Whether y' accepted that last monument
Of my dear love, the book I mean, I sent
your dear self, when the respectless wind
Bore me away, leaving my heart behind.
And deign, sometimes, when you the same do view,
To think on him who always thinks on you:
Or whether you, as oh, I fear you do,
Hate both my self, and gifts, and letters too.
I must confess, Unkind, when I consider,d
How ill, alas, how ill agree together,
So peerless beauty to so fierce a mind,
So hard an inside to so fair a rind,
A heart so bloody to so white a breast,
So proud disdain with so mild looks supprest;
And how, my dear, oh, would it had been never,
Accursed word! nay would it might be ever:
How once, I say, till our heart was estranged,
Alas, how soon my day to night was changed!
You did vouchsafe my poor eyes so much grace,
Freely to view the riches of your face,
And did so high exalt my lowly heart,
To call it yours, and take it in good part,
And, which was greatest bliss, did not disdain,
For boundless love to yield some love again.
d I must confess (unkind) when I do consider. edit. 1602.
When this, I say, I call unto my mind,
And in my heart and soul no cause can find,
No fact, no word, whereby my heart doth merit,
To lose that love, which once I did inherit,
Despair itself cannot make me despair
But that you'll prove as kind as you are fair,
And that my lines, and book, Oh would 't were true,
Are, though I know't not yet, received by you;
And often have your cruelty repented,
Whereby my guiltless heart is thus tormented.
And now at length, in lieu of passed woe,
Will pity, kindness, love and favour shew.
But when again my cursed memory,
To my sad thoughts confounded diversly,
Presents the time, the tear-procuring time,
That wither'd my young joys before their prime:
The time when I with tedious absence tired,
With restless love and rack'd desire inspired,
Coming to find my earthly Paradise,
To glass my sight in your two heavenly eyes,
On which alone my earthly joys depended,
And wanting which, my joy and life were ended,
e To love that love, in the second, third, and fourth editions, but it is evidently a misprint. In the first edition it stands,
No fact, no word, whereby my heart hath merited, Of your sweet love to be thus disinherited. edit. 1602. f Will pity, grace, and love, and favour shew.ibid. 1602.
From your sweet rosy lips, the springs of bliss,
To draw the nectar of a sweetest kiss:
My greedy ears on your sweet words to feed,
Which candied in your sugar'd breath proceed
In daintiest accents through that coral door,
Guarded with precious pearl and rubies' store:-
To touch your hand so white, so moist, so soft,
And with a ravish'd kiss redoubled oft,
Revenge with kindest spite the bloody theft,
Whereby it closely me my heart bereft :
And of all bliss to taste the consummation,
In your sweet, graceful, heavenly conversation,
By whose sweet charms the souls you do enchant
Of all that do your lovely presence haunt:
Instead of all these joys I did expect,
Found nought but frowns, unkindness and neglect.
Neglect, unkindness, frowns? nay, plain contempt,
And open hate, from no disdain exempt;
No bitter words, side-looks, nor aught that might
Engrieve, encrease so undeserv'd despite.
When this, I say, I think, and think withal
How, nor those show'rs of tears mine eyes let fall,
Nor wind of blust'ring sighs with all their force,
Could move your rocky heart once to remorse;
Can I expect that letter should find grace,
Or pity ever in your heart have place?
Besides looks.-edit. 1621.
No no, I think, and sad despair says for me,
You hate, disdain, and utterly abhor me.
Alas, my Dear, if this you do devise,
To try the virtue of your murdering eyes,
And in the glass of bleeding hearts, to view
The glorious splendour of your beauty's hue,
Ah, try it on rebellious hearts, and spritesh
That do withstand the power of sacred lights,
And make them feel, if any such be found,
How deep and cureless your eyes can wound.
But spare, oh spare my yielding heart, and save
Him whose chief glory is to be your slave:
Make me the matter of your clemency,
And not the subject of your tyranny.
h In the second, third, and fourth editions, this line is printed "Ah try it on rebellious hearts and eyes,"
but as this ill agrees with the sense and not at all with the rhyme, Sir Egerton Brydges has, with his usual ingenuity, suggested that the concluding word of the next line "lights" was a misprint for "sighs ;" and though this correction would improve the passage, still the idea of trying the effect of beauty's resplendent hue on
-rebellious hearts and eyes
That do withstand the power of sacred sighs, approached too nearly to nonsense, for it to have been the poet's meaning. The first edition of the Rhapsody, which was not discovered when the Lee Priory Edition was printed, but from which the text was corrected, has, however, perfectly explained the lines in question, and, as it now stands, the simile is highly beautiful.
That all his thoughts in you have birth and ending?
Hope of my heart,
Oh wherefore do the words,
Which your sweet tongue affords,
No hope impart ?
i In the first Edition the title of this Ode is "Being deprived of her sweet looks, words and gestures, by his absence in Italy, he desires her to write unto him." It is stated in the Memoir of Francis Davison, in this volume, that he was in Italy in 1596, at which time this Ode was probably written.
k This line is omitted in the fourth edition, but probably by accident.
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