XCVIII

OT, Celia, that I juster am

NOT,

Or better than the rest;

For I would change each hour, like them, Were not my heart at rest.

For the whole sex can but afford
The handsome and the kind.

Why then should I seek further store,
And still make love anew?

When change itself can give no more,
'Tis easy to be true.

Sir C. Sedley

XCIX

TO ALTHEA FROM PRISON

HEN Love with unconfinéd wings

WHEN

Hovers within my gates,

And my divine Althea brings

To whisper at the grates; When I lie tangled in her hair And fetter'd to her eye,

The birds that wanton in the air

Know no such liberty.

When flowing cups run swiftly round
With no allaying Thames,

Our careless heads with roses crown'd,

Our hearts with loyal flames;
When thirsty grief in wine we steep,

When healths and draughts go free -
Fishes that tipple in the deep

Know no such liberty.

When, linnet-like confinéd, I
With shriller throat shall sing
The sweetness, mercy, majesty
And glories of my King;
When I shall voice aloud how good
He is, how great should be,
Enlarged winds, that curl the flood,
Know no such liberty.

Stone walls do not a prison make,
Nor iron bars a cage;
Minds innocent and quiet take

That for an hermitage :
If I have freedom in my love
And in my soul am free,

Angels alone, that soar above,
Enjoy such liberty.

Or that when I am gone

You or I were alone;

Then, my Lucasta, might I crave

Pity from blustering wind, or swallowing wave.

Though seas and land betwixt us both,

Our faith and troth,

Like separated souls,

All time and space controls; Above the highest sphere we meet Unseen, unknown, and greet as Angels greet.

So then we do anticipate
Our after-fate,

And are alive i' the skies,
If thus our lips and eyes

Can speak like spirits unconfined
In heaven, their earthy bodies left behind.

Colonel Lovelace

CI

ENCOURAGEMENTS TO A LOVER

HY so pale and wan, fond lover?

WHY

Prythee, why so pale?

Will, if looking well can't move her,

Looking ill prevail?

Prythee, why so pale?

Why so dull and mute, young sinner?
Prythee, why so mute?

Will, when speaking well can't win her,
Saying nothing do 't?

Prythee, why so mute?

Quit, quit, for shame! this will not move,

This cannot take her;

If of herself she will not love,

Nothing can make her :

The D-1 take her!

Sir F. Suckling

CII

A SUPPLICATION

AWAKE, awake, my Lyre!

And tell thy silent master's humble tale

In sounds that may prevail;

Sounds that gentle thoughts inspire:

Though so exalted she

And I so lowly be

Tell her, such different notes make all thy harmony.

Hark! how the strings awake:

And, though the moving hand approach not near,
Themselves with awful fear

A kind of numerous trembling make.
Now all thy forces try;

Now all thy charms apply;

Revenge upon her ear the conquests of her eye.

Weak Lyre! thy virtue sure

Is useless here, since thou art only found
To cure, but not to wound,

And she to wound, but not to cure.

Too weak too wilt thou prove

My passion to remove;

Physic to other ills, thou 'rt nourishment to love.

Sleep, sleep again, my Lyre!

For thou canst never tell my humble tale

In sounds that will prevail,

Nor gentle thoughts in her inspire;

All thy vain mirth lay by,

Bid thy strings silent lie,

Sleep, sleep again, my Lyre, and let thy master die.

CIII

A. Cowley

THE MANLY HEART

HALL I, wasting in despair,

SHALL in

Or my cheeks make pale with care
'Cause another's rosy are?

Be she fairer than the day
Or the flowery meads in May-
If she be not so to me

What care I how fair she be?

Shall my foolish heart be pined
'Cause I see a woman kind;
Or a well disposéd nature
Joined with a lovely feature?
Be she meeker, kinder, than
Turtle-dove or pelican,

If she be not so to me

What care I how kind she be?

Shall a woman's virtues move

Me to perish for her love?

Or her merit's value known

Make me quite forget mine own?