THE EIGHTH EGLOGUE.
It joyes me, Gorbo, yet we meet at last
Perkin.
It joyes me, Gorbo, yet we meet at last,
'Tis many a Mon'th since I the Shepheard saw,
Me thinkes thou look'st as thou wert much agast,
What is't so much that should thy courage awe?
What, man? Have Patience, Wealth will come and go,
And to the end the World shall ebbe and flow.
The valiant man, whose thoughts be firmly placed,
And sees sometime how Fortune list to rage,
That by her frownes he would not be disgraced,
By Wisdome his straight Actions so doth gage,
That when she fawnes, and turnes her squinting eye,
He laughes to scorne her loose Inconstancie.
When as the Cullian, and the viler Clowne,
That like the Swine on Draffe sets his desire,
Feeling the tempest, sadly layes him downe,
Whilst that blind Strumpet treads him in the mire:
Yet tasting Weale, the Beast will quickly bray,
But feeling wo, as soone consumes away.
Gorbo.
Perkin, I thy Philosophie approve,
And know who well hath learn'd her sacred wayes,
The stormes of Fortune not so easly move,
With her high Precepts arm'd at all assayes,
When other folke her force may not indure,
Because they want that Med'cine for their cure.
Yet altogether blam'd let me not passe,
Though often I, and worthily admire,
Wisemen disgraced, and the barbarous Asse
Unto high place and dignitie aspire:
What should I say, that Fortune is to blame?
Or unto what should I impute the shame?
Perkin.
Why, she is Queene here of this World below,
That at her pleasure all things doth dispose,
And blind, her gifts as blindly doth bestow,
Yet where she raises, still she overthrowes:
Therefore her Embleme is a turning Wheele,
From whose high top the high soon'st downward reele.
Gave she her gifts to vertuous men and wise,
Shee should confirme this worldly state so sure,
That very Babes her Godhead would despise,
Nor longer here her Government endure:
Best she may give from whom she ever takes,
Fooles she may marre, for Fooles she ever makes.
For her owne sake we Wisdome must esteeme,
And not how other basely her regard:
For howsoe'r disgraced she doth seeme,
Yet she her owne is able to reward,
And none are so essentially hie,
As those that on her bountie doe relie.
Gorbo.
O but, good Shepheard, tell me where beene they,
That as a God did Vertue so adore?
And for her Impes did with such care purvey?
Ah, but in vaine, their want we doe deplore,
Long time since swaddled in their winding Sheet:
And she I thinke is buried at their feet.
Perkin.
Nay, stay, good Gorbo, Vertue is not dead,
Nor beene her friends gone all that wonned here,
But to a Nymph, for succour she is fled,
Which her doth cherish, and most holdeth deare,
In her sweet bosome she hath built her Nest,
And from the World, there doth she live at rest.
This is that Nymph, on that great Westerne Waste
Her Flocks far whither then the driven Snow,
Faire Shepherdesse, cleere
A River running by Wilton,
neere to the Plaine of Salisburie.
Willies bankes that grac'd,
Yet she them both for purenesse doth out-goe:
To whom all Shepheards dedicate their Layes,
And on her Altars offer up their Bayes.
Sister, sometime she to that Shepheard was,
That yet for piping never had his Peere,
Elphin, that did all other Swaines surpasse,
To whom she was of living things most deare,
And on his Death-bed by his latest Will,
To her bequeth'd the Secrets of his Skill.
Gorbo.
May we yet hope then in their weaker kind,
That there be some, poore Shepheards that respect:
The World else universally inclin'd,
To such an inconsiderate neglect,
And the rude times their ord'rous matter fling,
Into the sacred and once hallowed Spring.
Women be weake, and subject most to change,
Nor long to any can they stedfast bee,
And as their Eyes, their Minds doe ever range,
With every object varying that they see:
Think'st thou in them that possibly can live,
Which Nature most denyeth them to give?
No other is the stedfastnesse of those,
On whom even Nature will us to rely,
Fraile is it that the Elements compose,
Such is the state of all mortalitie,
That as the humour in the bloud doth move,
Lastly doe hate, what lately they did love.
So did great Olcon, which a Phœbus seem'd,
Whom all good Shepheards gladly flock'd about,
And as a God of Rowland was esteem'd,
Which to his prayse drew all the rurall Rout:
For, after Rowland, as it had beene Pan,
Onely to Olcon every Shepheard ran.
But he forsakes the Heard-groome and his Flocks,
Nor of his Bag-pipes takes at all no keepe,
But to the sterne Wolfe and deceitfull Fox,
Leaves the poore Shepheard and his harmelesse Sheepe,
And all those Rimes that he of Olcon sung,
The Swayne disgrac'd, participate his wrong.
Perkin.
Then since the Worlds distemp'rature is such,
And Man made blind by her deceitfull show,
Small Vertue in their weaker Sexe is much,
And to it in them much the Muses owe,
And praysing some may happily inflame,
Others in time with liking of the same.
As those two Sisters most discreetly wise,
That Vertues hests religiously obey,
Whose prayse my skill is wanting to comprize,
Th'eld'st of which is that good Panape,
In shadie Arden her deare Flocke that keepes,
Where mournefull Ankor
A River in the
Confines of Warwick and Lestershire, in some
parts deviding the Shires.
for her sicknesse weepes.
The yonger then, her Sister not lesse good,
Bred where the other lastly doth abide,
Modest Idea, flowre of Womanhood,
That Rowland hath so highly Deifide:
Whom Phœbus Daughters worthily prefer,
And give their gifts aboundantly to her.
Driving her Flocks up to the fruitfull
A Mountaine neer Cotswold.
Meene,
Which daily lookes upon the lovely Stowre,
Neere to that
Vale, which of all Vales is Queene,
Lastly, forsaking of her former Bowre:
And of all places holdeth Cotswold deere,
Which now is proud, because shee lives it neere.
Then is deere Sylvia one the best alive,
That once in
A part of Staffordshire,
famous for breeding Cattell.
Moreland by the silver Trent,
Her harmelesse Flockes as harmelesly did drive,
But now allured to the Fields of Kent:
The faithfull'st Nymph where ever that shee wonne,
That at this day, doth live under the Sunne.
Neere
A River falling
at Dertford, into the Thames.
Ravensburne in Cotage low shee lyes,
There now content her calme repose to take,
The perfect cleerenesse of whose lovely eyes,
Hath oft inforc'd the Shepheards to forsake
Their Flocks, and Folds, and on her set their keepe,
Yet her chaste thoughts still settled on her Sheepe.
Then that deare Nymph that in the Muses joyes,
That in wild
A Forrest in Lestershire.
Charnwood with her Flocks doth goe,
Mirtilla, Sister to those hopefull Boyes,
My loved Thirsis, and sweet Palmeo:
That oft to
A River under the same Forrest.
Soar the Southerne Shepheards bring,
Of whose cleere waters they divinely sing.
So good shee is, so good likewise they bee,
As none to her might brother be but they,
Nor none a Sister unto them, but shee,
To them for wit few like, I dare well say:
In them as nature truely meant to show,
How neere the first, shee in the last could goe.
Gorbo.
Shepheard, their prayse thou dost so cleerely sing,
That even when Groves their Nightingales shall want,
Nor Valleyes heard with rurall notes to ring:
And every-where when Shepheards shall be scant:
Their names shall live from memorie unrazed,
Of many a Nymph and gentle Shepheards praised.
