Elizabethan Sonnet Cycles: Phillis - Licia

THOMAS LODGE (2)

One of the first to take up the new fashion of the sonnet-cycle, was Thomas Lodge, whose "Phillis" was published in 1595. Lodge had a wide acquaintance among the authors of his time, and was in the thick of the literary activity in the last two decades of the sixteenth century. But in spite of his interesting personality and genius, he has had to wait until the present time for full appreciation. To his own age he may have appeared as a literary dilettante, who tried his hand at several forms of writing, and being outshone by the more excellent in each field, gave up the attempt and turned to the practice of medicine. This profession engaged him for the last twenty-five years of his life, until his death in 1625 at the advanced age of sixty-seven or eight. During all these years the gay young "university wit" of earlier days was probably forgotten in the venerable and successful physician. It was as "old Doctor Lodge" that he was satirised in a Cambridge student's Common-place Book in 1611. Heywood mentions him in 1609 among the six most famous physicians in England, and in the Return from Parnassus, a play acted in 1602, he is described as "turning over Galen every day."

Yet no one had been in the last twenty years the sixteenth century more responsive than Lodge to the shifting moods of that excitable period. Lodge was the son of a Lord Mayor of London, and was a contemporary at Oxford with Sidney, Gosson, Chapman, Lyly, Peele and Watson. His life included a round of varied experiences. A student at Lincoln's Inn, a young aspirant for literary honours, friends with Greene, Rich, Daniel, Drayton, Lyly and Watson, a taster of the sorrows that many of the University wits endured when usurers got their hands upon them, for a time perhaps a soldier, certainly a sailor following the fortunes of Captain Clarke to Terceras and the Canaries, and of Cavendish to Brazil and the Straits of Magellan, in London again making plays with Greene, off to Avignon to take his degree in medicine, back again to be incorporated an M.D. at Oxford and to practise in London, adopting secretly the Roman Catholic faith, and sometimes hiding on the continent as a recusant from persecution at home, imprisoned perhaps once for debt, and entertaining a concourse of patients of his own religion till his death in 1625:—the life of Lodge thus presents a view of the ups and downs possible in that picturesque age.

The wide variety of his literary ventures reflects the interests of his life. Some controversial papers, some unsuccessful plays, two dull historical sketches in prose, some satirical and moralising works in prose and in verse, two romantic tales in verse and three in prose, a number of eclogues, metrical epistles and lyrics, some ponderous translations from Latin and French, and two medical treatises; these widely differing kinds of writing are the products of Lodge's industry and genius. All, however, have but an antiquarian interest save two; the prose romance called Rosalynde, Euphues' Golden Legacy, could not be spared since Shakespeare borrowed its charming plot for As You Like It; and Phillis, bound up with a sheaf of his lyrics gathered from the pages of his stories and from the miscellanies of the time, should be treasured for its own sake and should keep Lodge's memory green for lovers of pure poetry.

Lodge's lyric genius was a clear if slender rill. His faults are the more unpardonable since they spring from sheer carelessness and a lack of appreciation of the sacred responsibility of creative power. He took up the literary fashion of the month and tried his hand at it; that done, he was ready for the next mode. He did not wait to perfect his work or to compare result with result; therefore he probably never found himself, probably never realised that after three centuries he would be esteemed, not for the ponderous tomes of his translation of Josephus, not for all the catalogues of his satirical and religious and scientific writings, but for mere lyrics like the "Heigh ho, fair Rosaline," and "Love in my bosom like a bee," heedlessly imbedded in the heart of a prose romance.

Lodge was one of the earliest to follow the example of Sidney in linking a sequence of sonnets together into a sonnet-cycle. The Astrophel and Stella was published in 1591, though it had doubtless before this been handed about, as was the Elizabethan fashion, in manuscript. Early in 1591 also when Daniel was probably abroad, twenty-seven of the fifty-seven sonnets that a year later formed the sonnet-cycle Delia were published in his absence. Now in August of 1591 Lodge set sail with Cavendish on that long voyage to Brazil and the Straits of Magellan from which he did not return till early in ninety-three, and it was during his absence that Daniel's and Constable's sonnet-cycles came out. It is possible that Lodge saw Daniel's series, as he doubtless did Sidney's, in manuscript before he left England, but the Induction to Phillis, which carries a message to Delia's "sweet prophet," was almost certainly written later, and in the absence of further proof it seems no more than fair to allow Lodge to share with Daniel and Constable the honour of being the earliest to take the hint Sidney had offered.

On the whole, Lodge's sonnets show a much more cheerful and buoyant temper than Daniel's "wailing verse." The "sad horror, pale grief, prostrate despair" that inform the Delia, are replaced in the Phillis by a spirit of airy toying, a pleasure in the graces of fancy even when they cluster around a feeling of sadness. During Lodge's absence, his friend Robert Green published several pieces for him, and in one of the prefaces promised the public to present on his return "what labours Lodge's sea-studies afford." Phillis was the chief of these sea-studies, and was like Rosalynde "hatcht in the stormes of the ocean and feathered in the surges of many perillous seas." But as far as the imagery of the sonnets is concerned, the pageantry of day and night at sea might have passed before blinded eyes; if it made any impression, it was in the form of ocean-nymphs and Cupid at the helm. The poet was in Arcadia, Phillis was a shepherdess, and the conventional imageries of the pastoral valley were the environment. "May it please you," he says in dedicating the book to the Countess of Shrewsbury, "to looke and like of homlie Phillis in her Country caroling, and to countenance her poore and affectionate sheapheard." The Countess of Shrewsbury he chooses for the "Sovereign and she-MÆcenas" of his toil, and promises her "as much in affection as any other can performe in perfection;" but the name of Phillis is no cover for the personality of a grand lady, and therefore no puzzling questions disturb the pleasure of the reader as the gentle modulations, the insidious alliterations, and the musical cadences of his double rhymes fall upon the ear.

Yet for this name or ideal, or whatever Phillis represented in the poet's thought, he has poured forth a passion that has an air of sincerity, an artless freshness, a flute-like clearness of tone, as rare as delightful. It is the very voice of the oaten pipe itself, thin, clear, and pure. The touches of seriousness are impossible, to mistake. When the poet avows his faith in Phillis' constancy, after giving the usual catalogue of her beauties, he says:

"At thy fair hands who wonders not at all
Wonder itself through ignorance embases;
Yet not the less though wondrous gifts you call these
My faith is far more wonderful than all these."

When Phillis persists in her disdain, he cries out impulsively:

"Burst, burst, poor heart, thou hast no longer hope!"

Even when re-moulding the familiar pastoral conceits, he makes the fancies his own and gives to them a unique touch and spirit. Mere conventions he rates at their proper value. His pen shall not "riot in pompous style." He claims a brighter aspect for his poetical devotion than his fellow-sonneteers manifest:

"No stars her; eyes....
.... but beams that clear the sight
Of him that seeks the true philosophy."

In spite of its defects, the lax structure of the sonnet-form, the obscurities and needless blurring, and the disappointing inequalities, Phillis takes a high place among the sonnet-cycles, and must ever be dear to lovers of quiet, melodious verse, who have made themselves at home in the golden world of the pastoral poets and mislike not the country-carolling heard therein.

THE INDUCTION

I that obscured have fled the scene of fame,
Intitling my conceits to nought but care,
I that have lived a phoenix in love's flame,
And felt that death I never would declare,
Now mount the theater of this our age,
To plead my faith and Cupid's cursed rage.

Oh you high sp'rited paragons of wit,
That fly to fame beyond our earthly pitch,
Whose sense is sound, whose words are feat and fit,
Able to make the coyest ear to itch;
Shroud with your mighty wings that mount so well,
These little loves, new crept from out the shell.

And thou the true Octavia of our time,
Under whose worth beauty was never matched,
The genius of my muse and ragged rime,
Smile on these little loves but lately hatched,
Who from the wrastling waves have made retreat,
To plead for life before thy judgment seat.

And though the fore-bred brothers they have had,
Who in their swan-like songs Amintas wept,
For all their sweet-thought sighs had fortune bad,
And twice obscured in Cinthia's circle slept,
Yet these I hope, under your kind aspect,
Most worthy Lady, shall escape neglect.

And if these infants of mine artless brain,
Not by their worth but by thy worthiness,
A mean good liking of the learnÈd gain,
My Muse enfranchised from forgetfulness
Shall hatch such breed in honour of thy name,
As modern poets shall admire the same.

As modern poets shall admire the same;
I mean not you (you never matchÈd men)
Who brought the chaos of our tongue in frame,
Through these Herculean labours of your pen;
I mean the mean, I mean no men divine,
But such whose feathers are but waxed like mine.

Go, weeping truce-men in your sighing weeds,
Under a great Maecenas I have passed you;
If so you come where learnÈd Colin feeds
His lovely flock, pack thence and quickly haste you;
You are but mists before so bright a sun,
Who hath the palm for deep invention won.

Kiss Delia's hand for her sweet prophet's sake,
Whose not affected but well couchÈd tears
Have power, have worth, a marble mind to shake,
Whose fame no iron-age or time outwears.
Then lay you down in Phillis' lap and sleep,
Until the weeping read, and reading weep.

I

Oh pleasing thoughts, apprentices of love,
Fore-runners of desire, sweet mithridates
The poison of my sorrows to remove,
With whom my hopes and fear full oft debates!
Enrich yourselves and me by your self riches,
Which are the thoughts you spend on heaven-bred beauty,
Rouse you my muse beyond our poets' pitches,
And, working wonders, yet say all is duty!
Use you no eaglets' eyes, nor phoenix' feathers,
To tower the heaven from whence heaven's wonder sallies.
For why? Your sun sings sweetly to her weathers,
Making a spring of winter in the valleys.
Show to the world though poor and scant my skill is
How sweet thoughts be, that are but thought on Phillis!

II

You sacred sea-nymphs pleasantly disporting
Amidst this wat'ry world, where now I sail;
If ever love, or lovers sad reporting,
Had power sweet tears from your fair eyes to hail;
And you, more gentle-hearted than the rest,
Under the northern noon-stead sweetly streaming,
Lend those moist riches of your crystal crest,
To quench the flames from my heart's Ætna streaming;
And thou, kind Triton, in thy trumpet relish
The ruthful accents of my discontent,
That midst this travel desolate and hellish,
Some gentle wind that listens my lament
May prattle in the north in Phillis' ears:
"Where Phillis wants, Damon consumes in tears."

III

In fancy's world an Atlas have I been,
Where yet the chaos of my ceaseless care
Is by her eyes unpitied and unseen,
In whom all gifts but pity planted are;
For mercy though still cries my moan-clad muse,
And every paper that she sends to beauty,
In tract of sable tears brings woeful news,
Of my true heart-kind thoughts, and loyal duty.
But ah the strings of her hard heart are strained
Beyond the harmony of my desires;
And though the happy heavens themselves have pained,
To tame her heart whose will so far aspires,
Yet she who claims the title of world's wonder,
Thinks all deserts too base to bring her under.

IV

Long hath my sufferance laboured to enforce
One pearl of pity from her pretty eyes,
Whilst I with restless rivers of remorse,
Have bathed the banks where my fair Phillis lies.
The moaning lines which weeping I have written,
And writing read unto my ruthful sheep,
And reading sent with tears that never fitten,
To my love's queen, that hath my heart in keep,
Have made my lambkins lay them down and sigh;
But Phillis sits, and reads, and calls them trifles.
Oh heavens, why climb not happy lines so high,
To rent that ruthless heart that all hearts rifles!
None writes with truer faith, or greater love,
Yet out, alas! I have no power to move.

V

Ah pale and dying infant of the spring,
How rightly now do I resemble thee!
That selfsame hand that thee from stalk did wring,
Hath rent my breast and robbed my heart from me.
Yet shalt thou live. For why? Thy native vigour
Shall thrive by woeful dew-drops of my dolor;
And from the wounds I bear through fancy's rigour,
My streaming blood shall yield the crimson color.
The ravished sighs that ceaseless take their issue
From out the furnace of my heart inflamed,
To yield you lasting springs shall never miss you;
So by my plaints and pains, you shall be famed.
Let my heart's heat and cold, thy crimson nourish,
And by my sorrows let thy beauty flourish.

VI

It is not death which wretched men call dying,
But that is very death which I endure,
When my coy-looking nymph, her grace envying,
By fatal frowns my domage doth procure.
It is not life which we for life approve,
But that is life when on her wool-soft paps
I seal sweet kisses which do batten love,
And doubling them do treble my good haps.
'Tis neither love the son, nor love the mother,
Which lovers praise and pray to; but that love is
Which she in eye and I in heart do smother.
Then muse not though I glory in my miss,
Since she who holds my heart and me in durance,
Hath life, death, love and all in her procurance.

VII

How languisheth the primrose of love's garden!
How trill her tears, th' elixir of my senses!
Ambitious sickness, what doth thee so harden?
Oh spare, and plague thou me for her offences!
Ah roses, love's fair roses, do not languish;
Blush through the milk-white veil that holds you covered.
If heat or cold may mitigate your anguish,
I'll burn, I'll freeze, but you shall be recovered.
Good God, would beauty mark now she is crased,
How but one shower of sickness makes her tender,
Her judgments then to mark my woes amazed,
To mercy should opinion's fort surrender!
And I,—oh would I might, or would she meant it!
Should hery[A] love, who now in heart lament it.

VIII

No stars her eyes to clear the wandering night,
But shining suns of true divinity,
That make the soul conceive her perfect light!
No wanton beauties of humanity
Her pretty brows, but beams that clear the sight
Of him that seeks the true philosophy!
No coral is her lip, no rose her fair,
But even that crimson that adorns the sun.
No nymph is she, but mistress of the air,
By whom my glories are but new begun.
But when I touch and taste as others do,
I then shall write and you shall wonder too.

IX

The dewy roseate Morn had with her hairs
In sundry sorts the Indian clime adorned;
And now her eyes apparrelÈd in tears,
The loss of lovely Memnon long had mourned,
When as she spied the nymph whom I admire,
Combing her locks, of which the yellow gold
Made blush the beauties of her curlÈd wire,
Which heaven itself with wonder might behold;
Then red with shame, her reverend locks she rent,
And weeping hid the beauty of her face,
The flower of fancy wrought such discontent;
The sighs which midst the air she breathed a space,
A three-days' stormy tempest did maintain,
Her shame a fire, her eyes a swelling rain.

X

The rumour runs that here in Isis swim
Such stately swans so confident in dying,
That when they feel themselves near Lethe's brim,
They sing their fatal dirge when death is nighing.
And I like these that feel my wounds are mortal,
Contented die for her whom I adore;
And in my joyful hymns do still exhort all
To die for such a saint or love no more.
Not that my torments or her tyranny
Enforce me to enjoin so hard a task,
But for I know, and yield no reason why,
But will them try that have desire to ask.
As love hath wreaths his pretty eyes to seel,
So lovers must keep secret what they feel.

XI

My frail and earthly bark, by reason's guide,
Which holds the helm, whilst will doth wield the sail,
By my desires, the winds of bad betide,
Hath sailed these worldly seas with small avail,
Vain objects serve for dreadful rocks to quail
My brittle boat from haven of life that flies
To haunt the sea of mundane miseries.
My soul that draws impressions from above,
And views my course, and sees the winds aspire,
Bids reason watch to scape the shoals of love;
But lawless will enflamed with endless ire
Doth steer empoop,[B] whilst reason doth retire.
The streams increase; love's waves my bark do fill;
Thus are they wracked that guide their course by will.

XII

Ah trees, why fall your leaves so fast?
Ah rocks, where are your robes of moss?
Ah flocks, why stand you all aghast?
Trees, rocks, and flocks, what, are you pensive for my loss?
The birds methinks tune naught but moan,
The winds breathe naught but bitter plaint,
The beasts forsake their dens to groan;
Birds, winds, and beasts, what doth my loss your powers attaint?
Floods weep their springs above their bounds,
And echo wails to see my woe,
The robe of ruth doth clothe the grounds;
Floods, echo, grounds, why do you all these tears bestow?
The trees, the rocks, and flocks reply,
The birds, the winds, the beasts report,
Floods, echo, grounds, for sorrow cry,
We grieve since Phillis nill kind Damon's love consort.

XIII

Love guides the roses of thy lips,
And flies about them like a bee;
If I approach he forward skips,
And if I kiss he stingeth me.
Love in thine eyes doth build his bower,
And sleeps within their pretty shine;
And if I look the boy will lower,
And from their orbs shoots shafts divine.
Love works thy heart within his fire,
And in my tears doth firm the same;
And if I tempt it will retire,
And of my plaints doth make a game.
Love, let me cull her choicest flowers,
And pity me, and calm her eye,
Make soft her heart, dissolve her lowers,
Then will I praise thy deity.
But if thou do not love, I'll truly serve her
In spite of thee, and by firm faith deserve her.

XIV

I wrote in Mirrha's bark, and as I wrote,
Poor Mirrha wept because I wrote forsaken;
'Twas of thy pride I sung in weeping note,
When as her leaves great moan for pity maken.
The falling fountains from the mountains falling,
Cried out, alas, so fair and be so cruel!
And babbling echo never ceasÈd calling,
Phillis, disdain is fit for none but truthless.
The rising pines wherein I had engraved
Thy memory consulting with the wind,
Are trucemen to thy heart and thoughts depraved,
And say, thy kind should not be so unkind.
But, out alas! so fell is Phillis fearless,
That she hath made her Damon well nigh tearless.

XV

My Phillis hath the morning sun
At first to look upon her.
And Phillis hath morn-waking birds,
Her risings for to honour.
My Phillis hath prime-feathered flowers,
That smile when she treads on them,
And Phillis hath a gallant flock,
That leaps since she doth own them.
But Phillis hath so hard a heart—
Alas that she should have it!—
As yields no mercy to desert,
Nor grace to those that crave it.
Sweet sun, when thou look'st on,
Pray her regard my moan.
Sweet birds, when you sing to her,
To yield some pity woo her.
Sweet flowers, whenas she treads on,
Tell her, her beauty deads one.
And if in life her love she nill agree me,
Pray her before I die, she will come see me.

XVI

I part; but how? from joy, from hope, from life;
I leave; but whom? love's pride, wit's pomp, heart's bliss;
I pine; for what? for grief, for thought, for strife;
I faint; and why? because I see my miss.
Oh ceaseless pains that never may be told,
You make me weep as I to water would!
Ah weary hopes, in deep oblivious streams
Go seek your graves, since you have lost your grounds!
Ah pensive heart, seek out her radiant gleams!
For why? Thy bliss is shut within those bounds!
All traitorous eyes, to[o] feeble in for[e] sight,
Grow dim with woe, that now must want your light!
I part from bliss to dwell with ceaseless moan,
I part from life, since I from beauty part,
I part from peace, to pine in care alone,
I part from ease to die with dreadful smart.
I part—oh death! for why? this world contains
More care and woe than with despair remains.
Oh loath depart, wherein such sorrows dwell,
As all conceits are scant the same to tell!

XVII

Ah fleeting weal, ah sly deluding sleep,
That in one moment giv'st me joy and pain!
How do my hopes dissolve to tears in vain,
As wont the snows, 'fore angry sun to weep!
Ah noisome life that hath no weal in keep!
My forward grief hath form and working might;
My pleasures like the shadows take their flight;
My path to bliss is tedious, long and steep.
Twice happy thou Endymion that embracest
The live-long night thy love within thine arms,
Where thou fond dream my longÈd weal defacest
Whilst fleeting and uncertain shades thou placest
Before my eyes with false deluding charms!
Ah instant sweets which do my heart revive,
How should I joy if you were true alive!

XVIII

As where two raging venoms are united,
Which of themselves dissevered life would sever,
The sickly wretch of sickness is acquited,
Which else should die, or pine in torments ever;
So fire and frost, that hold my heart in seizure,
Restore those ruins which themselves have wrought,
Where if apart they both had had their pleasure,
The earth long since her fatal claim had caught.
Thus two united deaths keep me from dying;
I burne in ice, and quake amidst the fire,
No hope midst these extremes or favour spying;
Thus love makes me a martyr in his ire.
So that both cold and heat do rather feed
My ceaseless pains, than any comfort breed.

XIX

XX

Some praise the looks, and others praise the locks
Of their fair queens, in love with curious words;
Some laud the breast where love his treasure locks,
All like the eye that life and love affords.
But none of these frail beauties and unstable
Shall make my pen riot in pompous style;
More greater gifts shall my grave muse enable,
Whereat severer brows shall never smile.
I praise her honey-sweeter eloquence,
Which from the fountain of true wisdom floweth,
Her modest mien that matcheth excellence,
Her matchless faith which from her virtue groweth;
And could my style her happy virtues equal,
Time had no power her glories to enthral.

EGLOGA PRIMA DEMADES DAMON

DEMADES

Now scourge of winter's wrack is well nigh spent,
And sun gins look more longer on our clime,
And earth no more to sorrow doth consent,
Why been thy looks forlorn that view the prime?
Unneth thy flocks may feed to see thee faint,
Thou lost, they lean, and both with woe attaint.
For shame! Cast off these discontented looks;
For grief doth wait on life, though never sought;
So Thenot wrote admired for pipe and books.
Then to the spring attemper thou thy thought,
And let advice rear up thy drooping mind,
And leave to weep thy woes unto the wind.

DAMON

Ah Demades, no wonder though I wail,
For even the spring is winter unto me!
Look as the sun the earth doth then avail,
When by his beams her bowels warmÈd be;
Even so a saint more sun-bright in her shining
First wrought my weal, now hastes my winter's pining.
Which lovely lamp withdrawn from my poor eyes,
Both parts of earth and fire drowned up in woe
In winter dwell. My joy, my courage dies;
My lambs with me that do my winter know
For pity scorn the spring that nigheth near,
And pine to see their master's pining cheer.
The root which yieldeth sap unto the tree
Draws from the earth the means that make it spring;
And by the sap the scions fostered be,
All from the sun have comfort and increasing
And that fair eye that lights this earthly ball
Kills by depart, and nearing cheereth all.
As root to tree, such is my tender heart,
Whose sap is thought, whose branches are content;
And from my soul they draw their sweet or smart,
And from her eye, my soul's best life is lent;
Which heavenly eye that lights both earth and air,
Quells by depart and quickens by repair.

DEMADES

Give period to the process of thy plaint,
Unhappy Damon, witty in self-grieving;
Tend thou thy flocks; let tyrant love attaint
Those tender hearts that made their love their living.
And as kind time keeps Phillis from thy sight,
So let prevention banish fancy quite.

Cast hence this idle fuel of desire,
That feeds that flame wherein thy heart consumeth;
Let reason school thy will which doth aspire,
And counsel cool impatience that presumeth;
Drive hence vain thoughts which are fond love's abettors,
For he that seeks his thraldom merits fetters.

The vain idea of this deity
Nursed at the teat of thine imagination,
Was bred, brought up by thine own vanity,
Whose being thou mayst curse from the creation;
And so thou list, thou may as soon forget love,
As thou at first didst fashion and beget love.

DAMON

Peace, Demades, peace shepherd, do not tempt me;
The sage-taught wife may speak thus, but not practise;
Rather from life than from my love exempt me,
My happy love wherein my weal and wrack lies;
Where chilly age first left love, and first lost her,
There youth found love, liked love, and love did foster.

Not as ambitious of their[C] own decay,
But curious to equal your fore-deeds,
So tread we now within your wonted way;
We find your fruits of judgments and their seeds;
We know you loved, and loving learn that lore;
You scorn kind love, because you can no more.

Though from this pure refiner of the thought
The gleanings of your learnings have you gathered
Your lives had been abortive, base and naught,
Except by happy love they had been fathered;
Then still the swain, for I will still avow it;
They have no wit nor worth that disallow it.

Then to renew the ruins of my tears
Be thou no hinderer, Demades, I pray thee.
If my love-sighs grow tedious in thine ears,
Fly me, that fly from joy, I list not stay thee.
Mourn sheep, mourn lambs, and Damon will weep by you;
And when I sigh, "Come home, sweet Phillis," cry you.

Come home, sweet Phillis, for thine absence causeth
A flowerless prime-tide in these drooping meadows;
To push his beauties forth each primrose pauseth,
Our lilies and our roses like coy widows
Shut in their buds, their beauties, and bemoan them,
Because my Phillis doth not smile upon them.

The trees by my redoubled sighs long blasted
Call for thy balm-sweet breath and sunny eyes,
To whom all nature's comforts are hand-fasted;
Breathe, look on them, and they to life arise;
They have new liveries with each smile thou lendest,
And droop with me, when thy fair brow thou bendest.

I woo thee, Phillis, with more earnest weeping
Than Niobe for her dead issue spent;
I pray thee, nymph who hast our spring in keeping,
Thou mistress of our flowers and my content,
Come home, and glad our meads of winter weary,
And make thy woeful Damon blithe and merry.

Else will I captive all my hopes again,
And shut them up in prisons of despair,
And weep such tears as shall destroy this plain,
And sigh such sighs as shall eclipse the air,
And cry such cries as love that hears my crying
Shall faint and weep for grief and fall a-dying.

My little world hath vowed no sun shall glad it,
Except thy little world her light discover,
Of which heavens would grow proud if so they had it.
Oh how I fear lest absent Jove should love her!
I fear it, Phillis, for he never saw one
That had more heaven-sweet looks to lure and awe one.

I swear to thee, all-seeing sovereign
Rolling heaven's circles round about our center,
Except my Phillis safe return again,
No joy to heart, no meat to mouth shall enter.
All hope (but future hope to be renowned,
For weeping Phillis) shall in tears be drowned.

DEMADES

How large a scope lends Damon to his moan,
Wafting those treasures of his happy wit
In registering his woeful woe-begone!
Ah bend thy muse to matters far more fit!
For time shall come when Phillis is interred,
That Damon shall confess that he hath erred.

When nature's riches shall, by time dissolved,
Call thee to see with more judicial eye
How Phillis' beauties are to dust resolved,
Thou then shalt ask thyself the reason why
Thou wert so fond, since Phillis was so frail,
To praise her gifts that should so quickly fail.

Have mercy on thyself, cease being idle,
Let reason claim and gain of will his homage;
Rein in these brain-sick thoughts with judgment's bridle,
A short prevention helps a mighty domage.
If Phillis love, love her, yet love her so
That if she fly, thou may'st love's fire forego.

Play with the fire, yet die not in the flame;
Show passions in thy words, but not in heart;
Lest when thou think to bring thy thoughts in frame,
Thou prove thyself a prisoner by thine art.
Play with these babes of love, as apes with glasses,
And put no trust in feathers, wind, or lasses.

DAMON

Did not thine age yield warrantise, old man,
Impatience would enforce me to offend thee;
Me list not now thy forward skill to scan,
Yet will I pray that love may mend or end thee.
Spring flowers, sea-tides, earth, grass, sky, stars shall banish,
Before the thoughts of love or Phillis vanish.

So get thee gone, and fold thy tender sheep,
For lo, the great automaton of day
In Isis stream his golden locks doth steep;
Sad even her dusky mantle doth display;
Light-flying fowls, the posts of night, disport them,
And cheerful-looking vesper doth consort them.

Come you, my careful flock, forego you master,
I'll fold you up and after fall a-sighing;
Words have no worth my secret wounds to plaster;
Naught may refresh my joys but Phillis nighing.
Farewell, old Demades.

DEMADES

Damon, farewell.
How 'gainst advice doth headlong youth rebel!

AN ELEGY

Ah cruel winds, why call you hence away?
Why make you breach betwixt my soul and me?
Ye traitorous floods, why nil your floats delay
Until my latest moans discoursÈd be?
For though ye salt sea-gods withhold the rain
Of all your floats and gentle winds be still,
While I have wept such tears as might restrain
The rage of tides and winds against their will.
Ah shall I love your sight, bright shining eyes?
And must my soul his life and glory leave?
Must I forsake the bower where solace lives,
To trust to tickle fates that still deceive?
Alas, so wills the wanton queen of change,
That each man tract this labyrinth of life
With slippery steps, now wronged by fortune strange,
Now drawn by counsel from the maze of strife!
Ah joy! No joy because so soon thou fleetest,
Hours, days, and times inconstant in your being!
Oh life! No life, since with such chance thou meetest!
Oh eyes! No eyes, since you must lose your seeing!
Soul, be thou sad, dissolve thy living powers
To crystal tears, and by their pores express
The grief that my distressÈd soul devours!
Clothe thou my body all in heaviness;
My suns appeared fair smiling full of pleasure,
But now the vale of absence overclouds them;
They fed my heart with joys exceeding measure
Which now shall die, since absence needs must shroud them.
Yea, die! Oh death, sweet death, vouchsafe that blessing,
That I may die the death whilst she regardeth!
For sweet were death, and sweet were death's oppressing,
If she look on who all my life awardeth.
Oh thou that art the portion of my joy,
Yet not the portion, for thou art the prime;
Suppose my griefs, conceive the deep annoy
That wounds my soul upon this sorry time!
Pale is my face, and in my pale confesses
The pain I suffer, since I needs must leave thee.
Red are mine eyes through tears that them oppresses,
Dulled are my sp'rits since fates do now bereave thee.
And now, ah now, my plaints are quite prevented!
The winds are fair the sails are hoisÈd high,
The anchors weighed, and now quite discontented,
Grief so subdues my heart as it should die.
A faint farewell with trembling hand I tender,
And with my tears my papers are distained.
Which closÈd up, my heart in them I render,
To tell thee how at parting I complained.
Vouchsafe his message that doth bring farewell,
And for my sake let him with beauty dwell.

THIRSIS EGLOGA SECUNDA

Muses help me, sorrow swarmeth,
Eyes are fraught with seas of languish;
Heavy hope my solace harmeth,
Mind's repast is bitter anguish.

Eye of day regarded never
Certain trust in world untrusty;
Flattering hope beguileth ever
Weary, old, and wanton lusty.

Dawn of day beholds enthronÈd
Fortune's darling, proud and dreadless;
Darksome night doth hear him moanÈd,
Who before was rich and needless.

Rob the sphere of lines united,
Make a sudden void in nature;
Force the day to be benighted,
Reave the cause of time and creature;

Ere the world will cease to vary,
This I weep for, this I sorrow.
Muses, if you please to tarry,
Further helps I mean to borrow.

Courted once by fortune's favour,
Compassed now with envy's curses,
All my thoughts of sorrow savour,
Hopes run fleeting like the sources.

Ay me! Wanton scorn hath maimÈd
All the joy my heart enjoyÈd;
Thoughts their thinking have disclaimÈd,
Hate my hopes hath quite annoyÈd.

Scant regard my weal hath scanted,
Looking coy hath forced my lowering;
Nothing liked where nothing wanted
Weds mine eyes to ceaseless showering.

Former love was once admirÈd,
Present favour is estrangÈd,
Loath the pleasure long desirÈd;
Thus both men and thoughts are changÈd.

Lovely swain with lucky guiding,
Once (but now no more so friended)
Thou my flocks hast had in minding,
From the morn till day was ended.

Drink and fodder, food and folding,
Had my lambs and ewes together;
I with them was still beholding,
Both in warmth and winter weather.

Now they languish since refusÈd,
Ewes and lambs are pained with pining;
I with ewes and lambs confusÈd,
All unto our deaths declining.

Silence, leave thy cave obscurÈd;
Deign a doleful swain to tender;
Though disdains I have endurÈd,
Yet I am no deep offender.

Phillis' son can with his finger
Hide his scar, it is so little;
Little sin a day to linger,
Wise men wander in a tittle.

Thriftless yet my swain have turnÈd,
Though my sun he never showeth:
Though I weep, I am not mournÈd;
Though I want, no pity groweth.

Yet for pity love my muses;
Gentle silence be their cover;
They must leave their wonted uses,
Since I leave to be a lover.

They shall live with thee inclosÈd,
I will loathe my pen and paper
Art shall never be supposÈd,
Sloth shall quench the watching taper.

Kiss them, silence, kiss them kindly
Though I leave them, yet I love them;
Though my wit have led them blindly,
Yet my swain did once approve them.

I will travel soils removÈd,
Night and morrow never merry;
Thou shalt harbour that I lovÈd,
I will love that makes me weary.

If perchance the sheep estrayeth,
In thy walks and shades unhaunted,
Tell the teen my heart betrayeth,
How neglect my joys hath daunted.

XXI

Ye heralds of my heart, mine ardent groans,
O tears which gladly would burst out to brooks,
Oh spent on fruitless sand my surging moans,
Oh thoughts enthralled unto care-boding looks!
Ah just laments of my unjust distress,
Ah fond desires whom reason could not guide!
Oh hopes of love that intimate redress,
Yet prove the load-stars unto bad betide!
When will you cease? Or shall pain never-ceasing,
Seize oh my heart? Oh mollify your rage,
Lest your assaults with over-swift increasing,
Procure my death, or call on timeless age.
What if they do? They shall but feed the fire,
Which I have kindled by my fond desire.

XXII

Fair art thou, Phillis, ay, so fair, sweet maid,
As nor the sun, nor I have seen more fair;
For in thy cheeks sweet roses are embayed,
And gold more pure than gold doth gild thy hair.
Sweet bees have hived their honey on thy tongue,
And Hebe spiced her nectar with thy breath;
About thy neck do all the graces throng,
And lay such baits as might entangle death.
In such a breast what heart would not be thrall?
From such sweet arms who would not wish embraces?
At thy fair hands who wonders not at all,
Wonder itself through ignorance embases?
Yet natheless though wondrous gifts you call these,
My faith is far more wonderful than all these.

XXIII

Burst, burst, poor heart! Thou hast no longer hope;
Captive mine eyes unto eternal sleep;
Let all my senses have no further scope;
Let death be lord of me and all my sheep!
For Phillis hath betrothÈd fierce disdain,
That makes his mortal mansion in her heart;
And though my tongue have long time taken pain
To sue divorce and wed her to desert,
She will not yield, my words can have no power;
She scorns my faith, she laughs at my sad lays,
She fills my soul with never ceasing sour,
Who filled the world with volumes of her praise.
In such extremes what wretch can cease to crave
His peace from death, who can no mercy have!

XXIV

No glory makes me glorious or glad,
Nor pleasure may to pleasure me dispose,
No comfort can revive my senses sad,
Nor hope enfranchise me with one repose.
Nor in her absence taste I one delight,
Nor in her presence am I well content;
Was never time gave term to my despite,
Nor joy that dried the tears of my lament.
Nor hold I hope of weal in memory,
Nor have I thought to change my restless grief,
Nor doth my conquest yield me sovereignty,
Nor hope repose, nor confidence relief.
For why? She sorts her frowns and favours so,
As when I gain or lose I cannot know.

XXV

I wage the combat with two mighty foes,
Which are more strong than I ten thousand fold;
The one is when thy pleasure I do lose,
The other, when thy person I behold.
In seeing thee a swarm of loves confound me,
And cause my death in spite of my resist,
And if I see thee not, thy want doth wound me,
For in thy sight my comfort doth consist.
The one in me continual care createth,
The other doth occasion my desire;
The one the edge of all my joy rebateth,
The other makes me a phoenix in love's fire.
So that I grieve when I enjoy your presence,
And die for grief by reason of your absence.

XXVI

I'll teach thee, lovely Phillis, what love is.
It is a vision seeming such as thou,
That flies as fast as it assaults mine eyes;
It is affection that doth reason miss;
It is a shape of pleasure like to you,
Which meets the eye, and seen on sudden dies;
It is a doubled grief, a spark of pleasure
Begot by vain desire. And this is love,
Whom in our youth we count our chiefest treasure,
In age for want of power we do reprove.
Yea, such a power is love, whose loss is pain,
And having got him we repent our gain.

XXVII

Fair eyes, whilst fearful I your fair admire,
By unexpressÈd sweetness that I gain,
My memory of sorrow doth expire,
And falcon-like, I tower joy's heavens amain.
But when your suns in oceans of their glory
Shut up their day-bright shine, I die for thought;
So pass my joys as doth a new-played story,
And one poor sigh breathes all delight to naught.
So to myself I live not, but for you;
For you I live, and you I love, but none else,
Oh then, fair eyes, whose light I live to view,
Or poor forlorn despised to live alone else,
Look sweet, since from the pith of contemplation
Love gathereth life, and living, breedeth passion.

XXVIII

Not causeless were you christened, gentle flowers,
The one of faith, the other fancy's pride;
For she who guides both faith and fancy's power,
In your fair colors wraps her ivory side.
As one of you hath whiteness without stain,
So spotless is my love and never tainted;
And as the other shadoweth faith again,
Such is my lass, with no fond change acquainted.
And as nor tyrant sun nor winter weather
May ever change sweet amaranthus' hue,
So she though love and fortune join together,
Will never leave to be both fair and true.
And should I leave thee then, thou pretty elf?
Nay, first let Damon quite forget himself.

XXIX

I feel myself endangered beyond reason,
My death already 'twixt the cup and lip,
Because my proud desire through cursÈd treason,
Would make my hopes mount heaven, which cannot skip;
My fancy still requireth at my hands
Such things as are not, cannot, may not be,
And my desire although my power withstands,
Will give me wings, who never yet could flee.
What then remains except my maimÈd soul
Extort compassion from love-flying age,
Or if naught else their fury may control,
To call on death that quells affection's rage;
Which death shall dwell with me and never fly,
Since vain desire seeks that hope doth deny.

XXX

I do compare unto thy youthly clear,
Which always bides within thy flow'ring prime,
The month of April, that bedews our clime
With pleasant flowers, when as his showers appear.
Before thy face shall fly false cruelty,
Before his face the doly season fleets;
Mild been his looks, thine eyes are full of sweets;
Firm is his course, firm is thy loyalty.
He paints the fields through liquid crystal showers,
Thou paint'st my verse with Pallas, learnÈd flowers;
With Zephirus' sweet, breath he fills the plains,
And thou my heart with weeping sighs dost wring;
His brows are dewed with morning's crystal spring,
Thou mak'st my eyes with tears bemoan my pains.

XXXI

Devoid of reason, thrall to foolish ire,
I walk and chase a savage fairy still,
Now near the flood, straight on the mounting hill,
Now midst the woods of youth, and vain desire.
For leash I bear a cord of careful grief;
For brach I lead an over-forward mind;
My hounds are thoughts, and rage despairing blind,
Pain, cruelty, and care without relief.
But they perceiving that my swift pursuit
My flying fairy cannot overtake,
With open mouths their prey on me do make,
Like hungry hounds that lately lost their suit.
And full of fury on their master feed,
To hasten on my hapless death with speed.

XXXII

A thousand times to think and think the same,
To two fair eyes to show a naked heart,
Great thirst with bitter liquor to restrain,
To take repast of care and crooked smart;
To sigh full oft without relent of ire,
To die for grief and yet conceal the tale,
To others' will to fashion my desire,
To pine in looks disguised through pensive-pale;
A short dispite, a faith unfeignÈd true,
To love my foe, and set my life at naught,
With heedless eyes mine endless harms to view,
A will to speak, a fear to tell the thought;
To hope for all, yet for despair to die,
Is of my life the certain destiny.

XXXIII

When first sweet Phillis, whom I must adore,
Gan with her beauties bless our wond'ring sky,
The son of Rhea, from their fatal store
Made all the gods to grace her majesty.
Apollo first his golden rays among,
Did form the beauty of her bounteous eyes;
He graced her with his sweet melodious song,
And made her subject of his poesies.
The warrior Mars bequeathed her fierce disdain,
Venus her smile, and Phoebe all her fair,
Python his voice, and Ceres all her grain,
The morn her locks and fingers did repair.
Young Love, his bow, and Thetis gave her feet;
Clio her praise, Pallas her science sweet.

XXXIV

I would in rich and golden-coloured rain,
With tempting showers in pleasant sort descend
Into fair Phillis' lap, my lovely friend,
When sleep her sense with slumber doth restrain.
I would be changÈd to a milk-white bull,
When midst the gladsome fields she should appear,
By pleasant fineness to surprise my dear,
Whilst from their stalks, she pleasant flowers did pull.
I were content to weary out my pain,
To be Narsissus so she were a spring,
To drown in her those woes my heart do wring.
And more; I wish transformÈd to remain,
That whilst I thus in pleasure's lap did lie,
I might refresh desire, which else would die.

XXXV

I hope and fear, I pray and hold my peace,
Now freeze my thoughts and straight they fry again,
I now admire and straight my wonders cease,
I loose my bonds and yet myself restrain;
This likes me most that leaves me discontent,
My courage serves and yet my heart doth fail,
My will doth climb whereas my hopes are spent,
I laugh at love, yet when he comes I quail;
The more I strive, the duller bide I still.
I would be thralled, and yet I freedom love,
I would redress, yet hourly feed mine ill,
I would repine, and dare not once reprove;
And for my love I am bereft of power,
And strengthless strive my weakness to devour.

XXXVI

If so I seek the shades, I presently do see
The god of love forsakes his bow and sit me by;
If that I think to write, his Muses pliant be
If so I plain my grief, the wanton boy will cry,
If I lament his pride, he doth increase my pain;
If tears my cheeks attaint, his cheeks are moist with moan;
If I disclose the wounds the which my heart hath slain,
He takes his fascia off, and wipes them dry anon.
If so I walk the woods, the woods are his delight;
If I myself torment, he bathes him in my blood;
He will my soldier be if once I wend to fight,
If seas delight, he steers my bark amidst the hood.
In brief, the cruel god doth never from me go,
But makes my lasting love eternal with my woe.

XXXVII

These fierce incessant waves that stream along my face,
Which show the certain proof of my ne'er-ceasing pains,
Fair Phillis, are no tears that trickle from my brains;
For why? Such streams of ruth within me find no place.
These floods that wet my cheeks are gathered from thy grace
And thy perfections, and from hundred thousand flowers
Which from thy beauties spring; whereto I medley showers
Of rose and lilies too, the colours of thy face.
My love doth serve for fire, my heart the furnace is,
The aperries of my sighs augment the burning flame,
The limbec is mine eye that doth distil the same;
And by how much my fire is violent and sly,
By so much doth it cause the waters mount on high,
That shower from out mine eyes, for to assuage my miss.

XXXVIII

Who lives enthralled to Cupid and his flame,
From day to day is changed in sundry sort;
The proof whereof myself may well report,
Who oft transformed by him may teach the same.
I first was turned into a wounded hart,
That bare the bloody arrow in my side;
Then to a swan that midst the waters glide,
With piteous voice presaged my deadly smart;
Eftsoons I waxed a faint and fading flower;
Then was I made a fountain sudden dry,
Distilling all my tears from troubled eye;
Now am I salamander by his power,
Living in flames, but hope ere long to be
A voice, to talk my mistress' majesty.

XXXIX

My matchless mistress, whose delicious eyes
Have power to perfect nature's privy wants,
Even when the sun in greatest pomp did rise,
With pretty tread did press the tender plants.
Each stalk whilst forth she stalks, to kiss her feet
Is proud with pomp, and prodigal of sweet.
Her fingers fair in favouring every flower
That wooed their ivory for a wishÈd touch,
By chance—sweet chance!—upon a blessed hour
Did pluck the flower where Love himself did couch.
Where Love did couch by summer toil suppressed,
And sought his sleeps within so sweet a nest.
The virgin's hand that held the wanton thrall,
Imprisoned him within the roseate leaves;
And twixt her teats, with favour did install
The lovely rose, where Love his rest receives.
The lad that felt the soft and sweet so nigh,
Drowned in delights, disdains his liberty;
And said, let Venus seek another son,
For here my only matchless mother is;
From whose fair orient orbs the drink doth run,
That deifies my state with greater bliss.
This said, he sucked, my mistress blushing smiled,
Since Love was both her prisoner and her child.

AN ODE

XL

Resembling none, and none so poor as I,
Poor to the world, and poor in each esteem,
Whose first-born loves at first obscured did die,
And bred no fame but flame of base misdeem,
Under the ensign of whose tirÈd pen,
Love's legions forth have masked, by others masked;
Think how I live wrongÈd by ill-tongued men,
Not master of myself, to all wrongs tasked!
Oh thou that canst, and she that may do all things,
Support these languishing conceits that perish!
Look on their growth; perhaps these silly small things
May win this wordly palm, so you do cherish.
Homer hath vowed, and I with him do vow this,
He will and shall revive, if you allow this.

LICIA

OR

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