Hugo de Anima.

They are justly punished, that abuse lawful things; but they are most justly punished, that use unlawful things; thus Lucifer fell from heaven; thus Adam lost his paradise.

EPIG. 2.

See how these fruitful kernels, being cast

Upon the earth, how thick they spring! how fast!
A full-ear'd crop and thriving, rank and proud;
Prepost'rous man first sow'd, and then he plough'd.

III.

PROV. xiv. 13.

Even in laughter the heart is sorrowful, and the end of that mirth is heaviness.

A'

LAS! fond child,

1.

How are thy thoughts beguil'd

To hope for honey from a nest of wasps?
Thou may'st as well

Go seek for ease in hell,

Or sprightly nectar from the mouths of asps.

The world's a hive,

2

From whence thou derive

No good, but what thy soul's vexation brings :
But case thou meet

Some petti-petti-sweet,

Each drop is guarded with a thousand stings.

Why dost thou make

3.

These murm'ring troops forsake

The safe protection of their waxen homes?

Their hive contains

No sweet that's worth thy pains;

There's nothing here, alas! but empty combs.

For

4.

For trash and toys,

And grief-engend'ring joys,

What torment seems too sharp for flesh and blood! What bitter pills,

Compos'd of real ills,

Men swallow down, to purchase one false good!

The dainties here,

5.

Are least what they appear;
Though sweet in hopes, yet in fruition sour:
The fruit that's yellow,

Is found not always mellow;
The fairest tulip's not the sweetest flow'r.

6.

Fond youth, give o'er,

And vex thy soul no more

In seeking what were better far unfound

Alas! thy gains

Are only present pains

To gather scorpions for a future wound.

7.

What's earth? or in it,

That longer than a minute,

Can lend a free delight that can endure >

O who would droil,*

Or delve in such a soil,

;

Where gain's uncertain, and the pain is sure?

S. AUGUST.

Sweetness in temporal matters is deceitful: it is a la lour and a perpetual fear; it is a dangerous pleasure, whose beginning is without providence, and whose end is not without repentance.

HUGO.

Luxury is an enticing pleasure, a bastard mirth, which hath honey in her mouth, gall in her heart, and a sting in her tail.

EPIG. 3.

What, Cupid, are thy shafts already made?
And seeking honey to set up thy trade,

True emblem of thy sweets! Thy bees do bring
Honey in their mouths, but in their tails a sting.

IV.

PSALM lxii. 29.

To be laid in the balance, it is altogether lighter than

vanity.

1.

UT in another weight: 'tis yet too light:
And yet, fond Cupid, put another in;

PUT

And yet another still there's under-weight

Put in another hundred: put again;

Add world to world; then heap a thousand more
To that; then, to renew thy wasted store,

Take up more worlds on trust, to draw thy balance low'r.

2.

Put in the flesh, with all her loads of pleasure;
Put in great Mammon's endless inventory;
Put in the pond'rous acts of mighty Cæsar:
Put in the greater weight of Sweden's glory:
Add Scipio's gauntlet; put in Plato's gown:
Put Circe's charms, put in the triple crown..
Thy balance will not draw; thy balance will not down.

3.

Lord! what a world is this, which day and night
Men seek with so much toil, with so much trouble?
Which, weigh'd in equal scales, is found so light,
So poorly overbalanc'd with a bubble!

Good

Good God! that frantic mortals should destroy Their higher hopes, and place their idle joy Upon such airy trash, upon so light a toy!

4.

Thou bold impostor, how hast thou befool'd
The tribe of man with counterfeit desire!
How has the breath of thy false bellows cool'd
Heaven's freeborn flame, and kindled bastard fire!
How hast thou vented dross instead of treasure,
And cheated men with thy false weights and measure,
Proclaiming bad for good; and gilding death with plea
sure !

5

The world's a crafty strumpet, most affecting
And closely following those that most reject her ;
But seeming careless, nicely disrespecting

And coyly flying those that most affect her:

If thou be free, she's strange; if strange, she's free; Flee, and she follows; follow, and she'll flee: Than she there's none more coy, there's none more fond

than she.

6.

O what a crocodilian world is this,

Compos'd of treach'ries, and insnaring wiles! She clothes destruction in a formal kiss,

And lodges death in her destructive smiles

;

She hugs the soul she hates; and there does prove The very'st tyrant where she vows to love; And is a serpent most, when most she seems a dove.

7.

Thrice happy he, whose nobler thoughts despise
To make an object of so easy gains;

Thrice happy he, who scorns so poor a prize
Should be the crown of his heroic pains :

Thrice happy he, that ne'er was born to try Her frowns or smiles: or, being born, did lie In his sad nurse's arms an hour or two, and die!

S. AU

S. AUGUST. lib. Confess.

O you that dote upon this world, for what victory do ye fight? Your hopes can be crowned with no greater reward than the world can give; and what is the world, but a brittle thing full of dangers, wherein we travel from lesser to greater perils? O let all her vain, light, momentary glory, perish with herself, and let us be conversant with more eternal things. Alas! this world is miserable; life is short, and death is sure.

EPIG. 4.

My soul, what's lighter than a feather?

Wind.

Than wind? The fire. And what, than fire? The

mind.

What's lighter than the mind? A thought. Than

The fashion of this world passeth away.

ONE are those golden days, wherein

Go

Pale conscience started not at ugly sin
When good old Saturn's peaceful throne
Was unusurp'd by his beardless son :

When jealous Ops ne'er fear'd th' abuse
Of her chaste bed, or breach of nuptial truce:
When just Astræa pois'd her scales

In mortal hearts, whose absence earth bewails :
When froth-born Venus and her brat
With all that spurious brood young Jove begat,
In horrid shapes were yet unknown:
Those halcyon days. that golden age is gone.
There was no client then to wait
The leisure of his long-tail'd advocate;

The