unknown author

“ Each man's thy slave, and womankind's thy—.
Methinks I see thee underneath the shade
Of golden canopies supinely laid;
Thy crouching slaves, all silent as the night,
But at thy nod, all active as the light.
Secure in solid sloath, thou there doest reign,
And feelst the ioyes of love without the pain.
Each female courts thee with a wishing eye,
Whilst thou with awfull pride walkst careless by;
Till thy kind pleadge at last markes out the dame,
Thou fanciest most to quench thy present flame. ”

“ See, while I speak, how curled, how rough 'tis growne!
Look how serene the sky, how calm the aire!
Now hark, it thunders round the hemisphere!
This great inconstancy of human state
Corrupts each minute of our hasty fate.
Who would be slave to such a tyrant life
That still engages him in noise and strife?
And what strange frensy must those men possess
Who blindly deem long life a happiness! ”

“ In each sunne-dyall full as much as you,
Yet, though it eastwards post, ther's none will say
The shadow gaines the light, or winnes the day:
So traveling but makes us here beneath
Resemble more the images of death:
Though Eagypts sunne may us to mummy burne,
Arabian fumes can nere to phoenix turne.
Oh three times happy that contented man,
Who, measuring all the world with one sole spann,
Contented with a single point of it,
Can quiet in his native country sitt! ”

“ We did our miseries mix,
O then why was not I allow'd with thee to die:
Free from grief and killing pain,
I had never sought in vain,
Sought my life where death I find,
In thy tombe, but not so kind. ”

“ Is angells' glory fixt to human life.
Without which, wedlock's but a dirty tye,
A profanation, an ungodly lye,
Where fortunes jugle conscience to comply.
Such friendship's a sweet bread, without all leaven,
Love's strongest chayne, a yoake that's sweet and even,
And leads two soules the easyest way to heaven. ”

“ My love will after death survive,
Which Fate or Time can n'ere decay.
And since all hopes of you are lost,
And joy with life must disappear,
When I'm converted to a ghost
I'le bee your guardian angell here. ”

“ Humility, and goodness, in excess,
Are all the impietyes which you express,
And (if you'le take my counsel!) ought repress.
Justice with Mercy, Truth and Peace must kiss;
They're not so perfect where we either miss. ”

“ When decks see only sea and sky.
By height our narrow sights enlarged are,
Low men perchance see well, but never far.
Rise then, cleare soul, lighten'd with knowledge rise,
Upon the wings of fame stuck full of eyes. ”

“ And what too soon would die, help to destroy.
As if the cares of human life were few
We seek out new,
And follow fate, which does too fast pursue.
In vain does Nature's bounteous hand supply
What peevish mortals to themselves deny. ”

“ He's air, or some thin exhalation
Next degree to annihilation.
'Tis thraldom, freedom, 'tis express
Good company, and loneliness;
It laughs, and cries, all in one breath;
'Tis wealth or want, 'tis life or death. ”

“ Life a Preparation for Eternity.
Time slowly moves to them that be
Busy in infelicity;
Whose every sun dos still beget
An age of woes before it set,
And ere their noone of life is gone,
They thinke the world's Jong course they've run. ”

“ True fires are not contained within a breast.
So that who loves must vent flames through his eyes,
Sigh, flame, or burn a smother'd sacrifice.
His thoughts, words, actions, all are in excess,
For true love hath no measures which express. ”

“ He becomes a more furious passion then hate:
Since my Phillis returns to the empire of harts,
He has new-strung his bow, and sharpened his darts,
And strictly the rights of his crown to maintaine,
He breakes every hart, and turnes every braine. ”

“ Were she on earth, she had been with me still;
Fly, fly to heaven, examin every spheare,
And see what stairs are lately fixed there:
If any brighter then the sun you see,
Fall downe and worship it, for that is shee. ”

“ The sight of heaven is worse than hell.
Your dainty voice, and warbling breath,
Sound like a trumpet past for death;
Your dangling tresses are like chaines,
Tying me to eternall paines;
O, if an angell torture soe,
My life must pass in endlesse woe! ”

“ From which thy taper fingers stand;
By those pretty nimble feet,
Wont in skilful steps to meet;
By the neat fabric of the whole,
Fair as the world, from either pole;
Whose each part is Paradise,
And Heaven both in and round it is ”

“ Did once some change discover;
To be too jelous is the fault
Of every tender lover.
My truth those kind reproches show,
Which you blame so severely:
A signe, alas! you little know,
What 'tis to love sincerely. ”

“ None merits you lesse, nor can value you more.
To purchase a smile, or a glance from her eyes,
Both my life and my fortune's too little a price;
But if to desert you can only be kind,
Like heaven, you must then to yourselfe be confin'd.
Our joyes are so ordred by nature's great doome,
That what ere we possesse, from another must come ”

“ Now, now the fight's done, and the great god of war
Lies sleeping in shades, and unruffles his care.
Love laughs at his rest, and his souldiers alarmes,
He drums, and he trumpets, and struts in his armes ”

“ She shuns his very sight,
And leaves him to that hopeles love,
She did create in spite.
Her name I could not make him tell,
Though vowing him my aid;
He said he never would reveale
In life, or death, the maid. ”

“ Never man had such a treasure;
But I die with jealous care,
In the midst of all my pleasure.
Free and easie without pride,
Is her language and her fashion;
Setting gentle love aside,
She is not mov'd with any passion. ”

“ While flatt'rers thrive and parasites shall dine,
While commonwealths afford a Catiline,
Laborious Jonson shall be thought divine.
Thee, Shakespear! poets ever shall adore,
Whose wealthy fancy left so vast a store,
They still refine thy rough but precious ore.
So long shall Cowley be admired above
The crowd, as David's troubles pity move,
Till women cease to charm and youth to love. ”

“ To give him quiett,
My faith rewards my love,
Though he deny it.
On his eyes will I gaze,
And there delight me;
While I conceale my love,
Noe frown can fright me;
To be more happy,
I dare not aspire ”

“ How soone she leaves the pride of wealth,
The flatteries of youth and health,
And fame's more pretious breath
And every gaudy circumstance,
That doth the pomp of life advance,
At the approach of death! ”

“ A Contemplation
upon the Shortness and Shallowness on Human Knowledge.
If of the smallest star in sky
We know not the immensity;
If those pure sparkes that stars compose,
The highest human wit doe pose ”

“ We here have past in love.
Ye starres above, my cruel foes,
Can tell how she hath sworne
A thousand times, that like to those
Her flame should ever burne.
But if she's lost, O! let me have
My wish, and quickly die ”

“ Canst thou in broken slumbers pray,
And by afflictions merit heaven?
Chorus.
Say, Voterisse, can this be done?
Whilst we the grace divine implore—
The world shall lose the battles won,
And sin shall never chaine thee more. ”

“ Bravely with her on earth shake off our dust.
T' arrive unto her height and greatness there,
We must, like her, be low and little here.
And, lastly, in our proper sphere to move,
Patterne we must our first idea, Love. ”

“ That honour thinks amiss.
Thus are poor maids unkindly used
By Love and Nature both abused—
And tender harts all ease refused;
And when we burn with secret flame,
Must die with grief or live with shame. ”

“ Sad parents then recall your greefes:
Your little one now truely lives,
Your pretty messenger of Love,
Your new intelligence above;
Since God created such immortal flowers
To grow in his owne Paradice, not ours. ”

“ My love to wrath abetted;
Felton had not a knife more tryed,
Nor Pymme a toung more whetted.
Nor thinke thy force, or thy deceipt,
Of art or arme can out me:
Love has his Ferfaxes to beat,
And Crumwells too to rowt thee. ”

“ And every lass would straine
To please him in her sonnet:
The pride of al the youth he was,
The glory of the grove,
The pleasure of each tender lass,
The theame of all their love.
But oh! unlucky fate!
A curse upon ambition! ”

“ What's the existence of man's life
But open war, or slumbered strife?
Where sicknes to his sense presents
The combat of the elements,
And never feeles a perfect peace,
Till Death's cold hand signs his release? ”

“ They have a right in heaven, an early place;
The beauteous bride is of a martyr's race:
And he above, with joy looks down,
I see, I see him blaze with his immortall crown.
He, on her nuptials, does his beams dispense,
Blessing the day with better influence;
He looks from heaven with joy, and gives her joy from thence. ”

“ Heere lyes two miracles in one,
Of all our age, and of her owne.
A vertue, durst mentain her prime,
When vertues self was growne a crime:
A beauty, held her springing flower;
When beauty fell in winter's power. ”

“ The least propriety in any sense,
Or any joy, that hath his rise from thence.
Like two bright lamps they burn with equal fires,
Each life takes breath from th' other, and expires;
Their interest but one as their desires. ”

“ And in the ayre we dance on high
To the loud musick of the sky.
About the moone we make a ring,
And falling stars we wanton fling
Like squibbs and rocketts, for a toy,
While what frights others is our joy. ”

“ The worm that never dies! the thorn within,
That pricks and pains; the whip and scourge of sin:
The voice of God in man! which, without rest,
Doth softly cry within a troubled breast;
To all temptations is that soul left free
That makes not to itself a curb of thee! ”

“ A Song
All the flatteries of fate,
Nor the pleasures of state,
Are nothing soe sweet as what love doth create:
If this you deny,
Tis time I should die,
Kind death's a reprieve when you threaten to hate. ”

“ Come, serened lookes,
Cleare as these cristall brookes,
Or the pure azure heaven, that smiles to see
The rich attendance of our poverty;
Peace, and a secure mind,
Which all men seeke, we only find. ”

“ Oh, since wee all confesse our sunne
Is by thy shining orbs outdone,
And that the fires (the torrid zone
Of love creates) are all thy owne,
Relent thy rigor and our paine,
Let pitty temper thy disdaine ”

“ From thence doth his empire extend,
Who ever looks on you is soone made a prise,
His liberty none can defend:
Love nere shoots amiss, secure of all harts,
Whilst your brow is his bow, your lookes are his darts. ”

“ I then may vouchsafe for to love her;
But if pride or unconstancy in her I find,
I'de have her to know I'm above her:
For at length I have learnt, since my Phillis is gon
To love if I please, or to let it alone. ”

“ Help one another out what we would say.
Each in ourselves we'd satisfie much less,
Since each wish more than we can all express.
May you love nothing but what joys may bring,
And they so many as may seme to spring. ”

“ Concealed Love.
My life is now a burden grown,
Opprest with constant anguish,
Whilst sicke with griefe I dare not owne,
I thus unpitied languish:
But whilst I burne with secret fire,
My heart, which now is breaking,
Must needs reveale its fond desire,
Without the helpe of speaking. ”

“ Presumptuous minds dare Heaven engage!
But crowding years push on and forwards drive,
Till, hurried on, vain men arrive
On death's inevitable coast,
Where all, dissolved to dust, in nature's mass are lost! ”

“ Then round the meadow did she walke,
Catching each flower by the stalke,
Such flowers as in the meadowes grew,
The dead mans thumbe of azure blew;
And as shee pluckt them up, cries shee,
Alas! alas! none ere did love like mee. ”