THE CALM.

Our form is past, and that ftorm's tyrannous rage
A ftupid Calm, but nothing it doth 'fwage.
The fable is inverted, and far more

A block affli&s now than a ftork before.
Storms chafe, and foon wear out themfelves or us;
In Calms Heaven laughs to fee us languish thus.
As fteady as I could with my thoughts were,
Smooth as thy mistress' glass, or what fines there,
The fea is now, and as the ifles which we
Seek, when we can move, our fhips rooted be.
As water did in ftorms, now pitch runs out;
As lead, when a fir'd church becomes one spout;
And all our beauty and our trim decays,
Like courts removing, or like ending plays.
The fighting place now feamen's rage supply,
And all the tackling is a frippery.
No use of lanthorns; and in one place lay
Feathers and duft to-day and yesterday.
Earth's hollowneffes, which the world's lungs are,
Have no more wind than th' upper vault of air.
We can nor loft friends nor fought foes recover,
But, meteor-like, fave that we move not, hover:
Only the calenture together draws

Dear friends, which meet dead in great fifhes maws,
And on the hatches, as on altars, lies
Each one, his own priest and own facrifice.
Who live that miracle do multiply,
Where walkers in hot ovens do not die.
If in defpite of thefe we fwim, that hath
No more refreshing than a brimstone bath;
But from the fea unto the fhip we turn,
Like parboil'd wretches, on the coals to burn.
Like Bajazet, encag'd, the shepherds scoff;
Or like flack finew'd Samson, his hair off,
Languish our fhips. Now as a myriad
Of ants durft th' Emperor's lov'd fnake invade,
The crawling gallies, fea-gulls, finny chips,
Might brave our pinnaces, our bed-rid fhips:
Whether a rotten state and hope of gain,
Or to disuse me from the queasy pain
Of being belov'd and loving; or the thirst
Of honour or fair death outpusht me first,
I lofe my end; for here, as well as 1,
A desperate may live, and coward die.
Stag, dog, and all which from or towards flies,
Is paid with life or prey, or doing dies:
Fate grudges us all, and doth fubtilely lay
A fcourge 'gainft which we all forgot to pray,
He that at fea prays for more wind, as well
Under the poles may beg cold, heat in hell.
What are we then? How little more, alas!
Is man now than before he was he was?
Nothing; for us, we are for nothing fit;
As chance or ourselves ftill difproportion it.
We have no power, no will, no sense. I lie;
1 fhould not then thus feel this misery.

TO SIR HENRY WOTTON.

Sin, more than kiffes letters mingle fouls,
Ier thus friends abfent fpeak. This cafe controuls

The tedioufnefs of my life: but for these
I could invent nothing at all to please;
But I fhould wither in one day, and pass
To a lock of hay that am a bottle of grass.
Life is a voyage, and in our life's ways
Countries, courts, towns, are rocks or remoras;
They break or ftop all ships, yet our state's fuch
That (though than pitch they stain worse) we
muft touch.

If in the furnace of the even Line,

Or under th' adverse icy Pole, thou pine,
Thou know'ft two temperate regions girded in
Dwell there; but, oh! what refuge canst thou

win

Parch'd in the court, and in the country frozen?
Shall cities built of both extremes be chosen?
Can dung or garlic be a perfume? or can
A fcorpion or torpedo cure a man?
Cities are worst of all three of all three ?
(O knotty riddle!) each is worst equally.
Cities are fepulchres; they who dwell there
Are carcaffes, as if none fuch there were:
And courts are theatres where some men play
Princes, fome flaves, and all end in one day.
The country is a defert where the good
Gain'd inhabits not; born is not understood:
There men become beafts, and, prone to all evils,
In cities blocks, and in a lewd court devils.
As in the first chaos confusedly

Each element's qualities were in th' other three;
So pride, luft, covetife, being several
To thefe three places, yet all are in all,
And, mingled thus, their iffue is incestuous;
Falsehood is denizon'd, Virtue is barbarous.
Let no man say there Virtue's stinty wall
Shall lock vice in me; I'll do none, but know all.
Men are sponges, which to pour out receive;
Who know falfe play rather than lose, deceive:
For in beft understandings fin began;
Angels finn'd firft, then devils, and then man.
Only perchance beafts fin not; wretched we
Are beafts in all but white Integrity.

I think if men, which in these places live,
Durft look in themselves, and themselves retrieve,
They would, like strangers, greet themselves, fec-
ing then

Utopian youth grown old Italian.

Be then thine own home, and in thyself dwell; Inn any where; continuance maketh hell: And fecing the fnail, which every where doth roam, Carrying his own house still, ftill is at home, Follow (for he is eafy pac'd) this snail; Be thine own palace, or the world's thy gaol: And in the world's fea do not, like cork, fleep Upon the water's face, nor in the deep Sink like a lead without a line; but as Fishes glide, leaving no print where they pass, Nor making found, fo closely thy courfe go; Let men difpute whether thou breathe or no; Only in this be no Galenift. To make Courts hot ambitions wholefome, do not take A dram of country's dulnefs; do not add Correctives, but as chemics purge the bad. But, Sir, I advise not you; I rather do Say o'er thofe leffons which I learn'd of you,

Whom, free from Germany's fchifms, and lightness
Of France, and fair Italy's faithleffness,
Having from these fuck'd all they had of worth,
And brought home that faith which you carried
forth,

I th'roughly love; but if myself I have won
To know my rules, I have, and you have DONNÉ.

TO SIR HENRY WOTTON.

HERE's no more news than virtue; I may as well
Tell you Calais or Saint Michael's Mount, as tell
That Vice doth here habitually dwell.

Yet as, to get stomachs, we walk up and down,
And toil to fweeten reft; fo may God frown,
If but to lothe both I haunt court and town.

For here no one is from th' extremity
Of vice by any other reason free,
But that the next to him still's worse than he.

In this world's warfare they whom rugged Fate (God's Commiffary) doth fo th'roughly hate As i' th' court's fquadron to marshal their state;

If they stand arm'd with filly honesty,
With wishing, prayers, and neat integrity,
Like Indians 'gainst Spanish hosts they be.

Sufpicious boldness to this place belongs,
And t' have as many ears as all have tongues;
Tender to know, tough to acknowledge wrongs.

Believe, me, Sir, in my youth's giddiest days,
When to be like the court was a player's praise,
Plays were not fo like courts as courts like plays.

Then let us at these mimic anticks jeft, Whose deepest projects and egregious jests Are but dull morals at a game at chefs.

But 't is an incongruity to smile;

Therefore I end, and bid farewell a while

After those learned papers, which your hand
Hath ftor'd with notes of ufe and pleasure too,
From which rich treasury you may command
Fit matter whether you will write or do:

After thofe loving papers which friends send
With glad grief to your fea-ward steps farewell,
Which thicken on you now as pray'rs afcend
To heaven in troops at a good man's paffing bell,

Admit this honest paper, and allow

It fuch an audience as yourself would ask ;
What you must say at Venice this means now,
And hath for nature what you have for talk.

To fwear much love, not to be chang'd before,
Honour alone will to your fortune fit;
Nor fhall I then honour your fortune more
Than I have done your noble-wanting wit.

But 't is an easier load (though both opprefs)
To want than govern greatnefs; for we are
In that our own and only business;

In this we must for others' vices care.

'Tis therefore well your fpirits now are plac'd In their last furnace, in activity,

Which fits them (fchools, and courts, and wars, o'erpaft)

To touch and taste in any best degree.

For me, (if there be such thing as I).
Fortune (if there be fuch a thing as the)
Spies that I bear fo well her tyranny,
That the thinks nothing else fo fit for me.

But though the part us, to hear my oft' prayers
For your increase, God is as near me here;
And to fend you what I shall beg, his stairs
In length and ease are alike every where.

TO SIR HENRY GOODERE.

Turns no new leaf, but still the fame things reads; Seen things he fees again, heard things doth hear, And makes his life but like a pair of beads.

A palace, when 't is that which it should be, Leaves growing, and stands such, or else decays: But he which dwells there is not fo; for he Strives to urge upward, and his fortune raise.

So had your body her morning, hath her noon, And shall not better; her next change is night: But her fair larger gueft, to whom fun and moon Are sparks, and short liv'd, claims another right.

The noble foul by age grows luftier:
Her appetite and her digeftion mend:
We must not starve, nor hope to pamper her
With woman's milk and pap unto the end.

Provide you manlier diet. You have seen
All libraries, which are schools, camps and courts;
But ask your garners if you have not been
In harvest too indulgent to your sports?

Would you redeem it? then yourfelf transplant
A while from hence. Perchance outlandish ground
Bears no more wit than ours; but yet more
fcant

Are those diverfions there which here abound.

To be a stranger hath that benefit;
We can beginnings but not habits choke.
Go. Whither? Hence. You get, if you forget;
New faults, till they prefcribe to us, are smoke.

Our foul, whofe country's heav'n, and God her father,

Into this world, corruption's fink, is fent;
Yet fo much in her travel the doth gather,
That the returns home wifer than she went.

It pays you well if it teach you to fpare,
And make you afham'd to make your hawk's
praise your's,

Which when herself the leffens in the air,
You then first fay that high enough she tow'rs,

However, keep the lively tafte yon hold
Of God: love him now, but fear him more;
And in your afternoons think what you told
And promis'd him at morning prayer before.

Let falsehood like a difcord anger you,
Elfe be not froward. But why do I touch
Things of which none is in your practice new,
And tables and fruit-trenchers teach as much?

But thus I make you keep your promife, Sir;
Riding I had you, though you still stay'd there;
And in these thoughts, although you never stir,
You came with me to Micham, and are here.

TO MR. ROWLAND WOODWARD.

If our fouls have ftain'd their first white, yet we May clothe them with faith and dear honesty, Which God imputes as native purity.

There is no virtue but religion:
Wife, valiant, fober, juft, are names which none
Want, which want not vice-covering discretion.
Seek we then ourselves in ourselves; for as
Men force the fun with much more force to pafs,
By gathering his beams with a crystal glass;

So we (if we into ourselves will turn,
Blowing our fpark of virtue) may out-burn
The ftraw which doth about our hearts fojourn,

You know, phyficians, when they would infufe
Into any oil the fouls of fimples, ufe

Places where they may lie ftill warm, to choose;

So works retiredness in us. To roam
Giddily, and be every where but at home,
Such freedom doth a banishment become.

We are but farmers of ourselves; yet may,
If we can stock ourselves and thrive, uplay
Much, much good treasure, for the great rent day.

Manure thyself then; to thyself b' improv❜d,
And with vain outward things be no more mov'd,
But to know that I love thee, and would be lov'd.

TO THE COUNTESS OF BEDFORD.
MADAM,

REASON is our foul's left hand, Faith her right;
By these we reach divinity, that's you:
Their loves, who have the bleffing of your light,
Grew from their reafon; mine from fair Faith grew.

But as although a squint left hand handedness
Be ungracious, yet we cannot want that hand;
So would I (not t' encreafe, but to exprefs
My faith) as I believe fo understand.

Therefore I ftudy you first in your faints, Those friends whom your election glorifies;

fels

Herfelf a Nun, ty'd to retiredness,

So affects my Mufe now a chafte fallowness;

Since the to few, yet too many, hath shown How love-fong weeds and fatiric thorns are grown

Where feeds of better arts were early fown.

Though to use and love poetry to me,
Betroth'd to no one art, be no adultery,
Omiffions of good ill as ill deeds be.

For though to us it feem but light and thin,
Yet in those faithful scales, where God throws in
Men's works, vanity weighs as much as fin.

And what you read, and what yourself devife.

But foon the reasons why you're lov'd by all
Grow infinite, and fo pafs reafon's reach;
Then back again t' implicit faith I fall,
And reft on what the catholic voice doth teach;

That you are good; and not one heretic
Denies it; if he did, yet you are fo:

For rocks, which high do feem, deep-rooted stick,
Waves wash, not undermine, por overthrow.

In ev'ry thing there naturally grows
A balfamum, to keep it fresh and new,
If 't were not injur'd by extrinsic blows;
You birth and beauty are this balm in you.

But you of learning, and religion,
And virtue, and fuch ingredients, have made
A Mithridate, whose operation
Keeps off or cures what can be done or faid.

Yet this is not your physic but your food,
A diet fit for you; for you are here
The first good angel, fince the world's frame ftood,
That ever did in woman's fhape appear.

Since you are then God's masterpiece, and fo
His factor for our loves, do, as you do,
Make your return home gracious, and bestow
This life on that, so make one life of two:
For fo, God help me! I would not miss you there
For all the good which you can do me here.

TO THE COUNTESS OF BEDFORD,

MADAM,

You have refin'd me, and to worthiest things;
Virtue, art, beauty, fortune; now I fee
Rareness or use, not nature, value brings,
And fuch as they are circumstanc'd they be.
Two ills can ne'er perplex us fin t' excuse,
But of two good things we may leave or choose,

Therefore at court, which is not virtue's clime,
Where a tranfcendent height (as lownefs me)
Makes her not fee, or not fhew, all my rhime
Your virtues challenge, which there rarest be;
For as dark texts need notes, fome there must be
To usher virtue, and say, This is she :

So in the country's beauty. To this place You are the feafon, (Madam!) you the day; 'Tis but a grave of fpices till your face Exhale them, and a thick close bud display. Widow'd and reclus'd, elfe her fweets the enfhrines,

As China, when the fun at Brazil dines.

Out from your chariot morning breaks at night, And falfifies both computations fo,

Since a new world doth rife here from your light, We your new creatures by new reck'nings go. This fhews that you from Nature lothly tray, That fuffer not an artificial day.

In this you've made the court th' antipodes,
And will'd your delegate, the vulgar fun,
To do profane autumnal offices,
Whilft here to you we facrificers run;
And whether priefts or organs you, we obey,
We found your influence, and your dictates say.

Yet to that deity which dwells in you,
Your virtuous foul, I now not facrifice;
These are petitions, and not hymns; they fue
But that I may furvey the edifice.
In all religions as much care hath been
Of temples frames and beauty as rites within.

As all which go to Rome do not thereby
Efteem religions, and hold faft the best,
But ferve difcourfe and curiofity

With that which doth religion but invest,
And fhun th' entangling labyrinths of schools,
And make it wit to think the wifer fools:

So in this pilgrimage I would behold
You as you're Virtue's temple, not as fhe;
What walls of tender crystal her enfold,
What eyes, hands, bofom, her pure altars be;
And after this furvey oppofe to all
Builders of chapels you, th' Escurial;

Yet not as confecrate, but merely as fair :
On these I caft a lay and country eye:
Of paft and future ftories, which are rare,
I find you all record and prophefy.
Purge but the book of Fate, that it admit
No fad nor guilty legends, you are it.

If good and lovely were not one, of both
You were the transcript and original;
The elements, the parent, and the growth,
And every piece of you is worth their all.
So entire are all your deeds and you, that you
Muft do the fame things ftill; you cannot two,

But these (as nicest school divinity
Serves herefy to further or reprefs)
Taste of poetic rage or flattery,

And need not, where all hearts one truth profefs;
Oft from new proofs and new phrase new doubts

Worst of spiritual vices, Simony;
And not to have written then feems little less
Than worft of civil vices, thankieffness.
In this my debt I feem'd loth to confefs,
In that I feem'd to fhun beholdingness;
But 't is not fo. Nothing, as I am, may
Pay all they have, and yet have all to pay.
Such borrow in their payments, and owe more,
By having leave to write fo, than before.
Yet fince rich mines in barren grounds are shewn
May not I yield not gold, but coal or ftone?
Temples were not demolish'd though profane;
Here Peter Jove's, there Paul hath Dina's fanc.
So whether my hymns you admit or choose,
In me you' ave hallowed a Pagan mufe

And denizon'd a stranger, who, mif-taught
By blamers of the times they marr'd, hath fought
Virtues in corners, which now bravely do
Shine in the world's beft part, or all it, you.

I have been told that virtue in courtiers hearts
Suffers an oftracism, and departs :
Profit, cafe, fitnefs. plenty, bid it go,
But whither, only knowing you, I know:
Your, or you virtue, two vast uses serves,
It randoms one fex, and one court preferves;
There's nothing but your worth, which being

trae,

Is known to any other, not to you;
And you can never know it; to admit

No knowledge of your worth is fome of it;
But fince to you your praises difcords be,
Stoop others ills to meditate with me.

Oh! to confefs we know not what we should,
Is half excufe we know not what we would,
Lightness depreffeth us, emptinefs fills!
We fweat and faint, yet still go down the hills,
As sew philofophy arrefts the fun,
And bids the paffive earth about it run,
So we have dull'd our mind, it hath no ends,
Only the body's bufy, and pretends.
As dead low earth eclipfes and controuls
The quick high moon, fo doth the body fouls,
In one but us are fuch mixt engines found,
As hands of double office! for the ground
Wet with them, and them to heaven we raise;
Whe pray'rlefs labours, or without these prays,
Doth but one half, that's none. He which faid,
Plough,,

And look not back, to look up doth allow.
Good feed degenerates, and oft obeys
The fail's difeafe, and into cockle ftrays.
Let the mind's thoughts be but transplanted fo
lato the body, and baftardly they grow.

What hate could hurt our bodies like our love?
We, but no foreign tyrants, could remove
Thee, not engrav'd, but inborn dignities,
Calets of fouls, temples, and palaces:
For bodies fhall from death redeemed be,
Souls but preferv'd, born naturally free.
As men tour prifons now, fouls t' us are sent,
Which learn vice there, and come in innocent.
Firk feeds of every creature are in us:
White'er the world hath bad or precious
Man's body can produce; hence hath it been
That fiones, worms, frogs, and snakes, in man are

feen:

But whoe'er faw, though Nature can work fo,
That pearl, or gold, or corn, in man did grow?
We've added to the world Virginia, and sent
Two new flars lately to the firmament.
Why grudge we us (not heaven) the dignity
To encrease with ours thofe fair fouls company?
But I muft end this letter; though it do
Stand on two truths, neither is true to you.
Virtue bath fome perverfenefs; for the will
Neither believe her good nor others ill.
Even in you, Virtue's best paradife,
Virtue hath fome, but wife, degrees of vice.
Too many virtues, or too much of one,
ges in you unjuft fufpicion;

And ignorance of vice makes virtue lefs,
Quenching compaffion of our wretchedness,
But these are riddles. Some afperfion
Of vice becomes well fome complexion.
Statesmen purge vice with vice, and may corrode
The bad with bad, a spider with a toad:
For fo ill thrals not them, but they tame ill,
And make her do much good against her will;
But in your common-wealth, or world in you,
Vice hath no office or good work to do.
Take then no vicious purge, but be content
With cordial virtue, your known nourishment,

TO THE COUNTESS OF BEDFORD,

On New Year's Day.

Tuis twilight of two years, not past nor next,
Some emblem is of me, or I of this,
Who, (meteor-like, of stuff and form perplext,
Whose what and where in difputation is)
If I should call me any thing, should mifs.

I fum the years and me, and find me not
Debtor to th' old, nor creditor to th' new:
That cannot fay my thanks I have forgot:
Nor truft I this with hopes, and yet scarce true;
This bravery's fince these times fhewed me you.

In recompenfe I would fhew future times
What you were, and teach them t'urge towards fuch.
Verfe embalms Virtue! and tombs or thrones of

rhymes

Preferve frail tranfitory fame as much
As fpice doth bodies from corrupt air's touch.

Mine are fhort-liv'd; the tincture of your name
Creates in them, but diffipates as faft
New fpirits; for ftrong agents with the fame
Force that doth warm and cherish us do waste;
Kept hot with strong extracts no bodies last.

So my verfe, built of your juft praise, might want
Reafon and likelihood, the firmeft base,
And made of miracle, now faith is fcant,
Will vanish foon, and so poffefs no place:
And you and it too much grace might difgrace.

When all (as truth commands affent) confefs
All truth of you, yet they will doubt how I
(One corn of one low ant-hill's duft, and lefs)
Should name, know, or exprefs, a thing fo high,
And (not an inch) measure infinity.

I cannot tell them, nor myself, nor you,
But leave, left truth b' endanger'd by my praife, '
And turn to God, who knows I think this true,
And ufeth oft, wher fuch a heart mif-fays,
To make it good; for fuch a praiser prays.

He will best teach you how you should lay out
His flock of beauty, learning, favour, blood;
He will perplex fecurity with doubt,