way; The Gods, when they descended, hither How happy here should I, And one dear She, live, and embracing die! She, who is all the world, and can exclude In deserts solitude. I should have then this only fearLest men, when they my pleasures see, Should hither throng to live like me, And so make a city here. MY DIET. Now, by my Love, the greatest oath that is, None loves you half so well as I: do not ask your love for this; But for Heaven's sake believe me, or I die. No servant e'er but did deserve His master should believe that he does serve; And I'll ask no more wages, though I starve. "Tis no luxurious diet this, and sure If 't can but keep together life and love. On a sigh of pity I a year can live; One tear will keep me twenty, at least; Fifty, a gentle look will give ; An hundred years on one kind word I'll feast; A thousand more will added be, If you an inclination have for me; And all beyond is vast eternity! THE THIEF. THOU robb'st my days of business and delights, Ah, lovely thief! what wilt thou do? Thou even my prayers dost steal from me; Begin to God, and end them all to thee. Is it a sin to love, that it should thus, What do I seek, alas! or why do I For making thee my deity, The divine presence there too is, ALL-OVER LOVE. "TIs well, 'tis well with them, say I, Whose short-lived passions with themselves can For none can be unhappy, who, 'Midst all his ills, a time does know [die; (Though ne'er so long) when he shall not be so. Whatever parts of me remain, Those parts will still the love of thee retain; But, like a God, by powerful art My affection no more perish can Mix'd with another's substance be, 'Twill leaven that whole lump with love of thee. Let Nature, if she please, disperse My atoms over all the universe; At the last they easily shall Themselves know, and together call; For thy love, like a mark, is stamp'd on all. LOVE AND LIFE. Now, sure, within this twelvemonth past, I'ave loved at least some twenty years or more: The' account of Love runs much more fast Than that with which our life does score: So, though my life be short, yet I may prove The great Methusalem of Love. Not that Love's hours or minutes are Thin airy things extend themselves in space, Yet Love, alas! and Life, in me, A double, different motion? O yes, there may; for so the self-same sun Swiftly his daily journey he goes, But treads his annual with a statelier pace; At once, with double course in the same sphere, When Soul does to myself refer, year. "Tis then my life, and does but slowly move; But when it does relate to her, It swiftly flies, and then is Love. Love's my diurnal course, divided right THE BARGAIN. TAKE heed, take heed, thou lovely maid, Nor be by glittering ills betray'd; Thyself for money! oh, let no man know The price of beauty fallen so low! What dangers ought'st thou not to dread, When Love, that's blind, is by blind Fortune led? The foolish Indian, that sells His precious gold for beads and bells, Can gold, alas! with thee compare? In all the journeys he does pass, Though the sea served him for a looking-glass. Bold was the wretch that cheapen'd thee; Too dear he'll find his sordid price If it be lawful thee to buy, There's none can pay that rate but I; Nothing on earth a fitting price can be, But what on earth's most like to thee; And that my heart does only bear; For there thyself, thy very self is there. |