The Golden Treasury. Various

That you your mind so soon removéd,

       Before that I the leisure had

       To choose you for my best belovéd:

       For all your love was past and done

       Two days before it was begun:—

       Adieu Love, adieu Love, untrue Love,

       Untrue Love, untrue Love, adieu Love;

       Your mind is light, soon lost for new love.

       ANON.

      41. A RENUNCIATION.

       If women could be fair, and yet not fond,

       Or that their love were firm, not fickle still,

       I would not marvel that they make men bond

       By service long to purchase their good will;

       But when I see how frail those creatures are,

       I muse that men forget themselves so far.

       To mark the choice they make, and how they change,

       How oft from Phoebus they do flee to Pan;

       Unsettled still, like haggards wild they range,

       These gentle birds that fly from man to man;

       Who would not scorn and shake them from the fist,

       And let them fly, fair fools, which way they list?

       Yet for disport we fawn and flatter both,

       To pass the time when nothing else can please,

       And train them to our lure with subtle oath,

       Till, weary of their wiles, ourselves we ease;

       And then we say when we their fancy try,

       To play with fools, O what a fool was I!

       E. VERE, EARL OF OXFORD.

      42.

       Blow, blow, thou winter wind,

       Thou art not so unkind

       As man's ingratitude;

       Thy tooth is not so keen,

       Because thou art not seen,

       Although thy breath be rude.

       Heigh ho! sing heigh ho! unto the green holly:

       Most friendship is feigning, most loving mere folly:

       Then, heigh ho! the holly!

       This life is most jolly.

       Freeze, freeze, thou bitter sky,

       That dost not bite so nigh

       As benefits forgot:

       Though thou the waters warp,

       Thy sting is not so sharp

       As friend remember'd not.

       Heigh ho! sing heigh ho! unto the green holly:

       Most friendship is feigning, most loving mere folly:

       Then heigh ho, the holly!

       This life is most jolly.

       W. SHAKESPEARE.

      43. MADRIGAL.

       My thoughts hold mortal strife;

       I do detest my life,

       And with lamenting cries

       Peace to my soul to bring

       Oft call that prince which here doth monarchise:

      —But he, grim grinning King,

       Who caitiffs scorns, and doth the blest surprise,

       Late having deck'd with beauty's rose his tomb,

       Disdains to crop a weed, and will not come.

       W. DRUMMOND.

      44. DIRGE OF LOVE.

       Come away, come away, Death,

       And in sad cypres let me be laid;

       Fly away, fly away, breath;

       I am slain by a fair cruel maid.

       My shroud of white, stuck all with yew,

       O prepare it!

       My part of death no one so true

       Did share it.

       Not a flower, not a flower sweet,

       On my black coffin let there be strown;

       Not a friend, not a friend greet

       My poor corpse, where my bones shall thrown:

       A thousand thousand sighs to save,

       Lay me, O where

       Sad true lover never find my grave,

       To weep there.

       W. SHAKESPEARE.

      45. FIDELE.

       Fear no more the heat o' the sun,

       Nor the furious winter's rages:

       Thou thy worldly task hast done,

       Home art gone, and ta'en thy wages:

       Golden lads and girls all must,

       As chimney-sweepers, come to dust.

       Fear no more the frown o' the great,

       Thou art past the tyrant's stroke;

       Care no more to clothe and eat;

       To thee the reed is as the oak:

       The sceptre, learning, physic, must

       All follow this, and come to dust.

       Fear no more the lightning flash

       Nor the all-dreaded thunder-stone;

       Fear not slander, censure rash;

       Thou hast finish'd joy and moan:

       All lovers young, all lovers must

       Consign to thee, and come to dust.

       W. SHAKESPEARE.

      46. A SEA DIRGE.

       Full fathom five thy father lies:

       Of his bones are coral made;

       Those are pearls that were his eyes:

       Nothing of him that doth fade,

       But doth suffer a sea-change

       Into something rich and strange;

       Sea-nymphs hourly ring his knell:

       Hark! now I hear them—

       Ding, dong, Bell.

       W. SHAKESPEARE.

      47. A LAND DIRGE.

       Call for the robin-redbreast and the wren,

       Since o'er shady groves they hover

       And with leaves and flowers do cover

       The friendless bodies of unburied men.

       Call unto his funeral dole

       The ant, the field-mouse, and the mole

       To rear him hillocks that shall keep him warm

       And (when gay tombs are robb'd) sustain no harm;

       But keep the wolf far thence, that's foe to men,

       For with his nails he'll dig them up again.

       J. WEBSTER.

      48. POST MORTEM.

       If Thou survive my well-contented day

       When that churl Death my bones with dust shall cover,

       And shalt by fortune once more re-survey

       These poor rude lines of thy deceaséd lover: