 | Emblemes (1635) and Hieroglyphikes (1638) |  |
XII. ISAIAH LXVI. XI.
Yee may suck, but not be satisfied with the brest of her Consolation.
1
What never fill'd? Be thy lips skrew'd so fastTo th'earths full breast? For shame, for shame unseise thee
Thou tak'st a surfeit, where thou shouldst but tast,
And mak'st too much not halfe enough, to lease thee:
Ah foole, forbeare: Thou swallow'st at one breath
Both food and poyson down; Thou drawst both milk and death.
2
The ub'rous breasts, when fairely drawne, repastThe thriving Infant with their milkie flood,
But being overstraind, returne, at last,
Unwholsome Gulps compos'd of wind and blood,
A mod'rate use does both repast and please;
Who straines beyond a meane, draws in and gulps desease.
3
But, O, meane whose good the least abuseMakes bad, is too too hard to be directed;
Can Thornes bring grapes, or Crabs a pleasing juce?
Ther's nothing wholsome, where the whole's infected:
Unseise thy lips; Earths milk's a ripned Core
That drops from her desease, that matters from her Sore.
4
Thinkst thou, that Paunch that burlyes out thy Coate,Is thriving Fat; or flesh, that seemes so brawny?
Thy Paunch is dropsied, and thy Cheekes are bloat;
Thy lips are white and thy complexion, tawny;
Thy skin's a Bladder blowne with watry tumors:
Thy flesh, a trembling Bogge, a Quagmire full of humors.
5
And thou, whose thrivelesse hands are ever strayningEarths fluent Brests, into an empty Sive,
That alwaies hast, yet alwaies art complaining;
And whin'st for more then earth has pow'r to give,
Whose treasure flowes, and flees away as fast,
That ever hast, and hast, yet hast not what thou hast.
6
Goe choose a Substance, foole, that will remaineWithin the limits of thy leaking measure;
Or else goe seeke an Urne that will retaine
The liquid Body of thy slipp'ry Treasure:
Alas, how poorely are thy labours crown'd?
Thy liquors neither sweet, nor yet thy vessell sound.
7
What lesse then Foole is Man, to progge and plott,And lavish out the Creame of all his care,
To gaine poore seeming goods, which, being got,
Make firme possession, but a Thorowfare:
Or if they stay, they furrow thoughts the deeper,
And being kept with care, they loose their carefull keeper.
S. GREG. Hom: 3. secund. parte Ezech.
If wee give more to the flesh then wee ought, wee nourish an Enemy; If we give not to her necessity what we ought, we destroy a Citizen: The flesh is to be satisfied so farre as suffices to our good; whosoever allowes so much to her as to make her proud, knowes not how to be satisfied: To be satisfied, is a great Art; left by the saciety of the flesh wee breake forth into the Iniquity of her Folly.
HUGO. de Anima.
The heart is a small thing, but desires great matters: It is not sufficient for a Kites dinner, yet the whole world is not sufficient for it.
EPIGRAM 12.
[What makes thee foole so fat? Foole, thee so Bare?]
What makes thee foole so fat? Foole, thee so Bare?Yee suck the selfe same milke; the self same aire:
No meane, betwixt all Paunch; and skinne and bone?
The meane's a vertue; and the world has none.
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