IX. ANOTHER.

And some with scales, and some with wings,
And some with teeth, and some with stings.
Wisdom to man she did afford,
Wisdom for shield, and wit for sword.
What to beauteous womankind,
What arms, what armor, has sh' assign'd?
Beauty is both ; for with the fair
What arms, what armor, can compare?
What steel, what gold, or diamond,
More impassable is found ?
And yet what flame, what lightning, e'er
So great an active force did bear?
They are all weapon, and they dart
Like porcupines from every part.
Who can, alas! their strength express,
Armd, when they themselves undress,
Cap-a-pie with nakedness ?

UNDERNEATH this myrtle shade, On flowery beds supinely laid, With odorous oils my head o'erflowing, And around it roses growing, What should I do but drink away The heat and troubles of the day? In this more than kingly state Love himself shall on me wait. Fill to me, Love; nay, fill it up; And mingled cast into the cup Wit, and mirth, and noble fires, Vigorous health and gay desires. The wheel of life no less will stay In a smooth than rugged way: Since it equally doth flee, Let the motion pleasant be. Why do we precious ointments show'r? Nobler wines why do we pour? Beauteous flowers why do we spread, Upon the monuments of the dead ? Nothing they but dust can show, Or bones that hasten to be so. Crown me with roses whilst I live, Now your wines and ointments give; After death I nothing crave, Let me alive my pleasures have, All are Stoics in the grave.

V. AGE.

Ort am I by the women told,
Poor Anacreon! thou grow'st old:
Look how thy hairs are falling all ;
Poor Anacreon, how they fall!
Whether I grow old or no,
By th' effects, I do not know;
This I know. without being told
"Tis time to live, if I grow old;
"Tis time short pleasures now to take
Of little life the best to make,
And manage wisely the last stake.

VII. GOLD.

A MIGĦTY pain to love it is,
And 'tis a pain that pain to miss
But, of all pains, the greatest pair
It is to love, but love in vain.
Virtue now, nor noble blood,
Nor wit, by love is understood
Gold alone does passion move
Gold monopolizes love.
A curse on her, and on the man
Who this traffic first began!
A curse on him who found the ore !
A curse on him who digg'd the store !
A curse on him who did refine it!
A curse on him who first did coin it!
A curse, all curses else above,
On him who us'd it first in love!
Gold begets in brethren hate;
Gold in families debate;
Gole does friendships separate;
Gold does civil wars create.
These the smallest harms of it!
Gold, alas! does love beget.

X. THE GRASSHOPPER. HAPPY Insect! what can be In happiness compar'd to thee? Fed with nourishment divine, The dewy Morning's gentle wine! Nature waits upon thee still, And thy verdant cup does fill; 'Tis fill'd wherever thou dost tread, Nature's self's thy Ganymede. Thou dost drink, and dance, and sing; Happier than the happiest king ! All the fields which thou dost see, All the plants, belong to thee; All that summer-hours produce, Fertile made with early juice. Man for thee does sow and plow; Farmer he, and landlord thou! Thou dost innocently joy ; Nor does thy luxury destroy ; The shepherd gladly heareth thee, More harmonious than he. The country hinds with gladness hear Prophet of the ripen'd year! Thee Phæbus loves, and does inspire Phæbus is hiinself thy sire. To thee, of all things upon earth, Life is no longer than thy mirth. Happy insect, happy thou! Dost neither age nor winter know But, when thou'st drunk, and danc Thy fill, the flow'ry leaves among (Voluptuous, and wise withal, Epicurean animal!) Sated with thy summer feast, Thou retir'st to endless rest.

But when their life, in its decline,
Touches th' inevitable line,
All the world's mortal to them then,
And wine is aconite to men;
Nay, in Death's hand, the grape-stone proves
As strong as thunder is in Jove's.

I'd advise them, when they spy
Any illustrious piety,
To reward her, if it be she-
To reward him, if it be he-
With such a husband, such a wife,
With Acme's and Septimius' life.

ODE, FROM CATULLUS.

THE COMPLAINT.

ACME AND SEPTIMIUS.

Whilst on Septimius' panting breast
(Meaning nothing less than rest)
Acme lean'd her loving head,
Thus the pleas'd Septimius said :

“My dearest Acme, if I be
Once alive, and love not thee
With a passion far above
All that e'er was called love ;
In a Libyan desert may
I become some lion's prey ;
Let him, Acme, let him tear
My breast, when Acme is not there."

The god of love, who stood to hear him,
(The god of love was always near him,)
Pleas'd and tickled with the sound,
Sneez'd aloud ; and all around
The little Loves, that waited by,
Bow'd, and blest the augury.
Acme, inflam'd with what he said,
Rear'd her gently-bending head ;
And, her purple mouth with joy
Stretching to the delicious boy,
Twice (and twice could scarce suffice)
She kiss'd his drunken rolling eyes.

In a deep vision's intellectual scene,
Beneath a bower for sorrow made,

Th' uncomfortable shade

of the black yew's unlucky green Mixt with the mourning willow's careful grey Where reverend Cham cuts out his famous way,

The melancholy Cowley lay.
And lo! a Muse appear'd to’s closed sight,
(The Muses oft in lands of vision play,)
Body'd, array'd, and seen, by an internal light.
A golden harp with silver strings she bore;
A wondrous hieroglyphic robe she wore,
In which all colors and all figures were,
That Nature or that Fancy can create,

That art can never imitate;
And with loose pride it wanton'd in the air.
In such a dress, in such a well-cloth'd dream,
She us'd, of old, near fair Ismenus' stream,
Pindar, her Theban favorite, to meet;
A crown was on her head, and wings were on her

feet. She touch'd him with her harp, and rais'd him fron.

the ground; The shaken strings melodiously resound.

“ Art thou return'd at last," said she,

“To this forsaken place and me? Thou prodigal! who didst so loosely waste Of all thy youthful years the good estate ;

Art thou return'd here, to repent too late,
And gather husks of learning up at last,
Now the rich harvest-time of life is past,

And Winter marches on so fast?
But, when I meant t'adopt thee for my son,
And did as learn'd a portion assign,
As ever any of the mighty Nine

Had to their dearest children done;
When I resolv'd t'exalt thy anointed name,
Among the spiritual lords of peaceful fame;
Thou, changeling! thou, bewitch'd with noise and

show, Would'st into courts and cities from me go; Would'st see the world abroad, and have a share In all the follies and the tumults there: Thou wouldst, forsooth, be something in a state, And business thou would'st find, and would'st

create;

Business! the frivolous pretence
Of human lusts, to shake off innocence ;

Business! the grave impertinence;
Business! the thing which I of all things hate;
Business! the contradiction of thy fate.

“My little life, my all!" (said she)
So may we ever servants be
To this best god, and ne'er retain
Our hated liberty again!
So may thy passion last for me,
As I a passion have for thee,
Greater and fiercer much than can
Be conceiv'd by thee a man!
Into my marrow is it gone,
Fixt and settled in the bone;
It reigns not only in my heart,
But runs, like life, through every part."
She spoke ; the god of love aloud
Sneez'd again ; and all the crowd
Of little Loves, that waited by,
Bow'd, and bless'd the augury.

This good omen thus from Heaven
Like a happy signal given,
Their loves and lives (all four) embrace,
And hand in hand run all the race.
To poor Septimius (who did now
Nothing else but Acme grow)
Acme's bosom was alone
The whole world's imperial throne;
And to faithful Acme's mind
Septimius was all human-kind.

“Go, renegado! cast up thy account,

And see to what amount

Thy foolish gains by quitting me: The sale of knowledge, fame, and liberty, The fruits of thy unlearn'd apostasy. Thou thought'st, if once the public storm were

past,

If the gods would please to be But advis'd for once by me,