SONG.

THE WILLING PRISONER TO HIS MISTRESS.

LET fools great Cupid's yoke disdain, Loving their own wild freedom better; Whilst, proud of my triumphant chain,

I sit and court my beauteous fetter. Her murdering glances, snaring hairs,

And her bewitching smiles, so please me, As he brings, ruin, that repairs

The sweet afflictions that disease me.

Hide not those panting balls of snow
With envious veils from my beholding;
Unlock those lips, their pearly row

In a sweet smile of love unfolding.

And let those eyes, whose motion wheels
The restless fate of every lover,
Survey the pains my sick heart feels,

And wounds, themselves have made, discover.

A PASTORAL DIALOGUE.
SHEPHERD, NYMPH, CHORUS.

Shep. THIS mossy bank they prest. Nym. That aged oak

Did canopy the happy pair

All night from the damp air.

Cho. Here let us sit, and sing the words they spoke,

Till the day-breaking their embraces broke.
Shep. See, love, the blushes of the morn appear:
And now she hangs her pearly store
(Robb'd from the eastern shore)
I' th' cowslip's bell and rose's ear:
Sweet, I must stay no longer here.

Nym. Those streaks of doubtful light usher not day,
But show my sun must set; no morn
Shall shine till thou return:

The yellow planets, and the gray
Dawn, shall attend thee on thy way.

Shep. If thine eyes gild my paths, they may forbear
Their useless shine. Nym. My tears will quite
Extinguish their faint light.

Shep. Those drops will make their beams more clear, Love's flames will shine in every tear.

Cho. They kiss'd, and wept; and from their lips

and eyes,

In a mix'd dew of briny sweet,
Their joys and sorrows meet;

But she cries out. Nym. Shepherd, arise,
The sun betrays us else to spies.

Shep. The winged hours fly fast whilst we embrace;
But when we want their help to meet,

They move with leaden feet.

Nym. Then let us pinion time, and chase
The day for ever from this place.

Shep. Hark! Nym. Ah me, stay! Shep. For ever.
Nym. No, arise;

We must be gone. Shep. My nest of spice. Nym. My soul. Shep. My paradise. [eyes Cho. Neither could say farewell, but through their Grief interrupted speech with tears supplies.

UPON MR. W. MONTAGUE'S RETURN FROM
TRAVEL.

LEAD the black bull to slaughter, with the boar
And lamb then purple with their mingled gore
The ocean's curled brow, that so we may
The sea-gods for their careful waftage pay:
Send grateful incense up in pious smoke
To those mild spirits that cast a curbing yoke
Upon the stubborn winds, that calmly blew
To the wish'd shore our long'd-for Montague:
Then, whilst the aromatic odours burn
In honour of their darling's safe return,
The Muse's quire shall thus, with voice and hand,
Bless the fair gale that drove his ship to land.
Sweetly-breathing vernal air,

That with kind warmth dost repair
Winter's ruins: from whose breast
All the gums and spice of th' East
Borrow their perfumes; whose eye
Gilds the morn, and clears the sky;
Whose dishevel'd tresses shed
Pearls upon the violet bed;

On whose brow, with calm smiles dress'd,
The halycon sits and builds her nest;
Beauty, youth, and endless spring,
Dwell upon thy rosy wing;
Thou, if stormy Boreas throws
Down whole forests when he blows,
With a pregnant flow'ry birth
Canst refresh the teeming earth:
If he nip the early bud,
If he blast what's fair or good,
If he scatter our choice flowers,
If he shake our hills or bowers,
If his rude breath threaten us;
Thou canst stroke great Eolus,
And from him the grace obtain
To bind him in an iron chain.

FEMININE HONOUR.

IN what esteem did the gods hold

Fair innocence and the chaste bed,
When scandal'd virtue might be bold,

Bare-foot upon sharp culters, spread
O'er burning coals, to march; yet feel
Nor scorching fire nor piercing steel!
Why, when the hard-edged iron did turn
Soft as a bed of roses blown,
When cruel flames forgot to burn

Their chaste, pure limbs, should man alone
'Gainst female innocence conspire,
Harder than steel, fiercer than fire?
Oh hapless sex! unequal sway

Of partial honour! who may know
Rebels from subjects that obey,

When malice can on vestals throw
Disgrace, and fame fix high repute
On the loose shameless prostitute?
Vain Honour! thou art but disguise,
A cheating voice, a juggling art;
No judge of Virtue, whose pure eyes
Court her own image in the heart,
More pleased with her true figure there,
Than her false echo in the ear.

Slight balms may heal a slighter sore;

No med'cine less divine

Can ever hope for to restore

A wounded heart like mine.

GOOD COUNSEL TO A YOUNG MAID. WHEN you the sun-burnt pilgrim see, Fainting with thirst, haste to the springs; Mark how at first with bended knee

He courts the crystal nymphs, and flings
His body to the earth, where he
Prostrate adores the flowing deity.
But when his sweaty face is drench'd

In her cool waves, when from her sweet
Bosom his burning thirst is quench'd;

Then mark how with disdainful feet He kicks her banks, and from the place That thus refresh'd him, moves with sullen pace. So shalt thou be despised, fair maid,

When by the sated lover tasted; What first he did with tears invade,

Shall afterwards with scorn be wasted; When all the virgin springs grow dry, When no streams shall be left but in thine eye.

SIR HENRY WOTTON was born at Bocton-Malherbe in Kent. Foreseeing the fall of the Earl of Essex, to whom he was secretary, he left the kingdom, but returned upon the accession of

FAREWELL TO THE VANITIES OF THE WORLD.
FAREWELL, ye gilded follies! pleasing troubles;
Farewell, ye honour'd rags, ye glorious bubbles;
Fame's but a hollow echo, gold pure clay,
Honour the darling but of one short day,
Beauty, th' eye's idol, but a damask'd skin,
State but a golden prison to live in

And torture free-born minds; embroider'd trains
Merely but pageants for proud swelling veins;
And blood, allied to greatness, is alone
Inherited, not purchased, nor our own.
Fame, honour, beauty, state, train, blood, and birth,
Are but the fading blossoms of the earth.

I would be great, but that the sun doth still
Level his rays against the rising hill;
I would be high, but see the proudest oak
Most subject to the rending thunder-stroke;
I would be rich, but see men too unkind
Dig in the bowels of the richest mind;
I would be wise, but that I often see
The fox suspected while the ass goes free;
I would be fair, but see the fair and proud
Like the bright sun oft setting in a cloud;
I would be poor, but know the humble grass
Still trampled on by each unworthy ass;
Rich, hated; wise, suspected; scorn'd if poor;
Great, fear'd; fair, tempted; high, still envied more.
I have wish'd all, but now I wish for neither
Great, high, rich, wise, nor fair-poor I'll be rather.

James, and was appointed ambassador to the court of Venice. Towards the close of his life he took deacon's orders, and was nominated provost of Eton.

Would the world now adopt me for her heir,
Would beauty's queen entitle me "the fair,"
Fame speak me fortune's minion, could I vie
Angels with India; with a speaking eye
Command bare heads, bow'd knees, strike justice
dumb

As well as blind and lame, or give a tongue
To stones by epitaphs; be call'd great master
In the loose rhymes of every poetaster;
Could I be more than any man that lives,
Great, fair, rich, wise, all in superlatives:
Yet I more freely would these gifts resign,
Than ever fortune would have made them mine;
And hold one minute of this holy leisure
Beyond the riches of this empty pleasure.
Welcome, pure thoughts! welcome, ye silent
groves!

[loves.

These guests, these courts, my soul most dearly
Now the wing'd people of the sky shall sing
My cheerful anthems to the gladsome spring;
A prayer-book now shall be my looking-glass,
In which I will adore sweet virtue's face;
Here dwell no hateful looks, no palace cares,
No broken vows dwell here, nor pale-faced fears:
Then here I'll sit, and sigh my hot love's folly,
And learn to affect a holy melancholy;
And if Contentment be a stranger then,
I'll ne'er look for it but in heav'n again.

*Angels-pieces of money.

ON THE SUDDEN RESTRAINT OF THE EARL OF
SOMERSET (THE FAVOURITE OF JAMES I.) THEN
FALLING FROM FAVOUR.

DAZZLED thus with height of place,
Whilst our hopes our wits beguile,
No man marks the narrow space
"Twixt a prison and a smile.
Yet since Fortune's favours fade,
You that in arms do sleep
Learn to swim and not to wade,
For the hearts of kings are deep.

But if greatness be so blind

As to trust in towers of air, Let it be with goodness lined,

That at least the fall be fair.

Then though dark and you shall say,
When friends fail and princes frown,
Virtue is the roughest way,

But proves at night a bed of down.

THE HAPPY LIFE.

How happy is he born and taught
That serveth not another's will,
Whose armour is his honest thought,
And simple truth his utmost skill!

Whose passions not his masters are,
Whose soul is still prepared for death,
Untied unto the worldly care

Of public fame or private breath. Who envies none that chance doth raise, Or vice; who never understood How deepest wounds are given by praise, Nor rules of state, but rules of good.

Who hath his life from rumours freed,
Whose conscience is his strong retreat,
Whose state can neither flatterers feed,
Nor ruin make oppressors great.
Who God doth late and early pray

More of his grace than gifts to lend,
And entertains the harmless day
With a religious book or friend.
This man is freed from servile bands
Of hope to rise, or fear to fall;
Lord of himself, though not of lands;
And having nothing, yet hath all.

A MEDITATION.

FROM SANSCROFT'S COLLECTION.

[Mr. Malone, from whose handwriting I copy this, says, "not, I think, printed."]

O, THOU great Power! in whom we move,
By whom we live, to whom we die,
Behold me through thy beams of love,
Whilst on this couch of tears I lie,
And cleanse my sordid soul within
By thy Christ's blood, the bath of sin.
No hallow'd oils, no gums I need,

No new-born drams of purging fire;
One rosy drop from David's seed

Was worlds of seas to quench thine ire:
O, precious ransom! which once paid,
That Consummatum est was said.
And said by him, that said no more,

But seal'd it with his sacred breath:
Thou then, that has dispurged our score,

And dying wert the death of death, But now, whilst on thy name we call, Our life, our strength, our joy, our all!

1601; and Mr. Collier has conjectured that he could have hardly begun to write before 1609 or 1610. In 1612 he was an author in print.-C.]

RISE, lady! mistress, rise!

The night hath tedious been, No sleep hath fallen into my eyes, Nor slumbers made me sin: Is not she a saint, then, say, Thought of whom keeps sin away?

Rise, madam! rise, and give me light,
Whom darkness still will cover,
And ignorance, darker than night,
Till thou smile on thy lover:
All want day till thy beauty rise,

For the gray morn breaks from thine eyes.

AT the close of the sixteenth century we find that the theatres, conducted by Henslowe and Alleyn, chiefly depended on Jonson, Heywood, Chettle, and this poet, for composing or retouching their pieces. Marston and Dekker had laboured frequently in conjunction with Jonson, when their well-known hostility with him commenced. What grounds of offence Marston and Dekker alleged, cannot now be told; but Jonson affirms, that after the appearance of his comedy, "Every Man in his Humour," they began to provoke him on every stage with their "petulant styles," as if they wished to single him out for their adversary. When Jonson's Cynthia's Revels appeared, they appropriated the two characters of

FORTUNE GIVING FORTUNATUS HIS CHOICE OF GOODS.

For. Six gifts I spend upon mortality, Wisdom, strength, health, beauty, long life, and Out of my bounty, one of these is thine, [riches; Choose then which likes thee best.

Fort. Oh, most divine!

Give me but leave to borrow wonder's eye,
To look (amazed) at thy bright majesty,
Wisdom, strength, health, beauty, long life, and
riches?

For. Before thy soul (at this deep lottery)
Draw forth her prize, ordain'd by destiny,
Know that here's no recanting a first choice:
Choose then discreetly, (for the laws of fate
Being graven in steel, must stand inviolate.)

Fort. Daughters of Jove and the unblemish'd Night,

Most righteous Parca, guide my genius right! Wisdom, strength, health, beauty, long life, and riches?

For. Stay, Fortunatus,once more hear me speak.
If thou kiss wisdom's cheek and make her thine,
She'll breathe into thy lips divinity,
And thou (like Phoebus) shalt speak oracle;
Thy heaven-inspired soul, on wisdom's wings,
Shall fly up to the parliament of Jove,
And read the statutes of eternity,

And see what's past, and learn what is to come:
If thou lay claim to strength, armies shall quake
To see thee frown; as kings at mine do lie,
So shall thy feet trample on empery:
Make health thine object, thou shalt be strong proof,
'Gainst the deep searching darts of surfeiting;
Be ever merry, ever revelling:

Wish but for beauty, and within thine eyes

Hedon and Anaides to themselves, and were brooding over their revenge when the Poetaster came forth, in which Dekker was recognised as Demetrius. Either that his wrath made him more willing, or that he was chosen the champion of the offended host, for his rapid powers and popularity, he furnished the Satiromastix; not indeed a despicable reply to Jonson, but more full of rage than of ridicule. The little that is known of Dekker's history, independent of his quarrel with Jonson, is unfortunate. His talents were prolific, and not contemptible; but he was goaded on by want to hasty productions-acquainted with spunginghouses, and an inmate of the King's Bench prison.* Oldys thinks that he was alive in 1638.

Two naked Cupids amorously shall swim,
And on thy cheeks I'll mix such white and red,
That Jove shall turn away young Ganymede,
And with immortal arms shall circle thee:
Are thy desires long life? thy vital thread
Shall be stretch'd out; thou shalt behold the change
Of monarchies; and see those children die
Whose great-great-grandsires now in cradles lie:
If through gold's sacred hunger thou dost pine,
Those gilded wantons which in swarms do run,
To warm their slender bodies in the sun,
Shall stand for number of those golden piles,
Which in rich pride shall swell before thy feet;
As those are, so shall these be, infinite.
Awaken then thy soul's best faculties,
And gladly kiss this bounteous hand of fate,
Which strives to bless thy name of Fortunate.

Fort. Oh, whither am I rapt beyond myself? More violent conflicts fight in every thought, Than his whose fatal choice Troy's downfall wrought.

Shall I contract myself to wisdom's love?
Then I lose riches; and a wise man poor
Is like a sacred book that's never read,
To himself he lives, and to all else seems dead:
This age thinks better of a gilded fool,
Than of a thread-bare saint in wisdom's school.
I will be strong: then I refuse long life;
And though my arm should conquer twenty worlds,
There's a lean fellow beats all conquerors:
The greatest strength expires with loss of breath;
The mightiest (in one minute) stoop to death.
Then take long life, or health: should I do so,
I might grow ugly; and that tedious scroll
Of months and years, much misery may inroll;
Therefore I'll beg for beauty; yet I will not,

Are poison'd baits, hung upon golden hooks.
When fools do swim in wealth, her Cynthian beams
Will wantonly dance on the silver-streams;
But when this squint-eyed age sees virtue poor,
And by a little spark set shivering,
Begging of all, relieved at no man's door,
She smiles on her as the sun shines on fire,
To kill that little heat.

218

The fairest cheek hath oftentimes a soul
Lep'rous as sin itself, than hell more foul.
The wisdom of this world is idiotism;
Strength a weak reed; health sickness' enemy,
(And it at length will have the victory ;)
Beauty is but a painting; and long life
Is a long journey in December gone,
Tedious and full of tribulation.

Therefore, dread sacred empress, make me rich;
[Kneels down.
My choice is store of gold; the rich are wise:
He that upon his back rich garments wears,
Is wise, though on his head grow Midas' ears:
Gold is the strength, the sinews of the world;
The health, the soul, the beauty most divine;
A mask of gold hides all deformities;
Gold is heaven's physic, life's restorative;
Oh, therefore, make me rich! not as the wretch
That only serves lean banquets to his eye,
Has gold, yet starves; is famish'd in his store;
No, let me ever spend, be never poor.

For. Thy latest words confine thy destiny;
Thou shalt spend ever, and be never poor :
For proof receive this purse; with it this virtue;
Still when thou thrust'st thy hand into the same,
Thou shalt draw forth ten pieces of bright gold,
Current in any realm where then thou breathest:
If thou canst dribble out the sea by drops,
Then shalt thou want; but that can ne'er be done,
Nor this grow empty.

Fort. Thanks, great deity!

For. The virtue ends when thou and thy sons end. This path leads thee to Cyprus, get thee hence:

Farewell, vain covetous fool, thou wilt repent, That for the love of dross thou hast despised Wisdom's divine embrace; she would have borne thee

On the rich wings of immortality;

But now go dwell with cares, and quickly die.

FROM "THE HONEST WHORE."
Hipolito's thoughts on his mistress's picture, from which he
turns to look on a scull that lies before him on a table.
My Infelice's face, her brow, her eye,
The dimple on her cheek: and such sweet skill
Hath from the cunning workman's pencil flown,
These lips look fresh and lively as her own;
Seeming to move and speak. 'Las! now I see
The reason why fond women love to buy
Adulterate complexion; here 'tis read;
False colours last after the true be dead.
Of all the roses grafted on her cheeks,
Of all the graces dancing in her eyes,
Of all the music set upon her tongue,
Of all that was past woman's excellence
In her white bosom; look, a painted board
Circumscribes all! Earth can no bliss afford:
Nothing of her, but this! This cannot speak;
It has no lap for me to rest upon;

No lip worth tasting. Here the worms will feed!
As in her coffin. Hence then, idle art!
True love's best pictured in a true-love's heart.
Here art thou drawn, sweet maid, till this be dead!
So that thou livest twice, twice art buried.
Thou figure of my friend, lie there.