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MAN'S MEDLEY

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XXXV

MAN'S MEDLEY

HARK how the birds do sing,

And woods do ring:

All creatures have their joy, and man hath his.
Yet if we rightly measure,

Man's joy and pleasure

Rather hereafter than in present is.

To this life things of sense

Make their pretence ;

In th' other angels have a right by birth:
Man ties them both alone,

And makes them one

With th' one hand touching heaven, with t' other earth.

In soul he mounts and flies,

In flesh he dies;

He wears a stuff whose thread is coarse and round, But trimm'd with curious lace,

And should take place

After1 the trimming, not the stuff and ground.

Not that he may not here

Taste of the cheer:

But as birds drink and straight lift up their head,

So must he sip and think

Of better drink

He

may

attain to after he is dead.

1 According to.

But as his joys are double,

So is his trouble;

He hath two winters, other things but one:
Both frosts and thoughts do nip
And bite his lip;

And he of all things fears two deaths alone.

Yet ev❜n the greatest griefs

May be reliefs,

Could he but take them right and in their ways. Happy is he whose heart

Hath found the art

To turn his double pains to double praise.

XXXVI

Geo. Herbert.

VIRTUE

SWEET day, so cool, so calm, so bright!
The bridal of the earth and sky,—
The dew shall weep thy fall to-night;
For thou must die.

Sweet rose, whose hue, angry and brave,
Bids the rash gazer wipe his eye,

Thy root is ever in its grave,

And thou must die.

Sweet spring, full of sweet days and roses,

A box where sweets compacted lie,
My music shows ye have your closes,
And all must die.

THE MESSAGE

Only a sweet and virtuous soul,
Like season'd timber, never gives;

But though the whole world turn to coal,
Then chiefly lives.

Geo. Herbert.

XXXVII

THE MESSAGE

YE little birds that sit and sing
Amidst the shady valleys,
And see how Phillis sweetly walks
Within her garden-alleys;

Go pretty birds about her bower;
Sing pretty birds, she may not lower;
Ah me! methinks I see her frown!
Ye pretty wantons warble.

Go tell her through your chirping bills,
As you by me are bidden,

To her is only known my love

Which from the world is hidden.

Go pretty birds and tell her so,

See that your notes strain not too low,
For still methinks I see her frown;
Ye pretty wantons warble.

Go tune your voices' harmony

And sing, I am her lover;

Strain loud and sweet, that every note

With sweet content may move her:

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And she that hath the sweetest voice,
Tell her I will not change my choice;
Yet still methinks I see her frown!
Ye pretty wantons warble.

O fly! make haste! see, see, she falls
Into a pretty slumber!

Sing round about her rosy bed

That waking she may wonder:
Say to her, 'tis her lover true
That sendeth love to you, to you;
And when you hear her kind reply,
Return with pleasant warblings.

T. Heywood.

XXXVIII

TO THE WESTERN WIND

SWEET Western wind, whose luck it is,
Made rival with the air,

To give Perenna's lips a kiss,

And fan her wanton hair:

Bring me but one, I'll promise thee,
Instead of common showers,
Thy wings shall be embalm'd by me,
And all beset with flowers.

Herrick.

PHYLLIDA AND CORYDON

333

XXXIX

PHYLLIDA AND CORYDON

In the merry month of May,
In a morn by break of day,
Forth I walk'd by the wood-side
Whenas May was in his pride:
There I spyed all alone
Phyllida and Corydon.

Much ado there was, God wot!
He would love and she would not.

She said, never man was true;
He said, none was false to you.

He said, he had loved her long
She said, Love should have no wrong.
Corydon would kiss her then;
She said, maids must kiss no men
Till they did for good and all;
Then she made the shepherd call
All the heavens to witness truth
Never loved a truer youth.
Thus with many a pretty oath,
Yea and nay, and faith and troth,
Such as silly shepherds use

When they will not Love abuse,
Love, which long had been deluded,
Was with kisses sweet concluded;
And Phyllida, with garlands gay,
Was made the Lady of the May.

N. Breton.

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