University of Virginia Library

Ostella asking me how I liked a painted Lady came to see her.

VVhy I will tell thee: Is that face her own,
she makes so much on't, or takes't up on Loan?
I promise if't be so, she doth deserve
to have it lent again, she doth preserve
It with such care, but this is jest. I know
she is a painted cloath, a Puppet show;
I must confesse when she unvail'd, I stood
in such amazement as though made of Wood:
Perhaps she did conceive as much, just so
when Persius did uncase unto his foe
Medusa's head, they were transform'd as I
beholding her strange Metamorphosie.
I'm sure my Heart was Marble; I forgot
all civill manners, and saluted not:
I might have prejudic'd her, if I had,
kist off her colours, then she had been mad:
And I did ow such dear regard to thee,
because she was thy friend so Wise to be.
Shee was thy foil, Ostella, for, when I,
compar'd with hers thy Native Livery,
Finding hers false, and she to Art was more,
beholding, than Nature for that poor
Decaying Pride, which the least Air doth vade,
I blest my fortune that by thee was made:
'Twere Sin to doubt her inside cause, with thee
she doth converse the Soul of Piety.
Yet be she what she wil, this joyes my Heart,
Thou art the Pride of Nature not of Art.