and may this Remain with you as earnest of my wish When you so far love any that you dare Venture your whole affection on his care May he for whom you change your Virgin-life Prove good to you and perfect as this Wife Vpon the same Madam who understands you well would swear That you the Life and this your Copie were To A. R. upon the same NOt that I would instruct or tutor you What is a Wifes behest or Husbands due Give I this Widdow-Wife Your early date Of knowledge makes such Precepts slow and late This book is but your glass where you shall see What your self are what other Wives should bee An Epitaph on Niobe turned to Stone THis Pile thou seest built out of Flesh not Stone Contains no shroud within nor mouldring bone This bloodless Trunk is destitute of Tombe Which may the Soul-fled Mansion enwombe This seeming Sepulchre to tell the troth Is neither Tomb nor Body and yet both Vpon a Braid of Hair in a Heart sent by Mrs. E. H. IN this small Character is sent My Loves eternal Monument Whil'st we shall live know this chain'd Heart Is our affections counter-part And if we never meet think I Bequeath'd it as my Legacy SONNET TEll me no more how fair she is I have no minde to hear The story of that distant bliss I never shall come near By sad experience I have found That her perfection is my wound And tell me not how fond I am To tempt a daring Fate From whence no triumph ever came But to repent too late There is some hope ere long I may In silence dâ—te my self away I ask no pity Love from thee Nor will thy justice blame So that thou wilt not envy mee The glory of my flame Which crowns my heart when ere it dyes In that it falls her sacrifice SONNET VVEre thy heart soft as thou art faire Thou wer 't a wonder past compare But frozen Love and fierce disdain By their extremes thy graces stain Cold coyness quenches the still fires Which glow in Lovers warm desires And scorn like the quick Lightnings blaze Darts death against affections gaze O Heavens what prodigy is this When Love in Beauty buried is Or that dead pity thus should be Tomb'd in a living cruelty SONNET GO thou that vainly do'st mine eyes invite To taste the softer comforts of the night And bid'st me cool the feaver of my brain In those sweet balmy dewes which slumber pain Enjoy thine own peace in untroubled sleep Whil'st my sad thoughts eternal vigils keep O could'st thou for a time change breasts with me Thou in that broken Glass shouldst plainly see A heart which wastes in the slow smothring fire Blown by despair and fed by false desire Can onely reap such sleeps as Sea-men have When fierce winds rock them on the foaming wave SONNET To Patience DOwn stormy passions down no more Let your rude waves invade the shore Where blushing reason sits and hides Her from the fuâ—y of your tides Fit onely 't is where you bear sway That Fools or Franticks do obey Since judgment if it not resists Will lose it self in your blind mists Fall easie Patience fall like rest Whose soft spells charm a troubled breast And where those Rebels you espy O in your silken cordage tie Their malice up so shall I raise Altars to thank your power and praise The soveraign vertue of your Balm Which cures a Tempest by a Calm Silence A SONNET PEace my hearts blab be ever dumb Sorrowes speak loud without a tongue And my perplexed thoughts forbear To breath your selves in any ear T is scarce a true or manly grief Which gaddes abroad to find relâ—ef Was ever stomack that lackt meat Nourisht by what another eat Can I bestow it or will woe Forsake me when I bid it goe Then I le believe a wounded breast May heal by shrift and purchase rest But if imparting it I do Not ease my self but trouble two 'T is better I alone possess My treasure of unhappiness Engrossing that which is my own No longer then it is unknown If silence be a kind of death He kindles grief who gives it breath But let it rak't in embers lye On thine own hearth 't will quickly dye And spight of fate that very wombe Which carries it shall prove its tombe Loves Harvest FOnd Lunatick forbear why do'st thou sue For thy affections pay e're it is due Loves fruits are legal use and therefore may Be onely taken on the marriage day Who for this interest too early call By that exaction lose the Principall Then gather not those immature delights Untill their riper Autumn thee invites He that abortive Corn cuts off his ground No Husband but a Ravisher is found So those that reap their love before they wed Do in effect but Cuckold their own Bed The Forlorn Hope HOw long vain Hope do'st thou my joys suspend Say must my expectation know no end Thou wast more kind unto the wandring Greek Who did ten years his Wife and Country seek Ten lazy Winters in my glass are run Yet my thoughts travail seems but new begun Smooth Quick-sand which the easy World beguiles Thou shalt not bury me in thy false smiles They that in hunting shadowes pleasure take May benefit of thy illusion make Since thou hast banisht me from my content I here pronounce thy finall banishment Farewell thou dream of nothing thou meer voice Get thee to fooles that can feed fat with noise Bid wretches markt for death look for reprieve Or men broke on the wheel perswade to live Henceforth my comfort and best Hope shall be By scorning Hope nere to rely on thee The Retreat PUrsue no more my thoughts that false unkind You may assoon imprison the North-wind Or catch the Lightning as it leaps or reach The leading billow first ran down the breach Or undertake the â—lying clouds to track In the same path they yesterday did rack Then like a Torch turn'd downward let the same Desire which nourisht it put out your flame Loe thus I doe dâ—vorce thee from my brest False to thy vow and traitour to my rest Henceforth thy tears shall be though thou repent Like pardons after execution sent Nor shalt thou ever my loves story read But as some Epitaph of what is dead So may my hope on future blessings dwell As 't is my firm resolve and last farewell SONNET TEll me you stars that our affections move Why made ye me that cruell one to love Why burnes my heart her scorned sacrifice Whose breast is hard as Chrystall cold as Ice God of Desire if all thy Votaries Thou thus repay succession will grow wise No sighs for incense at thy Shrine shall smoke Thy Rites will be despis'd thy Altars broke O! or give her my flame to melt that snow Which yet unthaw'd does on her bosome grow Or make me ice and with her chrystall chaines Binde up all love within my frozen veines SONNET I Prethee turn that face
kind fate Those worst acts of my life incinerate He shall in story fill a glorious room Whose ashes and whose sins sleep in one Tomb. If now to my cold hearse thou deign to bring Some melting sighs as thy last offering My peacefull exequies are crown'd Nor shall I ask more honour at my Funerall Thou wilt more richly balm me with thy tears Then all the Nard fragrant Arabia bears And as the Paphian Queen by her griâ—fs show'r Brought up her dead Loves Spirit in a flow'r So by those precious drops rain'd from thine â—ies Out of my dust O may some â—ertue rise And like thy better Genius thee attend Till thou in my dark Period shalt end Lastly my constant truth let me commend To him thou chooâ—est next to be thy friend For witness all things good I would not have Thy Youth and Beauty married to my grave 'T would shew thou didst repent the style of wife Should'st thou relapâ—e into a single life They with preposterous grief the world delude Who mourn for their lost Mates in solitude Since Widdowhood more strongly doth enforce The much lamented lot of their divorce Themselves then of their losses guilty are Who may yet will not suffer a repaire Those were Barbarian wives that did invent Weeping to death at th'Husbandâ— Monument But in more civil Rites She doth approve Her first who ventures on a second Love For else it may be thought if She refrain She sped so ill Shee durst not trie again Up then my Love and choose some worthier one Who may supply my room when I am gone So will the stock of our affection thrive No less in death then were I still alive And in my urne I shall rejoyce that I Am both Testatour thus and Legacie The short Wooing LIke an Oblation set before a Shrine Fair One I offer up this heart of mine Whether the Saint accept my Gift or no I le neither fear not doubt before I know For he whose faint distrust prevents reply Doth his own suits denial prophecy Your will the sentence is Who free as Fate Can bid my love proceed or else retreat And from short views that veâ—diâ—â—t is decreed Which seldom doth one audience exceed Love asks no dull probation but like light Conveyes his nimble influence at first sight I need not therefore importune or press This were t'extort unwilling happiness And much against affection might I sin To tire and weary what I seek to win Towns which by lingring siege enforced be Oft make both sides repent the victorie Be Mistriss of your self and let me thrive Or suffer by your own prerogative Yet stay since you are Judge who in one breath Bear uncontrolled power of Life and Death Remember Sweet pity doth best become Those lips which must pronounce a Suitors doome If I find that my spark of chast desire Shall kindle into Hymens holy fire Else like sad flowers will these verses prove To stick the Coffin of rejected Love St. Valentines day NOw that each feâ—ther'd Chorister doth sing The glad approches of the welcome Spring Now Phoebus darts forth his more early beam And dips it later in the curâ—ed stream I should to custome prove a retrograde Did I still dote upon my sullen shade Oft have the seasons finisht and begun Dayes into Months those into years have run Since my cross Starres and inauspicious fate Doom'd me to linger here without my Mate Whose loss ere since befrosting my desire Left me an Altar without Gift or Fire I therefore could have wisht for your own sake That Fortune had design'd a nobler stake For you to draw then one whose fading day Like to a dedicated Taper lay Within a Tomb and long burnt out in vain Since nothing there saw better by the flame Yet since you like your Chance I must not try To marre it through my incapacity I here make title to it and proclaime How much you honour me to wenâ— my name Who can no form of gratitude devise But offer up my self your sacrifice Haâ—l then my worthy Lot and may each Morn Successive springs of joy to you be born May your content ne're wane untill my heart Grown Bankrupt wants good wishes to impart Henceforth I need not make the dust my Shrine Nor search the Grave for my lost Valentine To his unconstant Friend BUt say thou very woman why to me This fit of weakness and inconstancie What forfeit have I made of word or vow That I am rack't on thy displeasure now If I have done a fault I do not shame To cite it from thy lips give it a name I ask the banes stand forth and tell me why We should not in our wonted loves comply Did thy cloy'd appetite urge thee to trie If any other man could love as I I see friends are like clothes lad up whil'st new But after wearing cast though nere so true Or did thy fierce ambition long to make Some Lover turn a martyr for thy sake Thinking thy beauty had deserv'd no name Unless some one do perish in that flame Upon whose loving dust this sentence lies Here 's one was murther'd by his Mistriss eyes Or was 't because my love to thee was such I could not choose but blab it swear how much I was thy slave and doting let thee know I better could my self then thee forgo Hearken ye men that ere shall love like me I le give you counsel gratis if you be Possest of what you like let your fair friend Lodge in your bosom but no secrets send To seek their lodging in a female brest For so much is abated of your rest The Steed that comes to understand his strength Growes wild and casts his manager at length And that tame Lover who unlocks his heart Unto his Mistriss teaches her an art To plague himself shews her the secret way How She may tyrannize another day And now my fair unkindness thus to thee Mark how wise Passion and I agree Hear and be sorry for 't I will not die To expiate thy crime of levitie I walk not cross-arm'd neither eat and live Yea live to pity thy neglect not grieve That thou art from thy faith and promise gone Nor envy him who by my loss hath won Thou shalt perceive thy changing Moon-like fitâ— Have not infected me or turn'd my wits To Lunacie I do not mean to weep When I should eat oâ— sigh when I should sleep I will not fall upon my pointed quill Bleed ink and Poems or invention spill To contrive Ballads or weave Elegies For Nurses wearing when the infant cries Nor like th'enamour'd Tristrams of the time Despair in prose and hang my self in rhime Nor thither run upon my verses feet Where I shall none but fools or mad-men meet Who mid'st the silent shades and Myrtle walks Pule and do penance for their Mistress faults I 'm none of those poetick male-contents Born to make paper dear with my laments Or wild Orlando that will rail and vex And
it out-goes All forms of thankfulness I can propose Those grateful levies which my pen would raise Are stricken dumb or bury'd in amazâ— Therefore as once in Athens there was shown An Altar built unto the God unknown My ignorant devotions must by guess This blind return of gratitude address Till You vouchsafe to shew me where and how I may to this revealed Goddess bow The Forfeiture MY Dearest To let you or the world know What Debt of service I do truly ow To your unpattern'd self were to require A language onely form'd in the desire Of him that writes It is the common fate Of greatest duties to evaporate In silent meaning as we often see Fires by their too much fuel smother'd be Small Obligations may find vent and speak When greater the unable debtor break And such are mine to you whose favours store Hath made me poorer then I was before For I want words and language to declare How strict my Bond or large your bounties are Since nothing in my desp'rate fortune found Can payment make nor yet the summe compound You must lose all or else of force accept The body of a Bankrupt for your debt Then Love your Bond to Execution sue And take my self as forfeited to you The Departure AN ELEGY VVEre I to leave no more then a good friend Or but to hear the summons to my end Which I have long'd for I could then with ease Attire my grief in words and so appease That passion in my bosom which outgrowes The language of strict verse or largest prose But here I am quite lost writing to you All that I pen or think is forc't and new My faculties run cross and prove as weak T' indite this melancholly task as speak Indeed all words are vain â— vell might I spare This rendring of my tortur'd thoughts in ayre Or sighing paper My infectious grief Strikes inward and affords me no relief But still a deeper wound to lose a sight More lov'd then health and dearer then the light But all of us were not at the same time Brought forth nor are we billited in one clime Nature hath pitch't mankind at several rates Making our places diverse as our fates Unto that universal law I bow Though with unwilling knee and do allow Her cruell justice which dispos'd us so That we must counter to our wishes go 'T was part of mans first curse which order'd wâ—ll We should not alway with our likings dwell 'T is onely the Triumphant Church where we Shall in unsever'd Neighbourhood agree Go then best soul and where You must appear Restore the Day to that dull Hemisphear Nere may the hapless Night You leave behind Darken the comforts of Your purer mind May all the blessings Wiâ—â—es can invent Enrich your dayes and crown them with coâ—tent And though You travel down into the West May Your lifes Sun stand fixed in the East Far from the weeping set nor may my car Take in that killing whisper You once were Thus kiss I your fair hands taking my leave As Prisoners at the Bar their doom receive All joyes go with You let sweet peace attend You on the way and wait Your journeys end But let Your discontents and sowrer fate Remain with me born off in my Retrait Might all your crosses in that sheet of lead Which folds my heavy heart lie buried 'T is the last service I would do You and the best My wishes ever meant or tongue profest Once more I take my leave And once for all Our parting shews so like a funerall It strikes my soul which hath most right to be Chief Mourner at this sad solemnitie And think not Dearest 'cause this parting knell Is rung in verses that at Your farewell I onely mourn in Poetry and Ink No my Pens melancholy Plommets sink So low they dive where th' hid affections sit Blotting that Paper where my mirth was writ Believ 't that sorrow truest is which lies Deep in the breast not floating in the eies And he with saddest circumstance doth part Who seals his farewell with a bleeding heart PARADOX That it is best for a Young Maid to marry an Old Man FAir one why cannot you an old man love He may as useful and more constant prove Experience shews you that maturer years Are a security against those fears Youth will expose you to whose wild desire As it is hot so 't is as rash as fire Mark how the blaze extinct in ashes lies Leaving no brand nor embers when it dies Which might the flame renew thus soon consumes Youths wandring heaâ— and vanishes in fumes When ages riper love unapt to stray Though loose and giddy change of objects may In your warm bosom like a cynder lie 〈◊〉 and kindled by your sparkling eie T is not 〈◊〉 there are extremes in both Which may the fancie move to like or loath 〈◊〉 of the two you better shall endure To marry with the Cramp then Calenture Who would in wisdom choose the Torrid Zone Therein to settle a Plantation Merchants can tell you those hot Climes were made But at the longest for a three years trade And though the Indies cast the sweeter smell Yet health and plenty do more Northward dwell For where the raging Sun-beams burn the earth Her scorched mantle withers into dearth Yet when that drought becomes the Harvests curâ—e Snow doth the tender Corn most kindly nurse Why now then wooe you not some snowy head To take you in meer pitty to his bed I doubt the harder task were to perswade Him to love you for if what I have said In Virgins as in Vegetals holds true Hee 'l prove the better Nurse to cherish you Some men we know renown'd for wisdom grown By old records and antique Medalls shown Why ought not women then be held moâ—t wise Who can produce living antiquities Besides if care of that main happiness Your sex triumphs in doth your thoughts possess I mean your beauty from decay to keep No wash nor mask is like an old mans sleep Young wives need never to be Sun-burnt fear Who their old husbands for Umbrellaes wear How russet looks an Orchard on the hill To one that 's water'd by some neighb'ring Drill Are not the floated Medowes ever seen To flouriâ—h soonest and hold longest green You may be sure no moist'ning lacks that Bride Who lies with Winter thawing by her side She should be fruitful too as fields that joyne Unto the melting waste of Appenine Whil'st the cold morning-drops bedew the Rose It doth nor leaf nor smell nor colour lose Then doubt noâ— Sweet Age hath supplies of wet To keep You like that flowr in water set Dripping Catarrhs and Fontinells are things Will make You thâ—nk You grew betwixt two Springs And should You not think so You scarce allow The force or Merit of Your Marriage-Vow Where Maids a new Creed learn must from thence Believe against their own or others sence Else Love will nothing differ from neglect Which
POEMS ELEGIES PARADOXES And SONETS LONDON Printed for Henry Herringman and are to be sold at the Anchor in the lower-walk in the New Exchange 1664. THE PUBLISHERS TO THE AUTHOR Sir IT is the common fashion to make some address to the Readers but we are bold to direct ours to you who will look on this publication with Anger which others must welcom into the world with Joy The Lord Verulam comparing ingenious Authors to those who had Orchards ill neighboured advised them to publish their own labours lest others might steal the fruit Had you followed his example or liked the advice we had not thus trespassed against your consent or been forced to an Apology which cannot but â—mply a fault committed The best we can say for our selves is that if we have injured you it is meerly in your own defence preventing the present attempts of others who to their theft would by their false copies of these Poems have added violence and some way have wounded your reputation Having been long engaged on better contemplations you may perhaps look down on these Iuvenilia most of them the issues of your youthful Muse with some disdain and yet the Courteous Reader may tell you with thanks that they are not to be despised being far from Abortive nor to be disowned because they are both Modest and Legitimate And thus if we have offered you a view of your yonnger face our hope is yoâ— will behold it with an unwrinkled brow though we have presented the Mirrour against your will We confess our design hath been set forward by friends that honour you who leâ—t the ill publishing might disfigure these things from whence you never expected addition to your credit sundry times endeavoured and by them defeated furnished us with some papers which they thought Authentick we may not turn their favour into an accusation and therefore give no intimation of their names but wholly take the blame of this hasty and immethodical impression upon our selves being persons at a distance who are fitter to bear it then those who are neerer related In hope of your pardon we remain Your most devoted servants Rich Marriot Hen Herringman POEMS SONNET The Double Rock SInce thou hast view'd some Gorgon and art grown A solid stone To bring again to softness thy hard heart Is past my art Ice may relent to water in a thaw But stone made flesh Loves Chymistry ne're saw Therefore by thinking on thy hardness I Will petrify And so within our double Quarryes Wombe Dig our Loves Tombe Thus strangely will our difference agree And with our selves amaze the world to see How both Revenge and Sympathy consent To make two Rocks each others Monument The Vow-Breaker VVHen first the Magick of thine ey Usurpt upon my liberty Triumphing in my hearts spoyl thou Didst lock up thine in such a vow When I prove false may the bright day Be govern'd by the Moons â—pale ray As I too well remember This Thou said'st and seald'st it with a kiss O Heavens and could so soon that Ty Relent in slack Apostacy Could all thy Oaths and morgag'd trust Vanish like letters form'd in dust Which the next wind scatters Take heed Take heed Revolter know this deed Hath wrong'd the world which will fare worse By thy Example then thy Curse Hide that false Brow in mists Thy shame Ne're see light more but the dimme flame Of funeral Lamps Thus sit and moane And learn to keep thy guilt at home Give it no vent for if agen Thy Love or Vowes betray more men At length I fear thy perjur'd breath Will blow out day and waken Death Vpon a Table-Book presented to a Lady VVHen your fair hand receives this little book You must not there for prose or verses look Those empty regions which within you see May by your self planted and peopled be And though we scarce allow your sex to prove Writers unless the Argument be Love Yet without crime or envy you have roome Here both the Scribe and Author to become To the same Lady upon Mrs Burtons Mâ—lancholy IF in this Glass of Humours you do find The Passions or diseases of your mind Here without pain you safely may endure Though not to suffer yet to read your cure But if you nothing meet you can apply Then ere you need you have a remedy And I do wish you never may have cause To be adjudg'd by these fantastick Laws But that this books example may be known By others Melancholy not your own The Farewell Splendidis longùm valedico nugis FArewell fond Love under whose childish whip I have serv'd out a weary Prentiship Thou that hast made me thy scorn'd property To dote on Rocks but yielding Loves to fly Go bane of my dear quiet and content Now practise on some other Patient Farewell false Hope that fann'd my warm desire Till it had rais'd a wild unruly fire Which nor sighs cool nor tears extinguish can Although my eyes out-flow'd the Ocean Forth of my thoughts for ever Thing of Air Begun in errour finish't in despair Farewell vain World upon whose restless stage Twixt Love and Hope I have foold out my age Henceforth ere sue to thee for my redress I le wooe the wind or court the wilderness And buried from the dayes discovery Study a slow yet certain way to dy My woful Monument shall be a Cell The murmur of the purling brook my knell My lasting Epitaph the Rock shall grone Thus when sad Lovers ask the weeping stone What wretched thing does in that Center lie The hollow Eccho will reply 't was I. A Black-moor Maid wooing a fair Boy sent to the Author by Mr. Hen. Rainolds STay lovely Boy why fly'st thou mee That languish in these flames for thee I 'm black 't is true why so is Night And Love doth in dark Shades delight The whole World do but close thine eye Will seem to thee as black as I Or op't and see what a black shade Is by thine own fair body made That follows thee where e're thou go O who allow'd would not do so Let me for ever dwell so nigh And thou shalt need no other shade than I. Mr. Hen. Rainolds The Boyes answer to the Blackmoor BLack Maid complain not that I fly When Fate commands Antipathy Prodigious might that union prove Where Night and Day together move And the conjunction of our lips Not kisses make but an Eclipse In which the mixed black and white Portends more terrour than delight Yet if my shadow thou wilt be Enjoy thy dearest wish But see Thou take my shadowes property That hastes away when I come nigh Else stay till death hath blinded mee And then I will bequeath my self to thee To a Friend upon Overbury's wife given to her I Know no fitter subject for your view Then this a meditation ripe for you As you for it Which when you read you 'l see What kind of wife your self will one day bee Which happy day be neer you
away Whose splendour but benights my day Sad eyes like mine and wounded hearts Shun the bright rayes which beauty daâ—ts Unwelcome is the Sun that pries Into those shades where sorrow lies Go shine on happy things To me That blessing is a miserie Whom thy fierce Sun not warmes but burnes Like that the â—ooty Indian turnes I le serve the night and there confin'd Wish thee less fair or else more kind SONNET DRy those fair those chrystal eyes Which like growing fountains rise To drown their banks Griefs â—ullen brooks Would better flow in furrow'd looks Thy lovely face was never meant To be the shoar of discontent Then clear those watrish starres again Which else portend a lasting rain Lest the clouds which settle there Prolong my Winter all the Year And the example others make In love with sorrow for thy sake SONNET VVHen I entreat either thou wilt not hear Or else my suit arriving at thy â—ar Cools and dies there A strange extâ—emitie To freeze i th' Sun and in the shade to frie. Whil'st all my blasted hopes decline so soon T is Evening with me though at high Noon For pity to thy self if not to me Think time will ravish what I lose from theâ— If my scorcht heart wither through thy delay Thy beauty withers too And swift decay Arrests thy Youth So thou whil'st I am slighted Wilt be too soon with age or sorrow nighted To a Lady who sent me a copy of verses at my going to bed LAdy your art or wit could nere devise To shame me more then in this nights surprise Why I am quite unready and my eye Now winking like my candle doth deny To guide my hand if it had ought to write Nor can I make my drowsie sense indite Which by your verses musick as a spell Sent from the Sybellean Oracle Is charm'd and bound in wonder and delight Faster then all the leaden chains of night What pity is it then you should so ill Employ the bounty of your flowing quill As to expend on him your bedward thought Who can acknowledge that large love in nought But this lean wish that fate soon send you those Who may requite your rhimes with midnight prose Mean time may all delights and pleasing Theam Like Masquers revell in your Maiden dreams Whil'st dull to write and to do more unmeeâ— I as the night invites me fall asleep The Pink. FAir one you did on me bestow Comparisons too sweet to ow And but I found them sent from you I durst not think they could be true But 't is your uncontrolled power Goddess-like to produce a flower And by your breath without more â—eed Make that a Pink which was a Weed Because I would be loth to miss So sweet a Metamorphosis Upon what stalk soere I grow Disdain not you sometimes to blow And cheâ—ish by your Virgin eye What in your frown would droop and die So shall my thankful leaf repay Persumed wishes every day And o're your fortune breathe a spell Which may his obligation tell Who though he nought but she can give Must ever your Sweet creature live To his Friends of Christ-Church upon the mislike of the Marriage of the Arts acted at Woodstock BUt is it true the Court mislik't the Play That Christ-Church and the Arts have lost the day That Ignoramus should so far excell Their Hobby-horse from ours hath born the Bell Tâ—oth you are justly serv'd that would present Ought unto them but shallow merriment Or to your Marriage-table did admit Guests that are stronger far in smell then wit Had some quaint Bawdry larded ev'ry Scâ—ne Some fawning Sycophant or courted queane Had there appear'd some sharp cross-garter'd man Whom their loud laugh might nick-name Puritan Cas'd up in factious breeches and small ruffe That hates the surplis and defies the cuffe Then sure they would have given applause to crown That which their ignorance did now cry down Let me advise when next you do bestow Your pains on men that do but little know You do no Chorus nor a Comment lack Which may expound and construe ev'ry Act That it be short and â—light for if 't be good T is long and neither lik't nor understood Know t is Court fashion still to discommend All that which they want brain to comprehend The Surrender MY once dear Love hapless that I no more Must call thee so the rich affections store That fed our hopes lies now exhaust and spent Like summes of treasure unto Bankrupts lent We that did nothing study but the way To love each other with which thoughts the day Rose with delight to us and with them set Must learn the hateful Art how to forget We that did nothing wish that Heav'n could give Beyond our selves nor did desire to live Beyond that wish all these now cancell must As if not writ in faith but words and dust Yet witness those cleer vowes which Lovers make Witness the chast desires that never brake Into unruly heats witness that brest Which in thy bosom anchor'd his whole rest T is no default in us I dare acquite Thy Maiden faith thy purpose fair and white As thy pure self Cross Planets did envie Us to each other and Heaven did untie Faster then vowes could binde O that the Starres When Lovers meet should stand oppos'd in warres Since then some higher Destinies command Let us not strive nor labour to withstand What is past help The longest date of grief Can never yield a hope of our relief And though we waste our selves in moist laments Tears may drown us but not our discontents Fold back our arms take home our fruitless loves That must new fortunes trie like Turtle Doves Dislodged from their haunts We must in tears Unwind a love knit up in many years In this last kiss I here surrender thee Back to thy self so thou again art free Thou in another sad as that resend The truest heart that Lover ere did lend Now turn from each So fare our sever'd hearts As the divorc't soul from her body parts The Legacy MY dearest Love when thou and I must part And th' icy hand of death shall seize that heart Which is all thine within some spacious will I le leave no blanks for Legacies to fill T is my ambition to die one of those Who but himself hath nothing to dispose And since that is already thine what need I to re-give it by some newer deed Yet take it once again Free circumstance Does oft the value of mean things advance Who thus repeats what he bequeath'd before Proclaims his bounty richâ—r then his store But let me not upon my love bestow Wâ—at is not worth the giving I do ow Somwhat to dust my bodies pamper'd care Hungry corruption and the woâ—m will share That mouldring relick which in earth must lie Would prove a gift of horrour to thine eie With this cast ragge of my mortalitie Let all my faults and errours buried be And as my â—ear-cloth rots so may
gales Distend thy sheet and wing thy flying sailes That all designes which must on thee embark May be securely plac't as in the Ark. May'st thou where ere thy streamers shall display Enforce the bold disputers to obey That they whose pens are sharper then their swords May yield in fact what they deny'd in words Thus when th' amazed world our Seas shall see Shut from Usurpers to their own Lord free Thou may'st returning from the conquer'd Main With thine own Triumphs be crown'd Soveraign AN EPITAPH On his most honoured Friend Richard Earl of Dorset LEt no profane ignoble foot tread neer This hallow'd peece of earth Dorset lies here A small sad relique of a noble spirit Free as the air and ample as his merit Whose least perfection was large and great Enough to make a common man compleat A soul reâ—in'd and cull'd from many men That reconcil'd the sword unto the pen Using both well No proud forgetting Lord But mindful of mean names and of his word One that did love for honour not for ends And had the noblest way of making friends By loving first One that did know the Court Yet understood it better by report Then practice for he nothing took from thence But the kings favour for his recompence One for religion or his countreys good That valu'd not his Fortune nor his blood One high in fair opinion rich in praise And full of all we could have wisht but dayes He that is warn'd of this and shall forbear To vent a sigh for him or lend a tear May he live long and scorn'd unpiti'd fall And want a mourner at his funerall The Exequy ACcept thou Shrine of my dead Saint Insteed of Dirges this complaint And for sweet flowres to crown thy hearse Receive a strew of weeping verse From thy griev'd friend whom thou might'st see Quite melted into tears for thee Dear loss since thy untimely fate My task hath been to meditate On thee on thee thou art the book The library whereon I look Though almost blind For thee lov'd clay I languish out not live the day Using no other exercise But what I practise with mine eyes By which wet glasses I find out How lazily time creeps about To one that mourns this onely this My exercise and bus'ness is So I compute the weary houres With sighs dissolved into showres Nor wonder if my time go thus Backward and most preposterous Thou hast benighted me thy set This Eve of blackness did begeâ— Who was 't my day though overcast Before thou had'st thy Noon-tide past And I remember must in tears Thou scarce had'st seen so many years As Day tells houres By thy cleer Sun My love and fortune first did run But thou wilt never more appear Folded within my Hemisphear Since both thy light and motion Like a fled Star is fall'n and gon And twixt me and my soules dear wish The earth now interposed is Which such a strange eclipse doth make As ne're was read in Almanake I could allow thee for a time To darken me and my fad Clime Were it a month a year or ten I would thy exile live till then And all that space my mirth adjourn So thou wouldst promise to return And putting off thy ashy shrowd At length disperse this sorrows cloud But woe is me the longest daâ—e Too narrow is to calculate These empty hopes never shall I Be so much blest as to descry A glimpse of thee till that day come Which shall the â—arth to cinders doome And a fierce Feaver must calcine The body of this world like thine My Little World that fit of fire Once off our bodies shall aspire To our soules bliss then we shall rise And view our selves with cleerer eyes In that calm Region where no night Can hide us from each others sight Mean time thou hast her earth much good May my harm do thee Since it stood With Heavens will I might not call Her longer mine I give thee all My short-liv'd right and interest In her whom living I lov'd best With a most free and bounteous grief I give thee what I could not keep Be kind to her and prethee look Thou write into thy Dooms-day book Each parcell of this Rarity Which in thy Casket shrin'd doth ly See that thou make thy reck'ning streight And yield her back again by weight For thou must audit on thy trust Each graine and atome of this duâ—t As thou wilt answer Him that lent Not gave thee my dear Monument So close the ground and 'bout her shade Black curtains draw my Bride is laid Sleep on my Love in thy cold bed Never to be disquieted My last good night Thou wilt not wake Till I thy fate shall overtake Till age or grief or sickness must Marry my body to that dust It so much loves and fill the room My heart keeps empty in thy Tomb. Stay for me there I will not faile To meet thee in that hallow Vale. And think not much of my delay I am already on the way And follow thee with all the speed Desire can make or sorrows breed Each minute is a short degree And ev'ry houre a step towards thee Aâ— night when I betake to rest Next morn I rise neerer my Weâ—t Of life almost by eight houres saile Then when sleep breath'd his drowsie gale Thus from the Sun my Bottom stears And my dayes Compass downward bears Nor labour I to stemme the tide Through which to Thee I swiftly glide 'T is true with shame and grief I yield Thou like the Vann first took'st the field And gotten hast the victory In thus adventuring to dy Before me whose more years might crave A just precedence in the grave But heark My Pulse like a soft Drum Beats my approch tells Thee I come And slow howere my marches be I shall at last sit down by Thee The thought of this bids me go on And wait my dissolution With hope and comfort Dear forgive The crime I am content to live Divided with but half a heart Till we shall meet and never part The Anniverse AN ELEGY SO soon grown old hast thou been six years dead Poor earth once by my Love inhabited And must I live to calculate the time To which thy blooming youth could never climbe But fell in the ascent yet have not I Studi'd enough thy losses history How happy were mankind if Death's strict lawes Consum'd our lamentations like the cause Or that our grief turning to dust might end With the dissolved body of a friend But sacred Heaven O how just thou art In stamping deaths impression on that heart Which through thy favours would grow insolent Were it not physick't by sharp discontent If then it stand resolv'd in thy decree That still I must doom'd to a Desart be Sprung out of my lone thoughts which know no path But what my own misfortune beaten hath If thou wilt bind me living to a coarse And I must slowly waste I then of force Stoop to thy
great appointment and obey That will which nought avail me to gainsay For whil'st in sorrowes Maze I wander on I do but follow lifes vocation Sure we were made to grieve at our first birth With cries we took possession of the earth And though the lucky man reputed be Fortunes adopted son yet onely he Is Natures true born child who summes his years Like me with no Arithmetick but tears On two Children dying of one Disease and buried in one Grave BRought forth in sorrow and bred up in care Two tender Children here entombed are One Place one Sire one Womb their being gave They had one mortal sickness and one grave And though they cannot number many years In their Account yet with their Patents tears This comfort mingles Though their dayes were few They scarcely sinne but never sorrow knew So that they well might boast they carry'd hence What riper ages lose their innocence You pretty losses that revive the fate Which in your mother death did antedate O let my high-swol'n grief distill on you The saddest drops of a Parentall dew You ask no other dower then what my eyes Lay out on your untimely exequies When once I have discharg'd that mournfull skore Heav'n hath decreed you ne're shall cost me more Since you release and quit my borrow'd trust By taking this inheritance of dust A Letter I Ne'r was drest in Forms nor can I bend My pen to flatter any nor commend Unless desert or honour do present Unto my verse a worthy argument You are my friend and in that word to me Stand blazon'd in your noblest Heraldry That style presents you full and does relate The bounty of your love and my own fate Both which conspir'd to make me yours A choice Which needs must in the giddy peoples voice That onely judge the outside and like apes Play with our names and comment on our shapes Appear too light but it lies you upon To justifie the disproportion Truth be my record I durst not presume To seek to you 't was you that did assume Me to your bosom Wherein you subdu'd One that can serve you though ne're could intrude Upon great titles nor knows how t' invade Acquaintance Like such as are onely paid With great mens smiles if that the passant Lord Let fall a forc't salute or but afford The Nod Regardant It was test enough For me you ne're did find such servile stuff Couch't in my temper I can freely say I do not love you in that common way For which Great Ones are lov'd in this false time I have no wish to gain nor will to climbe I cannot pawn my freedom nor out-live My liberty for all that you can give And sure you may retain good cheap such friends Who not your fortune make but you their ends I speak not this to vaunt in my own story All these additions are unto your glory Who counter to the world use to elect Not to take up on trust what you affect Indeed 't is seldom seen that such as you Adopt a friend or for acquaintance sue Yet you did this vouchsafe you did descend Below your self to raise an humble friend And â—ix him in your love where I will stand The constant subject of your free command Had I no ayerie thoughts sure you would teach Me higher then my own dull sphere to reach And by reflex instruct me to appear Something though course and plain fit for your wear Know best of friends however wild report May justly say I am unapt to sort With your opinion or society Which truth would shame me did I it deny There 's something in me sayes I dare make good When honour calls me all I want in blood Put off your Giant titles then I can Stand in your judgements blank an equal man Though Hills advanced are above the Plain They are but higher earth nor must disdain Alliance with the Vale we see a spade Can level them and make a Mount a Glade Howere we differ in the Heralds book He that mankindes extraction shall look In Natures Rolles must grant we all agree In our best parts immortal pedigree You must by that perspective onely view My service else 't will nere shew worthy you You see I court you bluntly like a friend Not like a Mistress my Muse is not penn'd For smooth and oylie flights And I â—ndent To use more honesty then complement But I have done in lieu of all you give Receive his thankful tribute who must live Your vow'd observer and devotes a heart Which will in death seal the bold counterpart An Acknowledgment MY best of friends what needs a chain to tie One by your merit bound a Votarie Think you I have some plot upon my peace I would this bondage change for a release Since 't was my fate your prisoner to be Heav'n knows I nothing fear but libertie Yet you do well that study to prevent After so rich a stock of favour spent On one so worthless left my memory Should let so dear an obligation dy Without Record This made my precious Friend Her Token as an Antidote to send Against forgetful poysons That as they Who Vespers late and early Matâ—ins say Upon their Beads so on this linked skore In golden numbers I might reckon oâ—e Your vertues and my debt which does surmount The trivial laws of Popular account For that within this emblematick knot Your beauteous mind and my own fate is wrote The sparkling constellation which combines The Lock is your dear self whose worth outshines Most of your sex so solid and so clear You like a perfect Diamond appear Casting from your example fuller light Then those dimme sparks which glaze the brow of night And gladding all your friends as doth the ray Of that East-starre which wakes the cheerful day But the black Map of death and discontent Behind that Adamantine firmament That luckless figure which like Calvary Stands strew'd and coppy'd out in skuls is I Whose life your absence clouds and makes my timâ— Move blindfold in the dark ecliptick line Then wonder not if my removed Sun So low within the Western Tropick run My eyes no day in this Horizon see Since where You are not all is night to one Lastly the anchor which enfastned lies Upon a pair of deaths sadly applies That Monument of Rest which harbour must Our Ship-wrackt fortunes in a road of dust So then how late soere my joyless life Be tired out in this affections strife Though my tempestuous fancie like the skie Travail with stormes and through my watry eie Sorrows high-going waves spring many a leak Though sighs blow loud til my hearts cordagebreaâ— Though Faith and all my wishes prove untrue Yet Death shall fix and anchor Me with You. 'T is some poor comfort that this mortal scope Will Period though never Crown my Hope The Acquittance NOt knowing who should my Acquittance take I know as little what discharge to makâ— The favour is so great that
turns not to a vertue each defect I le say no more but this you women make Your Childrens reck'ning by the Almanake I like it well so you contented are To choose their Fathers by that Kalendar Turn then old Erra Pater and there see According to lifes posture and degree What age or what complexion is most fit To make an English Maid happy by it And You shall find if You will choose a man Set justly for Your own Meridian Though You perhaps let One and Twenty woo Your elevation is for Fifty Two PARADOX That Fruition destroyes Love LOve is our Reasons Paradox which still Against the judgment doth maintain the Will And governs by such arbitrary laws It onely makes the Act our Likings cause We have no brave revenge but to forgo Our full desires and starve the Tyrant so They whom the rising blood tempts not to taste Preserve a stock of Love can never waste When easie people who their wish enjoy Like Prodigalls at once their wealth destroy Adam till now had stayd in Paradise Had his desires been bounded by his eyes When he did more then look that made th' offence And forfeited his state of innocence Fruition therefore is the bane t' undoe Both our affection and the subject too 'T is Love into worse language to translate And make it into Lust degenerate 'T is to De-throne and thrust it from the heart To seat it grossely in the sensual part Seek for the Starre that 's shot upon the ground And nought but a dimme gelly there is found Thus foul and dark our female starres appear If fall'n or loosned once from Vertues Sphear Glow-worms shine onely look't on and let ly But handled crawl into deformity So beauty is no longer fair and bright Then whil'st unstained by the appetite And then it withers like a blasted flowre Some poys'nous worm or spider hath crept ore Pigmaleon's dotage on the carved stone Shews Amorists their strong illusion Whil'st he to gaze and court it was content He serv'd as Priest at beauties Monument But when by looser fires t'embraces led It prov'd a cold hard Statue in his bed Irregular affects like mad mens dreams Presented by false lights and broken beams So long content us as no neer address Shews the weak sense our painted happiness But when those pleasing shaddowes us forsake Or of the substance we a trial make Like him deluded by the fancies mock We ship-wrack 'gainst an Alabaster rock What though thy Mistress far from Marble be Her softness will transform and harden thee Lust is a Snake and Guilt the Gorgons head Which Conscience turns to Stone Joyes to Lead Turtles themselves will blush if put to name The Act whereby they quench their am'rous flame Who then that 's wise or vertuous would not feare To catch at pleasures which forbidden were When those which we count lawful cannot be Requir'd without some loss of modestie Ev'n in the Marriage-Bed where soft delights Are customary and authoriz'd Rites What are those tributes to the wanton sense But toleration of Incontinence For properly you cannot call that Love Which does not from the Soul but Humour move Thus they who worship't Pan or Isâ—s Shrine By the fair Front judg'd all within Divine Though entring found 't was but a Goat or Cow To which before their ignorance did bow Such Temples and such Goddesses are these Which foolish Lovers and admirers please Who if they chance within the Shrine to priâ— Find that a beast they thought a Deity Nor makes it onely our opinion less Of what we lik't before and now possess But robbs the Fuel and corrupts the Spice Which sweetens and inflames Loves sacrifice After Fruition once what is Desire But ashes kept warm by a dying fire This is if any the Philosophers Stone Which still miscarries at Projection For when the Heat ad Octo intermits It poorly takes us like Third Ague fits Or must on Embers as dull Druggs infuse Which we for Med'cine not for Pleasure use Since Lovers joyes then leave so sick a taste And soon as relish'd by the Sense are past They are but Riddles sure lost if possest And therefore onely in Reversion best For bate them Expectation and Delay You take the most delightful Scenes away These two such rule within the fancie keep As banquets apprehended in our sleep After which pleasing trance next morn we wake Empty and angry at the nights mistake Give me long Dreams and Visions of content Rather then pleasures in a minute spent And since I know before the shedding Rose In that same instant doth her sweetness lose Upon the Virgin-stock still let her dwell For me to feast my longings with her smell Those are but counterfeits of joy at best Which languish soon as brought unto the test Nor can I hold it worth his pains who tries To Inne that Harvest which by reaping dies Resolve me now what spirit hath delight If by full feed you kill the appetite That stomack healthy'st is that nere was cloy'd Why not that Love the best then nere enjoy'd Since nat'rally the blood when tam'd or sated Will cool so fast it leaves the object hated Pleasures like wonders quickly lose their price When Reason or Experience makes us wise To close my argument then I dare say And without Paradox as well we may Enjoy our Love and yet preserve Desire As warm our hands by putting out the fire The Change Il sabio mude conseio Il loco persevera WE lov'd as friends now twenty years and more Is 't time or reason think you to give o're When though two prentiships set Jacob free I have not held my Rachel dear at three Yet will I not your levitie accuse Continuance sometimes is the worse abuse In judgment I might rather hold it strange If like the fleeting world you did not change Be it your wisdom therefore to retract When perseverance oft is follies act In pity I can think that what you do Hath Justice in 't and some Religion too For of all vertues Morall or Divine We know but Love none must in Heaven shine Well did you the presumption then foresee Of counterfeiting immortalitie Since had you kept our loves too long alive We might invade Heavens prerogative Or in our progress like the Jews comprise The Legend of an earthly Paradise Live happy and more prosperous in the next You have discharg'd your old friend by the Text. Farewel fair Shadow of a female faith And let this be our friendships Epitaph Affection shares the frailty of our fate When like our selves 't is old and out of date 'T is just all humane Loves their period have When friends are frail and dropping to the grave To my Sister Anne King who chid me in verse for being angry DEar Nan I would not have thy counsel lost Though I last night had twice so much been crost Well is a Passion to the Market brought When such a treasure of advice is bought With