Schola Cordis or the Heart of it Selfe, gone away from God ::

Oh that mine heart had wings like to a Dove,
That I might quickly hasten hence, and move
With speedy flight tow'rds the celestiall spheares,
As weary of this world, its faults, and feares!

Ode. 38.

1

This way, though pleasant, yet me thinks is long:
Step after step makes little haste,
And I am not so strong
As still to last
Among
So great
So many lets:
Swelter'd and swill'd in sweat
My toyling soule both fumes and frets,
As though she were inclin'd to a retreat.

2

Corruption clogs my feet like filthy clay,
And I am ready still to slip:
Which makes me often stay,
When I should trip
Away.
My feares

154

And faults, are such,
As challenge all my teares
So justly, that it were not much,
If I in weeping should spend all my yeares.

3

This makes me weary of the world below,
And greedy of a place above,
On which I may bestow,
My choisest love,
And so
Obtaine
That favour, which
Excells all worldly gaine,
And maketh the possessour rich,
In happinesse of a transcendent straine.

4

What? must I still be rooted here below,
And riveted unto the ground,
Wherein mine haste to grow
Will be though sound,
But slow?
I know
The Sunne exhales
Grosse vapours from below,
Which, scorning as it were the Vales,
On mountaine-topping clouds themselves bestow.

5

But my fault-frozen heart is slow to move,
Makes poore proceedings at the best,
As though it did not love,
Nor long for rest
Above.
Mine eyes
Can upward looke,

155

As though they did despise
All things on earth, and could not brooke
Their presence: but mine heart is slow to rise.

6

Oh that it were once winged like the Dove,
That in a moment mounts on high,
Then should it soone remove,
Where it may ly
In love.
And loe,
This one desire
Me thinks hath imp'd it so,
That it already flies like fire,
And ev'n my verses into wings doe grow.

University of Virginia Library

The flying of the Heart.

Epigr. 38.

Ode. 38.

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