I neither seeke by bribes to please, Nor by desert to breed offence. Thus do I live; thus will I die; Would all did so as well as I ! SIR EDWARD DYER. TO THE HON. CHARLES MONTAGUE. The worthless prey but only shows In Homer's riddle and in life. So, whilst in feverish sleeps we think We taste what waking we desire, The dream is better than the drink, Which only feeds the sickly fire. To the mind's eye things well appear, At distance through an artful glass; Bring but the flattering objects near, They're all a senseless gloomy mass. Seeing aright, we see our woes : Then what avails it to have eyes? From ignorance our comfort flows, The only wretched are the wise. 'T is much immortal beauty to admire, But must not with too near a love adore; LORD EDWARD THURLOW. OF MYSELF. MATTHEW PRIOR. THIS only grant me, that my means may lie Rumor can ope the grave. Acquaintance I would have, but when 't depends Not on the number, but the choice, of friends. Books should, not business, entertain the light, And sleep, as undisturbed as death, the night. My house a cottage more Than palace; and should fitting be For all my use, no luxury. My garden painted o'er BEAUTY. FROM "HYMN IN HONOR OF BEAUTY." So every spirit, as it is most pure, Therefore wherever that thou dost behold A comely corpse, with beauty fair endued, Know this for certain, that the same doth hold Yet oft it falls that many a gentle mind With Nature's hand, not Art's; and pleasures Dwells in deformèd tabernacle drowned, yield, Horace might envy in his Sabine field. * This is frequently attributed to William Byrd. Bartlett, how ever, gives it to Sir Edward Dyer, referring to Hannah's Courtly Poets as authority; so, also, Ward, in his English Poets, Vol. I., 1880. Either by chance, against the course of kind, Or through unaptnesse in the substance found, Which it assumed of some stubborne ground, That will not yield unto her form's direction, But is performed with some foul imperfection. And oft it falls (aye me, the more to rue!) Yet nathèmore is that faire beauty's blame, EDWARD SPENSER. CONTENTMENT. I WEIGH not fortune's frown or smile; I seek not state, I reck not style; I quake not at the thunder's crack; I see ambition never pleased; I see some Tantals starved in store; I want the seals of power and place, The ensigns of command; Charged by the People's unbought grace But from my country's will, I want the voice of honest praise And to be thought in future days The friend of human kind, Their blessings on my name. |