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ECHO'S LAMENT OF NARCISSUS.

[From Cynthia's Revels (acted 1600), Act I, Sc. 1.]

Slow, slow, fresh fount, keep time with my salt tears.
Yet slower, yet; O faintly, gentle springs :

List to the heavy part the music bears,
Woe weeps out her division, when she sings.
Droop herbs and flowers,

Fall grief in showers,

Our beauties are not ours;

O, I could still,

Like melting snow upon some craggy hill,
Drop, drop, drop, drop,

Since nature's pride is now a withered daffodil.

VENETIAN SONG1.

[From Volpone; or, The Fox (acted 1605), Act I. Sc. 6.)

Come, my Celia, let us prove,

While we can, the sports of love.
Time will not be ours for ever;
He, at length, our good will sever;
Spend not then his gifts in vain :
Suns that set may rise again;
But if once we lose this light,
'Tis with us perpetual night.
Why should we defer our joys?
Fame and rumour are but toys.
Cannot we delude the eyes

Of a few poor household spies?
Or his easier ears beguile,

Thus removed by our wile?

Compare Catullus, Carmen V. The allusion (not taken from Catullus) in the concluding lines is to a famous Spartan law.

'Tis no sin love's fruits to steal;
But the sweet thefts to reveal,
To be taken, to be seen,-

These have crimes accounted been.

SONG1.

[From Epicæne; or, The Silent Woman, Act I, Sc. 1; 1609.]

Still to be neat, still to be drest,
As you were going to a feast;
Still to be powdered, still perfumed:
Lady, it is to be presumed,

Though art's hid causes are not found,
All is not sweet, all is not sound.

Give me a look, give me a face,
That makes simplicity a grace;
Robes loosely flowing, hair as free:
Such sweet neglect more taketh me
Than all the adulteries of art:

They strike mine eyes, but not my heart.

CHARIS' TRIUMPH.

[One of the ten pieces forming A Celebration of Charis in Underwoods. The last two stanzas are sung or said by Wittipol in The Devil is an Ass (acted 1616), Act II, Sc. 2.]

See the chariot at hand here of Love,

Wherein my Lady rideth!

Each that draws is a swan or a dove,
And well the car Love guideth.

As she goes, all hearts do duty
Unto her beauty;

And enamoured do wish, so they might
But enjoy such a sight,

That they still were to run by her side,

Through swords, through seas, whither she would ride.

A translation from the Latin of Bonnefonius (Jean Bonnefons).

Do but look on her eyes, they do light
All that Love's world compriseth!
Do but look on her hair, it is bright
As Love's star when it riseth!
Do but mark, her forehead's smoother
Than words that soothe her;

And from her arched brows, such a grace
Sheds itself through the face,

As alone there triúmphs to the life

All the gain, all the good of the elements' strife.
Have you seen but a bright lily grow

Before rude hands have touched it?

Have you marked but the fall o' the snow
Before the soil hath smutched it?

Have you felt the wool of beaver?
Or swan's down ever?

Or have smelt o' the bud o' the briar?
Or the nard in the fire?

Or have tasted the bag of the bee?

O so white,-O so soft,-O so sweet is she!

TRUTH.

[From Hymenai; or, the Solemnities of Masque and Barriers at the marriage of the Earl of Essex, 1606.]

Upon her head she wears a crown of stars,
Through which her orient hair waves to her waist,
By which believing mortals hold her fast,

And in those golden cords are carried even,

Till with her breath she blows them up to heaven.

She wears a robe enchased with eagles' eyes,

To signify her sight in mysteries:

Upon each shoulder sits a milk-white dove,

And at her feet do witty serpents move:

Her spacious arms do reach from east to west,

And you may see her heart shine through her breast.
Her right hand holds a sun with burning rays,

Her left a curious bunch of golden keys,

With which heaven's gates she locketh and displays.

A crystal mirror hangeth at her breast,

By which men's consciences are searched and drest; On her coach-wheels Hypocrisy lies racked ;

And squint-eyed Slander with Vainglory backed
Her bright eyes burn to dust, in which shines Fate
An angel ushers her triumphant gait,

Whilst with her fingers fans of stars she twists,
And with them beats back Error, clad in mists.
Eternal Unity behind her shines,

That fire and water, earth and air combines.
Her voice is like a trumpet loud and shrill,

Which bids all sounds in earth and heaven be still.

THE SHEPHERDS' HOLIDAY.

[From Pan's Anniversary; or, The Shepherds' Holiday: 1625.]

First Nymph.

Thus, thus begin, the yearly rites

Are due to Pan on these bright nights;

His morn now riseth and invites

To sports, to dances, and delights:

All envious and profane, away!
This is the shepherds' holiday.

Second Nymph.

Strew, strew the glad and smiling ground
With every flower, yet not confound;

The primrose drop, the spring's own spouse,
Bright day's-eyes, and the lips of cows,
The garden-star, the queen of May,
The rose, to crown the holiday.

Third Nymph.

Drop, drop you violets, change your hues
Now red, now pale, as lovers use,

And in your death go out as well,
As when you lived unto the smell:
That from your odour all may say,
This is the shepherds' holiday.

SONG BEFORE THE ENTRY OF THE MASQUERS.

[From The Fortunate Isles and their Union, 1625.]

Spring all the graces of the age,

And all the loves of time;
Bring all the pleasures of the stage,
And relishes of rhyme;

Add all the softnesses of courts,

The looks, the laughters and the sports;
And mingle all their sweets and salts,
That none may say the triumph halts.

ODE TO HIMSELF.

[Written after the failure of the comedy The New Inn, 'never acted, but most negligently played by some, the king's servants; and more squeamishly beheld and censured by others, the king's subjects,' January 19, 1629.]

Come, leave the loathèd stage,
And the more loathsome age;
Where pride and impudence, in faction knit,

Usurp the chair of wit!
Indicting and arraigning every day.

Something they call a play.

Let their fastidious, vain

Commission of the brain

Run on and rage, sweat, censure, and condemn ;
They were not made for thee, less thou for them.

Say that thou pour'st them wheat,

And they will acorns eat;

"Twere simple fury still thyself to waste
On such as have no taste!

To offer them a surfeit of pure bread
Whose appetites are dead!

No, give them grains their fill,

Husks, draff to drink or swill:

If they love lees, and leave the lusty wine,

Envy them not, their palate's with the swine.

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