COMPLAINT OF A LOVER REBUKED Love, that liveth and reigneth in my thought, That built his seat within my captive breast, Clad in the arms wherein with me he fought, Oft in my face he doth his banner rest. She that me taught to love and suffer pain, My doubtful hope and eke my hot desire With shamefast cloak to shadow and refrain, Her smiling grace converteth straight to ire. The coward Love then to the heart apace Taketh his flight, whereas he lurks and plains,3 His purpose lost, and dare not show his face. For my lord's guilt thus faultless bide I pains. Yet from my lord shall not my foot remove; Sweet is his death that takes his end by love.
DESCRIPTION AND PRAISE OF HIS LOVE
GERALDINE
From Tuscan came my lady's worthy race;
Fair Florence was sometime her ancient seat;
The Western isle whose pleasant shore doth face
Wild Camber's cliffs did give her lively heat;
Fostered she was with milk of Irish breast;
Her sire, an earl; her dame, of princes' blood;
From tender years in Britain she doth rest,
With a king's child, where she tasteth costly food;
Hunsdon did first present her to mine eyes;
Bright is her hue, and Geraldine she hight; * ΙΟ
Hampton me taught to wish her first for mine;
And Windsor, alas, doth chase me from her
sight:
Her beauty of kind, her virtues from above.
Happy is he, that can obtain her love!
THE MEANS TO ATTAIN HAPPY LIFE
Martial, the things that do attain
The happy life be these, I find:
The riches left, not got with pain;
The fruitful ground; the quiet mind;
1 float 2mixes 3 laments 4 is named from nature
Resteth here, that quick could never rest;
Whose heavenly gifts, encreased by disdain,
And virtue sank the deeper in his breast;
Such profit he by envy could obtain.
A head where wisdom mysteries did frame;
Whose hammers beat still in that lively brain
As on a stithe 3 where that some work of fame
Was daily wrought to turn to Britain's gain.
A visage stern and mild; where both did grow,
Vice to condemn, in virtue to rejoice;
Amid great storms, whom grace assured so
To live upright and smile at fortune's choice.
A hand that taught what might be said in rhyme;
That reft Chaucer the glory of his wit:
A mark, the which (unperfected, for time)
Some may approach, but never none shall hit.
A tongue that served in foreign realms his king;
Whose courteous talk to virtue did enflame
Each noble heart; a worthy guide to bring
Our English youth by travail unto fame.
An eye whose judgment none affect could blind,
Friends to allure, and foes to reconcile;
Whose piercing look did represent a mind
With virtue fraught, reposed, void of guile.
A heart where dread was never so impressed,
To hide the thought that might the truth ad-
Thus, for our guilt, this jewel have we lost; The earth his bones, the heavens possess his ghost!
They whisted' all, with fixed face attent,
When Prince Eneas from the royal seat
Thus 'gan to speak: "O Queen, it is thy will
I should renew a woe cannot be told;
How that the Greeks did spoil and overthrow
The Phrygian wealth and wailful realm of Troy.
Those ruthful things that I myself beheld,
And whereof no small part fell to my share;
Which to express, who could refrain from tears?
What Myrmidon? or yet what Dolopes?
What stern Ulysses' waged soldier?
And lo! moist night now from the welkin falls,
And stars declining counsel us to rest;
But since so great is thy delight to hear
Of our mishaps and Troyës last decay,
Though to record the same my mind abhors
And plaint eschews, yet thus will I begin:-
The Greekës chieftains, all irked with the war,
Wherein they wasted had so many years,
And oft repulsed by fatal destiny,
A huge horse made, high raised like a hill,
By the divine science of Minerva,
Of cloven fir compacted were his ribs,
For their return a feigned sacrifice,
The fame whereof so wandered it at point.
In the dark bulk they closed bodies of men
Chosen by lot, and did enstuff by stealth
The hollow womb with armed soldiers.
There stands in sight an isle hight Tenedon,
Rich and of fame while Priam's kingdom stood,
Now but a bay and road unsure for ship.
Hither them secretly the Greeks withdrew,
Shrouding themselves under the desert shore;
And, weening we they had been fled and gone,
And with that wind had fet3 the land of Greece,
Troy discharged her long continued dole.*
The gates cast up, we issued out to play,
The Greekish camp desirous to behold,
The places void and the forsaken coasts.
Lo! foremost of a rout that followed him, Kindled Laöcoön hasted from the tower, Crying far off: 'O wretched citizens, What so great kind of frenzy freteth you? Deem ye the Greeks, our enemies, to be gone? Or any Greekish gifts can you suppose Devoid of guile? Is so Ulysses known? Either the Greeks are in this timber hid, Or this an engine is to annoy our walls, To view our towers, and overwhelm our town. Here lurks some craft. Good Troyans give no trust Unto this horse, for, whatsoever it be,
I dread the Greeks, yea when they offer gifts.'”’
GEORGE GASCOIGNE (1525?-1577)
Alas, my lord, my haste was all too hot,
I shut my glass before you gazed your fill,
And, at a glimpse, my silly self have spied
A stranger troop than any yet were seen.
Behold, my lord, what monsters muster here,
With angel's face, and harmful hellish hearts,
With smiling looks, and deep deceitful thoughts,
With tender skins, and stony cruel minds,
With stealing steps, yet forward feet to fraud.
Behold, behold, they never stand content,
With God, with kind, with any help of art,
But curl their locks with bodkins and with braids,
But dye their hair with sundry subtle sleights,
But paint and slick till fairest face be foul,
But bumbast, bolster, frizzle, and perfume.
They mar with musk the balm which nature made
And dig for death in delicatest dishes.
The younger sort come piping on apace, In whistles made of fine enticing wood,
Here Pyrrhus' band, there fierce Achilles pight; '
Here rode their ships, there did their battles join.
Astonied some the scathful gift beheld,
Behight by vow unto the chaste Minerve,
Nay then, my lord, let shut the glass apace,
High time it were for my poor muse to wink,*
Since all the hands, all paper, pen, and ink,
Which ever yet this wretched world possessed,
Cannot describe this sex in colors due!
No, no, my lord, we gazed have enough;
And I too much, God pardon me therefor.
Better look off, than look an ace too far;
And better mum, than meddle overmuch.
But if my glass do like my lovely lord,
We will espy, some sunny summer's day,
To look again, and see some seemly sights.
Meanwhile, my muse right humbly doth beseech,
That my good lord accept this vent'rous verse,
Until my brains may better stuff devise.
THOMAS SACKVILLE, LORD BUCKHURST (1536-1608) THE MIRROR FOR MAGISTRATES
FROM THE INDUCTION
Whereby I knew that she a goddess was, And therewithal resorted to my mind My thought, that late presented me the glass Of brittle state, of cares that here we find, Of thousand woes to silly men assigned; And how she now bid me come and behold, To see with eye that erst in thought I rolled. 168
Flat down I fell, and with all reverence
Adored her, perceiving now that she,
A goddess sent by godly providence,
This shalt thou see, but great is the unrest
That thou must bide before thou canst attain
Unto the dreadful place where these remain. 182
And with these words as I upraised stood, And 'gan to follow her that straightforth paced, Ere I was ware, into a desert wood
We now were come; where, hand in hand embraced,
She led the way, and through the thick SO traced,
As, but I had been guided by her might,
It was no way for any mortal wight.
But lo! while thus, amid the desert dark, We passed on with steps and pace unmeet, A rumbling roar, confused with howl and bark Of dogs, shook all the ground under our feet, And struck the din within our ears so deep, As half distraught unto the ground I fell, Besought return, and not to visit hell.
A deadly gulf where nought but rubbish grows, With foul black swelth in thickened lumps that lies,
Which up in the air such stinking vapours throws,
That over there may fly no fowl but dies,
Choked with the pestilent savours that arise.
Hither we come, whence forth we still did pace,
In dreadful fear amid the dreadful place.
And first within the porch and jaws of Hell Sat deep Remorse of Conscience, all besprent With tears: and to herself oft would she tell Her wretchedness, and cursing never stent To sob and sigh; but ever thus lament With thoughful care, as she that all in vain Would wear and waste continually in pain.
And next within the entry of this lake Sat fell Revenge, gnashing her teeth for ire, Devising means how she may vengeance take, Never in rest till she have her desire; But frets within so farforth with the fire Of wreaking flames, that now determines she To die by Death, or venged by Death to be. 245
When fell Revenge with bloody foul pretence Had shown herself as next in order set, With trembling limbs we softly parted thence, Till in our eyes another sigh we met: When from my heart a sight forthwith I fet, Rueing, alas! upon the woeful plight Of Misery, that next appeared in sight.
With retchless1 hand in grave doth cover it,
Thereafter never to enjoy again
The gladsome light, but, in the ground y-lain,
In depth of darkness waste and wear to nought,
As he had never into the world been brought. 322
But who had seen him, sobbing how he stood
Unto himself, and how he would bemoan
His youth forepast, as though it wrought him good
To talk of youth, all were his youth foregone,
He would have mused, and marvelled much
whereon
This wretched Age should life desire so fain, 328 And knows full well life doth but length his pain.
Crookbacked he was, toothshaken, and blear-
eyed,
Went on three feet, and sometime crept on four,
With old lame bones, that rattled by his side,
His scalp all piled and he with elde forlore; 3
His withered fist still knocking at death's door,
Fumbling and drivelling as he draws his breath,
For brief, the shape and messenger of Death. 336
And fast by him pale Malady was placed,
Sore sick in bed, her colour all foregone,
Bereft of stomach, savour, and of taste,
Ne could she brook no meat but broths alone.
Her breath corrupt, her keepers every one
Abhorring her, her sickness past recure,*
Detesting physic and all physic's cure.
But oh! the doleful sight that then we see;
Lastly stood War, in glittering arms y-clad,
With visage grim, stern looks, and blackly hued;
In his right hand a naked sword he had,
That to the hilts was all with blood embrued:
And in his left (that kings and kingdoms rued)
Famine and fire he held, and therewithal
391
He razed towns, and threw down towers and all.
Cities he sacked, and realms, that whilom
flowered
In honour, glory, and rule above the best,
He overwhelmed, and all their fame devoured, 395
Consumed, destroyed, wasted, and never ceased,
Till he their wealth, their name, and all oppressed.
His face forhewed with wounds, and by his side
There hung his targe' with gashes deep and wide.
GILES FLETCHER THE ELDER (1549?-1611)
Like Memnon's rock, touched with the rising sun, Which yields a sound, and echoes forth a voice; But, when it's drowned in western seas, is dumb, And, drowsy-like, leaves off to make a noise: So I, my love! enlightened with your shine, A Poet's skill within my soul I shroud! Not rude, like that which finer wits decline, But such as Muses to the best allowed! 1 shrieked 2 thrusting in 3 hewed to pieces • shield
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