Katherine Philips: Verses about Passion

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Hence Cupid! with your cheating toys,
Your real griefs, and painted joys,
Your pleasure which itself destroys.
Lovers like men in fevers burn and rave,
And only what will injure them do crave.
Men's weakness makes love so severe,
They give him power by their fear,
And make the shackles which they wear.
Who to another does his heart submit,
Makes his own idol, and then worships it.
Him whose heart is all his own,
Peace and liberty does crown,
He apprehends no killing frown.
He feels no raptures which are joys diseased,
And is not much transported, but still pleased.


*

Soule of my soule! my Joy, my crown, my friend!
A name which all the rest doth comprehend;
How happy are we now, whose sols are grown,
By an incomparable mixture, One:
Whose well acquainted minds are not as neare
As Love, or vows, or secrets can endeare.
I have no thought but what's to thee reveal'd,
Nor thou desire that is from me conceal'd.
Thy heart locks up my secrets richly set,
And my breast is thy private cabinet.
Thou shedst no teare but what but what my moisture lent,
And if I sigh, it is thy breath is spent.
United thus, what horrour can appeare
Worthy our sorrow, anger, or our feare?
Let the dull world alone to talk and fight
And with their vast ambitions nature fright;
Let them despise so innocent a flame,
While Envy, pride, and faction play their game:
But we by Love sublim'd so high shall rise,
To pitty Kings, and Conquerours despise,
Since we that sacred union have engrost,
Which they and all the sullen world have lost.

Soule of my soule! my Joy, my crown, my friend!
A name which all the rest doth comprehend;
How happy are we now, whose sols are grown,
By an incomparable mixture, One:
Whose well acquainted minds are not as neare
As Love, or vows, or secrets can endeare.
I have no thought but what's to thee reveal'd,
Nor thou desire that is from me conceal'd.
Thy heart locks up my secrets richly set,
And my breast is thy private cabinet.
Thou shedst no teare but what but what my moisture lent,
And if I sigh, it is thy breath is spent.
United thus, what horrour can appeare
Worthy our sorrow, anger, or our feare?
Let the dull world alone to talk and fight
And with their vast ambitions nature fright;
Let them despise so innocent a flame,
While Envy, pride, and faction play their game:
But we by Love sublim'd so high shall rise,
To pitty Kings, and Conquerours despise,
Since we that sacred union have engrost,
Which they and all the sullen world have lost.

Whom does this stately Navy bring?
O! ‘tis Great Britain's Glorious King,
Convey him then, ye Winds and Seas,
Swift as Desire and calm as Peace.
In your Respect let him survey
What all his other Subjects pay;
And prophesie to them again
The splendid smoothness of his Reign.
Charles and his mighty hopes you bear:
A greater now then Cæsar's here;
Whose Veins a richer Purple boast
Then ever Hero's yet engrost;
Sprung from a Father so august,
He triumphs in his very dust.
In him two Miracles we view,
His Vertue and his Safety too:
For when compell'd by Traitors crimes
To breathe and bow in forein Climes,
Expos'd to all the rigid fate
That does on wither'd Greatness wait,
Had plots for Life and Conscience laid,
By Foes pursu'd, by Friends betray'd;
Then Heaven, his secret potent friend,
Did him from Drugs and Stabs defend;
And, what's more yet, kept him upright
‘Midst flattering Hope and bloudy Fight.
Cromwell his whole Right never gain'd,
Defender of the Faith remain'd,
For which his Predecessors fought
And writ, but none so dearly bought.
Never was Prince so much beseiged,
At home provok'd, abroad obliged;
Nor ever Man resisted thus,
No not great Athanasius.
No help of Friends could, or Foes spight,
To fierce Invasion him invite.
Revenge to him no pleasure is,
He spar'd their bloud who gap'd for his;
Blush'd any hands the English Crown
Should fasten on him but their own.
As Peace and Freedom with him went,
With him they came from Banishment.
That he might his Dominions win,
He with himself did first begin:
And that best victory obtain'd,
His Kingdom quickly he regain'd.
Th' illustrious suff'rings of this Prince
Did all reduce and all convince.
He onely liv'd with such success,
That the whole world would fight with less.
Assistant Kings could but subdue
Those Foes which he can pardon too.
He thinks no Slaughter-trophees good,
Nor Laurels dipt in Subjects blood;
But with a sweet resistless art
Disarms the hand, and wins the heart;
And like a God doth rescue those
Who did themselves and him oppose.
Go, wondrous Prince, adorn that Throne
Which Birth and Merit make your own;
And in your Mercy brighter shine
Then in the Glories of your Line:
Find Love at home, and abroad Fear,
And Veneration every where.
Th' united world will you allow
Their Chief, to whom the English bow:
And Monarchs shall to yours resort,
As Sheba's Queen to Judah's Court;
Returning thence constrained more
To wonder, envy, and adore.
Disgusted Rome will hate your Crown,
But she shall tremble at your Frown.
For England shall (rul'd and restor'd by You)
The suppliant world protect, or else subdue.

Adieu dear object of my Love's excess,
And with thee all my hopes of happiness,
With the same fervent and unchanged heart
Which did it's whole self once to thee impart,
(And which though fortune has so sorely bruis'd,
Would suffer more, to be from this excus'd)
I to resign thy dear Converse submit,
Since I can neither keep, nor merit it.
Thou hast too long to me confined been,
Who ruine am without, passion within.
My mind is sunk below thy tenderness,
And my condition does deserve it less;
I'm so entangl'd and so lost a thing
By all the shocks my daily sorrow bring,
That would'st thou for thy old Orinda call
Thou hardly could'st unravel her at all.
And should I thy clear fortunes interline
With the incessant miseries of mine?
No, no, I never lov'd at such a rate
To tye thee to the rigours of my fate,
As from my obligations thou art free,
Sure thou shalt be so from my Injury,
Though every other worthiness I miss,
Yet I'le at least be generous in this.
I'd rather perish without sigh or groan,
Then thou shoul'dst be condemn'd to give me one;
Nay in my soul I rather could allow
Friendship should be a sufferer, then thou;
Go then, since my sad heart has set thee free,
Let all the loads and chains remain on me.
Though I be left the prey of sea and wind,
Thou being happy wilt in that be kind;
Nor shall I my undoing much deplore,
Since thou art safe, whom I must value more.
Oh! mayst thou ever be so, and as free
From all ills else, as from my company,
And may the torments thou hast had from it
Be all that heaven will to thy life permit.
And that they may thy vertue service do,
Mayest thou be able to forgive them too:
But though I must this sharp submission learn,
I cannot yet unwish thy dear concern.
Not one new comfort I expect to see,
I quit my Joy, hope, life, and all but thee;
Nor seek I thence ought that may discompose
That mind where so serene a goodness grows.
I ask no inconvenient kindness now,
To move thy passion, or to cloud thy brow;
And thou wilt satisfie my boldest plea
By some few soft remembrances of me, [50]
Which may present thee with this candid thought,
I meant not all the troubles that I brought.
Own not what Passion rules, and Fate does crush,
But wish thou couldst have don't without a blush,
And that I had been, ere it was too late,
Either more worthy, or more fortunate.
Ah who can love the thing they cannot prize?
But thou mayst pity though thou dost despise.
Yet I should think that pity bought too dear,
If it should cost those precious Eyes a tear.

Oh may no minutes trouble, thee possess,
But to endear the next hours happiness;
And maist thou when thou art from me remov'd,
Be better pleas'd, but never worse belov'd:
Oh pardon me for pow'ring out my woes
In Rhime now, that I dare not do't in Prose.
For I must lose whatever is call'd dear,
And thy assistance all that loss to bear,
And have more cause than ere I had before,
To fear that I shall never see thee more.


Anonymous Submission

Wee falsely think it due unto our friends,
That we should grieve for their too early ends:
He that surveys the world with serious eys,
And stripps Her from her grosse and weak disguise,
Shall find 'tis injury to mourn their fate;
He only dy's untimely who dy's Late.
For if 'twere told to children in the womb,
To what a stage of mischief they must come
Could they foresee with how much toile and sweat
Men court that Guilded nothing, being Great;
What paines they take not to be what they seem,
Rating their blisse by others false esteem,
And sacrificing their content, to be
Guilty of grave and serious Vanity;
How each condition hath its proper Thorns,
And what one man admires, another Scorns;
How frequently their happiness they misse,
And so farre from agreeing what it is,
That the same Person we can hardly find,
Who is an houre together in a mind;
Sure they would beg a period of their breath,
And what we call their birth would count their Death.
Mankind is mad; for none can live alone
Because their joys stand by comparison:
And yet they quarrell at Society,
And strive to kill they know not whom, nor why,
We all live by mistake, delight in Dreames,
Lost to ourselves, and dwelling in extreames;
Rejecting what we have, though ne're so good,
And prizing what we never understood.
compar'd to our boystrous inconstancy
Tempests are calme, and discords harmony.
Hence we reverse the world, and yet do find
The God that made can hardly please our mind.
We live by chance, and slip into Events;
Have all of Beasts except their Innocence.
The soule, which no man's pow'r can reach, a thing
That makes each women Man, each man a King.
Doth so much loose, and from its height so fall,
That some content to have no Soule at all.
"Tis either not observ'd, or at the best
By passion fought withall, by sin deprest.
Freedome of will (god's image) is forgot;
And if we know it, we improve it not.
Our thoughts, thou nothing can be more our own,
Are still unguided, verry seldom known.
Time 'scapes our hands as water in a Sieve,
We come to dy ere we begin to Live.
Truth, the most suitable and noble Prize,
Food of our spirits, yet neglected ly's.
Errours and shaddows ar our choice, and we
Ow our perdition to our Own decree.
If we search Truth, we make it more obscure;
And when it shines, we can't the Light endure;
For most men who plod on, and eat, and drink,
Have nothing less their business then to think;
And those few that enquire, how small a share
Of Truth they fine! how dark their notions are!
That serious evenness that calmes the Brest,
And in a Tempest can bestow a rest,
We either not attempt, or elce [sic] decline,
By every triffle snatch'd from our design.
(Others he must in his deceits involve,
Who is not true unto his own resolve.)
We govern not our selves, but loose the reins,
Courting our bondage to a thousand chains;
And with as man slaverys content,
As there are Tyrants ready to Torment,
We live upon a Rack, extended still
To one extreme, or both, but always ill.
For since our fortune is not understood,
We suffer less from bad then from the good.
The sting is better drest and longer lasts,
As surfeits are more dangerous than fasts.
And to compleat the misery to us,
We see extreames are still contiguous.
And as we run so fast from what we hate,
Like Squibs on ropes, to know no middle state;
So (outward storms strengthen'd by us) we find
Our fortune as disordred as our mind.
But that's excus'd by this, it doth its part;
A treacherous world befits a treacherous heart.
All ill's our own; the outward storms we loath
Receive from us their birth, or sting, or both;
And that our Vanity be past a doubt,
'Tis one new vanity to find it out.
Happy are they to whom god gives a Grave,
And from themselves as from his wrath doeth save.
'Tis good not to be born; but if we must,
The next good is, soone to return to Dust:
When th'uncag'd soule, fled to Eternity,
Shall rest and live, and sing, and love, and See.
Here we but crawle and grope, and play and cry;
Are first our own, then others Enemy:
But there shall be defac'd both stain and score,
For time, and Death, and sin shall be no more.