Poetical Works of Edmund Waller and Sir John Denham eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 294 pages of information about Poetical Works of Edmund Waller and Sir John Denham.

Poetical Works of Edmund Waller and Sir John Denham eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 294 pages of information about Poetical Works of Edmund Waller and Sir John Denham.

How false is hope, and how regardless fate,
That such a love should have so short a date! 
Lately I saw her, sighing, part from thee;
(Alas that that the last farewell should be!)
So looked Astraea, her remove design’d,
On those distressed friends she left behind. 70
Consent in virtue knit your hearts so fast,
That still the knot, in spite of death, does last;
For as your tears, and sorrow-wounded soul,
Prove well that on your part this bond is whole,
So all we know of what they do above,
Is that they happy are, and that they love. 
Let dark oblivion, and the hollow grave,
Content themselves our frailer thoughts to have;
Well-chosen love is never taught to die,
But with our nobler part invades the sky. 80
Then grieve no more that one so heavenly shaped
The crooked hand of trembling age escaped;
Rather, since we beheld her not decay,
But that she vanish’d so entire away,
Her wondrous beauty, and her goodness, merit
We should suppose that some propitious spirit
In that celestial form frequented here,
And is not dead, but ceases to appear.

[1] ‘Lady Rich’:  she was the daughter of the Earl of Devonshire, and
    married to the heir of the Earl of Warwick.
[2] ‘Womb she blessed’:  the Countess of Devonshire, a very old woman,
    the only daughter of Lord Bruce, descended from Robert the Bruce.

OF LOVE.

Anger, in hasty words or blows,
Itself discharges on our foes;
And sorrow, too, finds some relief
In tears, which wait upon our grief;
So every passion, but fond love,
Unto its own redress does move;
But that alone the wretch inclines
To what prevents his own designs;
Makes him lament, and sigh, and weep,
Disorder’d, tremble, fawn, and creep; 10
Postures which render him despised,
Where he endeavours to be prized.

For women (born to be controll’d)
Stoop to the forward and the bold;
Affect the haughty and the proud,
The gay, the frolic, and the loud. 
Who first the gen’rous steed oppress’d,
Not kneeling did salute the beast;
But with high courage, life, and force,
Approaching, tamed th’unruly horse. 20

Unwisely we the wiser East
Pity, supposing them oppress’d
With tyrants’ force, whose law is will,
By which they govern, spoil and kill: 
Each nymph, but moderately fair,
Commands with no less rigour here. 
Should some brave Turk, that walks among
His twenty lasses, bright and young,
And beckons to the willing dame,
Preferr’d to quench his present flame, 30
Behold as many gallants here,
With modest guise and silent fear,
All to one female idol bend,
While her high pride does scarce descend
To mark their follies, he would swear
That these her guard of eunuchs were,
And that a more majestic queen,
Or humbler slaves, he had not seen.

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Poetical Works of Edmund Waller and Sir John Denham from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.