Ex otio Negotium :: :: University of Virginia Library

Fair stranger! winged maid, where dost thou rest
Thy snowy locks at noon? Or on what brest
Of spices slumber ore the sullen night?
Or waking whether dost thou take thy flight?
Shall I goe seek some melanchollick grove?
The silent theatre of dispair and love?
There court the Bitterne and the Pelican
Those Aiery Antipodes to the tents of man?

205

Or sitting by some pretty pratling spring
Hear hoarse Nyctimene her dirges sing?
Whiles the rough Satyres dance Corantoes too
The chattring Sembriefs of her Woo hoo, hoo?
Or shall I trace some ice-bound wildernesse
Among the caverns of abstruse recess?
Where never prying Sun, nor blushing Day
Could steal a glimps, or intersqueeze a ray?

If not within this solitary Cell,
O whether must I post? Where dost thou dwel?

Shall I let loose the reins of blinde desire?
And surfet every ravening sense? Give fire
To any train? And tyre voluptuousnesse
In all her soft varieties of excess?
And make each day a history of sin?
Drink the A la mort Sun down and up agen?
Improve my crimes to such a roaring score,
That when I dye, where others goe before
In whining venial streams, and quarto pages,
My flouds may rise in folio, sinck all ages?
Or shall I bathe my selfe in widdows tears?
And build my name in th'curse of them and theirs?
Ship-wrack whole nature to craw out a purse
With th'molten cinders of the universe?
Belch nought but ruine? and the horrid cryes
Of fire and sword? & swim in drowned eyes?
Make lanes to crowns & scepters through th'heart's veins
Of Justice, Law, Right, Church and Soveraigns?

206

No, no, I trace thee not in this dark way
Of death, this scarlet streak'd Aceldama.

Shall I then to the house of mourning goe?
Where the Salt-peeter Vuates over-flow
With fresh supplies of grief? Fresh tides of brine?
Or traverse the wide world in every line?
Walk through the bowels of each realm and state
Simpling for rules of policy to create
Strang forms of government of new molds & wasts
Like a french Kickshaw of a thousand tasts?
Or shall I dive into the secrecy
Of Nature? Where the most retir'd doth lye?
Or shall I waste the taper of my soul
In scrutinies, where neither Northern-pole
Nor Southern-constellation darts a light
To constitute a latitude or height?
Or shall I float into the watry pale
Wan kingdom of the Moon? and there set sail
For all the Orbs? and keep high holiday
With th'Nectar-tipling-Gods in th'milky-way?
Swell Bacchus tripes with a tun of lusty Sack?
And lay the Plump Squire flat upon his back?
O no, these revels are too short, too soure,
Too sad, hugg'd and repented in an hour.

Shall I then plough the seas to forreign soils?
And rake the pregnant Indies for hid spoyls?
Or with the Anchorite abhor the eye
Of heaven, and banish all society.

207

Live in, and out the world? and pass my dayes
In treading out some strang misterious maze?
Tast every humane sweet? lilly and rose?
With all the sharp guard yt about them grows?
Climb wher dispair would tremble to set foot?
Spring new impossibles and force way to't?
Make the whole globe a shop of Chymistry
To melt down all her attomes, and descry
That small Iota, that last pittied grain
Which the gull'd sons of men pursue in vain?
Or shal I grasp those meteors, fame, & praise?
Which breath by th'charity of ye vulgar voice?
Pile honour upon honour till it crack
The Atlas of my pride, and break its back?
Hold fancy, hold! for whether wilt thou bear
My sun-burnt hope to loss? 'Tis, 'tis not here.

Soar then (My Soul) above the arched round
Of these poor spangled blisses: Here's no ground
To fix the sacred foot of pure Content,
Her mansion's in a higher element.

Hast thou perceiv'd the sweetness of a groan?
Or tried the wings of contemplation?
Or hast thou found the balm of tears that press
Like amber in the dregs of bitterness?
Or hast thou felt that secret joy that flowes
Against the tide of common over-throws?
Or hast thou known the dawnings of a God
Upon thee, when his love is shed abroad?
Or hast thou heard the sacred harmonie
Of a calm Conscience ecchoing in thee

208

A Requiem from above? A sealed peace
Beyond the power of hell, sin, or decease?
Or hast thou tasted that communion
Between a reconciled God and Man?
That holy intercourse? Those pretious smiles
Dissolv'd in holy whisprings between whiles?
Here, here's the steps lead to her bless'd abode;
Her chair of state is in the throne of God.