Divine poems :: :: University of Virginia Library

No sooner was the Brides attentive eares
Resolv'd, and pleas'd; but her impetuous fears
Cals in the Bridemen; and to them betraid,
The secret of the Riddle thus, and said:

You Sonnes of Thunder; Twas not the loud noise
Of your provoking threats, nor the soft voice
Of my prevailing feares, that thus addrest
My yeelding heart to grant your forc'd request;
Your language needed not have bin so rough
To speake too much, when lesse had bin enough:
Your speech at first was hony in mine eare;
At length, it prov'd a Lyon, and did teare
My wounded soule: It sought to force me to
What your entreaties wsre more apt to doe:
Know then (to keepe your lingring eares no longer
From what ye long to heare;) Ther's nothing stronger
Then a fierce Lyon: Nothing more can greet
Your pleased palats, with a greater sweet,
Then Hony: But more fully to expound,
In a dead Lyon, there was Hony found.

Now when the Sun was welking in the West,
Whose fall determines both the day, and Feast)

326

The hopefull Bridegroome (he whose smiling brow
Assur'd his hopes a speedy Conquest now)
Even thirsting for victorious Triumph, brake
The crafty silence of his lips, and spake:

The time is come whose latest hower ends
Our nuptiall Feast, and fairely recommends
The wreathe of Conquest to the victors brow:
Say, Is the Riddle read? Expound it now;
And, for your paines, these hands shall soone resigne
Your conquer'd prize: If not, The prize is mine:
With that, they join'd their whispring heads, and made
A Speaker; who in louder language, said;

Of all the sweets that ere were knowne,
Theres none so pleasing be,
As those rare dainties which doe crowne
The labour of the Bee:
Of all the creatures in the field;
That ever man set eye on,
There's none, whose power doth not yeeld
Vnto the stronger Lyon.

Where to th'offended Challenger, whose eye
Proclaim'd a quicke Revenge, made this reply:
No Hony's sweeter then a womans tongue;
And, when she list, Lyons are not so strong:
How thrice accurs'd are they, that doe fulfill
The lewd desiers of a womans will!
How more accurs'd is he, that doth impart
His bosome-secrets to a womans heart;
They plead like Angell, and, like Crocadiles,
Kill with their teares; They murther with their smiles:
How weake a thing is woman? Nay how weake
Is senslesse Man, that will be urg'd to breake
His counsells in her eare, that hath no power
To make secure a secret, for an hower!

327

No, Victors, no: Had not a womans minde
Bin faithlesse, and vnconstant, as the winde,
My Riddle had, till now, a Riddle bin;
You might have mus'd, and mist; and mus'd ag'n,
When the next day had heav'd his golden heat
From the soft pillow of his Sea-greene bed;
And, with his rising glory, had possest
The spatious borders of th'enlightened East,
Samson arose, and in a rage, went downe
(By heaven directed) to a neighbring towne:
His choller was inflam'd, and from his eye
The sudden flashes of his wrath did flye,
Palenesse was in his cheekes, and from his breath,
There flew the fierce Embassadours of death;
He heav'd his hand, and where it fell, it slew:
He spent, and still his forces would renew:
His quick-redoubled blowes fell thick as thunder:
And, whom he tooke alive, he tore in sunder:
His arme nere mist: And often, at a blow,
He made a Widow, and an Orphane too:
Here, it divides the Father from the child,
The husband from his Wife: there, it dispoild
The friend on's friend, the Sister of her brother:
And, oft, with one man, he would thrash another:
Where never was, he made a little flood,
And where there was no Kin, he joyn'd in blood,
Wherein, his ruthlesse hands he did imbrue:
Thrice ten, before he scarce could breath, he slue:
Their upper Garments, which he tooke away,
Were all the spoyles the Victor had, that day:
Wherewith, he quit the wagers that he lost,
Paying Philistians, with Philistians cost:
And thus, at length, with blood he did asswage,
But yet not quench the fier of his rage,

328

For now the thought of his disloyall wife,
In his sad soule, renew'd a second strife,
From whom, for feare his fury should recoile,
He thought most fit t'absent himselfe a while;
Vnto his fathers Tent, he now return'd;
Where, his divided passion rag'd, and mourn'd;
In part, he mourned; and, he rag'd, in part,
To see so faire a face; so false a heart:
But marke the mischiefe that his absence brings;
His bed's defiled, and the nuptiall strings
Are stretcht and crackt: A second love doth smother
The first; And she is wedded to another.