Love built a stately house, where Fortune came; And spinning fancies, she was heard to say Then Pleasure came, who, liking not the fashion, Till she had weaken'd all by alteration; But rev'rend laws, and many a proclamation, The fineriess which a If when the set Uut Then enter'd Sin, and with that sycamore Whose leaves first shelt'red man from drought and dew, Working and winding slily evermore, The inward walls and sommers cleft and tore; Then Sin combin'd with Death in a firm band CRASHAW. WISHES. TO HIS SUPPOSED MISTRESS. Whoe'er she be, That not impossible she That shall command my heart and me; Where'er she lie, Lock'd up from mortall eye, In shady leaves of Destiny; Till that ripe birth Of studied Fate stand forth, And teach her fair steps tread our Earth; Till that divine Idea, take a shrine Of crystal flesh, through which to shine; Meet you her, my wishes, Bespeak her to my blisses, And be ye call'd, my absent kisses. I wish her, beauty That owes not all its duty To gaudy tire or glistring shoe tie. A face that's best By its own beauty drest, And can alone commend the rest. A cheek where Youth, And blood, with pen of Truth Write, what their reader sweetly ru'th. * Lips, where all day A lover's kiss may play, Yet carry nothing thence away. * Eyes, that displace The neighbour diamond, and out-face That sunshine, by their own sweet grace. Tresses, that wear Jewels, but to declare How much themselves more precious are. Life, that dares send A challenge to his end, And when it comes say, Welcome friend! I wish her store Of worth may leave her poor Of wishes; and I wish-no more. Now if Time knows That her, whose radiant brows Weave them a garland of my vows; Her that dares be, What these lines wish to see: I seek no further: it is she. THE FLAMING HEART. [Upon the book and picture of the Seraphica! Saint Theresa, as she is usually expressed with a Seraphim beside her.] O thou undaunted daughter of desires! By all thy lives and deaths of love; By thy large draughts of intellectual day, And by thy thirsts of love more large than they ; By thy last morning's draught of liquid fire ; By the full kingdom of that final kiss That seiz'd thy parting soul, and seal'd thee His; "O'tis not Spanish but his Heaven she speaks. DESCRIPTION OF A RELIGIOUS HOUSE. No roofs of gold o'er riotous tables shining That chaste and cheap, as the few clothes we wear. Those, coarse and negligent, as the natural locks Obedient slumbers, that can wake and weep, And sing, and sigh, and work, and sleep again; And prize themselves; do much, that more they may, A respiration of reviving deaths. But neither are there those ignoble stings That nip the blossom of the world's best things, No cruel guard of diligent cares, that keep Crown'd woes awake, as things too wise for sleep: Silence, and sacred rest; peace, and pure joys; The self-remembring soul sweetly recovers Her kindred with the stars; not basely hovers Below but meditates her immortal way Home to the original source of Light and intellectual day. |