Abraham Cowley: Verses about Kindness

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.

Though all thy gestures and discourses be
Coin'd and stamp'd by modesty;
Though from thy tongue ne'er slipp'd away
One word which nuns at th' altar might not say;
Yet such a sweetness, such a grace,
In all thy speech appear,
That what to th' eye a beauteous face,
That thy tongue is to th' ear:
So cunningly it wounds the heart,
It strikes such heat through every part,
That thou a tempter worse than Satan art.

Though in thy thoughts scarce any tracks have been
So much as of original sin,
Such charms thy beauty wears as might
Desires in dying confess'd saints excite:
Thou, with strange adultery,
Dost in each breast a brothel keep;
Awake all men do lust for thee,
And some enjoy thee when they sleep.
Ne'er before did woman live,
Who to such multitudes did give
The root and cause of sin, but only Eve.

Though in thy breast so quick a pity be,
That a fly's death 's a wound to thee;
Though savage and rock-hearted those
Appear, that weep not ev'n Romance's woes;
Yet ne'er before was tyrant known,
Whose rage was of so large extent;
The ills thou dost are whole thine own;
Thou 'rt principal and instrument:
In all the deaths that come from you,
You do the treble office do
Of judge, of torturer, and of weapon too.

Thou lovely instrument of angry Fate,
Which God did for our faults create!
Thou pleasant, universal ill,
Which, sweet as health, yet like a plague dost kill!
Thou kind, well-natur'd tyranny!
Thou chaste committer of a rape!
Thou voluntary destiny,
Which no man can, or would, escape!
So gentle, and so glad to spare,
So wondrous good, and wondrous fair,
(We know) ev'n the destroying-angels are.

Whilst what I write I do not see,
I dare thus, ev'n to you, write poetry.
Ah, foolish Muse! which dost so high aspire,
And know'st her judgment well,
How much it does thy power excel,
Yet dar'st be read by, thy just doom, the fire.

Alas! thou think'st thyself secure,
Because thy form is innocent and pure:
Like hypocrites, which seem unspotted here;
But, when they sadly come to die,
And the last fire their truth must try,
Scrawled o'er like thee, and blotted, they appear.

Go then, but reverently go,
And, since thou needs must sin, confess it too:
Confess 't, and with humility clothe thy shame;
For thou, who else must burned be
An heretick, if she pardon thee,
Mayst like a martyr then enjoy the flame.

But, if her wisdom grow severe,
And suffer not her goodness to be there;
If her large mercies cruelly it restrain;
Be not discourag'd, but require
A more gentle ordeal fire,
And bid her by love's flames read it again.

Strange power of heat! thou yet dost show
Like winter-earth, naked, or cloth'd with snow:
But as, the quickening sun approaching near,
The plants arise up by degrees;
A sudden paint adorns the trees,
And all kind Nature's characters appear.

So, nothing yet in thee is seen;
But, when a genial heat warms thee within,
A new-born wood of various lines there grows;
Here buds an A, and there a B,
Here sprouts a V, and there a T,
And all the flourishing letters stand in rows.

Still, silly paper! thou wilt think
That all this might as well be writ with ink:
Oh, no; there's sense in this, and mystery—
Thou now mayst change thy author's name,
And to her hand lay noble claim;
For, as she reads, she makes, the words in thee.

Yet — if thine own unworthiness
Will still that thou art mine, not hers confess—
Consume thy self with fire before her eyes,
And so her grace or pity move:
The gods, though beasts they do not love,
Yet like them when they 're burnt in sacrifice.

First-born of Chaos, who so fair didst come
From the old Negro's darksome womb!
Which, when it saw the lovely child,
The melancholy mass put on kind looks and smiled,

Thou tide of glory which no rest dost know,
But ever ebb and ever flow!
Thou golden shower of a true Jove,
Who does in thee descend, and heaven to earth make love!

Hail, active nature's watchful life and health,
Her joy, her ornament and wealth!
Hail to thy husband Heat, and thee!
Thou the world's beauteous bride, the lusty bridegroom he!

Say, from what golden quivers of the sky
Do all thy winged arrows fly?
Swiftness and power by birth are thine:
From thy great Sire they came, thy Sire the Word divine.

'Tis, I believe, this archery to show,
That so much cost in colors thou,
And skill in painting, dost bestow
Upon thy ancient arms, the gaudy heavenly bow.

Swift as light thoughts their empty career run,
Thy race is finished when begun;
Let a post-angel start with thee,
And thou the goal of earth shalt teach as soon as he.

Thou in the moon's bright chariot, proud and gay,
Dost thy bright wood of stars survey,
And all the year dost with thee bring,
Of thousand flowery lights, thine own nocturnal spring.

Thou Scythian-like dost round thy lands, above
The sun's gilt tent, forever move,
And still, as thou in pomp dost go,
The shining pageants of the world attend thy show.

Nor amidst all these triumphs dost thou scorn
The humble glowworms to adorn,
And with those living spangles gild -
O greatness without pride! - the bushes of the field.

Night and her ugly subjects thou dost fright,
And sleep, the lazy owl of night;
Ashamed and fearful to appear,
They screen their horrid shapes with the black hemisphere.

With 'em there hastes, and wildly takes the alarm,
Of painted dreams, a busy swarm;
At the first openings of thine eye,
The various clusters break, the antic atoms fly.

The guilty serpents and obscener beasts
Creep conscious to their secret rests;
Nature to thee does reverence pay;
Ill omens and ill sights removes out of thy way.

At thy appearance, Grief itself is said
To shake his wings and rouse his head.
And cloudy Care has often took
A gentle beamy smile reflected from thy look.

At thy appearance, Fear itself grows bold;
Thy sunshine melts away his cold.
Encouraged at the sight of thee,
To the cheek color comes, and firmness to the knee.

Even Lust, the master of a hardened face,
Blushes if thou beest in the place,
To darkness' curtains he retires;
In sympathizing night he rolls his smoky fires.

When, goddess, thou list'st up thy wakened head
Out of the morning's purple bed,
Thy quire of birds about thee play,
And all the joyful world salutes the rising day.

The ghosts and monster spirits that did presume
A body's privilege to assume
Vanish again invisibly,
And bodies gain again their visibility.

All the world's bravery that delights our eyes
Is but thy several liveries;
Thou the rich dye on them bestow'st;
Thy nimble pencil paints this landscape as thou go'st.

A crimson garment in the rose thou wear'st;
A crown of studded gold thou bear'st;
The virgin blies in their white
Are clad but with the lawn of almost naked light.

The violet, spring's little infant, stands
Girt in thy purple swaddling-bands;
On the fair tulip thou dost dote;
Thou cloth'st it in a gay and parti-colored coat.

With flame condensed thou dost the jewels fix,
And solid colors in it mix;
Flora herself envies to see
Flowers fairer than her own, and durable as she.

Ah, goddess! would thou couldst thy hand withhold
And be less liberal to gold;
Didst thou less value to it give,
Of how much care, alas! mightst thou poor man relieve!

To me the sun is more delightful far,
And all fair days much fairer are,
But few, ah wondrous few, there be
Who do not gold prefer, O goddess, even to thee.

Through the soft ways of heaven, and air, and sea,
Which open all their pores to thee,
Like a clear river thou dost glide,
And with thy living stream through the close channels slide.

But where firm bodies thy free course oppose,
Gently thy source the land o'erflows,
Takes there possession, and does make
Of colors mingled, light, a thick and standing lake.

But the vast ocean of unbounded day
In the empyrean heaven does stay.
Thy rivers, lakes, and springs below
From thence took first their rise, thither at last must flow.