASk me no more where jove bestows,  
When june is past, the fading rose:  
For in your beauties orient deep,  
These Flowers as in their causes sleep.   

Ask me no more whither do stray  
The golden Atoms of the day:  
For in pure love heaven did prepare  
Those powders to enrich your hair.   

Ask me no more whither doth hast  
The Nightingale, when May is past:  
For in your sweet dividing throat  
She winters, and keeps warm her nose.   

Ask me no more where those stars light,  
That downwards fall in dead of night:  
For in your eyes they sit, and there,  
Fixed, become as in their sphere.   

Ask me no more if East or west,  
The Phoenix builds her spicy nest:  
For unto you at last she flies,  
And in your fragrant bosom dies.    

Song.  

WOuld you know what's soft? I dare,  
Not bring you to the down, or air:  
Nor to stars to show what's bright,  
Nor to snow to teach you white.   

Nor if you would Music hear,  
Call the orbs to take your ear:  
Nor to please your sense bring forth  
Bruised Nard, or what's more worth.   

Or on food were your thoughts placed,  
Bring you Nectar, for a taste:  
Would you have all these in one,  
Name my Mistress, and 'tis done.    

The Second Rapture.  

NO worlding, no, 'tis not thy gold,  
Which thou dost use but to behold,  
Nor fortune, honour, nor long life,  
Children, or friends, nor a good wife,  
That makes thee happy; these things be  
But shadows of felicity.  
Give me a wench about thirteen,  
Already voted to the Queen  
Of lust and lovers, whose soft hair,  
Fanned with the breath of gentle air,  
O'rspreads her shoulders like a tent,  
And is her vail and ornament;  
Whose tender touch will make the blood  
Wild in the aged, and the good;  
Whose kisses, fastened to the mouth  
Of threescore years and longer flouth,  
Renew the age; and whose bright eye  
Obscures those lesser lights of sky;  
Whose snowy breasts (if we may call  
That snow, that never melts at all)  
Makes jove invent a new disguise,  
In spite of June's jealousies;  
Whose every part doth reinvite  
The old decayed appetite;  
And in whose sweet embraces I  
May melt myself to lust, and die.  
This is true bliss, and I confess,  
There is no other happiness.    

The Hue and Cry.  

IN love's name you are charged hereby,  
To make a speedy Hue and Cry  
After a face whicht ' other day,  
Stole my wand'ring heart away.  
To direct you these (in brief)  
Are ready marks to know the thief.  
Her hair a net of beams would prove,  
Strong enough to captive jove  
In his Eagle shap: Her brow,  
Is a comely field of snow;  
Her eye so rich, so pure a grey,  
Every beam creates a day;  
And if she but sleep (not when  
The Sun sets) 'tis night again;  
In her cheeks are to be seen,  
Of flowers both the King and Queen,  
Thither by the graces led,  
And freshly laid in nuptial bed,  
On whom lips like Nymphs do wait,  
Who deplore their virgin star,  
Oft they blush, and blush for this,  
That they one another kiss:  
But observe besides the rest,  
You shall know this Felon best,  
By her tongue, for if your ear  
Once a heavenly music hear,  
Such as neither Gods nor Men,  
But from that voice, shall hear again,  
That, that is she. O straight surprise,  
And bring her unto love's Assize:  
If you let her go she may,  
Antedate the latter day,  
Fate and Philosophy control,  
And leave the world without a soul.    

To his Mistress confined. Song  

O Think not Phoebe, 'cause a cloud,  
Doth now thy silver brightness shroud  
My wand'ring eye  
Can stoop to common beauties of the Sky.  
Rather be kind, and this Eclipse,  
Shall neither hinder eye nor lips,  
For we shall meet,  
Within our hearts, and kiss, and none shall see't.   

Nor canst thou in thy prison be,  
Without some living sign of me;  
When thou dost spy  
A Sun beam peep into the room, 'tis I,  
For I am hid within a flame,  
And thus into thy chamber came,  
To let thee see  
In what a martyrdom I burn for thee.   

When thou dost touch thy Lute, thou mayest  
Think on my heart, on which thou playest:  
when each sad tone,  
Upon the things doth show my deeper groan.  
when thou dost please, they shall rebound  
with nimble airs, struck to the sound  
Of thy own voye;  
O think how much I tremble and rejoice.   

There's no sad picture that doth dwell  
Upon thy Arras wall, but well  
Resembles me;  
No matter though our age do not agree,  
Love can make old, as well as time,  
And be that doth but twenty clime,  
If he dare prove  
As true as I, shows fourscore years in love.    

The Primrose.  

ASk me why I send you here,  
This firstling of the infant year;  
Ask me why I send to you,  
This Primrose all bepearled with dew,  
I straight will whisper in your ears,  
The sweets of love are washed with tears   

Ask me why this flower doth show,  
So yellow, green, and sickly too;  
Ask me why the stalk is weak,  
And bending, yet it doth not break;  
I must tell you these discover  
What doubts and fears are in a Lover.    

The tinder.  

OF what mould did nature frame me?  
Or was it her intent to shame me,  
That no woman can come near me  
Fair, but her I court to hear me?  
Sure that mistress to whose beauty  
First I paid a Lover's duty,  
Burnt in rage my heart to tinder;  
That nor prayers, nor tears can hinder.  
But where ever I do turn me,  
Every spark let fall doth burn me,  
Women since you thus inflamme,  
Flint and steel I'll ever name ye.    

A Song.  

IN her fair cheeks two pits do lie,  
To bury those slain by her eye,  
So spite of death this comforts me,  
That fairly buried I shall be.  
My grave with rose and lily spread.  
Otis a life to be so dead!  
Come then and kill me with thy eye  
For if thou let me live, I die.  
When I behold those lips again,  
Reviving what those eyes have slain,  
With kisses sweet, whose balsam pure,  
Loves wounds as soon as made, can cure.  
Me thinks 'tis sickness to be sound,  
And there's no health to such a wound.  
Come then, etc.  
When in her chaste breast I behold,  
Those downy mounts of snow ne'er cold,  
And those blessed hearts her beauty kills,  
revived by climbing those fair hills.  
He thinks there's life in such a death,  
And so t'expire, inspires new breath.  
Come then, etc.   

Nymph since no death is deadly, where  
Such choice of Antidotes are near,  
And your keen eyes but kill in vain,  
Those that are sound, as soon as slain,  
That I no longer dead survive,  
Your way's to bury me alive  
In Cupid's cave, where happy I,  
May dying live, and living dye.  
Come then and kill me with thy eye.  
For if thou let me live, I die.    

The Carver. To his Mistress.  

A Carver having loved to long in vain,  
Hewed out the portraiture of Venus' Sun  
In marble rock, upon the which did rain  
Small drizzling drops that from a fount did run.  
Imagining the drops would either wear  
His fury out, or quench his living flame:  
But when he saw it bootless did appear,  
He swore the water did augment the same.  
So I that seek in verse to carve thee out,  
Hoping thy beauty will my flame allay,  
Viewing my lines impolished all throughout,  
Find my will rather to my love obey:  
That with the Carver I my work do blame,  
Finding it still th'augmenter of my flame.    

To the Painter.  

FOnd man that hop'st to catch that face,  
With those false colours, whose short grace  
Serves but to show the Looker's on  
The faults of thy presumption;  
Or at the least to let us see,  
That is divine, but yet not she.  
Say you could imitate the rays  
Of those eyes that outshine the days,  
Or counterfeit in red and white  
That most uncounterfeited light  
Of her complexion, yet canst thou,  
(Great Master though thou be) tell how  
To print a virtue? Then desist,  
This fair, your Artifice hath missed:  
You should have markthow she begins  
To grow in virtue, not insins;  
In stead of that same rosy die,  
You should have drawn out modesty,  
Whose beauty sits enthroned there,  
And learns to look and blush at her.  
Or can you colour just the same,  
When virtue blushes, or when shame,  
When sickness, and when innocence,  
Shows pale or white unto the sense?  
Can such corpse varnish e'er be said,  
To imitate her white and red?  
This may do well elsewhere in Spain,  
Among those faces died in grain,  
So you may thrive, and what you do,  
Prove the best picture of the two.  
Besides (if all I hear be true)  
'Tis taken ill by some, that you  
Should be so insolently vain,  
As to contrive all that rich gain  
Into one tablet, which alone  
May teach us superstition;  
Instructing our amazed eyes,  
T'admire and worship Imag'ries.  
Such as quickly might outshine  
Some new Saint, were't allowed a shrine,  
And turn each wand'ring looker on,  
Into a new Pigmaleon:  
Yet your Art cannot equalise  
This Picture in her Lover's eyes.  
His eyes the pencils are which limb,  
Her truly, as hers copy him,  
His heart the Tablet, which alone  
Is for that portraiture the truest stone,  
If you would a truer see,  
Mark it in their posterity,  
And you shall read it truly there,  
When the glad world shall see their Heir.    

Love's Courtship.  

KIss lovely Celia and be kind,  
Let my desires freedom find,  
Sat there down  
And we will make the Gods confess  
Mortals enjoy some happiness.   

Mars would disain his Mistress charms,  
If he beheld thee in my arms,  
And descend.  
Thee his mortal Queen to make,  
Or live as mortal for thy sake.   

Venus must lose her title now,  
And leave to brag of Cupid's bow;  
Silly Queen,  
Sweet hath but one, but I can spy,  
Ten thousand Cupids in thy eye.   

Nor may the Sun behold our bliss,  
For sure thy eyes do dazzle his.  
If thou fear.  
That hell betray thee with his light,  
Let me eclipse thee from his sight.   

And while I shade thee from his eye,  
Oh let me hear thee gently cry,  
Celia yields.  
Maids often lose their Maidenhead,  
Ere they set foot in Nuptial bed.    

On a Damask rose sticking upon a Lady's breast.  

LEt pride grow big my Rose, and let the clear  
And damask colour of thy leaves appear.  
Let scent and looks be sweet, and bless that hand  
That did transplant thee to that sacred land.  
O happy thou that in that garden rests,  
That Paradise between that Lady's breasts.  
There's an eternal spring, there shalt thou lie,  
Betwixt two Lily mounts, and never die.  
There shalt thou spring among the fertile valleys,  
By bad's like thee that grow in midst of Allies.  
There none dare pluck thee, for that place is such,  
That but a good divine, there's none dare touch.  
If any but approach, straight doth arise  
A blushing lightning flash, and blasts his eyes.  
There'stead of rain shall living fountains flow,  
For wind her fragrant breath for ever blow.  
Nor now, as erst, one Sun shall on thee shine,  
But those two glorious suns, her eyes divine.  
O then what Monarch would not think't a grace,  
To leave his Regal throne to have thy place.  
Myself to gain thy blessed seat do vow  
Would be transformed into a rose as thou.    

The Protestation, a Sonnet.  

NO more shall Meads be decked with Flowers,  
Nor sweetness dwelled in rosy bowers;  
Nor greenest buds on branches spring,  
Nor warbling birds delight to sing,  
Nor April violets paint the grove,  
If I forsake my Celia's love.   

The fish shall in the Ocean burn,  
And fountains sweet shall bitter ●●rn,  
The humble Oak no flood shall know  
When floods shall highest hits o'erflow;  
Black Lethe shall oblivion leave,  
If e'er my Celia I deceive.   

Love shall his bow and shaft lay by,  
And Venus' Doves want wings to fly,  
The Sun refuse to show his light,  
And day shall then be turned tonight,  
And in that night no star appear,  
If once I leave my Celia dear.   

Love shall no more inhabit earth,  
Nor Lovers more shall love for worth,  
Nor joy above in heaven dwell,  
Nor pain torment poor souls in hell;  
Grim Death no more shall horrid prove,  
If e'er I leave bright Celia's Love.    

The toothache cured by a kiss.  

FAte's now grown merciful to men,  
Turning disease to bliss:  
For had not kind Rheum vexed me then,  
I might not Celia kiss.  
Physicians you are now my corn:  
For I have found a way  
To cure diseases (when forlorn  
By your dull Art) which may  
Patch up a body for a time,  
But can restore to health,  
No more than Chemists can sublime  
True Gold, the Indies wealth.  
The Angel sure that used to move  
The pool, men so admired,  
Hath to her lip the seat of love,  
As to his heaven retired.    

To the jealous Mistress.  

ADmit (thou darling of mine eyes)  
I have some Idol lately framed:  
That under such a false disguise,  
Our true loves might the less be famed,  
Canst thou that knowest my heart suppose,  
I'll fall from thee, and worship those.   

Remember (dear) how loath and slow  
I was to cast a look or smile,  
Or one love-line to mis-bestow,  
Till thou hadst changed both face and stile,  
And art thou grown afraid to see,  
That mask put on thou mad'st for me?   

I dare not call those childish fears,  
Coming from love, much less from thee,  
But wash away with frequent tears  
This counterfeit Idolatry.  
And henceforth kneel at ne'er a shrine,  
To blind the world, but only thine.    

The Dart.  

OFt when I look, I may descry  
A little face peep through that eye;  
Sure that's the boy, which wisely chose  
His throne among such beams as those,  
Which if his quiver chance to fall,  
May serve for darts to kill withal.    

The Mistake.  

WHen on fair Celia I did spy  
A wounded heart of stone,  
The wound had almost made me cry,  
Sure this heart was my own.   

But when I saw it was enthroned  
In her celestial breast:  
O then! I it no longer owned,  
For mine was ne'er so blest.   

Yet if in highest heavens do shine  
Each constant Martyr's heart:  
Then she may well give rest to mine,  
That for her sake doth smart.   

Where seated in so high a bliss,  
Though wounded, it shall live:  
Death enters not in Paradise,  
The place free life doth give.   

Or if the place less sacred were,  
Did but her saving eye  
Bathe my sick heart in one kind tear,  
Then should I never die.   

'Slight balms may heal a slighter sore,  
No medicine less divine  
Can ever hope for to restore  
A wounded heart like mine.    

To my Lord Admiral, on his late sickness, and recovery.  

With joy like ours, the Thracian youth invade  
Orpheus, returning from th'Elysian shade,  
Embrace the Hero, and his stay implore,  
Make it their public suit he would no more  
Desert them so, and for his Spouses sake,  
His vanished love, tempt the Lethaen Lake;  
The Ladies too, the brightest of that time,  
Ambitious all his lofty bed to climb,  
Their doubtful hopes with expectation feed,  
Which shall the fair Eurydice succeed;  
Eurydice, for whom his numerous moan  
Makes listening Trees, and savage Mountain's groan,  
Through all the Air his sounding strings dilate  
Sorrow like that, which touched our hearts of late,  
Your pining sickness, and your restless pain,  
At once the Land affecting, and the Main,  
When the glad news that you were Admiral,  
Scarce through the Nation spread, 'twas feared by all  
That our great CHARLES, whose wisdom shines in you,  
Should be perplexed how to choose a new:  
So more than private was the joy and grief,  
That at the worst it gave our soul's relief,  
That in our Age such sense of virtue lived,  
They joyed so justly, and so justly grieved.  
Nature, her fairest light eclipsed, seems  
Herself to suffer in these sad extremes,  
While not from thine alone thy blood retires,  
But from those checks which all the world admires.  
The stem thus threatened, and the sap, in thee  
Droop all the branches of that noble Tree,  
Their beauties they, and we our love suspend,  
Nought can our wishes, save thy health intend;  
As Lilies overcharged with rain they bend  
Their beauteous heads, and with high heaven contend,  
Fold thee within their snowy anres, and cry,  
He is too faultless, and too young to die:  
So like Immortals, round about thee They  
Sat, that they fight approaching death away.  
Who would not languish, by so fair a train  
To be lamented, and restered again?  
Or thus withheld, what hasty soul would go.  
Though to the Blessed? O'er young Adonis so  
Fair Venus mourned, and with the precious shower  
Of her warm tears cherished the springing flower.  
The next support, fair hope, of your great name,  
And second Pillar of that noble frame,  
By loss of thee would no advantage have,  
But step by step pursues thee to thy grave.  
And now relentless Fate about to end  
The line, which backward doth so far extend,  
That Antique stock, which still the world supplies  
With bravest spirits, and with brightest eyes,  
Kind Phoebus interposing bade me stay,  
Such storms no more shall shake that house, but say,  
Like Neptune, and his Sea-born Niece shall be  
The shining glories of the Land and Sea,  
With courage guard, and beauty warm our Age,  
And Lovers fill with like Poetic rage.    

On Mistress N. to the green sickness.  

STay coward blood, and do not yield  
To thy pale sister, beauty's field,  
Who there displaying round her white  
Ensigns, hath usurped thy night;  
Invading thy peculiar throne,  
The lip, where thou shouldst rule alone;  
And on the cheek, where natures care,  
Allotted each an equal share,  
Her spreading Lily only grows,  
Whose milky deluge drowns thy Rose.  
Quit not the field faint blood, nor rush  
In the short sally of a blush  
Upon thy sister foe, but strive  
To keep an endless war alive;  
Though peace do petty States maintain,  
Here war alone makes beauty reign.    

Upon a Mole in Celia's bosom.  

THat lovely spot which thou dost see  
In Celia's bosom was a Bee,  
Who built her amorous spicy nest  
I'th' Hybla's of her either breast,  
But from close Ivory Hives, she flew  
To suck the Aromatic dew  
Which from the neighbour vale distils,  
Which parts those two twin-sister hills,  
There feasting on Ambrosial meat,  
A rolling file of Balmy sweat,  
(As in soft murmurs before death.  
Swanlike she sung) choked up her breath.  
So she in water did expire,  
More precious than the Phoenix fire;  
Yet still her shadow there remains  
Confined to those Elysian plains;  
With this strict Law, that who shall lay  
His bold lips on that milky way,  
The sweet, and smart, from thence shall bring  
Of the Bees Honey, and her sting.    

An Hymeneal Song on the Nuptials of the Lady Ann Wentworth, and the Lord Lovelace.  

BReak not the slumbers of the Bride,  
But let the Sun in Triumph ride,  
Scattering his beamy light,   

When she awakes, he shall resign  
His rays: And she alone shall shine  
in glory all the night,   

For she till day return must keep  
An Amorous Vigil, and not steep  
Her fair eyes in the dew of sleep.   

Yet gently whisper as she lies,  
And say her Lord waits her uprise;  
The Priests at the Altar s●●y,  
With Flowery wreathes the Virgin crew  
Attend while some with roses strew,  
And Myrtles trim the way.   

Now to the Temple, and the Priest,  
See her convaid, thence to the Feast;  
Then back to bed, though not to rest.   

For now to crown his faith and truth,  
We must admit the noble youth  
To revel in Love's sphere.   

To rule as chief Intelligence  
That Orb, and happy time dispense  
To wretched Lovers here.   

For there exalted far abov,  
All hope, fear, change, or they to move  
The wheel that spins the fates of Love.   

They know no night, nor glaring noon  
Measure no hours of Sun or Moon,  
Nor mark time's restless Glass.   

Their kisses measure as they flaw,  
Minutes, and there embraces show  
The hower's as they pass.   

Their Motions, the years circled make,  
And we from their conjunctions take,  
Rules to make Love an Almanac.    

A married Woman  

WHen I shall marry, if I do not find  
A wife thus moulded, I'll create this mind:  
Nor from her noble birth, nor ample dower,  
Beauty, or wit, shall she derive a power  
To prejudice my Right, but if she be  
A subject born, she shall be so to me:  
As to the soul the flesh, as Appetite  
To reason is, which shall our wills unite  
In habits so confirmed, as no rough sway  
Shall once appear, if she but learn t'obey.  
For in habitual virtues, sense is wrought  
To that calm temper, as the body's thought  
To have nor blood, nor gall, if wild and rude  
Passions of Lust, and Anger, are subdued;  
When 'tis the fair obedience to the soul,  
Doth in the birth those swelling Acts control.  
If I in murder steep my furious rage,  
Or with adultery my hot lust assuage,  
Will it suffice to say my sense, the Beast  
Provoked me to't? could I my soul divest,  
My plea were good. Lions, and Bulls commit  
Both freely, but man must in judgement sit,  
And tame this Beast, for Adam was not free,  
When in excuse he said, Eve gave it me:  
Had he not eaten, she perhaps had been  
Unpunished, his consent made hers a sin.    

A divine Love.  

1.  
WHy should dull Art, which is wise Nature's Ape,  
If she produce a shape  
So far beyond all patterns, that of old  
Fell from her mould  
As thine (admired Lucinda) not bring forth  
An equal wonder, to express that worth  
In some new way, that hath  
Like her great work, no print of vulgar path?   

2.  
Is it because the rapes of Poetry,  
Rifeling the spacious sky  
Of all his fires, light, beauty, influence,  
Did those dispense  
On airy creations that surpassed  
The real works of Nature, she at last  
To prove their rapeures vain,  
Showed such a light as Poets could not feign?   

3.  
Or is it 'cause the factious wits did vie  
With vain Idolatry,  
Whose Goddess was supreme, and so had hurled  
Schism through the world,  
Whose Priest sung sweetest lays; thou didst appear  
A glorious mystery, so dark, so clear,  
As Nature did intend  
All should confess, but none might comprehend?   

4.  
Perhaps all other beauties share a light  
Proportioned to the fight  
Of weak mortality, scattering such loose fires,  
As stir desires,  
And from the brain distil salt amorous rheums,  
Whilst thy immortal flame such dross consumes,  
And from the earthy mould  
With purging fires severs the purer gold.   

5.  
If so, then why in Fame's immortal scroll,  
Do we their names inroul,  
Whose easy hearts, and wanton eyes did sweat  
With sensual heat?  
If Petrark's unarmed bosom catch a wound  
From a light glance, must Laura be renowned?  
Or both a glory gain,  
He from ill-governed Love, she from Disdain?   

6.  
Shall he more famed in his great Art become,  
For wilful martyrdom?  
Shall she more title gain to chaste and fair  
Through his despair?  
Is Troy more noble 'cause to ashes turned?  
Than Virgin Cities that yet never burned?  
Is fire when it consumes  
Temples, more fire, than when it melts perfumes?   

7.  
Cause Venus from the Ocean took her form  
Must Love needs be a storm?  
'Cause she her wanton shrines in Islands rears,  
Through seas of tears,  
O'er Rocks, and Gulfs, with our own sighs for gales,  
Must we to Cyprus, or to Paphos' sail?  
Can there no way be given,  
But a true Hell that leads to her false Heaven.    

Love's Force.  

IN the first ruder Age, when Love was wild  
Not yet by Laws reclaimed, not reconciled  
To order, nor by Reason manned, but flew  
Full-summed by Nature, on the instant view  
Upon the wings of Appetite, at all  
The eye could fair, or sense delightful call:  
Election was not yet, but as their cheap  
Food from the Oak, or the next Acorn heap,  
As water from the nearest spring or brook,  
So men their undistinguished females took  
By chance, not choice; but soon the heavenly spark  
That in man's bosom lurked, broke through this dark  
Confusion, than the noblest breast first felt  
Itself, for its own proper object melt.    

A Fancy.  

MArk how this polished Eastern sheet  
Doth with our Northern tincture meet,  
For though the paper seem to sink,  
Yet it receives, and bears the Ink;  
And on her smooth soft brow these spots  
Seem rather ornaments than blots;  
Like those you Ladies use to place  
Mysteriously about your face;  
Not only to set off and break  
Shadows and Eye beams, but to speak  
To the skilled Lover, and relate  
Unheard, his sad or happy Fate:  
Nor do their Characters delight,  
As careless works of black and white  
But 'cause you underneath may find  
A sense that can inform the mind;  
Divine, or moral rules impart  
Or Raptures of Poetic Art:  
So what at first was only fit  
To fold up silks, may wrap up wit.     

Coelum Britannicum.  
A MASK AT WHITEHALL IN the Banqueting House, on Shrove-Tuesday-night, the 18. of February, 1633.  
The Inventors.  
Tho. Carew. Inigo jones.  
Non habet ingenium; Caesar sed jussit: habebo. Cur me posse negem, posse quod ille putat.  
LONDON, Printed for HUM. MOSELEY and are to be sold at his Shop at the sign of the Prince's Arms in St. Pauls-Church-yard. 1651.   


THE DESCRIPTION OF THE SCENE.  
THe first thing that presented itself to the sight, was a rich Ornament that enclosed the Scene; in the upper part of which were great branches of Foiage growing out of leaves and husks, with a Coronice at the top; and in the midst was placed a large Compartment composed of Grotesk work, wherein were Harpies with Wings and Lions claws, and their hinder parts converted into leaves and branches; over all was a broken Frontispiece, wrought with krowles and mask heads of Children, and within this a Table adorned with a lesser Compartment, with this Inscription, COELUM BRITANNICUM. The two sides of this Ornament were thus ordered: First, from the ground arose a square Basement, and on the Plinth stood a great vase of gold, richly enchased, and beautified with Sculptures of great Relief, with fruitages hanging from the upper-part; At the foot of this sat two youths naked, in their natural colours, each of these with one arm supported the Vase, on the cover of which stood two young women in Draperies, arm in arm, the one figuring the glory of Princes, and the other Mansuetude: their other arms bore up an Oval, in which, to the King's Majesty was this Impreze, A Lion with an Imperial Crown on his head; the word, Animum subpectore forti: On the other side was the like Composition, but the design of the Figures varied; and in the Oval on the top, being borne up by Nobility and Fecundity, was this Impreze to the Queen's Majesty, A Lily growing with branches and leaves, and three lesser Lilies springing out of the Stem; the word, Semper inclita Virtus: All this Ornament was heightened with Gold, and for the Invention, and various composition was the newest and most gracious that hath been done in this place.  
The Curtain was watcher, and a pale yellow in panes, which flying up on the sudden, discovered the Scene, representing old Arches, old Palaces, decayed walls, parts of Temples, theatres, Basilica's and Thermes with confused heaps of broken Columns, Bases, Cornices and Statues, lying as underground, and altogether resembling the ruins of some great City of the ancient Romans or civilised Britain's. This strange prospect detained the eyes of the Spectators sometime, when to a loud Music Mercury descends; on the upper part of his Chariot stands a Cock in action of crowing: his habit was a Coat of flame colour girt to him, and a white Mantle trimmed with gold and silver; upon his head a wreath with small falls of white Feathers, a Caduseus in his hand, and wings at his heels: being come to the ground he dismounts, and goés up to the State.  Mercury 
FRom the high Senate of the gods, to You  
Bright glorious Twins of Love and Majesty,  
Before whose Throne three warlike Nations bend  
Their willing knees, on whose Imperial brows  
The Regal Circle prints no awful frowns  
To fright your Subjects, but whose calmer eyes  
Shed joy and safety on their melting hearts  
That flow with cheerful loyal reverence,  
Come I cyllenius, Jove's Ambassador,  
Not as of old, to whisper amorcus tales  
Of wanton love, into the glowing ear  
Of some choice beauty in this numerous train;  
Those days are fled, the rebel flame is quenched  
In heavenly breasts, the gods have sworn by Styx,  
Never to tempt yielding mortality  
To loose embraces. Your exémplar life  
Hath not alone transfused a zealous heat  
Of imitation through your virtuous Court,  
By whose bright blaze your Palace is become  
The envied pattern of this under world,  
But the aspiring flame hath kindled heaven;  
Th'immortal bosoms burn with emulous fires,  
Jove rivals your great virtues, Royal Sir,  
And juno, Madam, your attractive graces;  
He his wild lusts, her raging jealousies  
She lays aside, and through th'olympic hall,  
As yours doth here, their great Example spreads,  
And though of old, when youthful blood conspired  
With his new Empire, prone to heats of lust,  
He acted incests, rapes, adulteries  
On earthly beauties, which his raging Queen,  
Swollen with revengeful fury turned to beast,  
And in despite he transformed to Stars,  
Till he had styled the crowded Firmament  
With his loose Strumpets, and their spurious race,  
Where the eternal records of his shame  
Shine to the world in flaming Characters;  
When in the Crystal myr our of your reign  
He viewed himself, he found his loathsome stains;  
And now to expiate the infection's guilt  
Of those detested luxuries he'll chase  
Th'infamous lights from their usurped Sphere,  
And drown in the Laethean flood, their cursed  
Both names and memories. In whose vacant rooms,  
First you succeed, and of the wheeling Orb  
In the most eminent and conspicuo is point,  
With dazeling beams, and spreading magnitude,  
Shine the bright Pole star of thy Hemisphere,  
Next, by your side, in a triumphant Chair,  
And crowned with Ariadne's Diadem,  
Sits the fair Consort of your heart, and Throne;  
Diffused about you, with that share of light  
As they of virtue have derived from you,  
he'll fix this Noble train, of either sex;  
So to the British stars this lower Globe  
Shall owe its light, and they alone dispense  
To''th' world a pure refined influence.  Enter Momus attired in a long darkish Robe, all wrought over with poniards, Serpents tongues, eyes and ears, his beard and hair particoloured and upon his head a wreath stuck with Feathers, and a Porcupine in the forepart. Momus. 
BY your leave, Mortals. Good Cousin Hermes, your pardon good my Lord Ambassador: I found the tables of your Arms and Titles, in every Inn betwixt this and Olympus, where your present expedition is registered your nine thousandth nine hundred ninety ninth Legation. I cannot reach the policy why your Master breeds so few States men, it suits not with his dignity, that in the whole Empyiaeum there should not be a god fit to send on these honourable errands but yourself, who are not yet so careful of his honour or your own, as might become your quality, when you are itinerant: the Hosts upon the highway cry out with open mouth upon you for supporting plafery in your train; which, though as you are the god of petty Larciny, you might protect, yet you know it is directly against the new orders, and opposes the Reformation in Diameter.  Merc. 
Peace Railer, bridle your licentious tongue.  
And let this Presence teach you modesty.  Mom. 
Let it if it can; in the mean time I will acquaint it with my condition. Know, (gay people) that though your poets who enjoy by patent a particular privilege to draw down any of the Deities from Twelfth-night till Shrove-tuesday, at what time there is annually a most familiar intercourse between the two Courts, have as yet never invited me to these Solemnities, yet it shall appear by my intrusion this night. that I am a very considerable person upon these occasions, and may most properly assist at such entertainments. My name is Momus ap-Somnus-ap-Erebus-ap-Chaos-ap-Demorgorgon-ap-Eternity, My Offices and Titles are, The Supreme Theomastix, Hupercritique of manners, protonotary of abuses, Arch-Informer, Dilator General, Universal Calumniator, Eternal plaintiff, and perpetual Foreman of the Grand Inquest. My privileges are an ubiquitary, circumambulatory, speculatory, interrogatory, redargutory, immunity over all the privy lodgings, behind hangings, doors, curtains, through keyholes, chinks, windows, about all Venerial Lobbies, Sconces, or Redoubts, though it be to the surprise of a perdu Page or Chambermald, in, and at all Courts of civil and criminal judicature, all Counsels, Consultations, and parliamentary Assemblies, where though I am but a Woolsack god, and have no vote in the sanction of new laws, I have yet a prerogative of wresting the old to any whatsoever interpretation, whether it be to the behoose, or prejudice, of jupiter, his Crown and Dignity, for, or against the Rights of either house of patrician or plebeian gods. My natural qualities are to make jove frown, juno pout, Mars chafe, Venus' blush, Vulcan glow, Saturn quake, Cyuthia pale, Phoebus hide his face, and Mercury here take his heels. My recreations are witty mischiefs, as when Saturn guelt his Father; The Smith caught his wife and her Bravo in a net of Cobweb-Iron; and Hebe, through the lubricity of the pavement stumbling over the Halfpace, presented the Emblem of the forked tree, and discovered to the tanned Ethiopes the snowy cliffs, of Calabria with the Grotta of Puteolum. But that you may arrive at the perfect knowledge of me, by the familiar illustration of a Bird of mine own feather, old Peter Aretine, who reduced all the Sceptres and Mitres of that Age tributary to his wit, was my parallel, and Frank Rabelais sucked much of my milk too; but your modern French Hospital of Oratory, is a mere counterfeit, an arrant Mountebank, for though fearing no other fortunes than his Sciatica, he discourse of Kings and Queens with as little Reverence as of Grooms and Chambermaids, yet he wants their fangteeth, and Scorpions tail; I mean that fellow, who to add to his stature thinks it a greater grace to dance on his tiptoes like a Dog in a doublet, than to walk like other men on the soles of his feet.  Merc. 
No more impertinent Trifler, you disturb  
The great Affair with your rude scurrilous chat.  
What doth the knowledge of your abject state  
concern Ioves solemn Message?  Mom. 
Sir, by your favour, though you have a more especial Commission of employment from jupiter, and a larger entertainment from his Exchequer, yet as a freedom God I have the liberty to travel at mine own charges, without your pass or countenance Legacine; and that it may appear a sedulous acute observer, may know as much as a dull phlegmatic Ambassador, and wears a treble key to unlock the mysterious Ciphers of your dark secrecies. I will discourse the politic state of Heaven to this trim Audience— At this Scene changeth, and in the heaven is discovered a Sphere, with Stars placed in their several Images; born up by a huge naked Figure (only a piece of Drapery hanging over his thigh) kneeling and bowing forwards; as if the great weight lying on his shoulders oppressed him, upon his head a Crown, by all which he might easily be known to be Atlas.— You shall understand that jupiter upon the inspection of I know not what virtuous. Precedents extant (as they say) here in this Court, but as I more probably guess out of the consideration of the decay of his natural abilities, hath before a frequent convocation of the Superlunary Peers in a solemn oration recanted, disclaimed, and utterly renounced all the lascivious extravagancies & riotous enormities of his forepast licentious life, and taken his oath on junos' Breviary, religiously kissing the two-leaveed Book, never to stretch his limbs mor betwixt adutrerous sheets and hath with pathetical remonstrances exhorted and under strict penalties enjoined, a respective conformity in the several subordinate Deities; and because the Libertines of Antiquity, the Ribald Poets, to perpetuate the memory and example of their triumphs over chastity, to all future imitation, have in their immortal songs celebrated the martyrdom of those Strumpets under the persecution of the wives, and devolved to posterity the pedigrees of their whores, bawds, and bastards, it is therefore by the authority aforesaid enacted, that this whole Army of Constellations be immediately dis-banded and cashiered so to remove all imputation of impiety from the Celestial Spirits, and all lustful influences upon terrestrial bodies, and consequently that there be an Inquisition erected to expunge in the Ancient, and suppress in the modern and succeeding Poems and pamphlets, all past present and future mention of those abjured heresies, and to take particular notice of all ensuing Incontinences, and punish them in their high Commission Court. Am not I in election to be a tall Statesman think you, that can repeat a passage at a Counsel-table thus punctually?  Merc. 
I eat in vain the importunity, With which this Snarler vexeth all the gods, jove cannot scape him: well what else from heaven?  Mom 
Heaven! Heaven is no more the place it was; a Cloister of Carthusians, a Monastery of converted gods, jove is grown old and fearful, apprehends a subversion of his Empire, and doubts lest Fate should introduce a legal succession in the legitimate heir by repossessing the Titanian line, and hence springs all this innovation. We have had new orders read in the presence Chamber, by the Vi-President of Parnassus, too strict to be observed long, Monopolies are called in, sophistication of wares punished, and rates imposed on commodities. Injunctions are gone out to the Nectar Brewers, for the purging of the heavenly Beverage of a narcotic weed which hath rendered the Idaeaes' confused in the Divine intellects, and reducing it to the composition used in Saturn's Reign. Edicts are made for the restoring of decayed house-keeping, prohibiting the repair of Families to the Metropolis, but this did endanger an Amazonian mutiny, till the females put on a more masculine resolution of soliciting business in their own persons, and leaving their husbands at home for stallions of hospitality. Bacchus hath commanded all Taverus to be shut, and no liquor drawn after ten at night. Cupid must go no more so scandalously naked, but but is enjoyed to make him breeches, though of his mother's petticoats. Gavimede is forbidden the Bedchamber, and must only Minister in public. The Gods must keep no Pages, nor Grooms of their Chamber, under the age of 25. and those provided of a competent stock of beard. Pan may not pipe, nor Proteus juggle, but by especial permission. Vulcan was brought to an Oretenus and fined, for driving in a plate of Iron into one of the Sun's Chariot-wheels, and frost-nailing his horses upon the fifth of November last, for breach of a penal Statute, prohibiting work upon Holidays, that being the annual celebration of the Gygantomacy. In brief, the whole state of the Hierarchy suffers a total reformation, especially in the point of reciprocation of conjugal affection. Venus hath confessed all her adulteries, and is received to grace by her husband, who conscious of the great disparity betwixt her perfections and his deformities, allows those levitieses as an equal counterpoise; but it is the prettiest spectacle to see her stroking with her Ivory hand his collied cheeks, and with her snowy fingers combing his sooty beard. Jupiter too begins to learn to lead his own wife, I left him practising in the milky way; and there is no doubt of an universal obedience, where the Lawgiver himself in his own person observes his decrees so punctually, who besides, to eternize the memory of that great example of Matrimonial union which he derives from hence, hath on his Bedchamber door and ceiling, fretted with stars in capital Letters, engraven the Inscription of CARLO-MARIA. This is as much I am sure as either your knowledge or Instructions can direct you to, which I having in a blunt round tale, without State, formality, politic inferences, or suspected Rhetorical elegancies, already delivered, you may now dexterously proceed to the second Part of your charge, which is the raking of your heavenly sparks up in the Embers, or reducing the Etherial lights to their primitive opacity, and gross dark subsistence; they are all unriveted from the Sphere, and hang loose in their sockets, where they but attend the waving of your Caduce, and immediately they reinvest their pristine shapes, and appear before you in their own natural deformities.  Merc. 
Momus thou shalt prevail, for since thy bold  
Intrusion hath inverted my resolves,  
I must obey necessity, and thus turn  
My face, to breathe the Thunder's just decree  
'Gainst this adult rate sphere, which first I purge  
Of loathsome Monsters, and misshapen forms;  
Down from her azure concave, thus I charm  
The Lyrnean Hydra, the rough unlicked Bear?  
The watchful Dragon, the storm-boading Whale,  
The Centaur, the horned Goatfish Capricorn,  
The Snake-head Gorgon, and fierce Sagittar:  
Divested of your gorgeous stany robes,  
Fall from the circling Orb, and e'er you suck  
Fresh venom in, measure this happy earth,  
Then to the Fens, Caves, Forests, Deserts, Seas,  
Fly, and resume your native qualities.  Thy dance in those monstrous shapes, the first Antimask of natural deformity. Mom. 
Are not these fine companions trim Playfellows for the Deities? yet these and their fellows have made up all our conversation for some thousands of years. Do not you fair Ladies acknowledge yourselves deeply engaged now to those Poets your servants that in the height of commendation have raised your beauties to a parallel with such exact proportions or at least ranked you in their spruce society? Hath not the consideration of these Inhabitants rather frighted your thoughts utterly from the contemplation of the place? but now that these heavenly Mansions are to be void, you that shall hereafter be found unlodged will become inexusable; especially since virtue alone shall be sufficient title, fine and rent: yet if there be a Lady not competently stocked that way she shall not on the instant utterly despair, if she carry a sufficient pawn of handsomeness for however the letter of the Law runs, jupeter notwithstanding his Age and present ansterity, will never refuse to stamp beauty, and make it current with his own Impression; but to such as are destitute of both, I can afford but small encouragement. Proceed Cousin Mercury, what follows?  Merc. 
Look up, and mark where the bright Zodiac  
Hangs like a Belt about the breast or heaven;  
On the right shoulder, like a flaming jewel,  
His shell with nine much Topazes adorned,  
Lord of this Tropic fits the scalding Crab,  
He, when the Sun gallops in full career  
His annual race, his ghastly claws upreared,  
Frights at the confines of the torrid Zone  
The fiery team, and proudly stops their course,  
Making a solstice, till the fierce Steeds learn  
His backward paces, and so retrogade,  
Post down hill to th'opposed Capricorn.  
Thus I depose him from his lofty Throne;  
Drop from the sky, into the briny flood,  
There teach thy motion to the ebbing Sea,  
But let those fires that beautified thy shell  
Take humane shapes, and the disorder show  
Of thy regressive spaces here below,  The second Antimasque is danced in retrograde paces, expressing obliquity in motion Mom. 
This Crab, I confess, did ill become the heavens; but there is another that more infests the Earth, and makes such a solstice in the politer Arts and Sciences, as they have not been observed for many Ages to have made any sensible advance: could you but lead the learned squadrons with a masculine resolution past this point of retrogradation, it were a benefit to mankind, worthy the power of a god and to be paid with Altars; but that not being the work of this night, you may pursue your purposes: what now succeeds?  Merc. 
Vice, that unbodied, in the Appetite  
Erects his Throne, hath yet, in bestial shapes,  
Branded, by Nature, with the Character  
And distinct stamp of some peculiar Ill,  
Mounted the Sky, and fixed his Trophies there:  
As fawning flattery in the little Dog;  
I'th' bigger, churlish Murmur; Cowardice  
I'th' timorous Hare; Ambition in the Eagle;  
Rapine and Avarice in th'adventurous Ship  
That sailed to Colchos for the golden fleece;  
Drunken distemper in the Goblet stows;  
I'th' Dart and Scorpion, biting Calumny;  
In Hercules and the Lion, furious rage;  
Vain Ostentation in Cassiope:  
All these I to eternal exile doom,  
But to this place their Emblem'd Vices summon,  
Clad in those proper Figures, by which best  
Their incorporeal nature is expressed.  The third Antimasque is danced of these several vices, expressing their deviation from Virtue. Mom. 
From henceforth it shall be no more ●id in the Proverb, when you would express ●●riotous Assembly, That hell but Heaven is broke ●●ose: this was an arrant Goal-delivery, all the ●●risons of your great Cities could not have vo●●ed more corrupt matter: but Cousin Cylleni●●, in my judgement it is not safe that these inferiors persons should wander here to the hazard this Island, they threatened less danger when they were nailed to the Firmament: I should conceive it a very discreet course, since they are provided of a tall vessel of their own ready rigged, membarque them all together in that goodship called the Argo, and send them to the plantation in New-England, which hath purged more virulent humours from the politic body, than Guai●●m and all the West-Indian drugs have from the natural bodies of this Kingdom. Can you devise how to dispose them better?  Merc. 
They cannot breathe this pure and temperate Air  
Where Virtue lives, but will with hasty flight,  
ongst fogs and vapours, seek unsound abodes.  
Fly after them, from your usurped fears,  
You foul remainders of that viporous brood:  
Let not a Start of aluxurious race  
With his loose blaze slain the skies crystal face.  All the Stars are quenched, and the Sphere darkened. 
Before the entry of every Antimasque, the stars in those figures in the Sphere which they were to represent were extinct; so as by the end of the Antimasques in the Sphere no more Stars were scene.  Mom. 
Here is a total Eclipse of the eight Sphere, which neither Booker, Allestre, nor any of your Prognosticators, no nor their great Master Tico were aware of; but yet in my opinion there were some innocent and some generous Constellations, that might have been reserved for Noble uses: as the Skales and Swordto adorn the statue of justice, since she resides here on earth only in Picture and Esfigie. The Eagle had been a fit present for the Germans in regard their Bird hath mewed most of her feathers lately. The Dolphin too had been most welcome to the French, and then had you but clapped Perseus on his Pegasus brandishing his sword the Dragon yawning on his back under the horses feet, with Phthon's dart through his throat there had been a Divine St. George for his Nation: but since you have improvidently shuffled them altogether, it now refts only that we provide and immidiate succession and to that purpose I will instantly proclaim a free Election.  
Oyes, Oyes, Oyes,  
By the Father of the gods,  
and the King of men,  
Whereas we having observed a very commendable practice taken into frequent use by the Princes of these latter Ages, of perpetuating the memory of their famous erterprises, sieges, battles, victories, in Pictures, Sculpture, Tapestry, Embroideries and other manufactures, wherewith they have embellished their public palaces, and taken into Our more distinct and serious consideration, ●●e particular Christmas hanging of the Guard Chamber of this Court, wherein the Naval Victory of 88 is to the eternal glory of this Nation exactly delineated; and whereas We likewise out of a prophetical imitation of this so laudable custom, did for many thousand years before, adorn and beautify the eighth room of Our celestial Mansion, commonly called the Star-chamber, with the military adventures, stratagems achievements, feats, and defeats, performed in Our Own person, whilst yet Our Standard was erected, and we a Combatant in the Amorous warfare, It hath notwithstanding, after mature deliberation, and long debate, held first in our own inscrutable bosom, and afterwards communicated with Our Privy Counsel, seemed meet to Our Omnipotency, for causes to Ourselves best known, to unfurnish and disarray Our foresaid Star-chamber of all those Ancient Coustellations which have for so many Ages been sufficiently notorious, and to admit into their vacant places, such Persons only as shall be qualified with exemplar Virtue and eminent Desert, there to shine in indelible Characters of glory to all posterity. It is therefore Our divine will and pleasure, voluntarily, and out of our own free and proper motion, mere grace, and special favour, by these presents to specify and declare to all our loving people, that it shall be lawful for any Person whatsoever, that conceiveth him or herself to be really endued with any Heroical Virtue, or transcendent Merit, worthy so high a calling and dignity, to bring their several pleas and pretences before Our Right trusty and Well-beloved Cousin and Connsellor, Don Mercury, and god Momus, etc. Our peculiar Delegates for that affair, upon whom we have transferred an absolute power to conclude and determine without Appeal or Revocation, accordingly as to their wisdoms it shall in such cases appear behooveful and expedient. Given at Our palace in Olympus the first day of the first month, in the first year of the Reformation, Plutus enters, an old man full of wrinkles, a bald head, a thin white beard, spectacles on his nose, with a buncht back, and attired in a Robe of Cloth of gold.  Plutus appears. Merc. 
Who's this appears?  Mom. 
This is a subterranean Friend, Plutus, in this Dialect termed Riches, or the god of Gold; a poison hid by Providence in the bottom of the Seas, and Navel of the Earth, from man's discovery, where if the seeds begun to sprout aboveground, the excrescence was carefully guarded by Dragons; yet at last by humane curiosity brought to light, to their own destruction; this being the true Pandora's box, whence issued all those mischiefs that now fill the Universe.  Plut. 
That I prevent the message of the gods  
Thus with my haste, and not attend their summons,  
Which ought in justice call me to the place  
I now require of Right, is not alone  
To show the just precedence that I hold  
Before all earthly, next th'immortal Powers;  
But to exclude the hope of partial Grace  
In all Pretenders, who, since I descend  
To equal trial, must by my example,  
Waving your favour, claym by sole Desert.  
If Virtue must inherit, she's my slave;  
I lead her captive in a golden chain,  
About the world: She takes her Form and Being  
From my creation; and those barren seeds  
That drop from heaven, if I not cherish them  
With my distilling dews, and fotive heat,  
They know no vegetation; but exposed  
To blasting winds of freezing Poverty,  
Or not shoot forth at all, or budding, whither.  
Should I proclaim the daily sacrifice  
Brought to my Temples by the toiling rout,  
Not of the fat and gore of abject Beasts,  
But humane sweat, and blood poured on my Altars,  
I might provoke the envy of the gods.  
Turn but your eyes and mark the busy world,  
Climbing steep Mountains for the sparkling stones,  
Piercing the Centre for the shining Ore,  
And th'ocean's bosom to rake pearly sands,  
Crossing the torrid and the frozen zones  
Midst Rocks and swallowing Gulfs for gainful trade,  
And through opposing swords, fire, murdering Canon,  
Scaling the walled Towns for precious spoils.  
Plant in the passage to your heavenly seats,  
These horrid dangers, and then see who dares  
Advance his desperate foot: yet am I sought,  
And oft in vain, through these and greater hazards  
I could discover how your Deities  
Are for my sake slighted, despised, abused,  
Your Temples, Shrines, Altars, and Images,  
Uncovered, rifled, robbed, and disarrayed  
By sacrilegious hands: yet is this treasure  
To th'golden Mountain, where I sit adored,  
With superstitious solemn rights conveyed,  
And becomes sacred there, the sordid wreteh  
Not daring touch the consecrated Ore,  
Or with profane hands lessen the bright heap:  
But this might draw your anger down on mortals  
For rendering me the homage due to you:  
Yet what is said may well express my power  
Too great for Earth, and only fit for Heaven.  
Now, for your pastime, view the naked root,  
Which in the dirty earth, and base mould drowned,  
Sends forth this precious Plant, and golden fruit.  
You lusty Swains, that to your grazing flocks  
Pipe amorous Roundelays; you toiling Hinds,  
That barb the fields, and to your merry Teams  
Whistle your passions; and you mining Moles,  
That in the bowels of your mother-Earth  
Dwell the eternal burden of her womb,  
Cease from your labours, when Wealth bids you play,  
Sing, dance, and keep a cheerful holiday.  They dance the fourth Antimasque, consisting of Country people, music and measures. Merc. 
Plutus, the gods know and confess your power  
Which feeble Virtue seldom can resist;  
Stronger than Towers of brass, or Chastity  
jove knew you when he courted Danae,  
And Cupid wears you on that Arrows head  
That still prevails. But the gods keep their Throne,  
To install Virtue, not her Enemies;  
They dread thy force, which even themselves have felt,  
Witness Mount-Ida, where the Martial Maid,  
And frowning juno, did to mortal eyes  
Naked, for gold, their sacred bodies show;  
Therefore for ever be from heaven banished.  
But since with toil from undiscovered Worlds  
Thou art brought hither, where thou first didst breathe  
The thirst of Empire, into Regal breasts,  
And frightedst quiet Peace from her meek Throne,  
Filling the world with tumult, blood, and war,  
Follow the Camps of the contentious earth,  
And be the Conquerors slave, but he that can  
Or conquer thee, or give thee Virtuous stamp,  
Shall shine in heaven a pure immortal Lamp.  Mom. 
Nay stay, and take my benediction along with you. I could, being here a Co-judge, like others in my place, now that you are condemned, either rail at you, or break jests upon you, but I rather choose to lose a word of good counsel, and entreat you be more careful in your choice of company: for you are always found either with Misers, that not use you at all; or with fools, that know not how to use you well. Be not hereafter so reserved and coy to men of worth and parts, and so you shall gain such credit, as at the next Sessions you may be heard with better success. But till you are thus reformed, I pronounce this positive sentence, That wheresoever you shall choose to abide, your society shall add no credit or reputation to the party, nor your discontinuance, or total absence, be matter of disparagement to any man; and whosoever shall hold a contrary estimation of you, shall be condemned to wear perpetual Motley, unless he recant his opinion, Now you may void the Cout.  Paenia enters, a woman of a pale colour, large brims of a hat upon her head, through which her hair started up like a fury, her Robe was of a dark colourful of patches, about one of her hands was tied a chain of Iron, to which was fastened a weighty (tone, which she bore up under her arm. Merc. 
What Creature's this?  Mom. 
The Antipodes to the other, they move like Two Buckets, or as two nails drive out one another; Of Riches depart, Poverty will enter.  Pou. 
I nothing doubt (Great and Immortal Powers)  
But that the place your wisdom hath denied  
My foe, your justice will confer on me;  
Since that which renders him incapable,  
Proves a strong plea for me. I could pretend,  
Even in these rags, a larger Sovereignty  
Then gaudy Wealth in all his pomp can boast;  
For mark how few they are that share the World:  
The numerous Armies, and the swarming Ants  
That fight and roil for them, are all my Subjects,  
They take my wages, wear my Livery:  
Invention too and Wit, are both my creatures,  
And the whole race of Virtue is my Offspring;  
As many mischief's issue from my womb,  
And those as mighty, as proceed from gold.  
Oft o'er his Throne I wave my awful Sceptre,  
And in the bowels of his state command,  
When 'midst his heaps of coin, and hills of gold,  
I pine, and starve the avaricious Fool.  
But I decline those titles, and lay claim  
To heaven, by right of Divine contemplation;  
She is my Darling, I, in my soft lap,  
Free from disturbing cares, bargains, accounts,  
Leases, Rents, Stewards, and the fear of thiefs,  
That vex the rich, nurse her in calm repose,  
And with her, all the Virtue's speculative,  
Which, but with me, find no secure retreat.  
For entertainment of this hour, I'll call  
A race of people to this place, that live  
At Nature's charge, and not importune heaven  
To chain the winds up, or keep back the storms,  
To stay the thunder, or forbid the hail  
To thresh the unreaped ear; but to all weathers,  
The chilling frost, and scalding Sun, expose  
Their equal face. Come forth, my swarthy train,  
In this fair circle dance, and as you move,  
Mark, and foretell happy events of Love.  They dance the fifth Antimasque of Gypsies. Mom. 
I cannot but wonder that your perpetual conversation with Poets and Philosophers hath furnished you with no more Logic, or that you should think to impose upon us so gross an inference as because Plutus and you are contrary therefore whatsoever is denied of the one must be true of the other; as if it should follow of necessity, because he is not jupiter, you are. No, I give you to know, I am better versed in cavils with the gods, than to swallow such a fallacy, for though you two cannot be together in one place, yet there are many places that may be without you both, and such is heaven, where neither of you are likely to arrive: therefore let me advise you to marry yourself to Content, and beget sage Apothegms, and goodly moral Sentences in dispraise of Riches, and contempt of the world.  Merc. 
Thou dost presume too much, poor needy wretch,  
To claim a station in the Firmament,  
Because thy humble Cottage, or thy Tub  
Nurse's some lazy or Pedantic virtue  
In the cheap Sunshine, or by shady springs  
With roots and potherbs, where thy right hand,  
Tearing those humane passions from the mind,  
Upon whose stocks fair blooming virtues flourish,  
Degradeth Nature, and benumbeth sense,  
And Gorgonlike, turns active men to stone.  
We not require the dull society  
Of your necessitated Temperance,  
Or that unnatural stupidity  
That knows nor joy nor sorrow; nor your forced  
Falsely exalted passive Fortitude  
Above the Active: This low abject brood,  
That fix their seats in mediocrity,  
Become your servile mind; but we advance  
Such virtues only as admit excess,  
Brave bounteous Acts, Regal Magnificence,  
Allseeing Prudence, Magnanimity  
That knows no bound, and that Heroic virtue  
For which Antiquity hath left no name,  
But patterns only, such as Hercules,  
Achilles, Theseus. Back to thy loathed cell,  
And when thou seest the new enlightened Sphere,  
Study to know but what those Worthies were.  Tyche enters, her head bald behind, and one great lock before, wings at her shoulders, and in her hand a wheel, her upper parts naked, and the skirt of her Garment wrought all over with Crowns, Sceptres, Books, and such other things as express both her greatest and smallest gifts. Mom. 
See where Dame Fortune comes, you may know her by her wheel, and that vail over her eyes, with which she hopes like a seeled pigeon to mount above the Clouds, and perch in the eighth Sphere: listeen, she begins.  Fort. 
I come not here (you gods) to plead the Right,  
By which Antiquity assigned my Deity,  
Though no peculiar station mongst the Stars,  
Yet general power to rule their influence,  
Or boast the Title of Omnipotent,  
Ascribed me then, by which I rivalled jove,  
Since you have cancelled all those old Records;  
But confident in my good cause and merit,  
Claim a succession in the vacant Orb;  
From since Astraea fled to heaven, I sit  
Her Deputy on Earth, I hold her scales  
And weigh men's Fates out, who have made me blind  
Because themselves want eyes to see my causes;  
Call me inconstant, 'cause my works surpass  
The shallow fathom of their humane reason;  
Yet here, like blinded justice, I dispense  
With my impartial hands their constant lots,  
And if desertless, impious men engross  
My best rewards, the fault is yours, you gods,  
That scant your graces to mortality,  
And niggards of your good, scarce spare the world  
One virtuous for a thousand wicked men;  
It is no error to confer dignity,  
But to bestow it on a vicious man;  
I gave the dignity, but you made the vice.  
Make you men good, and I'll make good men happy:  
That Plutus is refused, dismays me not,  
He is my Drudge, and the external pomp  
In which he decks the World, proceeds from me,  
Not him; like Harmony, that not resides  
In strings, or notes, but in the hand and voice.  
The revolutions of Empires, States,  
Sceptres, and Crowns, are but my game and sport,  
Which as they hang on the events of War,  
So those depend upon my turning wheel.  
You warlike Squadrons, who in battles joined,  
Dispute the Right of Kings, which I decide,  
Present the model of that martial frame,  
By which, when Crowns are staked, I rule the game.  They dance the sixth Antimasque, being the representation of a Battle. Mom. 
Madam, I should censure you, pro falso clamore, for preferring a scandalous crosse-bill of recrimination against the Gods, but your blindness shall excuse you. Alas! what would it advantage you, if virtue were as universal as vice is? it would only follow, that as the world now exclaims upon you for exalting the vicious, it would then rail as fast at you for depressing the virtuous; so they would still keep their tune, though you changed their Ditty.  Merc. 
The mists, in which future events are wrapped,  
That oft succeed beside the purposes  
Of him that works, his dull eyes not descerning  
The first great cause, offered thy clouded shape  
To his enquiring search; so in the dark  
The groping world first found thy Deity,  
And gave thee rule over contingencies,  
Which, to the piercing eye of Providence,  
Being fixed and certain, where past and to come  
Are always present, thou dost disappear,  
Losest they being, and art not at all.  
Be thou then only a deluding Phantom,  
At best a blind guide, leading blinder fools;  
Who, would they but survey their mutual wants,  
And help each other, there were left no room  
For thy vain aid. Wisdom, whose strong-built plot;  
Leave nought to hazard, mocks thy futile power,  
Industrious labour drags thee by the locks,  
Bound to his toiling Car, and not attending  
Till thou dispense, reaches his own reward,  
Only the lazy sluggard yawning lies  
Before thy threshold, gaping for thy dose,  
And licks the easy hand that feeds his sloth;  
The shallow, rash, and unadvised man  
Makes thee his stale, disburdens all the follies  
Of his misguided actions, on thy shoulders,  
Vanish from hence, and seek those Idiots out  
That thy fantastic godhead hath allowed,  
And rule that giddy superstitious crowd.  Hedone, Pleasure, a young woman with a smiling face, in a light lascivious habit, adorned with Silver and gold, her Temples crowned with a Garland of Roses, and over that a Rainbow circling her head down to her shoulders. Hedone enters. Merc. 
What wanton's this?  Mom. 
This is the sprightly Lady Hedone merry Gamester, this people call her Pleasure.  Plea. 
The reasons (equal judges) here alleged  
By the dismissed Pretenders, all concur  
To strengthen my just title to the Sphere.  
Honour, or Wealth, or the contempt of both,  
Have in themselves no simple real good,  
But as they are the means to purchase pleasure.  
The paths that lead to my delicious Palace;  
They for my sake, I for mine own am prized.  
Beyond me nothing is. I am the Goal,  
The journeys end, to which the swearing world,  
And wearied Nature travels. For this, the best  
And wisest sect of all Philosophers  
Made me the seat of supreme happiness.  
And though some more austere, upon my ruins  
Did to the prejudice of Nature, raise  
Some petty low-built virtues, 'twas because  
They wanted wings to reach my soaring pitch;  
Had they been Princes born, themselves had proved  
Of all mankind the most luxurious:  
For those delights, which to their low condition  
Were obvious, they with greedy appetite  
Sucked and devoured: from offices of State,  
From cares of family, children, wife, hopes, fears,  
Retired, the churlish Cynic in his Tub  
Enjoyed those pleasures which his tongue desamed.  
Nor am I ranked amongst the superfluous goods;  
My necessary offices preserve  
Each single man, and propagate the kind.  
Then am I universal as the light,  
Or common Air we breathe; and since I am  
The general desire of all mankind,  
Civil Felicity must reside in me.  
Tell me what rate my choicest pleasures bear,  
When for the short delight of a poor draught  
Of cheap cold water, great Lysmachus  
Rendered himself slave to the Scythians.  
Should I the curious structure of my seats,  
The art and beauty of my several objects,  
Rehearse at large, your bounties would reserve  
For every sense a proper constellation;  
But I present the Persons to your eyes.  
Come forth my subtle Organs of delight,  
With changing figures please the curious eye,  
And charm the ear with moving Harmony.  They dance the seventh Antimasque of the five senses. Merc. 
Bewitching Siren, guilded rottenness,  
Thou hast with cunning artifice displayed  
Th' enamelled out side, and the honeyed verge  
Of the fair cup, where deadly poison lurks.  
Within, a thousand sorrows dance the round:  
And like a shell, Pain circle's thee without,  
Grief is the shadow waiting on thy steps,  
Which, as thy joys 'ginn towards their West decline,  
Doth to a Giant's spreading form extend  
Thy Dwarfish stature. Thou thyself art Pain,  
Greedy intense Desire, and the keen edge  
Of thy fierce Appetite oft strangles thee,  
And cuts thy slender thread, but still the terror  
And apprehension of thy hasty end,  
Mingles with Gall thy most refined sweets;  
Yet thy Cyrcaean charms transform the world.  
Captains, that have resisted war and death,  
Nations, that over Fortune have triumphed,  
Are by thy Magic made effeminate.  
Empires, that knew no limits but the Poles,  
Have in thy wanton lap melted away.  
Thou wert the Author of the first excess  
That drew this reformation on the gods.  
Canst thou then dream, those Powers, that from heaven have  
Banished th' effect, will there enthrone the cause,  
To thy voluptuous Den, fly Witch from hence,  
There dwell, for ever drowned in brutish sense.  Mom. 
I concur, and am grown so weary of these tedious plead, as I'll pack up too and be gone: Besides, I see a crowd of other suitors pressing hither, I'll stop'em, take their petitions and preferre'em above; and as I came in bluntly without knocking, and no body bid me welcome; so I'll depart as abruptly without taking leave, and bid no body farewell.  Merc. 
These, with forced reasons, and strained arguments,  
Urge vain pretences, whilst your Actions plead,  
And with a silent importunity  
Awake the drowsy justice of the gods  
To crown your deeds with immortality.  
The growing Titles of your Ancestors,  
These Nations glorious Acts, joined to the stock  
Of your own Royal virtues, and the clear  
Reflex they take from th'imitation  
Of your famed Court, make Honour's story full,  
And have to that secure fixed state advanced  
Both you and them, to which the labouring world,  
Wading through streams of blood sweats to aspire.  
Those ancient Worthies of these famous Isles,  
That long have slept, in fresh and lively shapes  
Shall straight appear, where you shall see yourself  
Circled with modern Heroes, who shall be  
In Act, what ever elder times can boast,  
Noble, or Great; as they in Prophecy  
Were all but what you are. Then shall you see  
The sacred hand of bright Eternity  
Mould you to Stars, and fix you in the Sphere,  
To you, your Royal half, to them she ' Iloyn  
Such of this train, as with industrious steps  
In the fair prints your virtuous feet have made,  
Though with unequal paces, follow you.  
This is decreed by Jove, which my return  
Shall see performed; but first behold the rude  
And old Abiders here, and in them view  
The point from which your full perfections grew.  
You naked, ancient, wild Inhabitants,  
That breathed this Air, and pressed this flowery Earth,  
Come from those shades where dwells eternal night,  
And see what wonders Time hath brought to light.  
Atlas, and the Sphere vanished, and a new Scene appears of mountains, whose eminent height exceed the Clouds which passed beneath them, the lower parts were wild and woody: out of this place comes forth a more grave Antimasque of Picts, the natual Inhabitants of this Isle, ancient Scots and Irish, these dance a Perica, or Martial dance.  
When this Antimasque was past, there began to arise out of the earth the top of a hill, which by little and little grew to be a huge mountain that covered all the Scene; the under part of this was wild and craggy, and above somewhat more pleasant and flourishing: about the middle part of this Mountain were seated the three King. domes of England, Scotland, and Ireland; all richly attired in regal habits, appropriated to the several Nations, with Crowns on their heads, & Each of them bearing the ancient Arms of the kingdoms they there presented: At a distance above these sat a young man in a white embroidered robe, upon his fair hair an Olive Garland, with wings at his shoulders, and holding in his hand a Cornucopia filled with corn and fruits, representing the Genius of these kingdoms.  The first Song. GENIUS. 
RAise from these rocky cliffs your heads,  
Brave Sons, and see where Glory spreads  
Her glittering wings, where Majesty,  
Crowned with sweet smiles, shoots from her eye  
Diffusive joy, where good and Fair  
United sit in Honour's Chair.  
Call forth your aged Priests, and crystal streams.  
To warm their hearts, and waves in these bright beams.  KINGDOMS 1. 
From your consecrated woods  
Holy Druids.  2. 
Silver floods,  
From your channels fringed with flowers,  3. 
Hither move; forsake your bowers,  1. 
Strewed with hallowed Oaken leaves,  
Decked with flags and sedgy sheaves,  
And behold a wonder.  3. 
Say,  
What do your duller eyes survey?  CHORUS of DRVIDSS and RIVERS. 
We see at once in dead of night  
A Sun appear, and yet a bright  
Noonday, springing from Starlight.  GENIUS. 
Look up, and see the darkened Sphere  
Deprived of light, her eyes shine there.  CHORUS. 
These are more sparkling than those were.  KINGDOMS. 1. 
These shed a nobler influence,  2. 
These by a pure Intelligence  
Of more transcendent Virtue move,  3. 
These first feel, then kindle Love,  1. 2. 
From the bosoms they inspire,  
These receive a mutual fire;  1.2.3. 
And where their flames impure return;  
These can quench as well as burn.  GENIUS. 
Here the fair victorious eyes  
Make worth only Beauty's prize,  
Here the band of Virtue ties  
'Bout the heart Love's amorous chain,  
Captives triumph, Vassals reign,  
And none live here but the slain.  CHORUS 
These are th' Hesperian bowers, whose fair trees bear  
Rich golden fruit, and yet no Dragon near.  GENIUS. 
Then, from your imprisoning womb,  
Which is the cradle and the tomb  
Of British worthies (fair sons) send  
A troop of Heroes, that may lend  
Their hands to case this loaden grove,  
And gather the ripe fruits of Love.  KINGDOMS. 1.2.3. 
Open thy stony Entrails wide,  
And break old Atlas, that the pride  
Of three famed kingdoms may be spied.  CHORUS. 
Place forth thou mighty British Hercules,  
With thy choice band, for only thou and these,  
May revel here, in Love's Hesperides,  
At this the underpart of the Rock opens, and out of a Cave are seen to come the Masquers richly attired like ancient Heroes, the Colours yellow, embroidered with silver, their antique Helms curiously wrought, and great plumes on the top; before them a troop of young Lords and Nobleman's sons, bearing Torches of Virgin-wax, these were apparelled after the old British fashion in white Coats, embroidered with silver, girt, and full gathered, cut square collered, and round caps on their heads, with a white feather wreathen about them; first these dance with their lights in their hands: After which, the Masquers descend into the room, and dance their entry.  
The dance being past, there appears in the further part of the heaven coming down a Pleasant Cloud, bright and transparent, which coming softly downwards before the upper part of the mountain, embraceth the Genius, but so as through it all his body is seen; and then rising again with a gentle motion bears up the Genius of the three kingdoms and being past the Airy Region, piereeth the heavens, and is no more seen: At that instant the Rock with the three kingdoms on it sinks, and is hidden in the earth. This strange spectacle gave great cause of admiration, but especially how so huge a machine, and of that great height could come from under the Stage, which was but six foot high.  The Second Song. KINGDOMS. 1. 
HEre are shapes formed fit for heaven,  2. 
Those move gracefully and even,  3. 
Here the Air and paces meet  
So just, as if the skilful feet  
Had struck the Vials. 1.2.3. So the Ear  
Might the tuneful footing bear.  CHORUS. 
And had the Music silent been,  
The eye a moving time had seen.  GENIUS. 
These must in the unpeopled sky  
Succeed, and govern Destiny,  
jove is temp'ring purer fire,  
And will with brighter flames attire  
These glorious lights. I must ascend  
And help the Work.  KINGDOMS. 1. 
We cannot lend  
Heaven so much treasure.  2. 
Nor that pay,  
But rendering what it takes away.  
Why should they that here can move  
So well, be ever-fixed above?  CHORUS. 
Or be to one eternal posture tied,  
That can into such various figures slide?  GENIUS. 
jove shall not, to enrich the Sky,  
Beggar the Earth; their Fame shall fly  
From hence alone, and in the Sphere  
Kindle new Stars, whilst they rest here.  KINGDOMS. 1.2.3. 
How can the shaft stay in the quiver,  
Yet his the mark?  GENIUS. 
Did not the River  
Eridanus, the grace acquire  
In Heaven and Earth to flow,  
Above in streams of golden fire,  
In silver waves below?  KINGDOMS. 1.2.3. 
But shall not we, now thou art gone  
Who wert our Nature, whither?  
Or break that triple Union  
Which thy soul held together?  GENIUS. 
In Concord's pure immortal spring  
I will my force renew,  
And a more astive Virtue bring  
At my return. Adieu.  KINGDOMS adieu. CHORUS adieu. 
The Masquers dance their main dance; which done, the Scene again is varied into a new and pleasant prospect, clean differing from all the other, the nearest part showing a delicious Garden with several walks and perterras set round with low trees, and on the sides against these walks, were fountains and grots, and in the furthest part a Palace, from whence went high walks upon Arches, and above them open Terraces planted with Cypress trees, and all this together was composed of such Ornaments as might express a princely Villa.  
From hence the Chorus descending into the room, goes up to the State.  The third Song. By the Chorus, going up to the Queen. 

WHilst thus the Darlings of the gods,  
From Honour's Temple, to the shrine  
Of beauty, and these sweet abodes  
Of Love, we guide, let thy Divine  
Aspects (Bright Deily) with fair  
And Halcyon beams, becalm the Air,   

We bring Prince Arthur, or the brave  
St. George himself (great Queen) to you,  
You'll soon discern him; and we have  
A Guy, a Beavis, or some true  
Round Table Knight, as ever-sought  
For Lady, to each Beauty brought.   

Plant in their Martial hands, War's seat,  
Your peaceful pledges of warm snow,  
And, if a speaking touch, repeat  
In Loves known language, tales of woe;  
Say, in soft whispers of the Palm,  
As eyes shoot darts, so Lips shed Balm.   

For though you seem like Captives, led  
In triumph by the Foe away,  
Yet on the Conqueror's neck you tread,  
And the fierce Victor proves your prey,  
What heat is then secure from you,  
That can, though vanquished, yet subdue?   
The Song done they retire, and the Masquers dance the Revels with the Ladies, which continued a great part of the night.  
The Revels being past, and the King's Majesty seared under the State by the Queen; for conclusion to this Masque there appears coming forth from one of the sides, as moving by a gentle wind, a great cloud, which arriving at the middle of the heaven, stayeth; this was of several colours, and so great, that it covered the whole Scene. Out of the further part of the heaven begins to break forth two other clouds, differing in colour and shape; and being fully discovered there appeared sitting in one of them, Religion, Truth, and Wisdom. Religion was apparelled in white, and part of her face was covered with a light veil, in one hand a Book, and in the other a flame of fire. Truth in a Watchet Robe, a Sun upon her forehead, and bearing in her hand a Palm. Wisdom in a mantle wrought with eyes and hands, golden rays about her head, and Apollo's Cythera in her hand. In the other cloud sat Concord, Government, and Reputation. The habit of Concord was Carnation, bearing in her hand a little faggot of sticks bound together, and on the top of it a Hart, and a Garland of corn on her head: Government was figured in a coat of Armour, bearing a shield and on it a Medusa's head; upon her head a plumed helm, and in her right hand a lance. Reputation, a young man in a purple robe wrought with gold, and wearing a laurel wreath on his head. These being come down in an equal distance to the middle part of the Air, the great Cloud began to break open, out of which broke beams of light; in the midst suspended in the Air, sat Eternity on a Globe, his Garment was long, of a light blue, wrought all over with stars of gold, and bearing in his hand a Serpent bend into a circle, with his tail in his mouth. In the firmament about him, was a troop of fifteen stars, expressing the stellifying of our British Heroes; but one more great and eminent than the rest, which was over his head, figured his Majesty. And in the lower part was seen a far off the prospect of Windsor Castle, the famous seat of the most honourable Order of the Garter.  The fourth Song. Eternity, Eusebia, Alethia, Sophia, Homonoia, Dicaearche, Euphemia. ETERNITY. 
Be fixed rapid Orbs, that bear  
The changing seasons of the year  
On your swift wings, and see the old  
Decrepit spheres grown dark and cold;  
Nor did jove quench her fires, these bright  
Flames have eclipsed her sullen light:  
This Royal Payr, for whom Fate will  
Make Motion cease, and Time stand still:  
Since Good is here so perfect, as no Worth  
Is left for After-Ages to bring forth.  EUSEBIA. 
Mortality cannot with more  
Religious zeal, the gods adore.  ALETHEIA. 
My Truths, from human● eyes concealed;  
Are naked to their sight revealed.  SOPHIA. 
Nor do their actions, from the guide  
Of my exactest precepts slide.  HOMONOIA. 
And as their own pure Souls entwined,  
So are their Subjects hearts combined.  DICAEARCHE. 
So just, so gentle is their sway,  
As it seems Empire to obey.  EUPHEMIA. 
And their fair Fame, like incense hur'ld  
On Altars hath perfumed the world.  SO. 
wisdom.  AL. 
Truth.  EUS. 
Pure Adoration.  HO. 
Concord.  DI. 
Rule  EUP. 
Clear Reputation.  CHORUS. 
Crown this King, this Queen, this Nation.  CHORUS. 
Wisdom, Truth, etc.  ETERNITY. 

Brave Spirits, whose adventurous feet  
Have to the Mountain's top aspired,  
Where fair Desert, and Honour meet,  
Here, from the toiling Press retired,  
Secure from all disturbing Evil  
For ever in my Temple revelt.   

With wreathes of stars circled about,  
Gilled all the spacious Firmament,  
And smiling on the panting Rout  
That labour in the steep ascent,  
With your resistless influence guide  
Of humane change th'incertain tide.   EUS. ALE. SOP. 
But oh you Royal Turtles, shed,  
When you from Earth remove,  
On the ripe fruits of your chaste bed,  
Those sacred seeds of Love.  CHORUS. 
Which no Power can but yours dispense,  
Since you the pattern bean from hence.  HOM. DIC. EUP. 
Then from your fruitful race shall slow  
Endless succession.  
Sceptres shall bud, and Laurels blow  
'Bout their Immortal Throne.  CHORUS. 
Propitious stars shall crown each birth,  
Whilst you rule them and they the Earth.  The song ended, the two clouds, with the persons sitting on them, ascend, the great cloud closeth again, and so passeth away overthwart the Scene; leaving behind it nothing but a Serene sky. After which the Masquers dance their haste dance, and the curtain was let fall.  


The Names of the Masquers. The King's Majesty.  Duke of Lenox. 
Lord Fielding.  Earl of Devonshire. 
Lord Digby.  Earl of Holland. 
Lord Dungarvin.  Earl of Newport. 
Lord Dunluce.  Earl of Elgin. 
Lord Wharton.  Viscount Grandeson. 
Lord Paget.  Lord Rich. 
Lord Saltine   

The names of the young Lords and Nobleman's Sons.  Lord Walden. 
Mr. Thomas Howard  Lord Cranborne. 
Mr. Thomas Egerton.  Lord Brackley. 
Mr. Charles Cavendish  Lord Shandos. 
Mr. Robert Howard.  Mr. William Herbert. 
Mr. Henry Spencer.     


To his mistress.  

1.  
GRieve not my Celia, but with haste  
Obey the fury of thy fate,  
'Tis some perfection to waste  
Discreetly out our wretched state,  
To be obedient in this sense,  
Will prove thy virtue, though offence.   

2.  
Who knows but destiny may relent,  
For many miracles have been,  
Thou proving thus obedient  
To all the griefs she plundgd thee in?  
And then the certainty she meant  
Reverted is by accident.   

3.  
But yet I must confess 'tis much  
When we remember what hath been,  
Thus parting never more to touch  
To let eternal absence in,  
Though never was our pleasure yet  
So pure, but chance distracted it.   

4.  
What, shall we then submit to fate,  
And die to one another's love?  
No, Celia, no, my soul doth hate  
Those Lovers that inconstant prove,  
Fate may be cruel, but if you decline,  
The crime is yours, and all the glory mine.  
Fate and the Planets sometimes bodies part,  
But Cankered nature only altars th' heart    

In praise of his Mistress  

1.  
You, that will a wonder know,  
Go with me,  
Two suns in a heaven of snow  
Both burning bee,  
All they fire, that but eye them,  
Yet the snow's unmelted by them.   

2.  
Leaves of Crimson Tulips met  
Guide the way  
Where two pearly rows be set  
As white as day  
When they part themselves asunder  
She breathes Oracles of wonder.   

3.  
Hills of Milk with Azure mixed  
Swell beneath,  
Waving sweetly, yet still fixed,  
While she doth breath.  
From those hills descends a valley  
Where all fall, that dare to dally.   

4.  
As fair Pillars under-stand  
Statues two,  
Whither than the Silver swan  
That swims in Poe;  
If at any time they move her  
Every step begets a Lover.   

All this but the Casket is  
Which contains  
Such a jewel, as the miss  
Breeds endless pains;  
That's her mind, and they that know it  
May admire, but cannot show it    

To Celia, upon Love's ubiquity.  

As one that strives, being sick, and sick to death  
By changing places, to preserve a breath,  
A tedious restless breath, removes and tries  
A thousand rooms, a thousand policies,  
To cozen pain, when he thinks to find ease,  
At last he finds all change, but his disease,  
So (like a Ball with fire and powder filled)  
I restless am, yet live, each minute killed,  
And with that moving torture must retain  
(With change of all things else) a constant pain.  
Say I stay with you, prensence is to me  
Nought but a light, to show my misery,  
And parting are as Racks, to plague love on,  
The further stretchd, the more affliction.  
Go I to Holland, France, or furthest jude,  
I change but only Countries not my mind.  
And though I pass through air and water free,  
Despair and hopeless fate still follow me,  
Whilst in the bosom of the waves I reel  
My heart I'll liken to the tottering keel,  
The sea to my own troubled fate, the wind  
To your disdain, sent from a soul unkind:  
But when I lift my sad looks to the skies,  
Then shall I think I see my Celia's eyes,  
And when a Cloud or storm appears between,  
I shall remember what her frowns have been.  
Thus, whatsoever course my fates allow,  
All things but make me mind my business, you.  
The good things that I meet I think streams be  
From you the fountain, but when bad I see,  
How vile and cursed is that thing think I,  
That to such goodness is so contrary?  
My whole life is 'bout you, the Centre star,  
But a perpetual Motion Circular.  
I am the dial's hand, still walking round,  
You are the Compass, and I never sound  
Beyond your Circle, neither can I show  
Aught, but what first expressed is in you.  
That wheresoever my tears do cause me move  
My fate still keeps me bounded with your love;  
Which ere it die, or be extinct in me,  
Time shall stand still, and moist waves flaming be.  
Yet, being gone, think not on me, I am  
A thing too wretched for thy thoughts to name,  
But when I die, and wish all comforts given,  
I'll think on you, and by you think on heaven.    
FINIS.   

The Songs and Dialogues of this Book were set with apt Tunes to them, by Mr. Henry Laws, one of His Majesty's Musicians.