To warm thee with new fires, and grace
Those arms I left behind;

Were he as faithful as the sun,
That's wedded to the sphere;
His blood as chaste and temp'rate run,
As April's mildest tear;

Or were he rich, and with his heaps
And spacious share of earth,
Could make divine affection cheap,
And court his golden birth:

For all these arts I'd not believe,
--No, though he should be thine--
The mighty amorist could give
So rich a heart as mine.

Fortune and beauty thou might'st find,
And greater men than I:
But my true resolved mind
They never shall come nigh.[51]

For I not for an hour did love,
Or for a day desire,
But with my soul had from above
This endless, holy fire.

FOOTNOTES:

[51]

MS. _But with my true steadfast minde_
_None can pretend to vie._

AN ELEGY.

'Tis true, I am undone: yet, ere I die,
I'll leave these sighs and tears a legacy
To after-lovers: that, rememb'ring me,
Those sickly flames which now benighted be,
Fann'd by their warmer sighs, may love; and prove
In them the metempsychosis of love.
'Twas I--when others scorn'd--vow'd you were fair,
And sware that breath enrich'd the coarser air,
Lent roses to your cheeks, made Flora bring
Her nymphs with all the glories of the spring
To wait upon thy face, and gave my heart
A pledge to Cupid for a quicker dart,
To arm those eyes against myself; to me
Thou ow'st that tongue's bewitching harmony.
I courted angels from those upper joys,
And made them leave their spheres to hear thy voice.
I made the Indian curse the hours he spent
To seek his pearls, and wisely to repent
His former folly, and confess a sin,
Charm'd by the brighter lustre of thy skin.
I borrow'd from the winds the gentler wing
Of Zephyrus, and soft souls of the spring;
And made--to air those cheeks with fresher grace--
The warm inspirers dwell upon thy face.
_Oh! jam satis_ ...

A RHAPSODIS:

_Occasionally written upon a meeting with some of his friends at the
Globe Tavern, in a chamber painted overhead with a cloudy sky and
some few dispersed stars, and on the sides with landscapes, hills,
shepherds and sheep._

Darkness, and stars i' th' mid-day! They invite
Our active fancies to