The Whole Works of William Browne of Tavistock ... Now first collected and edited, with a memoir of the poet, and notes, by W. Carew Hazlitt, of the Inner Temple |
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 | The Whole Works of William Browne |  |
Looke as a Traueller in Summers day
Nye choakt with dust, and molt with Titans ray,
Longs for a spring to coole his inward heat,
And to that end, with vowes, doth heauen intreat,
When going further, finds an Apple-tree,
(Standing as did old Hospitalitie,
With ready armes to succour any needs:)
Hence plucks an Apple, tastes it, and it breeds
So great a liking in him for his thirst,
That vp he climbs, and gathers to the first
A second, third; nay, will not cease to pull
Till he haue got his cap and pockets full.
“Things long desir'd so well esteemed are,
“That when they come we hold them better farre.
“There is no meane 'twixt what we loue and want,
“Desire, in men, is so predominant.
No lesse did all this quaint assembly long
Then doth the Traueller: this Shepherds Song
Had so ensnar'd each acceptable eare,
That but a second, nought could bring them cleare
From an affected snare; had Orpheus beene
Playing, some distance from them, he had seene
Not one to stirre a foot for his rare straine,
But left the Thracian for the English Swaine.
Or had suspicious Iuno (when her Ioue
Into a Cowe transform'd his fairest
Loue)
Great Inachus sweet Stem in durance giuen
To this young Lad; the Messenger of heauen
(Faire Maia's off-spring) with the depth of Art
That euer Ioue to Hermes might impart,
In fingring of a Reed, had neuer won
Poore Iö's freedome. And though Arctors son
(Hundred-ey'd Argus) might be lull'd by him,
And loose his pris'ner: yet in euery lym
That God of wit had felt this Shepherds skill,
And by his charmes brought from the Muses hill
Inforc'd to sleepe; then, rob'd of Pipe and Rod,
And vanquish'd so, turne Swaine, this Swaine a God.
Yet to this Lad not wanted Enuies sting,
(“He's not worth ought, that's not worth enuying)
Since many at his praise were seene to grutch.
For as a Miller in his boulting hutch
Driues out the pure meale neerly (as he can)
And in his sister leaues the courser bran:
So doth the canker of a Poets name
Let slip such lines as might inherit Fame,
And from a Volume culs some small amisse,
To fire such dogged spleenes as mate with his.
Yet, as a man that (by his Art) would bring
The ceaslesse current of a Crystall Spring
To ouer-looke the lowly flowing head,
Sinkes by degrees his soder'd Pipes of Lead,
Beneath the Fount, whereby the water goes
High, as a Well that on a mountaine flowes:
So when Detraction and a Cynnicks tongue
Haue sunke Desert vnto the depth of wrong,
By that, the eye of skill, True Worth shall see
To braue the Stars, though low his passage be.
Nye choakt with dust, and molt with Titans ray,
Longs for a spring to coole his inward heat,
And to that end, with vowes, doth heauen intreat,
When going further, finds an Apple-tree,
(Standing as did old Hospitalitie,
With ready armes to succour any needs:)
Hence plucks an Apple, tastes it, and it breeds
So great a liking in him for his thirst,
That vp he climbs, and gathers to the first
A second, third; nay, will not cease to pull
Till he haue got his cap and pockets full.
“Things long desir'd so well esteemed are,
“That when they come we hold them better farre.
“There is no meane 'twixt what we loue and want,
“Desire, in men, is so predominant.
No lesse did all this quaint assembly long
Then doth the Traueller: this Shepherds Song
Had so ensnar'd each acceptable eare,
That but a second, nought could bring them cleare
From an affected snare; had Orpheus beene
Playing, some distance from them, he had seene
Not one to stirre a foot for his rare straine,
But left the Thracian for the English Swaine.
Or had suspicious Iuno (when her Ioue
6
Great Inachus sweet Stem in durance giuen
To this young Lad; the Messenger of heauen
(Faire Maia's off-spring) with the depth of Art
That euer Ioue to Hermes might impart,
In fingring of a Reed, had neuer won
Poore Iö's freedome. And though Arctors son
(Hundred-ey'd Argus) might be lull'd by him,
And loose his pris'ner: yet in euery lym
That God of wit had felt this Shepherds skill,
And by his charmes brought from the Muses hill
Inforc'd to sleepe; then, rob'd of Pipe and Rod,
And vanquish'd so, turne Swaine, this Swaine a God.
Yet to this Lad not wanted Enuies sting,
(“He's not worth ought, that's not worth enuying)
Since many at his praise were seene to grutch.
For as a Miller in his boulting hutch
Driues out the pure meale neerly (as he can)
And in his sister leaues the courser bran:
So doth the canker of a Poets name
Let slip such lines as might inherit Fame,
And from a Volume culs some small amisse,
To fire such dogged spleenes as mate with his.
Yet, as a man that (by his Art) would bring
The ceaslesse current of a Crystall Spring
To ouer-looke the lowly flowing head,
Sinkes by degrees his soder'd Pipes of Lead,
Beneath the Fount, whereby the water goes
High, as a Well that on a mountaine flowes:
So when Detraction and a Cynnicks tongue
Haue sunke Desert vnto the depth of wrong,
By that, the eye of skill, True Worth shall see
To braue the Stars, though low his passage be.
| The Whole Works of William Browne | |