What have I brought thee home For this thy love? have I discharg'd the debt, Which this day's favour did beget? My diet, care, and cost, Do end in bubbles, balls of wind; Of wind to thee whom I have cross'd, But balls of wild-fire to my troubled mind. Yet still thou goest on, And now with darkness closest weary eyes, Thus in thy ebony box Thou dost enclose us, till the day Put our amendment in our way, And give new wheels to our disorder'd clocks. I muse, which shows more love The day or night: that is the gale, this th' harbour; My God thou art all love, Not one poor minute 'scapes thy breast, But brings a favour from above: And in this love, more than in bed, I rest. Herbert. AN AUTUMN MORNING. Go! let the diving Negro seek For gems hid in some forlorn creek; We all pearls scorn, Save what the dewy morn Congeals upon each little spire of grass, Which careless shepherds beat down as they pass; And gold ne'er here appears, Save what the yellow Ceres bears? Sir W. Raleigh. FAIR DAYS; OR, DAWN'S DECEITFUL. Fair was the dawn; and but e'en now the skies Herrick. SUNDAY. O day most calm, most bright, The other days and thou Make up one man; whose face thou art, Man had straight forward gone The which he doth not fill. Sundays the pillars are, On which heaven's palace archéd lies! They are the fruitful beds and borders The Sundays of man's life, On Sunday heaven's gate stands ope; This day my Saviour rose, And did enclose this light for his; The rest of our creation Our great Redeemer did remove With the same shake which, at his passion, As Samson bore the doors away, Christ's hands, though nail'd, wrought our salvation, And did unhinge that day. The brightness of that day We sullied by our foul offence: Wherefore that robe we cast away, Having a new at his expense, Whose drops of blood paid the full price, That was required to make us gay, Thou art a day of mirth: And where the week-days trail on ground, O let me take thee at the bound, Leaping with thee from seven to seven, Till that we both, being toss'd from earth, Herbert. A LESSON FROM COMPARISONS. Flame goes to heav'n, from whence it once did come, Light's beauty's gone, which sometime was so fair; Which you your convoy to the heaven will find. Fairlie's Lychnocausia; or, Light's Moral Emblems, 1638. LIFE A TRAGEDY. Man's life's a tragedy; his mother's womb |