The Wisdome of Solomon Paraphrased :: :: University of Virginia Library

After this conflict betweene God and man,
Remorce tooke harbour in Gods angry breast,
Astræa to be pitifull began,
All heauenly powers to lie in mercies rest:
Forth with the voice of God did redescend,
And his Astræa warnde all to amend.

To you I speake, (quoth shee) heare, learne, and marke,
You that be Kings, Iudges, and Potentates,
Giue ere, (I say,) wisedome your strongest arke,
Sends me as messenger, to end debates:
Giue eare, (I say) you Iudges of the earth,
Wisedome is borne, seeke out for wisedomes birth.

Verse 3

This heauenly ambassage from wisedomes tong.
Worthy the volume of all heauens skie,
I bring as messenger to right your wrong,
If so her sacred name might neuer die:
I bring you happy tidings, she is borne,
Like golden sunne-beames from a siluer morne.

The Lord hath seated you in iudgements seat,
Let wisedome place you in discretions places,
Two vertues, one, will make one vertue great,
And drawe more vertues with attractiue faces:
Be iust and wise, for God is iust and wise,
He thoughts, he words, he words, and actions tries.

Uerse 4 5

If you neglect your offices decrees,
Heape new lament on long-tosst miseries,
Doe and vndoe by reason of degrees,
And drowne your sentences in briberies:
Fauour and punish, spare and keepe in awe,
Set and vnset, plant and supplant the lawe.

Oh bee assur'd there is a Iudge aboue,
Which will not let iniustice flourish long,
If tempt him, you, your owne temptation moue,
Proceeding from the iudgement of his tong:
Hard iudgement shal he haue which iudgeth hard,
And he that barreth others shall be bar'd.

Uerse 6

For God hath no respect of rich from poore,
For he hath made the poore, and made the rich,
Their bodies be alike, though their mindes soare,
Their difference nought, but in presumptions pitch:
The carcasse of a King is kept from foule,
The Begger yet may haue the cleaner soule.

The highest men do beare the highest mindes,
The cedars skorne to bowe, the mushromes bend,
The hiest often superstition blindes,
But yet their fall is greatest in the end:
The windes haue not such power of the grasse,
Because it lowly stoopeth when as they passe.

Verse 7 8

The olde should teach the yong obseruance way,
But now the yong doth teach the elder grace;
The shrubs doe teach the Cedars to obay,
These yeelde to winds, but these the winds out-face:
Yet he that made the windes to cease and blowe,
Can make the highest fall, the lowest growe.

He made the great to stoop as well as small,
The lions to obay as other beasts,
He cares for all alike, yet cares for all,
And lookes that all should answere his beheasts:
But yet the greater hath the sorer triall,
If once he findes them with his lawes deniall.

Verse 9

Be warnde you tyrants at the fall of pride,
You see how surges chaunge to quiet calme;
You see both flowe and ebbe in follies tide,
How fingers are infected by their palme:
This may your caucat be, you being kinges,
Infect your subiects, which are lesser things.

Ill sents of vice once crept into the head,
Doth pearce into the chamber of the braine,
Making the outward skin diseases bed,
The inward powers as nourishers of paine:
So if that mischeife raignes in wisedomes place,
The inward thought lies figured in the face.

Uerse 10

Wisdome should clothe her selfe in Kings attire,
Being the portrature of heauens Queene,
But tyrantes are no Kings, but mischiefes mire,
Not sage, but shewes of what they should haue beene:
They seeke for vice, and how to go amis,
But doe not once regard what wisdome is.

They which are Kings, by name are Kings by deed,
Both rulers of them selues and of their land,
They know that heau'n is vertues duest meed,
And holines is knit in holy band:
These may be rightly called by their name,
whose words and works are blaz'd in wisedomes flame.

Verse 11

To nurse vp crueltie with milde aspect,
Were to begin, but neuer for to end,
Kindenes with tygers neuer takes effect,
Nor proffered frendship with a foe-like friend:
Tyrants and tygers haue all naturall mothers,
Tyrants her sonnes, tygers the tyrants brothers.

No words delight can moue delight in them,
But rather plow the traces of their ire,
Like swine that take the durt defore the gem,
And skorns that pearle which they should most desire:
But Kings whose names proceed frō kindnes sound,
Do plant their harts & thoghts on wisdōs ground.

Uer. 12 13

A grounding euer moist, and neuer dry,
An euer fruitfull earth, no fruitlesse way,
In whose deare wombe the tender springs dolye,
which euer flowes, and neuer ebbes away;
The sunne but shines by day, she day and night,
Doth keepe one stayed essence of her light.

Her beams are conducts to her substance view,
Her eye is adamants attractiue force,
A shadowe hath shee none, but substance true,
Substance out liuing life of mortall corse.
Her sight is easie vnto them which loue her,
Her finding easie vnto them which proue her.

Uer. 14

The far fet chastitie of female sex,
Is nothing but allurement into lust,
Which will forsweare and take, scorne and annex,
Denie and practise it, mistrust, and trust:
Wisedome is chast and of another kinde,
She loues, she likes, and yet not lustfull blinde.

She is true loue, the other loue a toy,
Her loue hath eyes, the other loue is blinde,
This doth proceed from God, this from a boy,
This constant is, the other vaine combinde:
If longing passions follow her desire,
She offereth her selfe, as labours hire

Uerse 15

She is not coyish shee, won by delay,
With sighs and passions, which all louers vse,
With hot affection, death, or lifes decay,
With louers toyes, which might their loues excuse:
Wisedome is poore, her dowrie is content,
Shee nothing hath because shee nothing spent.

She is not woo'd to loue, nor won by wooing,
Nor got by labour, nor possest by paine,
The gaine of her consists in honest doing,
Her gaine is great, in that she hath no gaine:
He that betimes followes repentance way,
Sall meet with her his vertues worthy pay.

Verse 16

To think vpon her, is to think of blisse,
The very thought of her is mischiefes barre,
Depeller of misdeeds which do amisse,
The blot of vanitie, misfortunes scarre:
Who wold not think; to reap such gain by thought?
Who would not loue, when such a life is bought?

If thought be vnderstanding, what is shee?
The full perfection of a perfect power,
A heauenly branch from Gods immortall tree,
Which death, nor hell, nor mischiefe can deuoure:
Her selfe is wisedome, and her thought is so,
Thrice happie he which doth desire to know.

Uerse 17

Shee manlike woes, men womenlike refuses,
She offers loue, they offered loue denie,
And hould her promises as loues abuses,
Because she pleads with an indifferent eye:
They thinke that she is light, vaine and vniust,
When she doth plead for loue, and not for lust.

Hard hearted men (quoth shee) can you not loue,
Behold my substance, cannot substance please,
Behold my feature; cannot feature moue?
Can substance, nor my feature, helpe or ease?
See heauens ioy, defigured in my face,
Can neither heauen, nor ioy, turne you to grace?

Uer. 18 19

Oh how desire swayes her pleading tong,
Her tongue, her heart, her heart, her soules affection?
Faine would she make mortalitie be strong,
But mortall weaknes yeelds reiection:
Her care is care of them, they carelesse are,
Her loue loues them: they neither loue nor care.

Faine would shee make them clients in her lawe,
Whose laws assurance is immortall honour,
But them, nor words, nor loue, nor care can awe,
But still will fight vnder destructions bonner.
Though immortalitie be their reward,
Yet neither words, nor deeds will they regard.

Uerse 20

Her tongue is hoarse with pleading, yet doth plead,
Pleading for that which they should all desire,
Their appetite is heauie made of lead,
And lead can neuer melt without a fire:
Her words are milde and cannot raise a heat,
Whilst they with hard repulse her speeches beat.

Requested they; for what they should request,
Intreated they; for what they should intreat,
Requested to enioye their quiet rest,
Intreated like a sullen bird to eate:
Their eies behold ioyes maker which doth make it,
Yet must they be intreated for to take it.

Verse 21

You whose delight is plac'd in honours game,
Whose game, in maiesties imperiall throne,
Maiesticke portratures of earthly fame,
Releeuers of the poore in ages mone:
If your content be seated on a crowne,
Loue wisedome, and your state shall neuer downe.

Her crownes are not as earthly diadems,
But diapasans of eternall rest,
Her essence comes not from terrestriall stems,
But planted on the heauens immortall brest:
If you delight in scepters and in raigning,
Delight in her your crownes immortall gaining.

Uerse 22

Although the shadowes of her glorious view,
Hath beene as accessary to your eies,
Now will I shew you the true substance hiew,
And what she is, which without knowledge lies:
From whence she is deriude, whence her discent,
And whence the linage of her birth is lent.

Now will I shew the skie, and not the cloude,
The sunne, and not the shade, day, not the night,
Tethis her selfe, not Tethis in her floud,
Light, and not shadow of suppressing light:
Wisedome her selfe true tipe of wisedomes grace,
Shall be apparant before heart and face.

Verse 23

Had I still fed you with the shade of life,
And hid the sunne it selfe in enuies aire,
My selfe might well be called natures strife,
Striuing to cloude that which all cloudes impaire:
But Enuy, haste thee hence, I loathe thy eie,
Thy loue, thy life, thy selfe, thy company.

Here is the banner of discretions name,
Aduaunst on wisedomes euer-standing tower,
Here is no place for enuie or her shame,
For Nemesis, or blacke Mageraes power:
He that is enuious, is not wisedomes frend,
She euer liues, he dies when enuies end.

Uer. 24 25

Happy, thrice happy land, where wisedome raignes,
Happy, thrice happy king, whom wisedome swayes,
Where neuer poore laments, or soules complaines,
Where follie neuer keepes discretions wayes:
That land, that king doth flourish, liue and ioy,
Farre from ill fortunes reach, or sins annoy.

That land is happy, that king fortunate,
She in her dayes, he in his wisedomes force,
For fortitude is wisedomes sociate:
And wisedome truest fortitudes remorce:
Be therefore rulde by wisedome, she is chiefe,
That you may rule in ioy, and not in griefe.