o, all these trophies of affections hot, pensived and subdued desires the tender, ture hath charged me that I hoard them not, yield them up where I myself must render, at is, to you, my origin and ender;

these, of force, must your oblations be, ce I their altar, you enpatron me.

), then, advance of yours that phraseless hand,

ose white weights down the airy scale of praise;

ke all these similes to your own command, llow'd with sighs that burning lungs did

raise;

at me your minister, for you obeys, rks under you; and to your audit comes eir distract parcels in combined sums.

o, this device was sent me from a nun, sister sanctified, of holiest note;

Playing patient sports in unconstrained gyves?
The scars of battle 'scapeth by the flight,
She that her fame so to herself contrives,
And makes her absence valiant, not her might.
"O, pardon me, in that my boast is true:
The accident which brought me to her eye
Upon the moment did her force subdue,
And now she would the caged cloister fly:
Religious love put out Religion's eye:
Not to be tempted, would she be immured,
And now, to tempt, all liberty procured.
"How mighty then you are, O, hear me tell!
The broken bosoms that to me belong
Have emptied all their fountains in my well,
And mine I pour your ocean all among:

250

I strong o'er them, and you o'er me being strong,

Must for your victory us all congest,

As compound love to physic your cold breast.

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Who, disciplined, ay, dieted in grace,
"My parts had power to charm a sacred nun,
All vows and consecrations giving place:
Believed her eyes when they to assail begun,
In thee hath neither sting, knot, nor confine,
O most potential love! vow, bond, nor space,
For thou art all, and all things else are thine.

"When thou impressest, what are precepts worth

Of stale example? When thou wilt inflame,
How coldly those impediments stand forth
Of wealth, of filial fear, law, kindred, fame!
Love's arms are peace, 'gainst rule, 'gainst
sense, 'gainst shame,

And sweetens, in the suffering pangs it bears,
The aloes of all forces, shocks, and fears.

"Now all these hearts that do on mine depend,

Feeling it break, with bleeding groans they

pine;

And supplicant their sighs to you extend, To leave the battery that you make 'gainst mine,

Lending soft audience to my sweet design, And credent soul to that strong-bonded oath That shall prefer and undertake my troth."

290

‘O father, what a hell of witchcraft lies In the small orb of one particular tear! But with the inundation of the eyes What rocky heart to water will not wear? What breast so cold that is not warmed here? O cleft effect! cold modesty, hot wrath, Both fire from hence and chill extincture hath. 'For, lo, his passion, but an art of craft, Even there resolved my reason into tears; There my white stole of chastity I daff'd, Shook off my sober guards and civil fears; Appear to him, as he to me appears, All melting; though our drops this difference bore, 300

His poison'd me, and mine did him restore.

'In him a plenitude of subtle matter, Applied to cautels, all strange forms receives, Of burning blushes, or of weeping water, Or swooning paleness; and he takes and leaves,

In either's aptness, as it best deceives,

I.

My better angel is a man right fair,

To win me soon to hell, my female evil
Tempteth my better angel from my side,
And would corrupt my saint to be a devil,
Wooing his purity with her fair pride.
And whether that my angel be turn'd fiend.
Suspect I may, yet not directly tell:
For being both to me, both to each friend
I guess one angel in another's hell:

The truth I shall not know, but live
doubt,

Till my bad angel fire my good one out.

III.

Did not the heavenly rhetoric of thine eye 'Gainst whom the world could not hold arg ment,

Persuade my heart to this false perjury? Vows for thee broke deserve not punishme A woman I forswore; but I will prove, Thou being a goddess, I forswore not thee

y his bias leaves, and makes his book thine eyes,

re all those pleasures live that art can comprehend.

owledge be the mark, to know thee shall suffice;

learned is that tongue that well can thee commend;

ignorant that soul that sees thee without wonder;

ch is to me some praise, that I thy parts admire:

e eye Jove's lightning seems, thy voice his dreadful thunder,

h, not to anger bent, is music and sweet ire.

lestial as thou art, O do not love that wrong,

sing heaven's praise with such an earthly tongue.

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VI.

Scarce had the sun dried up the dewy morn, And scarce the herd gone to the hedge for shade,

When Cytherea, all in love forlorn,
A longing tarriance for Adonis made
Under an osier growing by a brook,
A brook where Adon used to cool his spleen:
Hot was the day; she hotter that did look
For his approach, that often there had been.
Anon he comes, and throws his mantle by,
And stood stark naked on the brook's green
brim:
80

The sun look'd on the world with glorious eye,
Yet not so wistly as this queen on him.

He, spying her, bounced in, whereas he stood:

'O Jove,' quoth she, 'why was not I a flood!'

VII.

Fair is my love, but not so fair as fickle; Mild as a dove, but neither true nor trusty; Brighter than glass, and yet, as glass is, brittle;

Softer than wax, and yet, as iron, rusty:

A lily pale, with damask dye to grace her, None fairer, nor none falser to deface her.

Her lips to mine how often hath she joined, Between each kiss her oaths of true love swearing!

How many tales to please me hath she coined, Dreading my love, the loss thereof still fearing! Yet in the midst of all her pure protestings, Her faith, her oaths, her tears, and all were jestings.

Because thou lovest the one, and I the other. Dowland to thee is dear, whose heavenly touch

Upon the lute doth ravish human sense;
Spenser to me, whose deep conceit is such
As, passing all conceit, needs no defence. 110

Paler for sorrow than her milk-white dove, For Adon's sake, a youngster proud and wild; Her stand she takes upon a steep-up hill: 121 Anon Adonis comes with horn and hounds; She, silly queen, with more than love's good will,

Forbade the boy he should not pass those grounds:

'Once,' quoth she, 'did I see a fair sweet youth

Here in these brakes deep-wounded with a boar,

Deep in the thigh, a spectacle of ruth!

See, in my thigh,' quoth she, 'here was the sore.'

She showed hers: he saw more wounds than

'Even thus, quoth she, 'he seized on my lys, And with her lips on his did act the seizure: And as she fetched breath, away he skips, And would not take her meaning nor her pleasure.

Ah, that I had my lady at this bay,
To kiss and clip me till I run away!

XII.

Crabbed age and youth cannot live together Youth is full of pleasance, age is full of care Youth like summer morn, age like winte weather;

Youth like summer brave, age like winter bare. Youth is full of sport, age's breath is short; Youth is nimble, age is lame;

Youth is hot and bold, age is weak and cold Youth is wild, and age is tame.

Age, I do abhor thee; youth, I do adore thee: O, my love, my love is young!

Age, I do defy thee: O, sweet shepherd, hie thee,

For methinks thou stay'st too long.

XIII.

Beauty is but a vain and doubtful good;
A shining gloss that vadeth suddenly; 170
A flower that dies when first it gins to bud;
A brittle glass that's broken presently:

A doubtful good, a gloss, a glass, a flower.
Lost, vaded, broken, dead within an hour.
And as goods lost are seld or never found,
As vaded gloss no rubbing will refresh,
As flowers dead lie wither'd on the ground,
As broken glass no cement can redress,

So beauty blemish'd once 's for ever lost, In spite of physic, painting, pain and cost

XIV.

Good night, good rest. Ah, neither be my share:

She bade good night that kept my rest away; And daff'd me to a cabin hang'd with care, To descant on the doubts of my decay.

'Farewell,' quoth she, 'and come again to morrow :'

Fare well I could not, for I supp'd with

sorrow.

Yet at my parting sweetly did she smile, In scorn or friendship, nill I construe whether: 'T may be, she joy'd to jest at my exile, 189 'T may be, again to make me wander thither:

'Wander,' a word for shadows like myself, As take the pain, but cannot pluck the pelf.

XV.