Thrice happy he, who by some shady grove, O how more sweet is birds' harmonious moan, 5 Which good make doubtful, do the evil approve! JOHN FORD (fl. 1639) FROM THE LOVER'S MELANCHOLY ACT I, SCENE I 100 MEN. Passing from Italy to Greece, the tales Which poets of an elder time have feigned To glorify their Tempe, bred in me Desire of visiting that paradise. To Thessaly I came; and living private, Without acquaintance of more sweet companions Than the old inmates to my love, my thoughts, I day by day frequented silent groves And solitary walks. One morning early This accident encountered me: I heard The sweetest and most ravishing contention That art and nature ever were at strife in. AMET. I cannot yet conceive what you infer By art and nature. ΜΕΝ. I shall soon resolve ye. A sound of music touched mine ears, or rather Indeed entranced my soul. As I stole nearer, Invited by the melody, I saw This youth, this fair-faced youth, upon his lute, With strains of strange variety and harmony, Proclaiming, as it seemed, so bold a challenge To the clear quiristers of the woods, the birds, That, as they flocked about him, all stood silent, Wondering at what they heard. I wondered too. AMET. And so do I; good, on! He could not run division with more art That such they were than hope to hear again. 133 MEN. You term them rightly; For they were rivals, and their mistress, harmony. Some time thus spent, the young man grew at last Into a pretty anger, that a bird, Whom art had never taught cliffs, moods, or notes, Should vie with him for mastery, whose study Had busied many hours to perfect practice: To end the controversy, in a rapture Upon his instrument he plays so swiftly, So many voluntaries and so quick, That there was curiosity and cunning, Concord in discord, lines of differing method Meeting in one full centre of delight. AMET. Now for the bird! MEN. 140 The bird, ordained to be Music's first martyr, strove to imitate These several sounds; which when her warbling PURITAN AND CAVALIER GEORGE WITHER (1588-1667) FROM FAIR VIRTUE, THE MISTRESS OF PHILARETE FAIR VIRTUE'S SWEET GRACES Think not, though, my Muse now sings Mere absurd or feigned things! If to gold I like her hair, Or to stars her eyes so fair, Though I praise her skin by snow, Eyes as fair (for eyes) hath she I would scorn to make compare But what pearls, what rubies can Seem so lovely fair to man 370 380 390 165 Whose names would die but for some hired pen. Each man that lives, according to his power, I like the pleasing cadence of a line 170 176 Struck by the consort of the sacred Nine. 180 190 150 Let it not be to you less pleasuring. Cloud their free Muse; as, when the sun doth shine On straw and dirt mix'd by the sweating hyne, FROM BOOK II, SONG V 146 Now was the Lord and Lady of the May Meeting the May-pole at the break of day, And Cælia, as the fairest on the green, Not without some maids' envy chosen queen. Now was the time com'n, when our gentle swain Must in his harvest or lose all again. Now must he pluck the rose lest other hands, Or tempests, blemish what so fairly stands: And therefore, as they had before decreed, Our shepherd gets a boat, and with all speed, 150 In night, that doth on lovers' actions smile, Arrived safe on Mona's fruitful isle. Between two rocks (immortal, without mother,) That stand as if out-facing one another, |