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Such cares my mind could never bear.
Content I live, this is my stay;
I seek no more than may suffice;
I press to bear no haughty sway;
Look, what I lack my mind supplies.
Lo, thus I triumph like a king,
Content with that my mind doth bring.
Some have too much, yet still do crave;
I little have, and seek no more.
They are but poor, though much they have,
And I am rich with little store;
They poor, I rich; they beg, I give;
They lack, I leave; they pine, I live.
I laugh not at another’s loss,
I grudge not at another’s gain;
No worldly waves my mind can toss;
My state at one doth still remain:
I fear no foe, I fawn no friend;
I loathe not life, nor dread my end.
Some weigh their pleasure by their lust,
Their wisdom by their rage of will;
Their treasure is their only trust,
A cloakèd craft their store of skill;
But all the pleasure that I find
Is to maintain a quiet mind.
My wealth is health and perfect ease,
My conscience clear my chief defence;
I neither seek by bribes to please,
Nor by deceit to breed offence:
Thus do I live; thus will I die;
Would all did so as well as I!
Love-Contradictions
As rare to hear as seldom to be seen,
It ca
That fire should burne with perfect heat and flame
Without some matter for to yield the same.
A stranger case yet true by proof I know
A man in joy that liveth still in woe:
A harder hap who has his love at lyst
Yet lives in love as he all love had missed:
Who has enough, yet thinks he lives wthout,
Lacking no love yet still he stands in doubt.
What discontent to live in such desire,
To have his will yet ever to require.
The Shepherd’s Conceit of Prometheus
Prometheus when first from heaven high
He brought dowe fire, ‘ere then on earth not seen,
Fond of Delight, a Satyr standing by
Gave it a kiss, as it like Sweet had been.
Feeling forthwith the other’s burning power,
Wood with the smart, with shouts and shreaking shrill,
He sought his ease in river, field and bower,
But for the time his grief went with him still.
So silly I, with that unwonted sight
In human shape, an angel from above,
Feeding mine eyes, th’impressione there did light,
That since I rest and run as pleaseth Love.
The difference is, the Satyr’s lips, my heart —
He for a time, I evermore, — have smart.
* * *
The lowest trees have tops, the ant her gall,
The fly her spleen, the little spark his heat,
And slender hairs cast shadows though but small,
And bees have stings although they be not great.
Seas have their source, and so have shallow springs,
And love is love in beggars and in kings.
Where waters smoothest run, deep are the fords,
The dial stirs, yet none perceives it move:
The firmest faith is in the fewest words,
The turtles ca
True hearts have eyes and ears no tongues to speak:
They hear, and see, and sigh, and then they break.
The Man of Woe
The man whose thoughts against him do conspire,
One whom mishapp her story doth depaint,
The man of woe, the matter of desire,
Free of the dead, that lives in endless plaint,
His spirit am I, which in this deserte lie,
To rue his case, whose cause I ca
Despair my name, who never finds relief,
Friended of none, but to myself a foe;
An idle care, maintained by firme belief
That praise of faith shall through my torments grow,
And count those hopes, that others’ hearts do ease,
But base conceits the common sense to please.
The happy good from whence my joys arise;
Nor have I power my sorrows to restrain.
But wail the want, when nought else may suffice;
Whereby my life the shape of death must bear, —
That death which feels the worst that life doth fear.
But what avails with tragical complaint,
Not hoping help, the Furies to awake?