Hope lends me wings, and lifts me up again,
To strive for life, and live in greater woe.

So fares the boat, which winds drive to the shore,

And tides drive backward where it was before.

life:

Thus neither hope will let me die with care,
Nor care consent that hope assure my
I seek for life; death doth his stroke prepare;
I come to death, and life renews my strife.
All as the shadow, follows" them that fly,
And flies from them that after it do hie.

What is my hope? that hope will fail at last,
And grief get strength to work his will on me:
Either the wax with which hope's wings are fast,
By scalding sighs mine eyes shall melted see;
Or else my tears shall wet the feathers so,
That I shall fall and drown in waves of woe.

ODE IX. x

CUPID'S MARRIAGE WITH DISSIMULATION.

A NEW-FOUND match is made of late;
Blind Cupid needs will change his wife.
New-fangled love doth Psyche hate,
With whom so long he led his life.

u follow.edit. 1608.

x Omitted in the first edition.

Dissembling, she

The bride must be,

To please his wanton eye:
Psyche laments

That Love repents

His choice without cause why.

Cytheron sounds with musick strange, Unknown unto the Virgins nine:

From flat to sharp the tune doth range, Too base, because it is too fine.

See how the bride,

Puff'd up with pride,

Can mince it passing well:

She trips on toe,

Full fair to show ;

Within doth poison dwell.

Now wanton Love at last is sped;
Dissembling is his only joy:

Bare Truth from Venus' court is fled,
Dissembling pleasures, hides annoy.

It were in vain

To talk of pain;
The wedding yet doth last;

But pain is near,

And will appear

With a dissembling cast.

Despair and Hope are join'd in one,
And pain with pleasure linked sure;
Not one of these can come alone,
No certain hope, no pleasure pure.
Thus, sour and sweet

In love do meet;

Dissembling likes it so ;

Of sweet small store,

Of sour the more,

Love is a pleasant woe.

AMOR ET MELLIS ET FELLIS.

ODE X.

DISPRAISE OF LOVE, AND LOVER'S FOLLIES.

If love be life, I long to die,

Live they that list for me:

And he that gains the most thereby,

A fool, at least, shall be.

But he that feels the sorest fits,

'Scapes with no less than loss of wits:

Unhappy life they gain,"

Which love do entertain.

Dispraise.-Lee Priory edit.

z An happy life they gain.-edit. 1608.

In day by feigned looks they live ;
By lying dreams in night;

Each frown a deadly wound doth give;
Each smile a false delight.

If 't hap their lady pleasant seem,
It is for other's love they deem :
If void she seem of joy,

Disdain doth make her coy.

Such is the peace that lovers find,
Such is the life they lead;

Blown here and there with every wind,
Like flowers in the mead.

a

Now war, now peace, now war again,
Desire, despair, delight, disdain:
Though dead in midst of life,
In peace, and yet at strife.

IN AMORE HÆC INSUNT MALA.

IN PRAISE OF THE SUN."

THE golden sun that brings the day,
And lends men light to see withal,

In vain doth cast his beams away,
Where they are blind on whom they fall:

a then. edit. 1608.

This title is omitted in the first edition.

There is no force in all his light,
To give the mole a perfect sight.

But thou, my sun, more bright than he
That shines at noon in summer tide,
Hast given me light and power to see ;
With perfect skill my sight to guide.
'Till now I liv'd as blind as mole,
That hides her head in earthly hole.

I heard the praise of beauty's grace,
Yet deem'd it nought but Poet's skill;
I gaz'd on many a lovely face,

Yet found I none to bind my will.

Which made me think, that beauty bright,
Was nothing else but red and white.

But now thy beams have clear'd my sight,

I blush to think I was so blind :

Thy flaming eyes afford me light,

That beauty's blaze each where I find:

And yet these Dames, that shine so bright,

с

Are but the shadow of thy light.

"A shadow," in the second and third, but as above in the first edition.