TO THE

MOST ILLVSTRIOVS

AND

MOST HOPEFULL PRINCE,

CHARLES,

PRINCE OF WALES.

WELL may my book come forth like publique day,
When such a light as you are leads the way;
Who are my works' creator, and alone

The flame of it, and the expansion.

And look how all those heavenly lamps acquire
Light from the sun, that inexhausted fire;
So all my morne and evening stars from you
Have their existence, and their influence too.
Full is my book of glories; but all these
By you become immortall substances.

HESPERIDES.

THE ARGUMENT OF HIS BOOK.

I SING of brooks, of blossomes, birds, and bowers,
Of April, May, of June, and July-flowers;
I sing of May-poles, hock-carts, wassails, wakes,
Of bride-grooms, brides, and of their bridall-cakes.
I write of youth, of love, and have accesse
By these, to sing of cleanly wantonnesse ;
I sing of dewes, of raines, and, piece by piece,
Of balme, of oyle, of spice, and amber-greece,
I sing of times trans-shifting; and I write
How roses first came red, and lillies white;
I write of groves, of twilights, and I sing
The court of Mab, and of the fairie king.
I write of Hell; I sing, and ever shall,
Of Heaven, and hope to have it after all.

TO HIS MUSE.

WHITHER, mad maiden, wilt thou roame?
Farre safer 'twere to stay at home;
Where thou mayst sit, and, piping please
The poore and private cottages.

Since coats and hamlets best agree

With this thy meaner minstralsie;

There with the reed thou mayst expresse
The shepherd's fleecie happinesse ;
And with thy Eclogues intermixe
Some smooth and harmlesse Beucolicks.
There, on a hillock, thou mayst sing
Unto a handsome shephardling;

Or to a girle, that keeps the neat,

With breath more sweet than violet.

There, there, perhaps, such lines as these

May take the simple villages;

But for the court, the country wit

Is despicable unto it.

Stay then at home, and doe not goe,
Or flie abroad to seeke for woe;
Contempts in courts and cities dwell;
No critick haunts the poore man's cell.
Where thou mayst hear thine own lines read

By no one tongue there censured;

That man's unwise will search for ill,

And may prevent it, sitting still.