Which being ftopt, the bounding banks o'erflows;
Grief dally'd with, nor law, nor limit knows.
You mocking birds, quoth fhe, your tunes intomb
Within your hollow-fwelling feather'd breasts;
And in my hearing be you ever dumb,
My reftlefs difcord loves no ftops nor refts:
A woeful hoftefs brooks not merry guests.
Relish your nimble notes to pleafing ears,
Diftrefs likes dumps, when time is kept with tears.
Come Philomel, thou fing'ft of ravishment,
Make thy fad grove in my difhevel'd hair.
As the dank earth weeps at thy languishment,
So I at each fad ftrain will ftrain my tear,
And with deep groans the Diapafon bear:
For burden-wife I'll hum on Tarquin still,
While thou on Tereus defcants better skill.
And while against a thorn thou bear'ft thy part,
To keep thy fharp woes waking; wretched I,
To imitate thee well, against my heart
Will fix a fharp knife, to affright mine eye,
Who if it wink, fhall thereon fall and die.
These means, as frets upon an instrument,
Shall tune our heart-ftrings to true languifhment.
And for, poor bird, thou fing'ft not in the day,
As fhaming any eye fhould thee behold;
Some dark deep defart feated from the way,
That knows nor parching heat, nor freezing cold,
We will find out; and there we will unfold
To creatures ftern, fad tunes to change their kinds;
Since men prove beasts, let beasts bear gentle minds.
As the poor frighted deer, that ftands at gaze,
Wildly determining which way to fly;
Or one incompass'd with a winding maze,
That cannot tread the way out readily:
So with herself is fhe in mutiny,
To live or die, which of the twain were better, When life is fham'd, and death reproaches debtor.
To kill myself, quoth she, alack! what were it,
But with my body my poor foul's pollution?
They that lofe half, with greater patience bear it,
Than they whofe whole is fwallow'd in confufion.
That mother tries a merciless conclufion,
Who having two fweet babes, when death takes
Will flay the other, and be nurse to none. [one,
My body or my foul, which was the dearer?
When the one pure, the other made divine,
Whofe love of either to myself was nearer,
When both were kept from heaven and Colatine?
Ah me! the bark peal'd from the lofty pine,
His leaves will wither, and his fap decay;
So muft my foul, her bark being peal'd away.
Her house is fack'd, her quiet interrupted;
Her manfion batter'd by the enemy;
Her facred temple spotted, spoil'd, corrupted,
Grofly ingirt with daring infamy.
Then let it not be call'd impiety,
If in this blemish'd fort I make fome hole, Thro' which I may convey this troubled foul.
Yet die I will not, till my Colatine
Have heard the cause of my untimely death:
That he may vow, in that fad hour of mine, Revenge on him, that made me ftop my breath: My ftained blood to Tarquin I bequeath,
Which by him tainted, fhall for him be spent,
And as his due, writ in my teftament.
My honour I'll bequeath unto the knife,
That wounds my body fo difhonoured :
'Tis honour to deprive difhonoured life:
The one will live, the other being dead.
So of fhame's ashes shall my fame be bred;
For in my death I murder fhameful scorn,
My fhame fo dead, my honour is new born.
Dear lord of that dear jewel I have loft,
What legacy fhall I bequeath to thee?
My refolution, love, fhall be thy boast,
By whofe example thou reveng'd may'ft be.
How Tarquin must be us'd, read it in me:
Myfelf thy friend, will kill myfelf thy foe;
And for my fake, ferve thou falfe Tarquin fo.
This brief abridgment of my will I make :
My foul and body to the fkies and ground;
My refolution (hufband) do you take;
My honour be the knife's, that makes my wound;
My fhame be his, that did my fame confound;
And all my fame that lives, disbursed be
To thofe that live, and think no fhame of me,
When Colatine fhall overfee this will,
How was I overseen, that thou fhalt see it?
My blood fhall wash the flander of mine ill;
My life's foul deed, my life's fair end fhall free it,
Faint not, faint heart, but ftoutly say, So be it:
Yield to my hand, and that fhall conquer thee;
Thou dead, that dies, and both shall victors be.
This plot of death, when fadly fhe had laid,
And wip'd the brinish pearl from her bright eyes,
With untun'd tongue the hoarfly call'd her maid,
Whofe fwift obedience to her miftrefs hies,
For fleet-wing'd duty with thought's feathers flies.
Poor Lucrece' cheeks unto her maid feem fo,
As winter meads, when fun does melt their snow.
Her mistress fhe doth give demure good-morrow,
With foft flow tongue, true mark of modefty;
And forts a fad look to her lady's forrow,
(For why, her face wore forrow's livery)
But durft not afk of her audaciously,
Why her two funs were cloud-eclipsed fo;
Nor why her fair cheeks over-wafh'd with woe.
But as the earth doth weep, the fun being fet,
Each flower moisten'd like a melting eye;
E'en fo the maid with fwelling drops 'gan wet
Her circled eyne, enforc'd by fympathy
Of those fair funs fet in her miftrefs' sky;
Who in a falt-wav'd ocean quench their light,
Which makes the maid weep like the dewy night.
A pretty while these pretty creatures ftand,
Like ivory conduits coral cifterns filling;
One juftly weeps, the other takes in hand
No caufe, but company of her drops fpilling :
Their gentle fex to weep are often willing;
Grieving themselves to guess at other smarts; And then they drown their eyes, or break their hearts.
For men have marble, women waxen minds,
And therefore they are form'd as marble will :
The weak opprefs'd, th' impreffion of ftrange kinds
Is form'd in them by force, by fraud, or skill.
Then call them not the authors of their ill,
No more than wax fhall be accounted evil,
Wherein is stamp'd the femblance of a devil.
Their fmoothness, like an even champain plain,
Lays open all the little worms that creep.
In men, as in a rough-grown grove, remain
Cave-keeping evils, that obfcurely fleep :
Thro' cryftal walls each little mote will peep.
Tho' men can cover crimes with bold ftern looks,
Poor womens faces are their own faults books.
No man inveighs against the wither'd flower,
But chides rough winter, that the flower has kill'd:
Not that's devour'd, but that which doth devour,
Is worthy blame: O let it not be held
Poor womens faults that they are so fulfill'd
With mens abufes; thofe proud lords, to blame, Make weak mad women tenants to their fhame.
The precedent whereof in Lucrece view,
Affail'd by night with circumftances strong
Of prefent death, and fhame that might enfue,
By that her death to do her husband wrong;
Such danger to refiftance did belong.
The dying fear thro' all her body spread,
And who cannot abuse a body dead?
By this mild patience did fair Lucrece speak
To the poor counterfeit of her complaining:
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