The Treasury of Musick :: :: University of Virginia Library

To his Platonick Mistris.

[I]

Beauty once blasted with the frost of
Age or Sickness, is quite lost;
He who loves that, and on it can,
Dote till he be no longer Man,
Hath neither Intellect or Eyes
To judge where womans beauty lies:
No, let him court your better part,
Your virtues and your loyal heart.

II

If nought but beauty in you be,
Your Picture seems as fair to me;
He that admires your red and white,
Is Traytor to his own delight;
And with those shadows growes so blind
He never can your sweetnesse find.
Then let me court your better part,
Your vertues, and your loyall heart.

III

Yet do I never hope to see
Goodnesse lodg'd in deformitie;
Though devils oft take shapes divine,
Angels take none but such as thine;
This made me make my choice of thee
The emblem of divinitie;
That I might court your better part,
Your vertues, and your loyal heart.