Complete Works of Matthew Prior
Page 20
Dispers’d the clouds, and chased dark night away,
The sad despairing shepherd rear’d his head
From off his pillow, and forsook his bed.
Strait he search’d out some melancholy shade,
Where he did blame the proud disdainful maid, 10
And thus with cruelty did her upbraid:
Ah, shepherdess, will you then let me die;
Will nothing thaw this frozen cruelty:
But you, lest you should pity, will not hear,
You will hot to my suff’rings give ear;
But adder-like to listen you refuse
To words, the greatest charm that man can use
’Tis now noon-day, the sun is mounted high,
Beneath refreshing shades the beasts do lie,
And seek out cooling rivers to assuage, 20
The lion’s sultry heat, and dog-star’s rage:
The oxen now can’t plough the fruitful soil,
The furious heat forbids the reaper’s toil
Both beast and men for work are now unfit,
The wearied hinds down to their dinner sit;
Each creature now is with refreshment blest,
And none but wretched I, debarr’d of rest,
I wander up and down thro’ desert lands,
On sun-burnt mountain-tops and parched sands.
And as alone, restless I go along, 30
Nothing but echo answers to my song.
Had I not better undergo the scorn
Of Jenny? is it not more easy borne?
The cruelty of angry Kate? altho’
That she is black, and you are white as snow.
O! nymph, don’t, too much, to your beauty trust,
The brightest steel is eaten up with rust:
The whitest blossoms fall, sweet roses fade,
And you, tho’ handsome, yet may die a maid.
With thee I could admire a country life, 40
Free from disturbance, city noise, or strife:
Amongst the shady groves and woods we’d walk,
Of nothing else but love’s great charm we’d talk,
We would pursue, in season, rural sports,
And then let knaves and fools resort to courts;
I could, besides, some country presents find,
Could they persuade you but to be more kind:
But since with scorn you do these gifts despise,
Another shepherdess shall gain the prize.
O! Amaryllis, beauteous maid, observe, 50
The nymphs themselves are willing thee to serve,
See where large baskets full of flowers they bring,
The sweet fair product of th’ indulgent spring.
See there the pink, and the anemony,
The purple violet, rose, and jessamy.
See where they humbly lay their presents down,
To make a chaplet thy dear head to crown.
See where the beasts go trooping drove by drove,
See how they answer one another’s love:
See where the bull the heifer does pursue, 60
See where the mare the furious horse does woo:
Each female to her male is always kind,
And women, only cruel women blind,
Contradict that for which they were design’d.
So Corydon loves an ungrateful fair,
Who minds not oaths, nor cares for any prayer.
But see the sun his race has almost run,
And the laborious ox his work has done.
But I still love without the thought of ease,
No cure was ever found for that disease, 70
But Corydon, what frenzy does thee seize.
Why dost thou lie in this dejected way?
Why dost thou let thy sheep and oxen stray?
Thy tuneful pipe, why dost thou throw away.
Had you not better dispossess your mind
Of her who is so cruel and unkind;
Forget her guile, and calm those raging cares,
Take heart again, and follow your affairs,
For what altho’ this nymph does cruel prove,
You’ll find a thousand other maids will love. 80
DORINDA.
FAREWEL ye shady walks, and fountains
Sinking Tallies, rising mountains:
Farewel ye crystal streams, that pass
Thro’ fragrant meads of verdant grass:
Farewel ye flowers, sweet and fair,
That us’d to grace Dorinda’s hair:
Farewel ye woods, who us’d to shade
The pressing youth, and yielding maid:
Farewel ye birds, whose morning song
Oft made us know we slept too long: 10
Farewel dear bed, so often prest,
So often above others blest,
With the kind weight of all her charms,
When panting, dying, in my arms.
Dorinda’s gone, gone far away,
She’s gone and Strephon cannot stay:
By sympathetic ties I find
That to her sphere I am confin’d;
My motions still on her most wait,
And what she wills to me is fate, 20
She’s gone, O! hear it all ye bowers,
Ye walks, ye fountains, trees, and flowers,
For whom you made your earliest show,
For whom you took a pride to grow.
She’s gone, O! hear, ye nightingales,
Ye mountains ring it to the vales,
And echo to the country round,
The mournful, dismal, killing sound:
Dorinda’s gone, and Strephon goes,
To find with her his lost repose. 30
But ere I go, O! let me see,
That all things mourn her loss like me:
Play, play, no more, ye spouting fountains,
Rise ye vallies, sink ye mountains;
Ye walks, in moss, neglected lie,
Ye birds, be mute; ye streams, be dry.
Fade, fade, ye flowers, and let the rose
No more its blushing buds disclose:
Ye spreading beach, and taper fir,
Languish away in mourning her; 40
And never let your friendly shade,
The stealth of other lovers aid.
And thou, O! dear, delightful bed,
The altar where her maidenhead,
With burning cheeks, and downcast eyes,
With panting breasts, and kind replies,
And other due solemnity,
Was offer’d up to love and me.
Hereafter suffer no abuse,
Since consecrated to our use, 50
As thou art sacred, don’t profane
Thy self with any vulgar stain,
But to thy pride be still display’d,
The print her lovely limbs have made:
See, in a moment, all is chang’d,
The flowers shrunk up, the trees disrang’d,
And that which wore so sweet a face.
Become a horrid, desert place.
Nature her influence withdraws,
Th’ effect must follow still the cause, 60
And where Dorinda will reside,
Nature must there all gay provide.
Decking that happy spot of earth.
Like Eden’s garden at its birth,
To please her matchless, darling maid,
The wonder of her forming-trade;
Excelling all who e’er excell’d,
And as we ne’er the like beheld,
So neither is, nor e’er can be,
Her parallel, or second she. 70
TO LEONORA.
IF absence so much racks my charmer’s heart,
Believe that Strephon’s bears a double smart,
So well he loves, and knows thy love so fine,
That in his own distress he suffers thine:
Yet, O forgive him, if his thoughts displease,
He would not, cannot wish
thee more at ease.
What need you bid me think of pleasures past?
Was there one joy, whose image does not last?
But that one; most ecstatic, most refin’d,
Reigns fresh, and will for ever in my mind, 10
With such a power of charms it storm’d my soul,
That nothing ever can its strength controul,
Not sleep, not age, not absence can avail,
Reflection, ever young, must still prevail.
What influence-divine did guide that hour,
Which gave to minutes the Almighty power,
To fix (whilst other joys are not a span)
A pleasure lasting as the life of man.
TO LEONORA.
ENCORE.
I.
CEASE, Leonora, cease to mourn,
Thy faithful Strephon will return.
Fate at thy sighs will ne’er relent,
Then grieve not, what we can’t prevent;
Nor let predestinating tears
Increase my pains, or raise thy fears.
II.
’Tis but the last long winter night,
Our Sun will rise to-morrow bright;
And to our suff’ring passion bring
The promise of eternal spring, 10
Which thy kind eyes shall ever cheer,
And make that season all our year.
ON A PRETTY MADWOMAN.
I.
WHILE mad Ophelia we lament,
And her distraction mourn,
Our grief’s misplac’d, our tears misspent,
Since what for her condition’s meant
More justly fits our own.
II.
For if ’tis happiness to be,
From all the tarns of fate,
From dubious joy, and sorrow free;
Ophelia then is blest, and we
Misunderstand her state. 10
III.
The fates may do Whate’er they will,
They can’t disturb her mind,
Insensible of good, or ill,
Ophelia is Ophelia still,
Be fortune cross or kind.
IV.
Then make with reason no more noise,
Since what should give relief,
The quiet of our mind destroys,
Or with a full spring-tide of joys,
Or a dead-ebb of grief. 20
ABSENCE.
I.
WHAT a tedious day is past!
Loving, thinking, wishing, weeping;
Gods! if this be not the last,
Take a life not worth my keeping.
II.
Love, ye gods, is life alone!
In the length is little pleasure:
Be but ev’ry day our own,
We shall ne’er complain of measure.
THE NEW YEAR’S GIFT TO PHYLLIS.
THE circling months begin this day,
To run their yearly ring,
And long-breath’d time which ne’er will stay,
Refits his wings, and shoots away,
It round again to bring.
II.
Who feels the force of female eyes,
And thinks some nymph divine,
Now brings his annual sacrifice,
Some pretty boy, or neat device,
To offer at her shrine.
III.
But I can pay no offering,
To show how I adore,
Since I had but a heart to bring,
A downright foolish, faithful thing,
And that you had before.
IV.
Yet we may give, for custom sake,
What will to both be new,
My constancy a gift I’ll make,
And in return of it will take
Some levity from you. 20
A SONG. FOR GOD’S-SAKE — NAY, DEAR SIR.
I.
FOR God’s-sake — nay, dear sir,
Lord, what do you mean,
I protest, and I vow, sir,
Your ways are obscene.
II.
Pray give over, O! fie,
Pish, leave off your fooling.
Forbear, or I’ll cry, —
I hate this rude doing.
III.
Let me die if I stay,
Does the devil possess you? 10
Your hand take away,
Then perhaps I may bless you.
ON SNUFF.
JOVE once resolv’d (the females to degrade)
To propagate their sex without their aid.
His brain conceiv’d, and soon the pangs and throes
He felt, nor could th’ unnatural birth disclose:
At last when try’d, no remedy would do,
The god took snuff, and out the goddess flew.
TO CELIA.
AN EPIGRAM.
YOU need not thus so often pray,
Or in devotion spend the day,
Since without half such toil and pain,
You surely Paradise will gain.
Your husband’s impotent and jealous,
And Celia that’s enough to tell us
You must inhabit heaven herea’ter,
Because you are a virgin-martyr.
UPON A FRIEND, WHO HAD A PAIN IN HIS LEFT SIDE.
I.
LAY not the pain, so near your heart,
On chance, or on disease,
So sensible, so nice a smart,
Is from no cause like these.
II.
Your friends, at last, the truth have found,
Howe’er you tell your story,
’Twas Celia’s eyes that gave the wound,
And they shall have the glory.
SONGS, SET TO MUSIC BY THE MOST EMINENT MASTERS.
I. SET BY MR. ABEL.
READING ends in melancholy;
Wine breeds vices and diseases;
Wealth is but care, and love but folly
Only friendship truly pleases.
My wealth, my books, my flask, my Molly;
Farewell all, if friendship ceases.
II. SET BY MR. PURCELL.
HITHER would my passion run?
Shall I fly her, or pursue her?
Losing her, I am undone;
Yet would not gain her, to undo her.
Ye tyrants of the human breast,
Love and reason! cease your war,
And order death to give me rest;
So each will equal triumph share.
III. SET BY MR. DE FESCH.
STREPHONETTA, why d’ye fly me,
With such rigour in your eyes?
Oh! ’tis cruel to deny me,
Since your charms I so much prize.
But I plainly see the reason,
Why in vain I you pursu’d;
Her to gain ’twas out of season,
Who before the chaplain woo’d.
IV. SET BY MR. SMITH.
COME, weep no more, for ’tis in vain;
Torment not thus your pretty heart:
Think, Flavia, we may meet again.
As well as, that we now must part
You sigh and weep: the gods neglect
That precious dew your eyes let fall;
Our joy and grief with like respect
They mind; and that is, not at all.
We pray, in hopes they will be kind,
As if they did regard our state: 10
They hear; and the return we find
Is, that no prayers can alter fate.
Then dear your brow, and look more gay,
Do not yourself to grief resign;
Who knows but that those powers may
The pair, they now have parted, join?
But, since they have thus cruel been.
And could such constant lovers sever;
I dare not trust, lest now they’re in.
They should divide us two for ever. 20
Then, Flavia, come, and let us grieve.
Rememb
ering though upon what score;
This our last parting look believe,
Believe we must embrace no more.
Yet, should our sun shine out at last:
And fortune, without more deceit.
Throw but one reconciling oast,
To make two wandering lovers meet;
How great then would our pleasure be
To find Heaven kinder than believ’d; 30
And we, who had no hopes to see
Each other, to be thus deceiv’d!
But say, should Heaven bring no relief,
Suppose our sun should never rise:
Why then what’s due to such a grief,
We’ve paid already with our eyes.
V. SET BY MR. DE FESCH.
LET perjur’d fair Amynta know,
What for her sake I undergo;
Tell her, for her how I sustain
A lingering fever’s wasting pain;
Tell her, the torments I endure,
Which only, only she can cure.
But, oh! she scorns to hear, or see,
The wretch that lies so low as me;
Her sudden greatness turns her brain,
And Strephon hopes, alas! in vain: 10
For ne’er ’twas found (though often tried)
That pity ever dwelt with pride.
VI. SET BY MR. SMITH.
PHILLIS, since we have both been kind,
And of each other had our fill;
Tell me what pleasure you can find.
In forcing nature ‘gainst her will.
’Tis true, you may with art and pain
Keep in some glowings of desire;
But still those glowings which remain
Are only ashes of the fire.
Then let us free each other’s soul,