112

GEORGE ETHEREGE.

Sighs which are from lovers blown
Do but gently heave the heart:
E'en the tears they shed alone
Cure like trickling balm their smart.
Lovers, when they lose their breath,
Bleed away in easy death.

Love and Time with reverence use!
Treat them like a parting friend:
Nor the golden gifts refuse
Which in youth sincere they send:
For each year their price is more,
And they less simple than before.

Love, like spring-tides full and high,
Swells in every youthful vein :
But each tide does less supply,
Till they quite shrink in again :
If a flow in age appear,

'Tis but rain, and runs not clear.

GEORGE ETHEREGE.

Born 1636, died 1694.

SUNG.

Ladies, though to your conquering eyes
Love owes his chiefest victories,

And borrows those bright arms from you,

With which he does the world subdue ¡
Yet you yourselves are not above
The empire nor the griefs of love.

Then rack not lovers with disdain,
Lest love on you revenge their pain:
You are not free, because you're fair,
The boy did not his mother spare:
Though beauty be a killing dart,
It is no armour for the heart.

CHARLES SACKVILLE,

EARL OF DORSET.

Born 1637, died 1705-6.

SONG.

Phillis, for shame! let us improve,
A thousand different ways,
Those few short moments snatch'd by love
From many tedious days.

If you want courage to despise

The censure of the grave,

Though Love's a tyrant in your eyes,

Your heart is but a slave.

114

EARL OF DORSET.

My love is full of noble pride;
Nor can it e'er submit,
To let that fop Discretion, ride
In triumph over it.

False friends I have as well as you,

Who daily counsel me
Fame and ambition to pursue,
And leave off loving thee.

But when the least regard I show
To fools who thus advise,
May I be dull enough to grow
Most miserably wise!

SONG.

May the ambitious ever find

Success in crowds and noise,
While gentle love doth till my mind
With silent real joys!

Let knaves and fools grow rich and great,
And the world think them wise :
Whilst I lie dying at her feet,

And all the world despise !

Let conquering kings new triumphs raise,
And melt in court delights:

Her eyes can give much brighter days!
Her arms, much softer nights!

SIR CHARLES SEDLEY.

Born about 1639, died 1708.

INDIFFERENCE EXCUSED.

Love, when 'tis true, needs not the aid Of sigh, nor oaths, to make it known: And, to convince the crucl'st maid, Lovers should use their love alone.

Into their very looks 'twill steal,

And he that most would hide his flame Does in that case his pain reveal: Silence itself can love proclaim.

This, my Aurelia, made me shun
The paths that common lovers tread,
Whose guilty passions are begun,

Not in their heart, but in their head.

I could not sigh, and with cross'd arms
Accuse your rigour, and my fate;
Nor tax your beauty with such charms
As meu adore, and women hate.

But careless lov'd, and without art,

Knowing my love you must have spied ¡

And thinking it a foolish part

To set to show what none can hide.

EARL OF ROCHESTER.

DISINTERESTED LOVE.

Phillis, men say that all my vows
Are to thy fortune paid;
Alas! my heart he little knows
Who thinksmy love a trade.

Were I, of all these woods, the lord,
One berry from thy hand
More real pleasure would afford,
Than all my large commands.

My humble love has learnt to live
On what the nicest maid,
Without a conscious blush, may give
Beneath the myrtle shade.

JOHN WILMOT,

EARL OF ROCHESTER.

Born 1647, died 1680.

ON HIS MISTRESS.

My dear Mistress has a heart

Soft as those kind looks she gave me,

When with love's resistless dart,

And her eyes she did enslave me :