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I. PART I. THE POEMS OF SIR WALTER RALEIGH

NOW FIRST COLLECTED AND AUTHENTICATED.

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I. WALTER RAWELY OF THE MIDDLE TEMPLE

IN COMMENDATION OF THE STEEL GLASS.

(1576.)
Sweet were the sauce would please each kind of taste;
The life likewise were pure that never swerved:
For spiteful tongues in cankered stomachs placed
Deem worst of things which best (percase) deserved.
But what for that? This medicine may suffice
To scorn the rest, and seek to please the wise.
Though sundry minds in sundry sort do deem,
Yet worthiest wights yield praise for every pain;
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But envious brains do nought, or light, esteem
Such stately steps as they cannot attain:
For whoso reaps renown above the rest,
With heaps of hate shall surely be oppressed.
Wherefore, to write my censure of this book,
This Glass of Steel unpartially doth show
Abuses all to such as in it look,
From prince to poor, from high estate to low.
As for the verse, who list like trade to try,
I fear me much, shall hardly reach so high.

II. THE EXCUSE.

WRITTEN BY SIR WALTER RALEIGH IN HIS YOUNGER YEARS.

Calling to mind, my eyes went long about
To cause my heart for to forsake my breast,
All in a rage I sought to pull them out,
As who had been such traitors to my rest:
5

What could they say to win again my grace?—
Forsooth, that they had seen my mistress' face.
Another time, my heart I called to mind,—
Thinking that he this woe on me had brought,
Because that he to love his force resigned,
When of such wars my fancy never thought:
What could he say when I would him have slain?—
That he was hers, and had forgone my chain.
At last, when I perceived both eyes and heart
Excuse themselves, as guiltless of my ill,
I found myself the cause of all my smart,
And told myself that I myself would kill:
Yet when I saw myself to you was true,
I loved myself, because myself loved you.

III. AN EPITAPH

UPON THE RIGHT HONOURABLE SIR PHILIP SIDNEY, KNIGHT, LORD GOVERNOR OF FLUSHING. (Died Oct. 7, 1586.)

To praise thy life or wail thy worthy death,
And want thy wit,—thy wit high, pure, divine,—
Is far beyond the power of mortal line,
Nor any one hath worth that draweth breath;
6

Yet rich in zeal (though poor in learning's lore),
And friendly care obscured in secret breast,
And love that envy in thy life suppressed,—
Thy dear life done,—and death hath doubled more.
And I, that in thy time and living state
Did only praise thy virtues in my thought,
As one that seeld the rising sun hath sought,
With words and tears now wail thy timeless fate.
Drawn was thy race aright from princely line;
Nor less than such, by gifts that nature gave,—
The common mother that all creatures have,—
Doth virtue show, and princely lineage shine.
A king gave thee thy name; a kingly mind,—
That God thee gave,—who found it now too dear
For this base world, and hath resumed it near
To sit in skies, and sort with powers divine.
Kent thy birth-days, and Oxford held thy youth;
The heavens made haste, and stayed nor years nor time;
The fruits of age grew ripe in thy first prime;
Thy will, thy words; thy words the seals of truth.
Great gifts and wisdom rare employed thee thence,
To treat from kings with those more great than kings;
Such hope men had to lay the highest things
On thy wise youth, to be transported hence.
Whence to sharp wars sweet honour did thee call,
Thy country's love, religion, and thy friends;
Of worthy men the marks, the lives, and ends,
And her defence, for whom we labour all.
7

There didst thou vanquish shame and tedious age,
Grief, sorrow, sickness, and base fortune's might;
Thy rising day saw never woeful night,
But passed with praise from off this worldly stage.
Back to the camp by thee that day was brought,
First thine own death; and after thy long fame;
Tears to the soldiers; the proud Castilian's shame;
Virtue expressed, and honour truly taught.
What hath he lost that such great grace hath won?
Young years for endless years, and hope unsure
Of fortune's gifts for wealth that still shall dure:
O happy race, with so great praises run!
England doth hold thy limbs, that bred the same;
Flanders thy valour, where it last was tried;
The camp thy sorrow, where thy body died;
Thy friends thy want; the world thy virtue's fame;
Nations thy wit; our minds lay up thy love;
Letters thy learning; thy loss years long to come;
In worthy hearts sorrow hath made thy tomb;
Thy soul and spright enrich the heavens above.
Thy liberal heart embalmed in grateful tears,
Young sighs, sweet sighs, sage sighs, bewail thy fall;
Envy her sting, and spite hath left her gall;
Malice herself a mourning garment wears.
That day their Hannibal died, our Scipio fell,—
Scipio, Cicero, and Petrarch of our time;
Whose virtues, wounded by my worthless rhyme,
Let angels speak, and heaven thy praises tell.
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IV. A VISION UPON THIS CONCEIT OF THE FAIRY QUEEN.

(1590.)
Methought I saw the grave where Laura lay,
Within that temple where the vestal flame
Was wont to burn: and, passing by that way,
To see that buried dust of living fame,
Whose tomb fair Love and fairer Virtue kept,
All suddenly I saw the Fairy Queen,
At whose approach the soul of Petrarch wept;
And from thenceforth those graces were not seen,
For they this Queen attended; in whose stead
Oblivion laid him down on Laura's hearse.
Hereat the hardest stones were seen to bleed,
And groans of buried ghosts the heavens did pierce:
Where Homer's spright did tremble all for grief,
And cursed the access of that celestial thief.
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V. ANOTHER OF THE SAME.

(1590.)
The praise of meaner wits this work like profit brings,
As doth the cuckoo's song delight when Philumena sings.
If thou hast formed right true virtue's face herein,
Virtue herself can best discern, to whom they written bin.
If thou hast beauty praised, let her sole looks divine
Judge if aught therein be amiss, and mend it by her eine.
If Chastity want aught, or Temperance her due,
Behold her princely mind aright, and write thy Queen anew.
Meanwhile she shall perceive how far her virtues soar
Above the reach of all that live, or such as wrote of yore:
And thereby will excuse and favour thy good will,
Whose virtue cannot be expressed but by an angel's quill.
Of me no lines are loved nor letters are of price,
Of all which speak our English tongue, but those of thy device.
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VI. REPLY TO MARLOWE.
[_]
Marlowe's Song. THE PASSIONATE SHEPHERD TO HIS LOVE.
(Before 1593.)
Come live with me, and be my love;
And we will all the pleasures prove
That hills and valleys, dales and fields,
Woods, or steepy mountain yields.
And we will sit upon the rocks,
Seeing the shepherds feed their flocks
By shallow rivers, to whose falls
Melodious birds sing madrigals.
And I will make thee beds of roses,
And a thousand fragrant posies;
A cap of flowers, and a kirtle
Embroidered all with leaves of myrtle;
A gown made of the finest wool
Which from our pretty lambs we pull;
Fair-lined slippers for the cold,
With buckles of the purest gold;
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A belt of straw and ivy-buds,
With coral clasps and amber-studs:
And if these pleasures may thee move,
Come love with me, and be my love.
The shepherd-swains shall dance and sing
For thy delight each May-morning;
If these delights thy mind may move,
Then live with me, and be my love.

(Before 1599.)
If all the world and love were young,
And truth in every shepherd's tongue,
These pretty pleasures might me move
To live with thee and be thy love.
But time drives flocks from field to fold,
When rivers rage and rocks grow cold;
And Philomel becometh dumb;
The rest complains of cares to come.
The flowers do fade, and wanton fields
To wayward winter reckoning yields:
A honey tongue, a heart of gall,
Is fancy's spring, but sorrow's fall.
12

Thy gowns, thy shoes, thy beds of roses,
Thy cap, thy kirtle, and thy posies,
Soon break, soon wither, soon forgotten,—
In folly ripe, in reason rotten.
Thy belt of straw and ivy buds,
Thy coral clasps and amber studs,—
All those in me no means can move
To come to thee and be thy love.
But could youth last, and love still breed;
Had joys no date, nor age no need;
Then those delights my mind might move
To live with thee and be thy love.

VII. LIKE HERMIT POOR.

(Before 1593.)
Like hermit poor in pensive place obscure
I mean to spend my days of endless doubt,
To wail such woes as time cannot recure,
Where nought but love shall ever find me out.
And at my gates despair shall linger still,
To let in death when love and fortune will.
13

A gown of grief my body shall attire,
And broken hope shall be my strength and stay;
And late repentance, linked with long desire,
Shall be the couch whereon my limbs I'll lay.
And at my gates despair shall linger still,
To let in death when love and fortune will.
My food shall be of care and sorrow made;
My drink nought else but tears fallen from mine eyes;
And for my light, in such obscured shade,
The flames may serve which from my heart arise.
And at my gates despair shall linger still,
To let in death when love and fortune will.

VIII. FAREWELL TO THE COURT.

(Before 1593.)
Like truthless dreams, so are my joys expired,
And past return are all my dandled days,
My love misled, and fancy quite retired;
Of all which past, the sorrow only stays.
14

My lost delights, now clean from sight of land,
Have left me all alone in unknown ways,
My mind to woe, my life in fortune's hand;
Of all which past, the sorrow only stays.
As in a country strange without companion,
I only wail the wrong of death's delays,
Whose sweet spring spent, whose summer well nigh done;
Of all which past, the sorrow only stays;
Whom care forewarns, ere age and winter cold,
To haste me hence to find my fortune's fold.

IX. THE ADVICE.

Many desire, but few or none deserve
To win the fort of thy most constant will;
Therefore take heed; let fancy never swerve
But unto him that will defend thee still:
For this be sure, the fort of fame once won,
Farewell the rest, thy happy days are done!
Many desire, but few or none deserve
To pluck the flowers, and let the leaves to fall;
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Therefore take heed; let fancy never swerve
But unto him that will take leaves and all:
For this be sure, the flower once plucked away,
Farewell the rest, thy happy days decay!
Many desire, but few or none deserve
To cut the corn, not subject to the sickle;
Therefore take heed; let fancy never swerve,
But constant stand, for mowers' minds are fickle;
For this be sure, the crop being once obtained,
Farewell the rest, the soil will be disdained.

X. IN THE GRACE OF WIT, OF TONGUE, AND FACE.

(Before 1593.)
Her face, her tongue, her wit, so fair, so sweet, so sharp,
First bent, then drew, now hit, mine eye, mine ear, my heart:
Mine eye, mine ear, my heart, to like, to learn, to love,
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Her face, her tongue, her wit, doth lead, doth teach, doth move:
Her face, her tongue, her wit, with beams, with sound, with art,
Doth blind, doth charm, doth rule, mine eye, mine ear, my heart.
Mine eye, mine ear, my heart, with life, with hope, with skill,
Her face, her tongue, her wit, doth feed, doth feast, doth fill:
O face, O tongue, O wit, with frowns, with cheeks, with smart,
Wring not, vex not, wound not, mine eye, mine ear, my heart:
This eye, this ear, this heart, shall joy, shall bind, shall swear
Your face, your tongue, your wit, to serve, to love, to fear.

XI. FAIN WOULD I, BUT I DARE NOT.

Fain would I, but I dare not; I dare, and yet I may not;
I may, although I care not, for pleasure when I play not.
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You laugh because you like not; I jest whenas I joy not;
You pierce, although you strike not; I strike and yet annoy not.
I spy, whenas I speak not; for oft I speak and speed not;
But of my wounds you reck not, because you see they bleed not:
Yet bleed they where you see not, but you the pain endure not:
Of noble mind they be not that ever kill and cure not.
I see, whenas I view not; I wish, although I crave not;
I serve, and yet I sue not; I hope for that I have not;
I catch, although I hold not; I burn, although I flame not;
I seem, whenas I would not; and when I seem, I am not.
Yours am I, though I seem not, and will be, though I show not;
Mine outward deeds then deem not, when mine intent you know not;
But if my serving prove not most sure, although I sue not,
Withdraw your mind and love not, nor of my ruin rue not.
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XII. SIR WALTER RALEIGH TO HIS SON.

Three things there be that prosper all apace,
And flourish while they are asunder far;
But on a day, they meet all in a place,
And when they meet, they one another mar.
And they be these; the Wood, the Weed, the Wag:
The Wood is that that makes the gallows tree;
The Weed is that that strings the hangman's bag;
The Wag, my pretty knave, betokens thee.
Now mark, dear boy—while these assemble not,
Green springs the tree, hemp grows, the wag is wild;
But when they meet, it makes the timber rot,
It frets the halter, and it chokes the child.
God Bless the Child!
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XIII. ON THE CARDS AND DICE.

Before the sixth day of the next new year,
Strange wonders in this kingdom shall appear:
Four kings shall be assembled in this isle,
Where they shall keep great tumult for awhile.
Many men then shall have an end of crosses,
And many likewise shall sustain great losses;
Many that now full joyful are and glad,
Shall at that time be sorrowful and sad;
Full many a Christian's heart shall quake for fear,
The dreadful sound of trump when he shall hear.
Dead bones shall then be tumbled up and down,
In every city and in every town.
By day or night this tumult shall not cease,
Until an herald shall proclaim a peace;
An herald strong, the like was never born,
Whose very beard is flesh and mouth is horn.
Sr Wal. R.
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XIV. THE SILENT LOVER.

Passions are likened best to floods and streams:
The shallow murmur, but the deep are dumb;
So, when affections yield discourse, it seems
The bottom is but shallow whence they come.
They that are rich in words, in words discover
That they are poor in that which makes a lover.
Wrong not, sweet empress of my heart,
The merit of true passion,
With thinking that he feels no smart,
That sues for no compassion;
Since, if my plaints serve not to approve
The conquest of thy beauty,
It comes not from defect of love,
But from excess of duty.
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For, knowing that I sue to serve
A saint of such perfection,
As all desire, but none deserve,
A place in her affection,
I rather choose to want relief
Than venture the revealing;
Where glory recommends the grief,
Despair distrusts the healing.
Thus those desires that aim too high
For any mortal lover,
When reason cannot make them die,
Discretion doth them cover.
Yet, when discretion doth bereave
The plaints that they should utter,
Then thy discretion may perceive
That silence is a suitor.
Silence in love bewrays more woe
Than words, though ne'er so witty:
A beggar that is dumb, you know,
May challenge double pity.
Then wrong not, dearest to my heart,
My true, though secret, passion:
He smarteth most that hides his smart,
And sues for no compassion.
Sr W. R.
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XV. A POESY TO PROVE AFFECTION IS NOT LOVE.

(Before 1602.)
Conceit, begotten by the eyes,
Is quickly born and quickly dies;
For while it seeks our hearts to have,
Meanwhile, there reason makes his grave;
For many things the eyes approve,
Which yet the heart doth seldom love.
For as the seeds in spring time sown
Die in the ground ere they be grown,
Such is conceit, whose rooting fails,
As child that in the cradle quails;
Or else within the mother's womb
Hath his beginning and his tomb.
Affection follows Fortune's wheels,
And soon is shaken from her heels;
For, following beauty or estate,
Her liking still is turned to hate;
For all affections have their change,
And fancy only loves to range.
Desire himself runs out of breath,
And, getting, doth but gain his death:
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Desire nor reason hath nor rest,
And, blind, doth seldom choose the best:
Desire attained is not desire,
But as the cinders of the fire.
As ships in ports desired are drowned,
As fruit, once ripe, then falls to ground,
As flies that seek for flames are brought
To cinders by the flames they sought;
So fond desire when it attains,
The life expires, the woe remains.
And yet some poets fain would prove
Affection to be perfect love;
And that desire is of that kind,
No less a passion of the mind;
As if wild beasts and men did seek
To like, to love, to choose alike.
W. R.

XVI. THE LIE.

(Certainly before 1608; possibly before 1596.)
Go, Soul, the body's guest,
Upon a thankless arrant:
Fear not to touch the best;
The truth shall be thy warrant:
24

Go, since I needs must die,
And give the world the lie.
Say to the court, it glows
And shines like rotten wood;
Say to the church, it shows
What's good, and doth no good:
If church and court reply,
Then give them both the lie.
Tell potentates, they live
Acting by others' action;
Not loved unless they give,
Not strong but by a faction:
If potentates reply,
Give potentates the lie.
Tell men of high condition,
That manage the estate,
Their purpose is ambition,
Their practice only hate:
And if they once reply,
Then give them all the lie.
25

Tell them that brave it most,
They beg for more by spending,
Who, in their greatest cost,
Seek nothing but commending:
And if they make reply,
Then give them all the lie.
Tell zeal it wants devotion;
Tell love it is but lust;
Tell time it is but motion;
Tell flesh it is but dust:
And wish them not reply,
For thou must give the lie.
Tell age it daily wasteth;
Tell honour how it alters;
Tell beauty how she blasteth;
Tell favour how it falters:
And as they shall reply,
Give every one the lie.
Tell wit how much it wrangles
In tickle points of niceness;
Tell wisdom she entangles
Herself in over-wiseness:
And when they do reply,
Straight give them both the lie.
Tell physic of her boldness;
Tell skill it is pretension;
Tell charity of coldness;
Tell law it is contention:
And as they do reply,
So give them still the lie.
26

Tell fortune of her blindness;
Tell nature of decay;
Tell friendship of unkindness;
Tell justice of delay:
And if they will reply,
Then give them all the lie.
Tell arts they have no soundness,
But vary by esteeming;
Tell schools they want profoundness,
And stand too much on seeming:
If arts and schools reply,
Give arts and schools the lie.
Tell faith it's fled the city;
Tell how the country erreth;
Tell manhood shakes off pity;
Tell virtue least preferreth:
And if they do reply,
Spare not to give the lie.
So when thou hast, as I
Commanded thee, done blabbing,—
Although to give the lie
Deserves no less than stabbing,—
Stab at thee he that will,
No stab the soul can kill.
27

XVII. SIR WALTER RALEIGH'S PILGRIMAGE.

(Circ. 1603?)
Give me my scallop-shell of quiet,
My staff of faith to walk upon,
My scrip of joy, immortal diet,
My bottle of salvation,
My gown of glory, hope's true gage;
And thus I'll take my pilgrimage.
Blood must be my body's balmer;
No other balm will there be given;
Whilst my soul, like quiet palmer,
Travelleth towards the land of heaven;
Over the silver mountains,
Where spring the nectar fountains:
There will I kiss
The bowl of bliss;
And drink mine everlasting fill
Upon every milken hill.
My soul will be a-dry before;
But after, it will thirst no more.
28

Then by that happy blissful day,
More peaceful pilgrims I shall see,
That have cast off their rags of clay,
And walk apparelled fresh like me.
I'll take them first
To quench their thirst
And taste of nectar suckets,
At those clear wells
Where sweetness dwells,
Drawn up by saints in crystal buckets.
And when our bottles and all we
Are filled with immortality,
Then the blessed paths we'll travel,
Strowed with rubies thick as gravel;
Ceilings of diamonds, sapphire floors,
High walls of coral and pearly bowers.
From thence to heaven's bribeless hall,
Where no corrupted voices brawl;
No conscience molten into gold,
No forged accuser bought or sold,
No cause deferred, no vain-spent journey,
For there Christ is the king's Attorney,
Who pleads for all without degrees,
And He hath angels, but no fees.
And when the grand twelve-million jury
Of our sins, with direful fury,
Against our souls black verdicts give,
Christ pleads His death, and then we live.
Be Thou my speaker, taintless pleader,
Unblotted lawyer, true proceeder!
Thou givest salvation even for alms;
Not with a bribed lawyer's palms.
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And this is mine eternal plea
To Him that made heaven, earth, and sea,
That, since my flesh must die so soon,
And want a head to dine next noon,
Just at the stroke, when my veins start and spread,
Set on my soul an everlasting head!
Then am I ready, like a palmer fit,
To tread those blest paths which before I writ.
Of death and judgment, heaven and hell,
Who oft doth think, must needs die well.

XVIII.

[What is our life? The play of passion.]

What is our life? The play of passion.
Our mirth? The music of division:
Our mothers' wombs the tiring-houses be,
Where we are dressed for life's short comedy.
The earth the stage; Heaven the spectator is,
Who sits and views whosoe'er doth act amiss.
The graves which hide us from the scorching sun
Are like drawn curtains when the play is done.
Thus playing post we to our latest rest,
And then we die in earnest, not in jest.
Sr W. R.
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XIX. TO THE TRANSLATOR OF LUCAN.

(1614.)
Had Lucan hid the truth to please the time,
He had been too unworthy of thy pen,
Who never sought nor ever cared to climb
By flattery, or seeking worthless men.
For this thou hast been bruised; but yet those scars
Do beautify no less than those wounds do,
Received in just and in religious wars;
Though thou hast bled by both, and bearest them too.
Change not! To change thy fortune 'tis too late:
Who with a manly faith resolves to die,
May promise to himself a lasting state,
Though not so great, yet free from infamy.
Such was thy Lucan, whom so to translate,
Nature thy muse like Lucan's did create.
W. R.
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XX. CONTINUATION OF THE LOST POEM, CYNTHIA
[_]

NOW FIRST PUBLISHED FROM THE HATFIELD MSS.

(1604–1618?)

I.

If Cynthia be a Queen, a princess, and supreme,
Keep these among the rest, or say it was a dream;
For those that like, expound, and those that loathe, express
Meanings according as their minds are moved more or less.
For writing what thou art, or showing what thou were,
Adds to the one disdain, to the other but despair.
Thy mind of neither needs, in both seeing it exceeds.

II.

My body in the walls captived
Feels not the wounds of spiteful envy;
But my thralled mind, of liberty deprived,
Fast fettered in her ancient memory,
Doth nought behold but sorrow's dying face:
Such prison erst was so delightful,
As it desired no other dwelling place:
But time's effects and destinies despiteful
32

Have changed both my keeper and my fare.
Love's fire and beauty's light I then had store;
But now, close kept, as captives wonted are,
That food, that heat, that light, I find no more.
Despair bolts up my doors; and I alone
Speak to dead walls; but those hear not my moan.

III. THE 21ST AND LAST BOOK OF THE OCEAN, TO CYNTHIA.

Sufficeth it to you, my joys interred,
In simple words that I my woes complain;
You that then died when first my fancy erred,—
Joys under dust that never live again?
If to the living were my muse addressed,
Or did my mind her own spirit still inhold,
Were not my living passion so repressed
As to the dead the dead did these unfold,
Some sweeter words, some more becoming verse
Should witness my mishap in higher kind;
But my love's wounds, my fancy in the hearse,
The idea but resting of a wasted mind,
The blossoms fallen, the sap gone from the tree,
The broken monuments of my great desires,—
From these so lost what may the affections be?
What heat in cinders of extinguished fires?
33

Lost in the mud of those high-flowing streams,
Which through more fairer fields their courses bend,
Slain with self-thoughts, amazed in fearful dreams,
Woes without date, discomforts without end:
From fruit[less] trees I gather withered leaves,
And glean the broken ears with miser's hand,
Who sometime did enjoy the weighty sheaves;
I seek fair flowers amid the brinish sand.
All in the shade, even in the fair sun days,
Under those healthless trees I sit alone,
Where joyful birds sing neither lovely lays,
Nor Philomen recounts her direful moan.
No feeding flocks, no shepherd's company,
That might renew my dolorous conceit,
While happy then, while love and fantasy
Confined my thoughts on that fair flock to wait;
No pleasing streams fast to the ocean wending,
The messengers sometimes of my great woe;
But all on earth, as from the cold storms bending,
Shrink from my thoughts in high heavens or below.
Oh, hopeful love, my object and invention,
Oh, true desire, the spur of my conceit,
Oh, worthiest spirit, my mind's impulsion,
Oh, eyes transpersant, my affection's bait;
Oh, princely form, my fancy's adamant,
Divine conceit, my pains' acceptance,
Oh, all in one! oh, heaven on earth transparent!
The seat of joys and love's abundance!
34

Out of that mass of miracles, my muse
Gathered those flowers, to her pure sense pleasing;
Out of her eyes, the store of joys, did choose
Equal delights, my sorrow's counterpoising.
Her regal looks my vigorous sighs suppressed;
Small drops of joys sweetened great worlds of woes;
One gladsome day a thousand cares redressed;—
Whom love defends, what fortune overthrows?
When she did well, what did there else amiss?
When she did ill, what empires would have pleased?
No other power effecting woe or bliss,
She gave, she took, she wounded, she appeased.
The honour of her love love still devising,
Wounding my mind with contrary conceit,
Transferred itself sometime to her aspiring,
Sometime the trumpet of her thought's retreat.
To seek new worlds for gold, for praise, for glory,
To try desire, to try love severed far,
When I was gone, she sent her memory,
More strong than were ten thousand ships of war;
To call me back, to leave great honour's thought,
To leave my friends, my fortune, my attempt;
To leave the purpose I so long had sought,
And hold both cares and comforts in contempt.
Such heat in ice, such fire in frost remained,
Such trust in doubt, such comfort in despair,
Which, like the gentle lamb, though lately weaned,
Plays with the dug, though finds no comfort there.
35

But as a body, violently slain,
Retaineth warmth although the spirit be gone,
And by a power in nature moves again
Till it be laid below the fatal stone;
Or as the earth, even in cold winter days,
Left for a time by her life-giving sun,
Doth by the power remaining of his rays
Produce some green, though not as it hath done;
Or as a wheel, forced by the falling stream,
Although the course be turned some other way,
Doth for a time go round upon the beam,
Till, wanting strength to move, it stands at stay;
So my forsaken heart, my withered mind,—
Widow of all the joys it once possessed,
My hopes clean out of sight with forced wind,
To kingdoms strange, to lands far-off addressed,
Alone, forsaken, friendless, on the shore
With many wounds, with death's cold pangs embraced,
Writes in the dust, as one that could no more,
Whom love, and time, and fortune, had defaced;
Of things so great, so long, so manifold,
With means so weak, the soul even then depicting
The weal, the woe, the passages of old,
And worlds of thoughts described by one last sighing.
As if, when after Phœbus is descended,
And leaves a light much like the past day's dawning,
And, every toil and labour wholly ended,
Each living creature draweth to his resting,
36

We should begin by such a parting light
To write the story of all ages past,
And end the same before the approaching night.
Such is again the labour of my mind,
Whose shroud, by sorrow woven now to end,
Hath seen that ever shining sun declined,
So many years that so could not descend,
But that the eyes of my mind held her beams
In every part transferred by love's swift thought;
Far off or near, in waking or in dreams,
Imagination strong their lustre brought.
Such force her angelic appearance had
To master distance, time, or cruelty;
Such art to grieve, and after to make glad;
Such fear in love, such love in majesty.
My weary lines her memory embalmed;
My darkest ways her eyes make clear as day.
What storms so great but Cynthia's beams appeased?
What rage so fierce, that love could not allay?
Twelve years entire I wasted in this war;
Twelve years of my most happy younger days;
But I in them, and they now wasted are:
“Of all which past, the sorrow only stays.”
So wrote I once, and my mishap foretold,
My mind still feeling sorrowful success;
Even as before a storm the marble cold
Doth by moist tears tempestuous times express,
So felt my heavy mind my harms at hand,
Which my vain thought in vain sought to recure:
At middle day my sun seemed under land,
When any little cloud did it obscure.
37

And as the icicles in a winter's day,
Whenas the sun shines with unwonted warm,
[OMITTED]
[OMITTED]
So did my joys melt into secret tears;
So did my heart dissolve in wasting drops:
And as the season of the year outwears,
And heaps of snow from off the mountain tops
With sudden streams the valleys overflow,
So did the time draw on my more despair:
Then floods of sorrow and whole seas of woe
The banks of all my hope did overbear,
And drowned my mind in depths of misery:
Sometime I died; sometime I was distract,
My soul the stage of fancy's tragedy;
Then furious madness, where true reason lacked,
Wrote what it would, and scourged mine own conceit.
Oh, heavy heart! who can thee witness bear?
What tongue, what pen, could thy tormenting treat,
But thine own mourning thoughts which present were?
What stranger mind believe the meanest part?
What altered sense conceive the weakest woe,
That tare, that rent, that pierced thy sad heart?
And as a man distract, with triple might
Bound in strong chains doth strive and rage in vain,
Till, tired and breathless, he is forced to rest,—
Finds by contention but increase of pain,
And fiery heat inflamed in swollen breast;
38

So did my mind in change of passion
From woe to wrath, from wrath return to woe,
Struggling in vain from love's subjection;
Therefore, all lifeless and all helpless bound,
My fainting spirits sunk, and heart appalled,
My joys and hopes lay bleeding on the ground,
That not long since the highest heaven scaled.
I hated life and cursed destiny;
The thoughts of passed times, like flames of hell,
Kindled afresh within my memory
The many dear achievements that befell
In those prime years and infancy of love,
Which to describe were but to die in writing;
Ah, those I sought, but vainly, to remove,
And vainly shall, by which I perish living.
And though strong reason hold before mine eyes
The images and forms of worlds past,
Teaching the cause why all those flames that rise
From forms external can no longer last,
Than that those seeming beauties hold in prime
Love's ground, his essence, and his empery,
All slaves to age, and vassals unto time,
Of which repentance writes the tragedy:—
But this my heart's desire could not conceive,
Whose love outflew the fastest flying time,
A beauty that can easily deceive
The arrest of years, and creeping age outclimb.
39

A spring of beauties which time ripeth not—
Time that but works on frail mortality;
A sweetness which woe's wrongs outwipeth not,
Whom love hath chose for his divinity;
A vestal fire that burns but never wasteth,
That loseth nought by giving light to all,
That endless shines each where, and endless lasteth,
Blossoms of pride that can nor fade nor fall;
These were those marvellous perfections,
The parents of my sorrow and my envy,
Most deathful and most violent infections;
These be the tyrants that in fetters tie
Their wounded vassals, yet nor kill nor cure,
But glory in their lasting misery—
That, as her beauties would, our woes should dure—
These be the effects of powerful empery.
Yet have these wounders want, which want compassion;
Yet hath her mind some marks of human race;
Yet will she be a woman for a fashion,
So doth she please her virtues to deface.
And like as that immortal power doth seat
An element of waters, to allay
The fiery sunbeams that on earth do beat,
And temper by cold night the heat of day,
So hath perfection, which begat her mind,
Added thereto a change of fantasy,
And left her the affections of her kind,
Yet free from every evil but cruelty.
40

But leave her praise; speak thou of nought but woe;
Write on the tale that sorrow bids thee tell;
Strive to forget, and care no more to know
Thy cares are known, by knowing those too well.
Describe her now as she appears to thee;
Not as she did appear in days fordone:
In love, those things that were no more may be,
For fancy seldom ends where it begun.
And as a stream by strong hand bounded in
From nature's course where it did sometime run,
By some small rent or loose part doth begin
To find escape, till it a way hath won;
Doth then all unawares in sunder tear
The forced bounds, and, raging, run at large
In the ancient channels as they wonted were;
Such is of women's love the careful charge,—
Held and maintained with multitude of woes;
Of long erections such the sudden fall:
One hour diverts, one instant overthrows,
For which our lives, for which our fortune's thrall
So many years those joys have dearly bought;
Of which when our fond hopes do most assure,
All is dissolved; our labours come to nought;
Nor any mark thereof there doth endure:
No more than when small drops of rain do fall
Upon the parched ground by heat updried;
No cooling moisture is perceived at all,
Nor any show or sign of wet doth bide.
41

But as the fields, clothed with leaves and flowers,
The banks of roses smelling precious sweet,
Have but their beauty's date and timely hours,
And then, defaced by winter's cold and sleet,
So far as neither fruit nor form of flower
Stays for a witness what such branches bare,
But as time gave, time did again devour,
And change our rising joy to falling care:
So of affection which our youth presented;
When she that from the sun reaves power and light,
Did but decline her beams as discontented,
Converting sweetest days to saddest night,
All droops, all dies, all trodden under dust,
The person, place, and passages forgotten;
The hardest steel eaten with softest rust,
The firm and solid tree both rent and rotten.
Those thoughts, so full of pleasure and content,
That in our absence were affection's food,
Are razed out and from the fancy rent;
In highest grace and heart's dear care that stood,
Are cast for prey to hatred and to scorn,—
Our dearest treasures and our heart's true joys;
The tokens hung on breast and kindly worn,
Are now elsewhere disposed or held for toys.
And those which then our jealousy removed,
And others for our sakes then valued dear,
The one forgot, the rest are dear beloved,
When all of ours doth strange or vild appear.
42

Those streams seem standing puddles, which before
We saw our beauties in, so were they clear;
Belphœbe's course is now observed no more;
That fair resemblance weareth out of date;
Our ocean seas are but tempestuous waves,
And all things base, that blessed were of late . . . . .
And as a field, wherein the stubble stands
Of harvest past, the ploughman's eye offends;
He tills again, or tears them up with hands,
And throws to fire as foiled and fruitless ends,
And takes delight another seed to sow;
So doth the mind root up all wonted thought,
And scorns the care of our remaining woes;
The sorrows, which themselves for us have wrought,
Are burnt to cinders by new kindled fires;
The ashes are dispersed into the air;
The sighs, the groans of all our past desires
Are clean outworn, as things that never were.
With youth is dead the hope of love's return,
Who looks not back to hear our after-cries:
Where he is not, he laughs at those that mourn;
Whence he is gone, he scorns the mind that dies.
When he is absent, he believes no words;
When reason speaks, he, careless, stops his ears;
Whom he hath left, he never grace affords,
But bathes his wings in our lamenting tears.
Unlasting passion, soon outworn conceit,
Whereon I built, and on so dureless trust!
43

My mind had wounds, I dare not say deceit,
Were I resolved her promise was not just.
Sorrow was my revenge and woe my hate;
I powerless was to alter my desire;
My love is not of time or bound to date;
My heart's internal heat and living fire
Would not, or could, be quenched with sudden showers;
My bound respect was not confined to days;
My vowed faith not set to ended hours;
I love the bearing and not bearing sprays
Which now to others do their sweetness send;
The incarnate, snow-driven white, and purest azure,
Who from high heaven doth on their fields descend,
Filling their barns with grain, and towers with treasure.
Erring or never erring, such is love
As, while it lasteth, scorns the account of those
Seeking but self-contentment to improve,
And hides, if any be, his inward woes,
And will not know, while he knows his own passion,
The often and unjust perseverance
In deeds of love and state, and every action
From that first day and year of their joy's entrace.
But I, unblessed and ill-born creature,
That did embrace the dust her body bearing,
That loved her, both by fancy and by nature,
That drew, even with the milk in my first sucking,
44

Affection from the parent's breast that bare me,
Have found her as a stranger so severe,
Improving my mishap in each degree;
But love was gone: so would I my life were!
A queen she was to me,—no more Belphœbe;
A lion then,—no more a milk-white dove;
A prisoner in her breast I could not be;—
She did untie the gentle chains of love.
[OMITTED]
[OMITTED]
[OMITTED]
Love was no more the love of hiding
All trespass and mischance for her own glory:
It had been such; it was still for the elect;
But I must be the example in love's story;
This was of all forepast the sad effect.
But thou, my weary soul and heavy thought,
Made by her love a burthen to my being,
Dost know my error never was forethought,
Or ever could proceed from sense of loving.
Of other cause if then it had proceeding,
I leave the excuse, sith judgment hath been given;
The limbs divided, sundered, and ableeding,
Cannot complain the sentence was uneven.
This did that nature's wonder, virtue's choice,
The only paragon of time's begetting,
Divine in words, angelical in voice,
That spring of joys, that flower of love's own setting,
45

The idea remaining of those golden ages,
That beauty, braving heavens and earth embalming,
Which after worthless worlds but play on stages,
Such didst thou her long since describe, yet sighing
That thy unable spirit could not find aught,
In heaven's beauties or in earth's delight,
For likeness fit to satisfy thy thought:
But what hath it availed thee so to write?
She cares not for thy praise, who knows not theirs;
It's now an idle labour, and a tale
Told out of time, that dulls the hearer's ears;
A merchandize whereof there is no sale.
Leave them, or lay them up with thy despairs!
She hath resolved, and judged thee long ago.
Thy lines are now a murmuring to her ears,
Like to a falling stream, which, passing slow,
Is wont to nourish sleep and quietness;
So shall thy painful labours be perused,
And draw on rest, which sometime had regard;
But those her cares thy errors have excused.
Thy days fordone have had their day's reward;
So her hard heart, so her estranged mind,
In which above the heavens I once reposed;
So to thy error have her ears inclined,
And have forgotten all thy past deserving,
Holding in mind but only thine offence;
And only now affecteth thy depraving,
And thinks all vain that pleadeth thy defence.
46

Yet greater fancy beauty never bred;
A more desire the heart-blood never nourished;
Her sweetness an affection never fed,
Which more in any age hath ever flourished.
The mind and virtue never have begotten
A firmer love, since love on earth had power;
A love obscured, but cannot be forgotten;
Too great and strong for time's jaws to devour;
Containing such a faith as ages wound not,
Care, wakeful ever of her good estate,
Fear, dreading loss, which sighs and joys not,
A memory of the joys her grace begat;
A lasting gratefulness for those comforts past,
Of which the cordial sweetness cannot die;
These thoughts, knit up by faith, shall ever last;
These time assays, but never can untie,
Whose life once lived in her pearl-like breast,
Whose joys were drawn but from her happiness,
Whose heart's high pleasure, and whose mind's true rest,
Proceeded from her fortune's blessedness;
Who was intentive, wakeful, and dismayed
In fears, in dreams, in feverous jealousy,
Who long in silence served, and obeyed
With secret heart and hidden loyalty,
Which never change to sad adversity,
Which never age, or nature's overthrow,
Which never sickness or deformity,
Which never wasting care or wearing woe,
If subject unto these she could have been,—
47

Which never words or wits malicious,
Which never honour's bait, or world's fame,
Achieved by attempts adventurous,
Or aught beneath the sun or heaven's frame
Can so dissolve, dissever, or destroy
The essential love of no frail parts compounded,
Though of the same now buried be the joy,
The hope, the comfort, and the sweetness ended,
But that the thoughts and memories of these
Work a relapse of passion, and remain
Of my sad heart the sorrow-sucking bees;
The wrongs received, the frowns persuade in vain.
And though these medicines work desire to end,
And are in others the true cure of liking,
The salves that heal love's wounds, and do amend
Consuming woe, and slake our hearty sighing,
They work not so in thy mind's long decease;
External fancy time alone recureth:
All whose effects do wear away with ease
Love of delight, while such delight endureth;
Stays by the pleasure, but no longer stays . . . .
But in my mind so is her love inclosed,
And is thereof not only the best part,
But into it the essence is disposed:
Oh love! (the more my woe) to it thou art
Even as the moisture in each plant that grows;
Even as the sun unto the frozen ground;
Even as the sweetness to the incarnate rose;
Even as the centre in each perfect round:
48

As water to the fish, to men as air,
As heat to fire, as light unto the sun;
Oh love! it is but vain to say thou were;
Ages and times cannot thy power outrun.
Thou art the soul of that unhappy mind
Which, being by nature made an idle thought,
Began even then to take immortal kind,
When first her virtues in thy spirits wrought.
From thee therefore that mover cannot move,
Because it is become thy cause of being;
Whatever error may obscure that love,
Whatever frail effect in mortal living,
Whatever passion from distempered heart,
What absence, time, or injuries effect,
What faithless friends or deep dissembled art
Present to feed her most unkind suspect.
Yet as the air in deep caves underground
Is strongly drawn when violent heat hath vent,
Great clefts therein, till moisture do abound,
And then the same, imprisoned and uppent,
Breaks out in earthquakes tearing all asunder;
So, in the centre of my cloven heart—
My heart, to whom her beauties were such wonder—
Lies the sharp poisoned head of that love's dart
Which, till all break and all dissolve to dust,
Thence drawn it cannot be, or therein known:
There, mixed with my heart-blood, the fretting rust
The better part hath eaten and outgrown.
49

But what of those or these? or what of ought
Of that which was, or that which is, to treat?
What I possess is but the same I sought:
My love was false, my labours were deceit.
Nor less than such they are esteemed to be;
A fraud bought at the price of many woes;
A guile, whereof the profits unto me—
Could it be thought premeditate for those?
Witness those withered leaves left on the tree,
The sorrow-worn face, the pensive mind;
The external shews what may the internal be:
Cold care hath bitten both the root and rind.
But stay, my thoughts, make end: give fortune way:
Harsh is the voice of woe and sorrow's sound:
Complaints cure not, and tears do but allay
Griefs for a time, which after more abound.
To seek for moisture in the Arabian sand
Is but a loss of labour and of rest:
The links which time did break of hearty bands
Words cannot knit, or wailings make anew.
Seek not the sun in clouds when it is set. . . .
On highest mountains, where those cedars grew,
Against whose banks the troubled ocean beat,
And were the marks to find thy hoped port,
Into a soil far off themselves remove.
On Sestus' shore, Leander's late resort,
Hero hath left no lamp to guide her love.
Thou lookest for light in vain, and storms arise;
She sleeps thy death, that erst thy danger sighed;
50

Strive then no more; bow down thy weary eyes—
Eyes which to all these woes thy heart have guided.
She is gone, she is lost, she is found, she is ever fair:
Sorrow draws weakly, where love draws not too:
Woe's cries sound nothing, but only in love's ear.
Do then by dying what life cannot do.
Unfold thy flocks and leave them to the fields,
To feed on hills, or dales, where likes them best,
Of what the summer or the spring-time yields,
For love and time hath given thee leave to rest.
Thy heart which was their fold, now in decay
By often storms and winter's many blasts,
All torn and rent becomes misfortune's prey;
False hope my shepherd's staff, now age hath brast
My pipe, which love's own hand gave my desire
To sing her praises and my woe upon,—
Despair hath often threatened to the fire,
As vain to keep now all the rest are gone.
Thus home I draw, as death's long night draws on;
Yet every foot, old thoughts turn back mine eyes:
Constraint me guides, as old age draws a stone
Against the hill, which over-weighty lies
For feeble arms or wasted strength to move:
My steps are backward, gazing on my loss,
My mind's affection and my soul's sole love,
Not mixed with fancy's chaff or fortune's dross.
51

To God I leave it, who first gave it me,
And I her gave, and she returned again,
As it was hers; so let His mercies be
Of my last comforts the essential mean.
But be it so or not, the effects are past;
Her love hath end; my woe must ever last. [OMITTED]
My days' delights, my spring-time joys fordone,
[_]

The end of the books of the “Ocean's Love to Cynthia,” and the beginning of the 22nd book, entreating of Sorrow.


Which in the dawn and rising sun of youth
Had their creation, and were first begun,
Do in the evening and the winter sad
Present my mind, which takes my time's account,
The grief remaining of the joy it had.
My times that then ran o'er themselves in these,
And now run out in other's happiness,
Bring unto those new joys and new-born days.
So could she not if she were not the sun,
Which sees the birth and burial of all else,
And holds that power with which she first begun,
Leaving each withered body to be torn
By fortune, and by times tempestuous,
Which, by her virtue, once fair fruit have born;
Knowing she can renew, and can create
Green from the ground, and flowers even out of stone,
By virtue lasting over time and date,
Leaving us only woe, which, like the moss,
Having compassion of unburied bones,
Cleaves to mischance, and unrepaired loss.
For tender stalks—[OMITTED]
[_]

(MS. abruptly ends here.)


52

XXI. SIR WALTER RALEIGH'S PETITION TO THE QUEEN

(ANNE OF DENMARK).

(1618.)
O had truth power, the guiltless could not fall,
Malice win glory, or revenge triumph;
But truth alone cannot encounter all.
Mercy is fled to God, which mercy made;
Compassion dead; faith turned to policy;
Friends know not those who sit in sorrow's shade.
For what we sometime were, we are no more:
Fortune hath changed our shape, and destiny
Defaced the very form we had before.
All love, and all desert of former times,
Malice hath covered from my sovereign's eyes,
And largely laid abroad supposed crimes.
But kings call not to mind what vassals were,
But know them now, as envy hath described them:
So can I look on no side from despair.
53

Cold walls! to you I speak; but you are senseless:
Celestial Powers! you hear, but have determined,
And shall determine, to my greatest happiness.
Then unto whom shall I unfold my wrong,
Cast down my tears, or hold up folded hands?
To Her, to whom remorse doth most belong;
To Her who is the first, and may alone
Be justly called the Empress of the Bretanes.
Who should have mercy if a Queen have none?
Save those that would have died for your defence!
Save him whose thoughts no treason ever tainted!
For lo! destruction is no recompense.
If I have sold my duty, sold my faith
To strangers, which was only due to One;
Nothing I should esteem so dear as death.
But if both God and Time shall make you know
That I, your humblest vassal, am oppressed,
Then cast your eyes on undeserved woe;
That I and mine may never mourn the miss
Of Her we had, but praise our living Queen,
Who brings us equal, if not greater, bliss.
54

XXII. SIR WALTER RALEIGH'S VERSES,

FOUND IN HIS BIBLE IN THE GATE-HOUSE AT WESTMINSTER.

(1618.)
Even such is time, that takes in trust
Our youth, our joys, our all we have,
And pays us but with earth and dust;
Who, in the dark and silent grave,
When we have wandered all our ways,
Shuts up the story of our days;
But from this earth, this grave, this dust,
My God shall raise me up, I trust!
W. R.
55

XXIII. FRAGMENTS AND EPIGRAMS.

I.

[“‘Fain would I climb, yet fear I to fall.’ ]

This made him write in a glass window, obvious to the Queen's eye—

“‘Fain would I climb, yet fear I to fall.’

Her Majesty, either espying or being shown it, did under-write—

“‘If thy heart fails thee, climb not at all.’”

II.

[“‘The word of denial and the letter of fifty]

“Sir Wa. Rawley made this rhyme upon the name of a gallant, one Mr. Noel:—

“Noe. L.
“‘The word of denial and the letter of fifty
Makes the gentleman's name that will never be thrifty.’

“And Noel's answer:—

“‘Raw. Ly.
“The foe to the stomach and the word of disgrace
Shews the gentleman's name with the bold face.’”
56

III.

[In vain mine eyes, in vain you waste your tears]

In vain mine eyes, in vain you waste your tears;
In vain my sighs, the smokes of my despairs;
In vain you search the earth and heavens above;
In vain ye seek; for Fortune keeps my love.

IV.

[With wisdom's eyes had but blind fortune seen]

With wisdom's eyes had but blind fortune seen,
Then had my love, my love for ever been.

V. Epitaph on the Earl of Leicester.

(Died Sept. 4, 1588.)
Here lies the noble warrior that never blunted sword;
Here lies the noble courtier that never kept his word;
Here lies his excellency that governed all the state;
Here lies the L. of Leicester that all the world did hate.
Wa. Ra.

VI. Epitaph on the Earl of Salisbury.

(Died May 24, 1612.)
Here lies Hobbinol, our pastor whilere,
That once in a quarter our fleeces did sheer.
57

To please us his cur he kept under clog,
And was ever after both shepherd and dog.
For oblation to Pan his custom was thus:—
He first gave a trifle, then offered up us.
And through his false worship such power he did gain,
As kept him o'th' mountain and us on the plain:
Where many a hornpipe he tuned to his Phyllis,
And sweetly sung Walsingham to 's Amaryllis. [OMITTED]
[_]

(Two lines omitted.)


VII. A Poem put into my Lady Laiton's Pocket by Sir Walter Raleigh.

Lady, farewell, whom I in silence serve!
Would God thou knewest the depth of my desire!
Then mought I wish, though nought I can deserve,
Some drops of grace to slake my scalding fire;
But sith to live alone I have decreed,
I'll spare to speak, that I may spare to speed!

VIII. Sir W. Raleigh on the Snuff of a Candle the Night before he Died.

Cowards [may] fear to die; but courage stout,
Rather than live in snuff, will be put out.
58

XXIV. METRICAL TRANSLATIONS

OCCURRING IN SIR W. RALEIGH'S HISTORY OF THE WORLD.

I. BOOK I. CH. I. § 6.

[The heaven and earth and all the liquid main]

[_]

Virgil, Æneid, vi. 724–7.

The heaven and earth and all the liquid main,
The moon's bright globe and stars Titanian,
A spirit within maintains; and their whole mass
A mind, which through each part infused doth pass,
Fashions and works, and wholly doth transpierce
All this great body of the universe.

II. BOOK I. CH. I. § 7.

[The world discerns itself, while I the world behold]

[_]

Ovid, Metam. iv. 226–8.

The world discerns itself, while I the world behold;
By me the longest years and other times are told;
I, the world's eye.

III. BOOK I. CH. I. § 11.

['Gainst fate no counsel can prevail.]

[_]

Ovid, Trist. iii. vi. 18; and Juvenal, vii. 201.

'Gainst fate no counsel can prevail.
Kingdoms to slaves by destiny,
To captives triumphs given be.
59

IV. BOOK I. CH. I. § 15.

[From wisdom fortune differs far]

[_]

Athenæus (?Agathon: cf. Ar. Eth. N. vi. 4).

From wisdom fortune differs far;
And yet in works most like they are.

V. BOOK I. CH. I. § 15.

[While fury gallops on the way]

[_]

Ovid, Remed. Am. 119.

While fury gallops on the way,
Let no man fury's gallop stay.

VI. BOOK I. CH. II. § 1.

[More holy than the rest, and understanding more]

[_]

Ovid, Metam. i. 76–8.

More holy than the rest, and understanding more,
A living creature wants, to rule all made before;
So man began to be.

VII. BOOK I. CH. II. § 3.

[Diseases, famine, enemies, in us no change have wrought]

[_]

Marius Victor, de perversis suæ æt. moribus Epist. 30–33.

Diseases, famine, enemies, in us no change have wrought;
What erst we were, we are; still in the same snare caught:
No time can our corrupted manners mend;
In vice we dwell, in sin that hath no end.
60

VIII. BOOK I. CH. II. § 5.

[From thence our kind hard-hearted is, enduring pain and care]

[_]

Ovid, Metam. i. 414–5.

From thence our kind hard-hearted is, enduring pain and care;
Approving that our bodies of a stony nature are.

IX. BOOK I. CH. II. § 5.

[The plants and trees made poor and old]

[_]

Albinovanus, Eleg. de ob. Mæc. 113–4.

The plants and trees made poor and old
By winter envious,
The spring-time bounteous
Covers again from shame and cold;
But never man repaired again
His youth and beauty lost,
Though art and care and cost
Do promise nature's help in vain.

X. BOOK I. CH. II. § 5.

[The sun may set and rise]

[_]

Catull. Carm. V. 4–6.

The sun may set and rise;
But we, contrariwise,
Sleep after our short light
One everlasting night.

XI. BOOK I. CH. III. § 3.

[The East wind with Aurora hath abiding]

[_]

Ovid, Metam. I. 61–2.

The East wind with Aurora hath abiding
Among the Arabian and the Persian hills,
Whom Phœbus first salutes at his uprising.
61

XII. BOOK I. CH. III. § 3.

[The joyful spring did ever last, and Zephyrus did breed]

[_]

Ovid, Metam. I. 107–8.

The joyful spring did ever last, and Zephyrus did breed
Sweet flowers by his gentle blast, without the help of seed.

XIII. BOOK I. CH. IV. § 2.

[The Amazon with crescent-formed shield]

[_]

Virgil, Æneid I. 490–1.

The Amazon with crescent-formed shield
Penthesilea leads into the field.

XIV. BOOK I. CH. V. § 5.

[O wasteful riot, never well content]

[_]

Lucan, Pharsal. IV. 373–8, 380–1.

O wasteful riot, never well content
With low-priced fare; hunger ambitious
Of cates by land and sea far fetched and sent;
Vain glory of a table sumptuous;
Learn with how little life may be preserved.
In gold and myrrh they need not to carouse;
But with the brook the people's thirst is served,
Who, fed with bread and water, are not starved.

XV. BOOK I. CH. V. § 8.

[From the earth and from thy blood, O heaven, they came]

[_]

John Cassam out of Orpheus, Fragm. L. from Etym. M.

From the earth and from thy blood, O heaven, they came,
Whom thereupon the gods did giants name.
62

XVI. BOOK I. CH. VI. § 3.

[I sacrifice to God the beef which you adore]

[_]

Anaxandr. Rhod. ap. Natal. Com. I. 7; p. 12, ed. 1612.

I sacrifice to God the beef which you adore;
I broil the Egyptian eels, which you as God implore;
You fear to eat the flesh of swine; I find it sweet;
You worship dogs; to beat them I think meet,
When they my store devour.

XVII. BOOK I. CH. VI. § 3.

[The Egyptians think it sin to root up or to bite]

[_]

Juvenal, XV. 9–11.

The Egyptians think it sin to root up or to bite
Their leeks or onions, which they serve with holy rite.
O happy nations, which of their own sowing
Have store of gods in every garden growing!

XVIII BOOK I. CH. VI. § 4.

[Astræa last of heavenly wights the earth did leave.]

[_]

Ovid, Metam. I. 150.

Astræa last of heavenly wights the earth did leave.

XIX. BOOK I. CH. VI. § 4.

[The giants did advance their wicked hand]

[_]

Cornelius Severus, Ætna, 43–5.

The giants did advance their wicked hand
Against the stars, to thrust them headlong down;
And, robbing Jove of his imperial crown,
On conquered heavens to lay their proud command.
63

XX. BOOK I. CH. VI. § 5.

[Saturn to be the fatter is not known]

[_]

Lycophron, Alexandr. 1200.

Saturn to be the fatter is not known,
By being the grave and burial of his own.

XXI. BOOK I. CH. VI. § 5.

[Things thus agreed, Titan made Saturn swear]

[_]

Sibylla, III. p. 227, ed. Paris, 1599.

Things thus agreed, Titan made Saturn swear
No son to nourish; which by reigning might
Usurp the right of Titan's lawful heir.

XXII. BOOK I. CH. VI. § 5.

[The Cretans ever liars were; they care not what they say]

[_]

Callim. εις τον Δια 8, 9.

The Cretans ever liars were; they care not what they say;
For they a tomb have built for thee, O king that livest alway.

XXIII. BOOK I. CH. VI. § 7.

[Heaven and earth one form did bear]

[_]

Eurip. Fragm. Melanipp. vi. Dind.

Heaven and earth one form did bear;
But when disjoined once they were
From mutual embraces,
All things to light appeared then;
Of trees, birds, beasts, fishes, and men
The still remaining races.
64

XXIV. BOOK I. CH. VI. § 7.

[Then marking this my sacred speech, but truly lend]

[_]

Orpheus to Musæus; Fragm. I. from Just. Mart., Cohort. ad Gent. 15.

Then marking this my sacred speech, but truly lend
Thy heart that's reason's sphere, and the right way ascend,
And see the world's sole king. First, He is simply one
Begotten of Himself, from whom is born alone
All else, in which He's still; nor could it e'er befall
A mortal eye to see Him once, yet He sees all.

XXV. BOOK I. CH. VI. § 7.

[The first of all is God, and the same last is He.]

[_]

Id. Fragm. vi. from Proclus.

The first of all is God, and the same last is He.
God is the head and midst; yea, from Him all things be.
God is the base of earth and of the starred sky;
He is the male and female too; shall never die.
The spirit of all is God; the sun and moon and what is higher;
The king, the original of all, of all the end:
For close in holy breast He all did comprehend;
Whence all to blessed light His wondrous power did send.

XXVI. BOOK I. CH. VII. § 2.

[Bura and Helice on Achaian ground]

[_]

Ovid, Metam. XV. 293–4.

Bura and Helice on Achaian ground
Are sought in vain, but under sea are found.
65

XXVII. BOOK I. CH. VII. § 3.

[Saturn descending from the heavens high]

[_]

Virgil, Æneid, viii. 318–23.

Saturn descending from the heavens high,
Fearing the arms of Jupiter his son,
His kingdom lost, and banished, thence doth fly.
Rude people on the mountain tops he won
To live together, and by laws; which done,
He chose to call it Latium.

XXVIII. BOOK I. CH. VII. § 3.

[Then came the Ausonian bands and the Sicanian tribes.]

[_]

Virgil, Æneid, viii. 328.

Then came the Ausonian bands and the Sicanian tribes.

XXIX. BOOK I. CH. VII. § 7.

[The ancients called me Chaos; my great years]

[_]

Ovid, Fasti, i. 103–4.

The ancients called me Chaos; my great years
By those old times of which I sing appears.

XXX. BOOK I. CH. VIII. § 3.

[Tyrus knew first how ships might use the wind.]

[_]

Tibull. Eleg. I. vii. 20.

Tyrus knew first how ships might use the wind.

XXXI. BOOK I. CH. VIII. § 3.

[The moistened osier of the hoary willow]

[_]

Lucan, Pharsal. IV. 131–5.

The moistened osier of the hoary willow
Is woven first into a little boat;
66

Then, clothed in bullock's hide, upon the billow
Of a proud river lightly doth it float
Under the waterman:
So on the lakes of overswelling Po
Sails the Venetian; and the Briton so
On the outspread ocean.

XXXII. BOOK I. CH. VIII. § 4.

[The Chalybes plough not their barren soil]

[_]

Apollon. Rhod. Argonaut. II. 1004–6.

The Chalybes plough not their barren soil,
But undermine high hills for iron veins;
Changing the purchase of their endless toil
For merchandize, which their poor lives sustains.

XXXIII. BOOK I. CH. VIII. § II. 2.

[The Arcadians the earth inhabited]

[_]

Ovid, Fasti, II. 289–90.

The Arcadians the earth inhabited
Ere yet the moon did shine, or Jove was bred.

XXXIV. BOOK I. CH. X. § 2.

[Semiramis with walls of brick the city did enclose.]

[_]

Ovid, Metam. IV. 57–8.

Semiramis with walls of brick the city did enclose.

XXXV. BOOK I. CH. X. § 7.

[Ah! wretched they that worship vanities]

[_]

Sedulius, I. 226–31.

Ah! wretched they that worship vanities,
And consecrate dumb idols in their heart;
Who their own maker, God on high, despise,
And fear the work of their own hands and art!
67

What fury, what great madness, doth beguile
Men's minds, that man should ugly shapes adore,
Of birds or bulls or dragons, or the vile
Half-dog, half-man, on knees for aid implore!

XXXVI. BOOK I. CH. XI. § 7.

[If Crœsus over Halys go]

[_]

Cic. De Divin. II. 56, et al.

If Crœsus over Halys go,
Great kingdoms he shall overthrow.

XXXVII. BOOK I. CH. XI. § 8.

[We fear by light, as children in the dark.]

[_]

Lucretius, II. 54–5.

We fear by light, as children in the dark.

XXXVIII. BOOK II. CH. VI. § 4.

[But fortune governed all their works, till when]

[_]

Æschylus, P. V. 456–61.

But fortune governed all their works, till when
I first found out how stars did set and rise,—
A profitable art to mortal men.
And others of like use I did device:
As letters to compose in learned wise
I first did teach, and first did amplify
The mother of the Muses, Memory.

XXXIX. BOOK II. CH. VI. § 5.

[No man was better nor more just than he]

[_]

Ovid, Metam. I. 322–3.

No man was better nor more just than he,
Nor any woman godlier than she.
68

XL. BOOK II. CH. VII. § 3. 3.

[I have no wine of Gaza nor Falerna wine]

[_]

Sidonius, Carm. xvii. 15, 16.

I have no wine of Gaza nor Falerna wine,
Nor any for thy drinking of Sarepta's vine.

XLI. BOOK II. CH. VII. § 4. 5.

[Of yew the Ituræans' bows were made.]

[_]

Virgil, Georg. II. 448

Of yew the Ituræans' bows were made.

XLII. BOOK II. CH. VIII. § 1.

[The queen anon commands the weighty bowl]

[_]

Virgil, Æneid, I. 728–30.

The queen anon commands the weighty bowl,
Weighty with precious stones and massy gold,
To flow with wine. This Belus used of old,
And all of Belus' line.

XLIII. BOOK II. CH. VIII. § 1.

[Phœnicians first, if fame may credit have]

[_]

Lucan, Pharsal. III. 220–1.

Phœnicians first, if fame may credit have,
In rude characters dared our words to grave.

XLIV. BOOK II. CH. VIII. § 1.

[If a Phœnician born I am, what then?]

[_]

Diog. Laert. VII. 30.

If a Phœnician born I am, what then?
Cadmus was so; to whom Greece owes
The books of learned men.
69

XLV. BOOK II. CH. X. § 2.

[The white dove is for holy held in Syria Palestine.]

[_]

Tibullus, I. vii. 18.

The white dove is for holy held in Syria Palestine.

XLVI. BOOK II. CH. XIII. § 3.

[Here Tantalus in water seeks for water, and doth miss]

[_]

Ovid, Am. II. ii. 43–4.

Here Tantalus in water seeks for water, and doth miss
The fleeting fruit he catcheth at; his long tongue brought him this.

XLVII BOOK II. CH. XIII. § 3.

[The thirsting Tantalus doth catch at streams that from him flee]

[_]

Horace, Sat. I. i. 68–70.

The thirsting Tantalus doth catch at streams that from him flee;
Why laughest thou? The name but changed, the tale is told of thee.

XLVIII. BOOK II. CH. XIII. §

[Because that, stealing immortality]

[_]

Natalis Com. p. 627, ed. 1612, out of Pindar, Ol. i. 60–63.

Because that, stealing immortality,
He did both nectar and ambrosia give
To guests of his own age to make them live.

XLIX. BOOK II. CH. XIII. § 3.

[Nine furlongs stretched lies Tityus, who for his wicked deeds]

[_]

Tibullus, I. iii. 75–6, out of Homer, Od. xi. 576.

Nine furlongs stretched lies Tityus, who for his wicked deeds
The hungry birds with his renewing liver daily feeds.
70

L. BOOK II. CH. XIII. § 3.

[Strong Ilion thou shalt see with walls and towers high]

[_]

Ovid, Heroid, xvi. 179–80.

Strong Ilion thou shalt see with walls and towers high,
Built with the harp of wise Apollo's harmony.

LI. BOOK II. CH. XIII. § 4.

[The brazen tower, with doors close barred]

[_]

Horace, Od. III. xvi. 1–11.

The brazen tower, with doors close barred,
And watchful bandogs' frightful guard,
Kept safe the maidenhead
Of Danae from secret love,
Till smiling Venus and wise Jove
Beguiled her father's dread:
For, changed into a golden shower,
The god into her lap did pour
Himself and took his pleasure.
Through guards and stony walls to break
The thunderbolt is far more weak
Than is a golden treasure.

LII. BOOK II. CH. XIII. § 8.

[If all this world had no original]

[_]

Lucretius, V. 325–8.

If all this world had no original,
But things have ever been as now they are
Before the siege of Thebes or Troy's last fall,
Why did no poet sing some elder war?
71

LIII. BOOK II. CH. XIV. § 1.

[In the main sea the isle of Crete doth lie]

[_]

Virgil, Æneid, III. 104–12.

In the main sea the isle of Crete doth lie,
Whence Jove was born; thence is our progeny.
There is Mount Ida; there in fruitful land
An hundred great and goodly cities stand.
Thence, if I follow not mistaken fame,
Teucer, the eldest of our grandsires, came
To the Rhœtean shores, and reigned there
Ere yet fair Ilion was built, and ere
The towers of Troy. Their dwelling-place they sought
In lowest vales. Hence Cybel's rites were brought;
Hence Corybantian cymbals did remove;
And hence the name of our Idæan grove.

LIV. BOOK II. CH. XIV. § 1.

[Hesperia the Grecians call the place,—]

[_]

Virgil, Æneid, III. 163–8.

Hesperia the Grecians call the place,—
An ancient fruitful land, a warlike race.
Œnotrians held it; now the later progeny
Gives it their captain's name, and calls it Italy.
This seat belongs to us; hence Dardanus,
Hence came the author of our stock, Iasius.

LV. BOOK II. CH. XIV. § 1.

[Some old Auruncans, I remember well—]

[_]

Virgil, Æneid, VII. 205–11.

Some old Auruncans, I remember well—
Though time have made the fame obscure—would tell
72

Of Dardanus, how born in Italy;
From hence he into Phrygia did fly.
And leaving Tuscane, where he erst had place,
With Corythus did sail to Samothrace;
But now enthronized he sits on high,
In golden palace of the starry sky.

LVI. BOOK II. CH. XIV. § 1.

[Many by valour have deserved renown]

[_]

Horace, Od. IV. ix. 25–8.

Many by valour have deserved renown
Ere Agamemnon, yet lie all oppressed
Under long night, unwept for and unknown;
For with no sacred poet were they blest.

LVII. BOOK II. CH. XXI. § 6.

[Who rules the duller earth, the wind-swollen streams]

[_]

Horace, Od. III. iv. 45–8.

Who rules the duller earth, the wind-swollen streams,
The civil cities and the infernal realms,
Who the host of heaven and the mortal band
Alone doth govern by his just command.

LVIII. BOOK II. CH. XXII. § 6.

[I am that Dido which thou here dost see]

[_]

Ausonius, Epigr. CXVIII.

I am that Dido which thou here dost see,
Cunningly framed in beauteous imagery.
Like this I was, but had not such a soul
As Maro feigned, incestuous and foul.
Æneas never with his Trojan host
Beheld my face, or landed on this coast.
73

But flying proud Iarbas' villainy—
Not moved by furious love or jealousy—
I did, with weapon chaste, to save my fame,
Make way for death untimely ere it came.
This was my end. But first I built a town,
Revenged my husband's death, lived with renown.
Why didst thou stir up Virgil, envious Muse,
Falsely my name and honour to abuse?
Readers, believe historians; not those
Which to the world Jove's thefts and vice expose.
Poets are liars; and for verses' sake,
Will make the gods of human crimes partake.

LIX. BOOK II. CH. XXIII. § 4.

[Nor southern heat nor northern snow]

[_]

Horace, Od. III. xxiv. 36–41.

Nor southern heat nor northern snow,
That freezing to the ground doth grow,
The subject regions can fence,
And keep the greedy merchant thence.
The subtle shipmen way will find,
Storm never so the seas with wind.

LX. BOOK II. CH. XXIII. § 5.

[Such as like heavenly wights do come]

[_]

Horace, Od. IV. ii. 17, 18.

Such as like heavenly wights do come
With an Elean garland home.

LXI. BOOK II. CH. XXIV. § 1.

[There is a land which Greeks Hesperia name]

[_]

Virgil, Æneid, I. 530–3.

There is a land which Greeks Hesperia name,
Ancient and strong, of much fertility;
74

Œnotrians held it; but we hear by fame,
That, by late ages of posterity,
'Tis from a captain's name called Italy.

LXII. BOOK II. CH. XXIV. § 5.

[Yet, though thou fetch thy pedigree so far]

[_]

Juvenal, viii. 272–5.

Yet, though thou fetch thy pedigree so far,
Thy first progenitor, whoe'er he were,
Some shepherd was; or else—that I'll forbear.

LXIII. BOOK III. CH. VII. § 3.

[Seldom the villain, though much haste he make]

[_]

Horace, Od. III. ii. 31–2.

Seldom the villain, though much haste he make,
Lame-footed vengeance fails to overtake.

LXIV. BOOK IV. CH. I. § 5.

[By gifts the Macedon clave gates asunder]

[_]

Horace, Od. III. xvi. 13–15.

By gifts the Macedon clave gates asunder,
The kings envying his estate brought under.

LXV. BOOK IV. CH. II. § 8.

[The minds of men are ever so affected]

[_]

Homer, Od. XVIII. 135–6.

The minds of men are ever so affected
As by God's will they daily are directed.

LXVI. BOOK IV. CH. II. § 15.

[Over the Medes and light Sabæans reigns]

[_]

Claudian in Eutrop. I. 321–3.

Over the Medes and light Sabæans reigns
This female sex; and under arms of Queen
Great part of the Barbarian land remains.
75

LXVII. BOOK V. CH. II. § 1.

[Have special care that valiant poverty]

[_]

Juvenal, VIII. 121–2.

Have special care that valiant poverty
Be not oppressed with too great injury.

LXVIII. BOOK V. CH. VI. § 11.

[One fire than other burns more forcibly]

[_]

Pausan. (VII) XII. vol. iii. p. 182, Siebelis.

One fire than other burns more forcibly;
One wolf than other wolves does bite more sore;
One hawk than other hawks more swift doth fly;
So one most mischievous of men before,
Callicrates, false knave as knave might be,
Met with Menalcidas, more false than he.

LXIX. BOOK V. CH. VI. § 12.

[Even they that have no murderous will]

[_]

Juvenal, X. 96–7.

Even they that have no murderous will
Would have it in their power to kill.
76

XXV. NO PLEASURE WITHOUT PAIN.

(Before 1576.)
Sweet were the joys that both might like and last;
Strange were the state exempt from all distress;
Happy the life that no mishap should taste;
Blessed the chance might never change success.
Were such a life to lead or state to prove,
Who would not wish that such a life were love?
But oh! the soury sauce of sweet unsure,
When pleasures flit, and fly with waste of wind.
The trustless trains that hoping hearts allure,
When sweet delights do but allure the mind;
When care consumes and wastes the wretched wight,
While fancy feeds and draws of her delight.
77

What life were love, if love were free from pain?
But oh that pain with pleasure matched should meet!
Why did the course of nature so ordain
That sugared sour must sauce the bitter sweet?
Which sour from sweet might any means remove,
What hap, what heaven, what life, were like to love!

XXVI. THE SHEPHERD'S PRAISE OF HIS SACRED DIANA.

Before 1593.)
Praised be Diana's fair and harmless light;
Praised be the dews wherewith she moists the ground;
Praised be her beams, the glory of the night;
Praised be her power, by which all powers abound.
Praised be her nymphs, with whom she decks the woods;
Praised be her knights, in whom true honour lives;
78

Praised be that force, by which she moves the floods;
Let that Diana shine which all these gives.
In heaven queen she is among the spheres;
She mistress-like makes all things to be pure;
Eternity in her oft change she bears;
She beauty is; by her the fair endure.
Time wears her not; she doth his chariot guide;
Mortality below her orb is placed;
By her the virtues of the stars down slide;
In her is virtue's perfect image cast.
A knowledge pure it is her worth to know:
With Circes let them dwell that think not so.
[S. W. R.] Ignoto.

XXVII. THE SHEPHERD'S DESCRIPTION OF LOVE.

(Before 1600.)
Melibœus.
Shepherd, what's love, I pray thee tell?

Fau.
It is that fountain and that well
Where pleasure and repentance dwell;
It is perhaps that sauncing bell
79

That tolls all into heaven or hell;
And this is love as I heard tell.

Meli.
Yet what is love, I prithee say?

Fau.
It is a work on holiday;
It is December matched with May,
When lusty bloods, in fresh array,
Hear ten months after of the play;
And this is love as I hear say.

Meli.
Yet what is love, good shepherd, sain?

Fau.
It is a sunshine mixed with rain;
It is a tooth-ache, or like pain;
It is a game where none doth gain;
The lass saith no, and would full fain;
And this is love, as I hear sain.

Meli.
Yet, shepherd, what is love, I pray?

Fau.
It is a yea, it is a nay,
A pretty kind of sporting fray;
It is a thing will soon away;
Then, nymphs, take 'vantage while ye may;
And this is love, as I hear say.

Meli.
Yet what is love, good shepherd, show?

Fau.
A thing that creeps; it cannot go;
A prize that passeth to and fro;
A thing for one, a thing for moe;
And he that proves shall find it so;
And, shepherd, this is love, I trow.

[S. W. R.] Ignoto.
80

XXVIII. AS YOU CAME FROM THE HOLY LAND.

As you came from the holy land
Of Walsinghame,
Met you not with my true love
By the way as you came?
How shall I know your true love,
That have met many one,
As I went to the holy land,
That have come, that have gone?
She is neither white nor brown,
But as the heavens fair;
There is none hath a form so divine
In the earth or the air.
Such a one did I meet, good sir,
Such an angelic face,
Who like a queen, like a nymph, did appear,
By her gate, by her grace.
81

She hath left me here all alone,
All alone, as unknown,
Who sometimes did me lead with herself,
And me loved as her own.
What's the cause that she leaves you alone,
And a new way doth take,
Who loved you once as her own,
And her joy did you make?
I have loved her all my youth,
But now old, as you see:
Love likes not the falling fruit
From the withered tree.
Know that Love is a careless child,
And forgets promise past;
He is blind, he is deaf when he list,
And in faith never fast.
His desire is a dureless content,
And a trustless joy;
He is won with a world of despair,
And is lost with a toy.
Of womenkind such indeed is the love,
Or the word love abused,
Under which many childish desires
And conceits are excused.
But true love is a durable fire,
In the mind ever burning,
Never sick, never old, never dead,
From itself never turning.
Sr. W. R.
82

XXIX. A POEM BY SIR WALTER RALEIGH.

Shall I, like an hermit, dwell
On a rock or in a cell,
Calling home the smallest part
That is missing of my heart,
To bestow it, where I may
Meet a rival every day?
If she undervalue me,
What care I how fair she be?
Were her tresses angel-gold,
If a stranger may be bold
Unrebuked, unafraid,
To convert them to a braid,
And, with little more ado,
Work them into bracelets too;
If the mine be grown so free,
What care I how rich it be?
Were her hand as rich a prize
As her hairs or precious eyes,
If she lay them out to take
Kisses for good manners' sake,
And let every lover skip
From her hand unto her lip;
If she seem not chaste to me,
What care I how chaste she be?
83

No; she must be perfect snow,
In effect as well as show;
Warming but as snow-balls do,
Not, like fire, by burning too;
But when she by change hath got
To her heart a second lot,
Then, if others share with me,
Farewell her, whate'er she be!

XXX. TO HIS SINGULAR FRIEND, WILLIAM LITHGOW.

(1618.)
Whiles I admire thy first and second ways,
Long ten years wandering in the world-wide bounds;
I rest amazed to think on these assays
That thy first travel to the world forth sounds:
In bravest sense, compendious ornate style,
Didst show most rare adventures to this isle.
And now thy second pilgrimage I see
At London thou resolvest to put in light;
Thy Libyan ways, so fearful to the eye,
And Garamants their strange amazing sight.
84

Meanwhile this work affords a three-fold gain
In fury of thy fierce Castalian vein;
As thou for travels brookest the greatest name,
So voyage on, increase, maintain the same!
W. R.
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