Robert Gould

“ How curst is Man! when Brutes his Rivals prove,
Ev’n in the sacred business of his Love!
Unless Religion pious thoughts instil }
Shew me the Woman that would not be ill, }
If she, conveniently, cou’d have her will? }
And when the mind’s corrupt, we all well know
The actions that proceed from’t must be so:
Their guilt’s as great who any ill would do,
As theirs who, actually, that ill pursue;
That they would have it so their Crime assures;
Thus, if they durst, all Women would be Whores.
At least (and ‘tis what all Men will allow)
Most would be so that yet seem virtuous now. ”

“ Yet that’s untold for which they most are fam’d:
A ‘’Sin,’‘ tall as the ‘’Pyramids’‘ of old,
From whose aspiring top we may behold
Enough to damn a World: - what should it be,
But (Curse upon the Name!) ‘’Inconstancy?’‘
O tell me, does the World those Men contain,
(For I have look’d for such, but look’d in vain)
Who ne’er were drawn into that fatal snare? ”

“ Rifle and bear the sacred Guest away:
‘Tis they, ‘tis they that rob us of that ‘’Gem,’‘
How could we lose it were it not for them?
Avoid ‘em, then, with all the gaudy Arts
They daily practice to amuse our hearts ”

“ From the swift-turns of their ‘’Inconstancy:’‘
Witness th’ ‘’Ephesian Matron,’‘ - - - -
Who to the Grave with her dead Husband went,
And clos’d her self up at his ‘’Monument,’‘
Where on the cold Marble she lamenting lay; }
In sighs she spent the night, in tears the day, }
And seem’d to have no use of Life, but to mourn it all away: }
The wond’rignt World extoll’d her faithful mind,
Extoll’d her as the best of Womankind! ”

“ Bliss of the day, and Rapture of the night! }
The reins that guide us in our wild Careers?
And the Supporter of our feeble years?
No, no, ‘tis contradiction; rather far,
They are the cause of all our Bosom-War ”