Where glory recommends the grief, Thus those desires that boil so high When Reason cannot make them die, Yet when Discretion doth bereave Silence in love bewrays more woe Than words, though ne'er so witty; The beggar that is dumb, you know, May challenge double pity! Then wrong not, dearest to my heart! My love for secret passion; He smarteth most that hides his smart, And sues for no compassion! HIS LOVE ADMITS NO RIVAL. Shall I, like a hermit, dwell Meet a rival every day? If she undervalue me, What care I how fair she be? Were her tresses angel-gold, If a stranger may be bold, To convert them to a braid; And with little more ado If the mine be grown so free, Were her hands as rich a prize If she seem not chaste to me, No; she must be perfect snow, Then, if others share with me, SIR EDWARD DYER. 1540-161-. ["England's Helicon." 1600.] TO PHILLIS, THE FAIR SHEPHERDESS. My Phillis hath the morning sun, My Phillis hath morn-waking birds, My Phillis hath prime-feathered flowers, And Phillis hath a gallant flock, That leaps since she doth own them. But Phillis hath too hard a heart, Alas, that she should have it! It yields no mercy to desert, Nor grace to those that crave it: Sweet sun, when thou look'st on, And if in life her love she will agree me, NICHOLAS BRETON. 1555-1624. ["England's Helicon."] A PASTORAL OF PHILLIS AND CORIDON. ON a hill there grows a flower, Fair befall the dainty sweet: In that bower there is a chair, Fringed all about with gold, It is Phillis, fair and bright, She that is the shepherd's joy : She that Venus did despite, And did blind her little boy. This is she, the wise, the rich, That the world desires to see: This is ipse quæ, the which There is none but only she. Who would not this face admire? Who would not this saint adore? Who would not this sight desire, Though he thought to see no more? O fair eyes, yet let me see One good look, and I am gone; Look on me, for I am he, Thy poor silly Coridon. Thou that art the shepherd's queen, By thy comfort have been seen CORIDON'S SUPPLICATION TO PHILLIS. Sweet Phillis, if a silly swain May sue to thee for grace, See not thy loving shepherd slain, But think what power thou hast got, Thou see'st they now regard me not, And if I have so far presumed, With prying in thine eyes; But as thou art that Phillis fair, That in thy favour lives. If it be so that thou hast sworn, |