If bowe and shaftes should be his chiefest tooles,
Why doth he set so many heartes on fire?

If he were madde, how could he further fooles
To whet theire wits, as place and time require?

If wise, how could so many leeze theire wittes,
Or doate through loue, and dye in frantike fittes ?
If naked still he wander too and froe,

How doth not sunne or frost offend his skinne?

If that a God he be, how falles it so

That all wants end, which he doth once beginne?
O wondrous thing, that I, whom Loue hath spent,
Can scarcely knowe himself, or his intent.

XXII.

The substance of this passion is taken out of Seraphine, Sonetto 127, which beginneth thus:

Quando nascesti amor? quando la terra

-Se rinueste di verde e bel colore;

Di che fusti creato? d'un ardore,

Che cio lasciuo in se rinchiude e serra, &c.

But the author hath in this translation inuerted the order of some verses of Seraphine, and added the two last of him. selfe, to make the rest to seeme the more patheticall. "When werte thou borne sweet Loue? who was thy sire?"— "When Flora first adorn'd dame Tellus lap,

Then sprung I forth from wanton hote DESIRE." "Who was thy nurse to feede thee first with pap "YOUTH first with tender hand bound up my heade, Then saide, with Lookes alone I should be fed." "What maides had she attendant on her side,

To playe, to singe, to rocke thee fast a sleepe?" "Vaine NICENESSE, BEAUTIE faire, and pompous PRIde.""By stealth when further Age on thee did creepe;

Where didst thou make thy chiefe abiding place ?"— "In willing Hurtes, which were of gentle race.". "What is't where with thou wagest warres with me?""FEARE cold as ise, and HOPE as hote fire." "And cannot Age, or Death make end of thee?". "No, no: my dying life still makes retire."

"Why then, sweete Loue, take pittie on my paine,
Which often dye, and eft reuiue againe."

XXV.

It is to be considered in reading this passion, howe in some

answeres

answeres, the accent or poynting of the wordes is altered, and therewithall howe the Authour walking in the woods, and bewayling his inward passion of Loue, is contraried by the replies of Echo: whose meaning yet is not so much to gainsay him, as to expresse her owne miserable estate in daily consuming away for the loue of her beloued Narcissus, whose vnkindnes Quid describeth at large, together with the extreme loue of Echo.*

Author. In all this world I thinke none lou's but I.

Echo. None lou's but I.

ghest

Auth. Thou foolish tattling

In this thou telst a lie. Echo. Thou telst a lie.

Author. Why? Loue him selfe he

lodgeth in my brest.
Auth I pine for griefe,
Echo. I want reliefe.

Echo. He lodgeth in my brest.
And yet I want reliefe.

Author. No starre more faire than her whom I adore.

Echo. Then the, whom I adore. Auth. Herehence I

burne

Author. Is then the Saint, for whom thou makest mone,
And whom I loue but one? Echo. Iloue butone.
Author. O beav'ns is there in loue no ende of ills?
Echo. In loue no ende of ills. Auth. Thou pratling voyce,
Dwel'st thou in th'ayre, or but in hollow hills?
Echo. In hollow hills. Auth. Cease of to vaunt thy choyse.
Esho. Cease of to vaunt thy choyse. Auth. I would replie,
But here for loue I die. Echo. For loue I die.

XXVI.

Here the Author as a man ouertaken with some deepe me. lancholie, compareth him selfe vnto the nightingale, and conferreth his vnhappie estate (for that by no meanes his mistresse will pitie him) with her nightly complaints: to whose harmonie all those that giue attentiue eare, they conceiue more delight in the musicall varietie of her noates, then they take just compassion vpon her distressed heauines.

* Lib. 1. Metamorph.

+S. liquescens immutat sensum.

When

When Maye is in his prime, and youthfull spring
Doth cloath the tree with leaues, and ground with flowres,
And time of yere reuiueth eu'ry thing;

And louely Nature smiles, and nothing lowres ;
Then Philomela most doth straine her brest
With night-complaints, and sits in litle rest.
This bird's estate I may compare with mine,

To whom fond loue doth worke such wrongs by day,
That in the night my heart must needes repine,
And storme with sighes to ease me as I may;

Whilst others are becalm'd or lye them still,
Or sayle secure with tide and winde at will.
And as all those which heare this Bird complaine,
Conceiue in all her tunes a sweete delight,
Without remorse, or pitying her payne:
So she, for whom I wayle both day and night,
Doth sport her selfe in hearing my complaint;
A iust reward for seruing such a Saint.

XLI.

This Passion is framed vpon a somewhat tedious or too much affected continuation of that figure in Rhethorique, whiche of the Grekes is called παλιλογία οι αναδίπλωσισ, οι the Latins Reduplicatio; whereof Susenbrotus (if I well remember me) alleadgeth this example out of Virgill :

Sequitur pulcherrimus Austur,

Austur equo fidens. Eneid. 10.

O happy men that finde no lacke in Loue;
I loue, and lacke what most I do desire;
My deepe desire no reason can remoue;
All reason shunnes my brest, that's set one fire;
And so the fire mainetaines both force and flame,
That force auayleth not against the same.
One onely helpe can slake this burning heate,
Which burning heate proceedeth from her face;
Whose face by lookes bewitched my conceite,
Through which conceite I liue in woefull case.

O woefull case, which hath no ende of woe,
Till woes have ende by fauour of my foe.
And yet my foe mainetaineth such a warre,
As all her warre is nothing els but peace;
But such a peace as breedeth secreat jarre,
Which jarre no witte, no force, no time can cease.

Yet

Yet cease despaire; for time, by witte, or force,
May force my frendly foe to take remorse.

XLII.

In this Passion the Authour vnder colour of telling his dreame doth very cunningly and liuely praise his Mistres, so farre forth, as not onely to prefer her before Helen of Greece for excellencie of beautie, but also before howe many soeuer are nowe lining in this our age. The dreame of itselfe is so plainely and effectually set downe (albeit in fewe wordes) that it neede no further annotation to explaine it.

This latter night amidst my troubled rest

A dismall dreame my fearefull hart appald,
Whereof the somme was this: Loue made a feast
To which all neighbour Saintes and God's were calde:
The cheere was more then mortall men can thinke,
And mirth grew on, by taking in their drinke.
Then Joue amidst his cuppes for seruice done
Gan thus to iest with Ganymede his boy;
I faine would finde for thee, my preaty Sonne,
A fayrer wife, then Paris brought to Troy :

Why, Sir, quoth he, if Phebus stand my frend,
Who knows the world, this geere will soon haue end.
Then Ioue replide that Phebus should not choose
But do his best to finde the fayrest face;

And she once found should neither will nor choose,
But yeelde her selfe, and chaunge her dwelling place;
Alas, how much was then my hart affright;

Which bade me wake, and watch my faire delight?

XLV.

The Authour vseth in this passion the like sense to that which he had in the last before it, calling his mistres a second Sunne vpon earth, wherewith Heauen itselfe is become in loue. But when he compiled this Sonnet, he thought not to haue placed it among these his English toyes.

Fælices alii juuenes, quos blandula Cypris
Aptos fecit amoribus,

Exoptare solent tenebrosa crepuscula noctis,
Auroræ maledicere:

At multo est mihi chara magis pulcherrima conjux
Tythoni gelidi senis,

Dum venit in prima surgentis parte diei,

Et soles geminos mihi

2

Apperit

Apperit et masto fælices reddit ocellos,
Quod soles videam duos,

Qui simili forma, simili sic luce coruscant,
Et mittunt radios pares,

Vt Polus ipse nouo Terræ laqueatus amore,

Flammis inuideat meis,

Solis et ignoto se torreat igne secundi,

Oblitus decoris sui,

Haud secus atque olim, cum veris prima venustas
Multo flore superbijt,

Et intidos primum strophiis ornare capillos

Pulchri Naiadum chori.

LII.

Here the Authour after some dolorous discourse of his ▼nhappines, and rehearsall of some particular hurtes which he susteineth in the pursute of his loue: first questioneth with his lady of his deserte; and then, as hauinge made a sufficiente proofe of his innocency, perswadeth her to pitie him, whom she herselfe hath hurte. Moreouer it is to be noted, that the first letters of all the verses in this passion being ioyned together as they stand, do conteine this posie agreeable to his meaning, Amor me pungit et urit. A A world of woes doth raigne within my brest,

My pensiue thoughtes are cou'red all with care,
Of all that sing the Swanne doth please me best,
Restraint of ioyes exiles my woonted fare,

Mad mooded Loue vsurping Reason's place,
Extremitie doth ouer rule the case.
Paine drieth vp my vaines and vitall bloud,
Unlesse the Saint I serue geue helpe in time:
None els, but she alone, can do me good.
Graunt then, ye Gods, that first she may not clime
Immortall heav'ns, to liue with saintes aboue,
Then she vouchsafe to yeeld me loue for loue.
Examine well the time of my distresse,

Thou dainty dame, for whom I pine away
Unguylty though as needcs thou must confesse,
Remembring but the cause of my decay:

In vewing thy sweet face arose my griefe,
Therefore in time vouchsafe me some reliefe.

LXVI.

This Latine passion is borrowed from Petrarch, sonnetto

133, which beginneth,

Hor,