In fluent numbers, and in pleasant veins,
I rob both sea and earth of all their state,
To praise her parts: I charm both time and fate,
To bless the nymph that yields me lovesick pains.
My sheep are turned to thoughts, whom froward will
Guides in the restless labyrinth of love;
Fear lends them pasture wheresoe'er they move,
And by their death their life reneweth still.
My sheephook is my pen, mine oaten reed
My paper, where my many woes are written.
Thus silly swain, with love and fancy bitten,
I trace the plains[3] of pain in woeful weed.
Vet are my cares, my broken sleeps, my tears,
My dreams, my doubts, for Phoebe sweet to me:
Who waiteth heaven in sorrow's vale must be,
And glory shines where danger most appears.
Then, Corydon, although I blithe me not,
Blame me not, man, since sorrow is my sweet:
So willeth love, and Phoebe thinks it meet,
And kind Montanus liketh well his lot.
[Footnote 1: old age.]
[Footnote 2: praise.]
[Footnote 3: complaints.]
CORYDON
O stayless youth, by error so misguided,
Where will proscribeth laws to perfect wits,
Where reason mourns, and blame in triumph sits,
And folly poisoneth all that time provided!
With wilful blindness bleared, prepared to shame,
Prone to neglect Occasion when she smiles:
Alas, that love, by fond and froward guiles,
Should make thee tract[1] the path to endless blame!
Ah, my Montanus, cursed is the charm,
That hath bewitched so thy youthful eyes.
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