Tell wit how much it wrangles

In fickle points of niceness; Tell wisdom she entangles Herself in over-wiseness: And if they do reply,

Then give them both the lie.

Tell physic of her boldness;
Tell skill it is pretension;

Tell charity of coldness;
Tell law it is contention:
And if they yield reply,
Then give them still the lie.

Tell fortune of her blindness;
Tell nature of decay ;
Tell friendship of unkindness;

Tell justice of delay:

And if they do reply,

Then give them all the lie.

Tell arts they have no soundness,

But vary by esteeming;

Tell schools they lack profoundness,

And stand too much on seeming.
If arts and schools reply,
Give arts and schools the lie.

Tell faith it's fled the city;

Tell how the country erreth; Tell manhood, shakes off pity; Tell virtue, least preferreth. And if they do reply, Spare not to give the lie.

So, when thou hast, as I

Commanded thee, done blabbing;

POEMS.

Although to give the lie

Deserves no less than stabbing
Yet stab at thee who will,

No stab the soul can kill!

On the Snuff of a Candle.

The night before he died.

COWARDS fear to die; but courage stout,
Rather than live in snuff, will be put out.

Sir Walter Ralegh the night before his death.

[In some copies thus entitled; "Verses said to have been found in his Bible "in the Gate house at Westminster;" archbishop Sancroft, who has transcribed the lines, calls them his "Epitaph made by himself, and given to one of his the night before his suffering."]

EVEN Such is time, that takes on trust

Our youth, our joys, our all we have,
And pays us but with age and dust;
Who in the dark and silent grave,
When we have wandered all our ways,

Shuts

of

the story up

our days!

But from this earth, this grave, this dust,

The Lord shall raise me up, I trust!

LIKE truthless dreams so are my joys expir'd,
And past return are all my dandled days,
My love misled, and fancy quite retir'd,
Of all which past, the sorrow only stays.

My lost delights, now clean from sight of land,
Have left me all alone in unknown ways,

My mind to woe, my life in fortune's hand,
Of all which past, the sorrow only stays.

As in a country strange without companion,
I only wait the wrongs of death's delays,

Whose sweet spring spent, whose sound well nigh is done,

Of all which past, the sorrow only stays,

Whom care forewarns, ere care or winter's cold,
To haste me hence to find my fortune's fold.

The Advice.

[From Le Prince d'Amour.]

MANY desire, but few or none deserve
To win the fort of thy most constant will;
Therefore take heed, let fancy never swerve
But unto him that will defend thee still.

For this be sure, the fort of fame once won,
Farewell the rest, thy happy days are done!

Many desire, but few or none deserve
To pluck the flowers and let the leaves to fall;
Therefore take heed, let fancy never swerve,
But unto him that will take leaves and all.

For this be sure, the flower once pluckt away,
Farewell the rest, thy happy days decay!

Many desire, but few or none deserve,
To cut the corn, not subject to the sickle.
Therefore take heed, let fancy never swerve,
But constant stand, for mowers' minds are fickle.
For this be sure, the crop being once obtain'd,
Farewell the rest, the soil will be disdain'd.

Verses by Sir Walter Ralegh.

[From the Ashmolean MSS.]

CALLING to mind, mine eye went long about
heart for to forsake my breast,

To cause my

All in a rage I thought to pluck it out
By whose device I liv'd in such unrest.
What could I say then to regain my grace?
Forsooth that it had seen my mistress' face!

And then again I called unto mind,

It was my heart that all this woe had wrought,
Because that he to love his fort resign'd,
When on such wars my fancy never thought.
What could he say when I would have him slain?
That it was yours, and had forgone me clean.

At length, when I perceiv'd both eye and heart
Excuse themselves as guilty of mine ill;
I found myself the cause of all my smart,
And told myself, myself now slay I will.
Yet, when I saw myself to you was true,
I love myself, because myself loves you.

Moral Advice.

[From the Ashmolean MSS.]

WATER thy plants with grace divine, and hope to live

Then to thy Saviour Christ incline, in him make stead

fast stay;

Raw is the reason that doth lie within an atheist's head, Which saith the soul of man doth die, when that the body's dead.