Richard Lovelace: Verses about Destiny

Behold! three sister-wonders, in whom met,
Distinct and chast, the splendrous counterfeit
Of Juno, Venus and the warlike Maid,
Each in their three divinities array'd;
The majesty and state of Heav'ns great Queen,
And when she treats the gods, her noble meen;
The sweet victorious beauties and desires
O' th' sea-born princess, empresse too of fires;
The sacred arts and glorious lawrels torn
From the fair brow o' th' goddesse father-born;
All these were quarter'd in each snowy coat,
With canton'd honours of their own, to boot.
Paris, by fate new-wak'd from his dead cell,
Is charg'd to give his doom impossible.
He views in each the brav'ry of all Ide;
Whilst one, as once three, doth his soul divide.
Then sighs so equally they're glorious all:
WHAT PITY THE WHOLE WORLD IS BUT ONE BALL!

Behold! three sister-wonders, in whom met,
Distinct and chast, the splendrous counterfeit
Of Juno, Venus and the warlike Maid,
Each in their three divinities array'd;
The majesty and state of Heav'ns great Queen,
And when she treats the gods, her noble meen;
The sweet victorious beauties and desires
O' th' sea-born princess, empresse too of fires;
The sacred arts and glorious lawrels torn
From the fair brow o' th' goddesse father-born;
All these were quarter'd in each snowy coat,
With canton'd honours of their own, to boot.
Paris, by fate new-wak'd from his dead cell,
Is charg'd to give his doom impossible.
He views in each the brav'ry of all Ide;
Whilst one, as once three, doth his soul divide.
Then sighs so equally they're glorious all:
WHAT PITY THE WHOLE WORLD IS BUT ONE BALL!

I.
How I grieve that I am well!
All my health was in my sicknes,
Go then, Destiny, and tell,
Very death is in this quicknes.

II.
Such a fate rules over me,
That I glory when I languish,
And do blesse the remedy,
That doth feed, not quench my anguish.

III.
'Twas a gentle warmth that ceas'd
In the vizard of a feavor;
But I feare now I am eas'd
All the flames, since I must leave her.

IV.
Joyes, though witherd, circled me,
When unto her voice inured
Like those who, by harmony,
Only can be throughly cured.

V.
Sweet, sure, was that malady,
Whilst the pleasant angel hover'd,
Which ceasing they are all, as I,
Angry that they are recover'd.

VI.
And as men in hospitals,
That are maim'd, are lodg'd and dined;
But when once their danger fals,
Ah th' are healed to be pined!

VII.
Fainting so, I might before
Sometime have the leave to hand her,
But lusty, am beat out of dore,
And for Love compell'd to wander.

Cord. Distressed pilgrim, whose dark clouded eyes
Speak thee a martyr to love's cruelties,
Whither away?
Amor. What pitying voice I hear,
Calls back my flying steps?
Cord. Pr'ythee, draw near.
Amor. I shall but say, kind swain, what doth become
Of a lost heart, ere to Elysium
It wounded walks?
Cord. First, it does freely flye
Into the pleasures of a lover's eye;
But, once condemn'd to scorn, it fetter'd lies,
An ever-bowing slave to tyrannies.
Amor. I pity its sad fate, since its offence
Was but for love. Can tears recall it thence?
Cord. O no, such tears, as do for pity call,
She proudly scorns, and glories at their fall.
Amor. Since neither sighs nor tears, kind shepherd, tell,
Will not a kiss prevail?
Cord. Thou may'st as well
Court Eccho with a kiss.
Amor. Can no art move
A sacred violence to make her love?
Cord. O no! 'tis only Destiny or Fate
Fashions our wills either to love or hate.
Amor. Then, captive heart, since that no humane spell
Hath power to graspe thee his, farewell.
Cord. Farewell.
Cho. Lost hearts, like lambs drove from their folds by fears,
May back return by chance, but not by tears.]

For cherries plenty, and for corans
Enough for fifty, were there more on's;
For elles of beere, flutes of canary,
That well did wash downe pasties-Mary;
For peason, chickens, sawces high,
Pig, and the widdow-venson-pye;
With certaine promise (to your brother)
Of the virginity of another,
Where it is thought I too may peepe in
With knuckles far as any deepe in;
For glasses, heads, hands, bellies full
Of wine, and loyne right-worshipfull;
Whether all of, or more behind--a
Thankes freest, freshest, faire Ellinda.
Thankes for my visit not disdaining,
Or at the least thankes for your feigning;
For if your mercy doore were lockt-well,
I should be justly soundly knockt-well;
Cause that in dogrell I did mutter
Not one rhime to you from dam-Rotter.

Next beg I to present my duty
To pregnant sister in prime beauty,
Whom well I deeme (e're few months elder)
Will take out Hans from pretty Kelder,
And to the sweetly fayre Mabella,
A match that vies with Arabella;
In each respect but the misfortune,
Fortune, Fate, I thee importune.

Nor must I passe the lovely Alice,
Whose health I'd quaffe in golden chalice;
But since that Fate hath made me neuter,
I only can in beaker pewter:
But who'd forget, or yet left un-sung
The doughty acts of George the yong-son?
Who yesterday to save his sister
Had slaine the snake, had he not mist her:
But I shall leave him, 'till a nag on
He gets to prosecute the dragon;
And then with helpe of sun and taper,
Fill with his deeds twelve reames of paper,
That Amadis, Sir Guy, and Topaz
With his fleet neigher shall keep no-pace.
But now to close all I must switch-hard,
[Your] servant ever;
LOVELACE RICHARD.

Vnhappy youth, betrayd by Fate
To such a love hath sainted hate,
And damned those celestiall bands
Are onely knit with equal hands;
The love of great ones is a love,
Gods are incapable to prove:
For where there is a joy uneven,
There never, never can be Heav'n:
'Tis such a love as is not sent
To fiends as yet for punishment;
IXION willingly doth feele
The gyre of his eternal wheele,
Nor would he now exchange his paine
For cloudes and goddesses againe.

Wouldst thou with tempests lye? Then bow
To th' rougher furrows of her brow,
Or make a thunder-bolt thy choyce?
Then catch at her more fatal voyce;
Or 'gender with the lightning? trye
The subtler flashes of her eye:
Poore SEMELE wel knew the same,
Who both imbrac't her God and flame;
And not alone in soule did burne,
But in this love did ashes turne.

How il doth majesty injoy
The bow and gaity oth' boy,
As if the purple-roabe should sit,
And sentence give ith' chayr of wit.

Say, ever-dying wretch, to whom
Each answer is a certaine doom,
What is it that you would possesse,
The Countes, or the naked Besse?
Would you her gowne or title do?
Her box or gem, the thing or show?
If you meane HER, the very HER,
Abstracted from her caracter,
Unhappy boy! you may as soone
With fawning wanton with the Moone,
Or with an amorous complaint
Get prostitute your very saint;
Not that we are not mortal, or
Fly VENUS altars, and abhor
The selfesame knack, for which you pine;
But we (defend us!) are divine,
[Not] female, but madam born, and come
From a right-honourable wombe.
Shal we then mingle with the base,
And bring a silver-tinsell race?
Whilst th' issue noble wil not passe
The gold alloyd (almost halfe brasse),
And th' blood in each veine doth appeare,
Part thick Booreinn, part Lady Cleare;
Like to the sordid insects sprung
From Father Sun and Mother Dung:
Yet lose we not the hold we have,
But faster graspe the trembling slave;
Play at baloon with's heart, and winde
The strings like scaines, steale into his minde
Ten thousand false and feigned joyes
Far worse then they; whilst, like whipt boys,
After this scourge hee's hush with toys.

This heard, Sir, play stil in her eyes,
And be a dying, live like flyes
Caught by their angle-legs, and whom
The torch laughs peece-meale to consume.

Frank, wil't live unhandsomely? trust not too far
Thy self to waving seas: for what thy star,
Calculated by sure event, must be,
Look in the glassy-epithete, and see.

Yet settle here your rest, and take your state,
And in calm halcyon's nest ev'n build your fate;
Prethee lye down securely, Frank, and keep
With as much no noyse the inconstant deep
As its inhabitants; nay, stedfast stand,
As if discover'd were a New-found-land,
Fit for plantation here. Dream, dream still,
Lull'd in Dione's cradle; dream, untill
Horrour awake your sense, and you now find
Your self a bubbled pastime for the wind;
And in loose Thetis blankets torn and tost.
Frank, to undo thy self why art at cost?

Nor be too confident, fix'd on the shore:
For even that too borrows from the store
Of her rich neighbour, since now wisest know
(And this to Galileo's judgement ow),
The palsie earth it self is every jot
As frail, inconstant, waveing, as that blot
We lay upon the deep, that sometimes lies
Chang'd, you would think, with 's botoms properties;
But this eternal, strange Ixion's wheel
Of giddy earth ne'er whirling leaves to reel,
Till all things are inverted, till they are
Turn'd to that antick confus'd state they were.

Who loves the golden mean, doth safely want
A cobwebb'd cot and wrongs entail'd upon't;
He richly needs a pallace for to breed
Vipers and moths, that on their feeder feed;
The toy that we (too true) a mistress call,
Whose looking-glass and feather weighs up all;
And cloaths which larks would play with in the sun,
That mock him in the night, when 's course is run.

To rear an edifice by art so high,
That envy should not reach it with her eye,
Nay, with a thought come neer it. Wouldst thou know,
How such a structure should be raisd, build low.
The blust'ring winds invisible rough stroak
More often shakes the stubborn'st, prop'rest oak;
And in proud turrets we behold withal,
'Tis the imperial top declines to fall:
Nor does Heav'n's lightning strike the humble vales,
But high-aspiring mounts batters and scales.

A breast of proof defies all shocks of Fate,
Fears in the best, hopes in worser state;
Heaven forbid that, as of old, time ever
Flourish'd in spring so contrary, now never.
That mighty breath, which blew foul Winter hither,
Can eas'ly puffe it to a fairer weather.
Why dost despair then, Frank? Aeolus has
A Zephyrus as well as Boreas.

'Tis a false sequel, soloecisme 'gainst those
Precepts by fortune giv'n us, to suppose
That, 'cause it is now ill, 't will ere be so;
Apollo doth not always bend his bow;
But oft, uncrowned of his beams divine,
With his soft harp awakes the sleeping Nine.

In strictest things magnanimous appear,
Greater in hope, howere thy fate, then fear:
Draw all your sails in quickly, though no storm
Threaten your ruine with a sad alarm;
For tell me how they differ, tell me, pray,
A cloudy tempest and a too fair day?

How have I bin religious? what strange good
Has scap't me, that I never understood?
Have I hel-guarded Haeresie o'rthrowne?
Heald wounded states? made kings and kingdoms one?
That FATE should be so merciful to me,
To let me live t' have said I have read thee.

Faire star, ascend! the joy! the life! the light
Of this tempestuous age, this darke worlds sight!
Oh, from thy crowne of glory dart one flame
May strike a sacred reverence, whilest thy name
(Like holy flamens to their god of day)
We bowing, sing; and whilst we praise, we pray.

Bright spirit! whose aeternal motion
Of wit, like Time, stil in it selfe did run,
Binding all others in it, and did give
Commission, how far this or that shal live;
Like DESTINY of poems who, as she
Signes death to all, her selfe cam never dye.

And now thy purple-robed Traegedy,
In her imbroider'd buskins, cals mine eye,
Where the brave Aetius we see betray'd,
T' obey his death, whom thousand lives obey'd;
Whilst that the mighty foole his scepter breakes,
And through his gen'rals wounds his own doome speakes,
Weaving thus richly VALENTINIAN,
The costliest monarch with the cheapest man.

Souldiers may here to their old glories adde,
The LOVER love, and be with reason MAD:
Not, as of old, Alcides furious,
Who wilder then his bull did teare the house
(Hurling his language with the canvas stone):
Twas thought the monster ror'd the sob'rer tone.

But ah! when thou thy sorrow didst inspire
With passions, blacke as is her darke attire,
Virgins as sufferers have wept to see
So white a soule, so red a crueltie;
That thou hast griev'd, and with unthought redresse
Dri'd their wet eyes who now thy mercy blesse;
Yet, loth to lose thy watry jewell, when
Joy wip't it off, laughter straight sprung't agen.

Now ruddy checked Mirth with rosie wings
Fans ev'ry brow with gladnesse, whilst she sings
Delight to all, and the whole theatre
A festivall in heaven doth appeare:
Nothing but pleasure, love; and (like the morne)
Each face a gen'ral smiling doth adorne.

Heare ye, foul speakers, that pronounce the aire
Of stewes and shores, I will informe you where
And how to cloath aright your wanton wit,
Without her nasty bawd attending it:
View here a loose thought sayd with such a grace,
Minerva might have spoke in Venus face;
So well disguis'd, that 'twas conceiv'd by none
But Cupid had Diana's linnen on;
And all his naked parts so vail'd, th' expresse
The shape with clowding the uncomlinesse;
That if this Reformation, which we
Receiv'd, had not been buried with thee,
The stage (as this worke) might have liv'd and lov'd
Her lines, the austere Skarlet had approv'd;
And th' actors wisely been from that offence
As cleare, as they are now from audience.

Thus with thy Genius did the scaene expire,
Wanting thy active and correcting fire,
That now (to spread a darknesse over all)
Nothing remaines but Poesie to fall:
And though from these thy Embers we receive
Some warmth, so much as may be said, we live;
That we dare praise thee blushlesse, in the head
Of the best piece Hermes to Love e're read;
That we rejoyce and glory in thy wit,
And feast each other with remembring it;
That we dare speak thy thought, thy acts recite:
Yet all men henceforth be afraid to write.