He was not of an age, but for all time! And all the Muses still were in their prime, When, like Apollo, he came forth to warm Our ears, or like a Mercury to charm! Nature herself was proud of his designs, And joyed to wear the dressing of his lines, Which were so richly spun, and woven so fit, As, since, she will vouchsafe no other wit. The merry Greek, tart Aristophanes, Neat Terence, witty Plautus, now not please; But antiquated and deserted lie,
As they were not of Nature's family. Yet must I not give Nature all; thy Art, My gentle Shakespeare, must enjoy a part. For though the poet's matter nature be, His art doth give the fashion; and that he Who casts to write a living line, must sweat (Such as thine are) and strike the second heat Upon the Muses' anvil, turn the same, And himself with it, that he thinks to frame; Or for the laurel he may gain a scorn; For a good poet's made, as well as born.
And such wert thou! Look, how the father's face
Lives in his issue, even so the race
Or leave a kiss within the cup,
And I'll not look for wine.
I would not change for thine.
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!
1 Plain, or unadorned, in thy neatness, the phrase is from Horace's ode to Pyrrha (Odes, Lib. I. Car. V.).
1 Jonson thus explains the title Underwoods, which consists of a collection of comparatively short poems on various subjects: "As the multitude called Timber-trees promiscuously growing, a Wood, or Forest; so I am bold to entitle these lesser poems of later growth by this name of Underwood." Preface "To the Reader."
(From The Rape of Lucrece, acted c. 1605)
Pack, clouds, away, and welcome day, With night we banish sorrow;
Sweet air blow soft, mount lark aloft, To give my love good-morrow.
Pan, O great god Pan, to thee
Thou that keep'st us chaste and free
Wings from the wind to please her mind, 5 Notes from the lark I'll borrow;
Bird prune thy wing, nightingale sing, To give my love good-morrow,
To give my love good-morrow, Notes from them both I'll borrow.
Wake from thy rest, robin redbreast, Sing birds in every furrow;
And from each bill let music shrill Give my fair love good-morrow.
As the young spring;
Ever be thy honour spoke,
From that place the Morn is broke To that place Day doth unyoke!
SONG OF THE PRIEST OF PAN
Shepherds all, and maidens fair Fold your flocks up, for the air 'Gins to thicken, and the sun Already his great course hath run. See the dew-drops how they kiss Every little flower that is; Hanging on their velvet heads, Like a rope of crystal beads; See the heavy clouds low falling, And bright Hesperus down calling The dead night from under ground; At whose rising mists unsound, Damps and vapours fly apace, Hovering o'er the wanton face Of these pastures, where they come Striking dead both bud and bloom: 1 Starling.
Therefore from such danger lock Every one his loved flock; And let your dogs lie loose without, Lest the wolf come as a scout From the mountain, and, ere day, Bear a lamb or kid away; Or the crafty thievish fox Break upon your simple flocks. To secure yourselves from these Be not too secure in ease; Let one eye his watches peep While the other eye doth sleep; So you shall good shepherds prove, And for ever hold the love
Of our great god. Sweetest slumbers, And soft silence, fall in numbers1 On your eyelids! So, farewell! Thus I end my evening's knell.
ON THE LIFE OF MAN1
(From Poems, 1640)
Like to the falling of a star, Or as the flights of eagles are,
Or like the fresh spring's gaudy hue, Or silver drops of morning dew, Or like the wind that chafes the flood, Or bubbles which on water stood; Even such is man, whose borrowed light Is straight called in and paid to-night. The wind blows out, the bubble dies, The spring entombed in autumn lies, The dew's dried up, the star is shot, The flight is past, and man forgot.
With his honour and his name
ON THE TOMBS IN WESTMINSTER
(From Poems, 1653)
Mortality, behold and fear!
What a change of flesh is here!
Think how many royal bones
Sleep within this heap of stones;
MELANCHOLY
(From "Nice Valour")
Hence all you vain delights, As short as are the nights
Wherein you spend your folly! There's naught in this life sweet, If man were wise to see 't, But only melancholy;
O sweetest melancholy!
Welcome folded arms, and fixed eyes, A sigh that piercing mortifies, A look that's fastened to the ground, tongue chained up, without a sound!
1 Fall with a musical or rhythmical cadence.
Lo, by thy charming rod, all breathing things 5 Lie slumb'ring, with forgetfulness possess'd, And yet o'er me to spread thy drowsy wings Thou spar'st, alas! who cannot be thy guest. Since I am thine, O come, but with that face To inward light, which thou are wont to shew, 10 With feigned solace ease a true-felt woe; Or if, deaf god, thou do deny that grace, Come as thou wilt, and what thou wilt be- queath,
I long to kiss the image of my death.
I know that all beneath the moon decays, And what by mortals in this world is brought In time's great periods shall return to naught; That fairest states have fatal nights and days. I know that all the Muses' heavenly lays, With toil of sprite, which are so dearly bought, As idle sounds, of few, or none are sought, That there is nothing lighter than vain praise. I know frail beauty's like the purple flow'r, To which one morn oft birth and death affords, That love a jarring is of mind's accords, Where sense and will bring under reason's
Know what I list, this all cannot me move, But that, alas, I both must write and love.
Who seek by trophies and dead things To leave a living name behind,
And weave but nets to catch the wind.
(From Poems, Amorous, Funeral, etc., 1616) Sleep, Silence' child, sweet father of soft rest, Prince whose approach peace to all mortals brings,
Indifferent host to shepherds and to kings, Sole comforter of minds which are oppress'd;
1 Gifts of food or money and the like, were sometimes distributed at funerals for the benefit of the soul of the deceased.
1 Green plover or lapwing.
This life, which seems so fair,
Is like a bubble blown up in the air, By sporting children's breath, Who chase it every where,
And strive who can most motion it bequeath. 5 And though it sometime seem of its own might Like to an eye of gold to be fix'd there, And firm to hover in that empty height, That only is because it is so light. But in that pomp it doth not long appear; For when 'tis most admired, in a thought, Because it erst was nought, it turns to nought.
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