Each body's plump and juicy, all things full
Of supple moisture: no coy twig but will
Trust his beloved bosom to the sun
(Grown lusty now); no vine so weak and young
That fears the foul-mouth'd Auster, or those storms
That the south-west wind hurries in his arms,
But hastes her forward blossoms, and lays out,
Freely lays out her leaves; nor do I doubt
But when the world first out of chaos sprang,
So smiled the days, and so the tenor ran
Of their felicity. A spring was there,
An everlasting spring, the jolly year
Led round in his great circle; no wind's breath
As then did smell of winter, or of death;
When life's sweet light first shone on beasts, and when
From their hard mother earth sprang hardy men;
When beasts took up their lodging in the wood,
Stars in their higher chambers; never could
The tender growth of things endure the sense
Of such a change, but that th' heavens' indulgence
Kindly supplies sick nature, and doth mould
A sweetly-temper'd mean, nor hot nor cold.
WITH A PICTURE SENT TO A FRIEND.
I PAINT SO ill, my piece had need to be
Painted again by some good poesy;
I write so ill, my slender line is scarce
So much as th' picture of a well-limn'd verse:
Yet may the love I send be true, though I
Send not true picture nor true poesy:
Both which away, I should not need to fear
My love, or feign'd, or painted should appear.
IN PRAISE OF LESSIUS HIS RULE OF
HEALTH.
Go, now, with some daring drug
Bait the disease, and while they tug,
Thou to maintain their cruel strife,
Spend the dear treasure of thy life:
Go, take physic, doat upon
Some big-named composition,
Th' oraculous doctors' mystic bills,
Certain hard words made into pills;
And what at length shalt get by these?
Only a costlier disease.
Go, poor man, think what shall be
Remedy 'gainst thy remedy.
That which makes us have no need
Of physic, that's physic indeed.
Hark hither, reader, wouldst thou see
Nature her own physician be?
Wouldst see a man all his own wealth,
His own physic, his own health?
A man whose sober soul can tell
How to wear her garments well,
Her garments that upon her sit,
As garments should do, close and fit?
A well-clothed soul, that's not oppress'd
Nor choked with what she should be dress'd?
A soul sheath'd in a crystal shrine,
Through which all her bright features shine,
As when a piece of wanton lawn,
A thin aerial vail is drawn
O'er beauty's face, seeming to hide,
More sweetly shews the blushing bride?
A soul whose intellectual beams
No mists do mask, no lazy steams?
A happy soul, that all the way
To Heaven hath a summer's day?
Wouldst see a man whose well warm'd blood
Bathes him in a genuine flood?
A man whose tuned humours be
A set of rarest harmony?
Wouldst see blithe looks, fresh cheeks, beguile
Age, wouldst see December smile?
Wouldst see a nest of roses grow
In a bed of rev'rend snow?
Warm thoughts, free spirits, flattering
Winter's self into a spring?
In sum, wouldst see a man that can
Live to be old, and still a man?
Whose latest and most leaden hours
Fall with soft wings, stuck with soft flowers;
And when life's sweet fable ends,
Soul and body part like friends;
No quarrels, murmurs, no delay;
A kiss, a sigh, and so away.
This rare one, reader, wouldst thou see?
Hark hither, and thyself be he.
THE BEGINNING OF HELIODORUS.
THE smiling morn had newly waked the day,
And tipp'd the mountains in a tender ray,
When on a hill (whose high, imperious brow
Looks down, and sees the humble Nile below
Lick his proud feet, and haste into the seas
Through the great mouth that's named from Hercules)
A band of men, rough as the arms they wore,
Look'd round, first to the sea, then to the shore,
The shore that shew'd them what the sea denied-
Hope of a prey. There, to the mainland tied,
A ship they saw, no men she had; yet prest
Appear'd with other lading, for her breast
Deep in the groaning waters wallowed
Up to the third ring; o'er the shore was spread
Death's purple triumph, on the blushing ground
Life's late forsaken houses all lay drown'd
In their own blood's dear deluge, some new dead,
Some panting in their yet warm ruins bled;
While their affrighted souls, now wing'd for flight,
Lent them the last flash of her glimm'ring light, 20
Those yet fresh streams, which crawled ev'rywhere,
Show'd that stern War had newly bathed him there:
Nor did the face of this disaster show
Marks of a fight alone, but feasting too,
A miserable and a monstrous feast,
Where hungry War had made himself a guest;
And, coming late, had eat up guests and all,
Who proved the feast to their own funeral, &c.
OUT OF THE GREEK-CUPID'S CRIER
LOVE is lost, nor can his mother
Her little fugitive discover:
She seeks, she sighs, but nowhere spies him;
Love is lost, and thus she cries him:
O yes! if any happy eye
This roving wanton shall descry,
Let the finder surely know
Mine is the wag; 'tis I that own
The wing'd wanderer; and that none
May think his labour vainly gone,
The glad descrier shall not miss
To taste the nectar of a kiss
From Venus' lips; but as for him
That brings him to me, he shall swim
In riper joys: more shall be his
(Venus assures him) than a kiss.
But lest your eye discerning slide,
These marks may be your judgment's guide:
His skin as with a fiery blushing
High-colour'd is; his eyes still flushing
With nimble flames; and though his mind
Be ne'er so curst, his tongue is kind:
For never were his words in ought
Found the pure issue of his thought.
The working bees' soft melting gold,
That which their waxen mines enfold,
Flows not so sweet as do the tones
Of his tuned accents; but if once
His anger kindle, presently
It boils out into cruelty
And fraud: he makes poor mortals' hurts
The objects of his cruel sports.
With dainty curls his froward face
Is crown'd about; but oh! what place,
What farthest nook of lowest hell
Feels not the strength, the reaching spell
Of his small hand? yet not so small
As 'tis powerful therewithal;
Though bare his skin, his mind he covers,
And like a saucy bird he hovers
With wanton wing, now here, now there,
'Bout men and women; nor will spare
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