University of Virginia Library


494

[The curious eye that over-rashly lookes]

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[From Nicholas Ling's Politeuphuia. Wits Commonwealth. Newly corrected and augmented, 1598.]

The curious eye that over-rashly lookes,
And gives no tast nor feeling to the mind,
Robs it own selfe, & wrongs those labored bookes
Wherein the soule might greater comfort find;
But when that sence doth play the busie Bee,
And for the honny, not the poyson reeds,
Then for the labour it receaves the fee,
When as the minde on heavenly sweetnes feeds;
This doe thine eye; and if it find not heere
Such precious comforts as may give content,
And shall confesse the travaile not too deere,
Nor idle howers that in this worke were spent,
Never heereafter will I ever looke
For thing of worth in any morrall booke.
M. D.