LEAVE, Lady! in your glasse of crystall clene,
Your goodly selfe for ever more to vew :
And in my selfe my inward selfe I meane,
Most lively lyke behold your semblant trew.
Within my hart, though hardly it can shew
Thing so divine to vew of earthly eye,
The fayre idea of your celestiall hew,
And every part, remains immortally:
And were it not that, through your cruelty,
With sorrow dimmed and deform'd it were,
The goodly image of your visnomy,
Clearer than crystal would therein appear.
But if your selfe in me ye plain will see,
Remove the cause by which your fayre beames
[darkned be.
WHEN my abodes prefixed time is spent,
My cruell fayre streight bids me wend my way:
But then from heaven most hideous stormes are sent,
As willing me against her will to stay.
Whom then shall I, or heaven or her, obay?
The heavens know best what is the best for me:
But as she will, whose will my life doth sway,
My lower heaven, so it perforce must be.
But ye high Hevens! that all this sorrowe see,
Sith all your tempests cannot hold me backe,
Aswage your storms; or else both you, and she,
Will both together me too sorely wracke.
Enough it is for one man to sustaine
The stormes which she, alone, on me doth rain.
TRUST not the treason of those smyling lookes,
Until ye have their guylefull trayns well tryde:
For they are lyke but unto golden hookes,.
That from the foolish fish theyr baytes do hyde:
So she with flattering smyle, weake haris doth guyde
Unto her love, and tempre to theyr decay;
Whome being caught, she kills with cruel pryde,
And feeds at pleasure on the wretched pray :
Yet, even whyist her bloody hands them slay,
Her eyes looke lovely, and upon them smyle;
That they take pleasure in their cruell play,
And,dying, doe themselves of payne beguyle. [bane,
O mighty charm! which makes men love theyr
And thinck they dyewith pleasure,livewithpayne.
INNOCENT Paper! whom too cruell hand
Did make the matter to avenge her yre;
And, ere she could thy cause well understand,
Did sacrifize unto the greedy fyre.
Well worthy thou to have found better hyre
Than so bad end, for hereticks ordayned;
Yet heresye nor treason didst conspire,
But plead thy maisters cause, unjustly payned,
Whom she, all carelesse of his grief, constrayned
To utter forth the anguish of his hart:
And would not heare, when he to her complayned
The piteous passion of his dying smart.
Yet live for ever, though against her will,
And speake her good, though she requite it ill.
FAYRE Cruell! why are ye so fierce and cruell?
Is it because your eyes have powre to kill?
Then know, that mercy is the Mighties jewell;
And greater glory think to save than spill.
But if it be your pleasure, and proud will,
To shew the powre of your imperious eyes;
Then not on him that never thought you ill,
But bend your force against your enemyes:
Let them feel the utmost of your crueltyes;
And kill with looks, as cockatrices do:
But him, that at your footstoole humbled lies,
With mercifull regard, give mercy to.
Such mercy shall you make admyr'd to be;
So shall you live, by giving life to me.
LONG languishing in double malady
Of my harts wound and of my bodies griefe;
There came to me a Leach, that would apply
Fit medcines for my bodies best reliefe.
Vaine Man! quoth I, that hast but little priefe
In deep discovery of the mynds disease;
Is not the hart of all the body chiefe,
And rules the members as it selfe doth please?
Then, with some cordialls, seeke for to appease
The inward languour of my wounded hart;
And then my body shall have shortly ease:
But such sweet cordialls passe physicians art.
Then my lyfes Leach! doe you your skill reveale;
And, with one salve, both hart and body heale.
DOE I not see that fayrest ymages
Of hardest marble are of purpose made,
For that they should endure through many ages,
Ne let theyr famous moniments to fade?
Why then do I, untrainde in Lovers trade,
Her hardnes blame, which I should more tommend,
Sith never ought was excellent assayde,
Which was not hard t'atchive and bring to end?
Ne ought so hard, but he that would attend
Mote soften it, and to his will allure:
So do I hope her stubborne hart to bend,
And that it then more stedfast will endure.
Only my paines will be the more to get her;
But, having her, my ioy wil be the greater.
So oft as homeward I from her depart,
I goe lyke one that, having lost the field,.
Is prisoner led away with heavy hart,
Despoyl'd of warlike arms and knowen shield.
So doe I now my self a prisoner yield
To sorrow and to solitary paine;
From presence of my dearest deare exylde, ́
Long-while alone in languor to remaine.
There let no thought of ioy, or pleasure vaine,
Dare to approch, that may my solace breed;
But sudden dumps, and drery sad disdayne
Of all worlds gladnesse, more my torment feed..
So I her absense will my penaunce make,
That of her presens I my meed may take..
THE panther, knowing that his spotted hyde
Doth please all beasts, but that his looks them fray,
Within a bush his dreadful head doth hide,
To let them gaze, whylst he on them may pray:
Right so my cruell fayre with me doth play,
For, with the goodly semblance of her hew,
She doth allure me to mine owne decay,
And then no mercy will unto me shew.
Great shame it is, thing so divine in view,
Made for to be the world's most ornament,
To make the bayte her gazers to embrew:
Good shames to be to ill an instrument!
But mercy doth with beautie best agree,
As in theyr Maker ye them best may see.
Or this worlds theatre, in which we stay,
My love, like the spectator, ydly sits;
Beholding me, that all the pageants play,
Disguysing diversly my troubled wits.
Sometimes I ioy, when glad occasion fits,
And mask in myrth lyke to a Comedy:
Soone after, when my ioy to sorrow flits,
I waile, and make my woes a Tragedy.
Yet she, beholding me with constant eye,
Delights not in my merth, nor rues my smart:
But when I laugh, she mocks; and, when I cry,
She laughs, and hardens evermore her hart:
What then can move her? if not merth, nor mone,
She is no woman, but a sencelesse stone.
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