a golden chair
Is not less cared for after three days
By children, than the thing which lovers so
Blindly admire, and with such worship woo;
Being had, enjoying it decays;
And thence,
What before pleased them all, takes but one sense,
And that so lamely, as it leaves behind
A kind of sorrowing dullness to the mind.
Ah, cannot we,
As well as cocks and lions, jocund be
After such pleasures, unless wise
Nature decreed—since each such act, they say,
Diminisheth the length of life a day—
This; as she would man should despise
The sport,
Because that other curse of being short,
And only for a minute made to be
Eager, desires to raise posterity.
Since so, my mind
Shall not desire what no man else can find;
I’ll no more dote and run
To pursue things which had endamaged me;
And when I come where moving beauties be,
As men do when the summer’s sun
Grows great,
Though I admire their greatness, shun their heat.
Each place can afford shadows; if all fail,
’Tis but applying wormseed to the tail.
A Lecture Upon the Shadow
Stand still, and I will read to thee
A lecture, Love, in Love’s philosophy.
These three hours that we have spent,
Walking here, two shadows went
Along with us, which we ourselves produced.
But, now the sun is just above our head,
We do those shadows tread,
And to brave clearness all things are reduced.
So whilst our infant loves did grow,
Disguises did, and shadows, flow,
From us and our cares; but now ’tis not so.
That love has not attain’d the highest degree,
Which is still diligent lest others see.
Except our loves at this noon stay,
We shall new shadows make the other way.
As the first were made to blind
Others, these which come behind
Will work upon ourselves, and blind our eyes.
If our loves faint, and westwardly decline,
To me thou, falsely, thine
And I to thee mine actions shall disguise.
The morning shadows wear away,
But these grow longer all the day;
But O! love’s day is short, if love decay.
Love is a growing, or full constant light,
And his short minute, after noon, is night.
The Token
Send me some tokens, that my hope may live
Or that my easeless thoughts may sleep and rest;
Send me some honey, to make sweet my hive,
That in my passions I may hope the best.
I beg nor ribbon wrought with thine own hands,
To knit our loves in the fantastic strain
Of new-touch’d youth; nor ring to show the stands
Of our affection, that, as that’s round and plain,
So should our loves meet in simplicity;
No, nor the corals, which thy wrist enfold,
Laced up together in congruity,
To show our thoughts should rest in the same hold;
No, nor thy picture, though most gracious,
And most desired, ’cause ’tis like the best
Nor witty lines, which are most copious,
Within the writings which thou hast address’d.
Send me nor this nor that, to increase my score,
But swear thou think’st I love thee, and no more.
Self-Love
He that cannot choose but love,
And strives against it still,
Never shall my fancy move,
For he loves against his will;
Nor he which is all his own,
And cannot pleasure choose;
When I am caught he can be gone,
And when he list refuse;
Nor he that loves none but fair,
For such by all are sought;
Nor he that can for foul ones care,
For his judgment then is nought;
Nor he that hath wit, for he
Will make me his jest or slave;
Nor a fool when others ⸻
He can neither ⸻
Nor he that still his mistress prays,
For she is thrall’d therefore;
Nor he that pays, not, for he says
Within, she’s worth no more.
Is there then no kind of men
Whom I may freely prove?
I will vent that humour then
In mine own self-love.
Epigrams
Hero and Leander
Both robb’d of air, we both lie in one ground;
Both whom one fire had burnt, one water drown’d
Pyramus and Thisbe
Two, by themselves, each other, love and fear,
Slain, cruel friends, by parting have join’d here.
Niobe
By children’s births, and death, I am become
So dry, that I am now mine own sad tomb.
A Burnt Ship
Out of a fired ship, which by no way
But drowning could be rescued from the flame,
Some men leap’d forth, and ever as they came
Near the foes’ ships, did by their shot decay;
So all were lost, which in the ship were found,
They in the sea being burnt, they in the burnt ship drowned.
Fall of a Wall
Under an undermined and shot-bruised wall
A too-bold captain perish’d by the fall,
Whose brave misfortune happiest men envied,
That had a town for tomb, his bones to hide.
A Lame Beggar
I am unable, yonder beggar cries,
To stand, or move; if he say true, he lies.
Cales and Guyana
If you from spoil of th’ old world’s farthest end
To the new world your kindled valours bend,
What brave examples then do prove it true
That one thing’s end doth still begin a new.
Sir John Wingfield
Beyond th’ old Pillars many have travalled
Towards the sun’s cradle, and his throne, and bed.
A fitter pillar our Earl did bestow
In that late island; for he well did know
Farther than Wingfield no man dares to go.
A Self-Accuser
Your mistress, that you follow whores, still taxeth you;
’Tis strange that she should thus confess it, though ’t be true.
A Licentious Person
Thy sins and hairs may no man equal call;
For, as thy sins increase, thy hairs do fall.
Antiquary
If in his study he hath so much care
To hang all old strange things, let his wife beware.
Disinherited
Thy father all from thee, by his last will,
Gave to the poor; thou hast good title still.
Phryne
Thy flattering picture, Phryne, is like thee,
Only in this, that you both painted be.
An Obscure Writer
Philo with twelve years’ study hath been grieved
To be understood; when will he be believed?
Klockius
Klockius so deeply hath sworn ne’er more to come
In bawdy house, that he dares not go home.
Raderus
Why this
