Oft in a smile: oft in a silent tear: And if all fail, yet virtue's self he'll hire. Himself's a dart, when nothing else can move: Who then the captive soul can well reprove, When love and virtue's self become the darts of love. SIR JOHN BEAUMONT, Brother of Francis Beaumont, and author of "Bosworth "Field," and other poems, 1629. According to Wood, he was entered at Oxford, in 1596, at the age of 14, consequently born in 1582. DESCRIPTION OF LOVE. LOVE is a region full of fires, This meteor, striving high to rise, * Why then should lovers (most will say) Love is like youth: he thirsts for age, We know that Hope and Love are twins; Hope gone, fruition now begins: But what is this? unconstant, frail, In nothing sure, but sure to fail, Which, if we lose it, we bewail; And when we have it, still we bear The worst of passions, daily fear! When Love thus in his centre ends, Stand in his council as the chief. And now he to his period brought, From Love becomes some other thought. These lines I write not to remove United souls from serious love: The best attempts by mortals made To leave affections, where may shine SONG. [In the Nice Valour.] HENCE all you vain delights, Wherein you spend your folly; But only melancholy, O sweetest melancholy! Welcome folded arms, and fixed eyes, Fountain-heads and pathless groves, Nothing's so dainty sweet as lovely melancholy. SONG. [In a Masque.] YE should stay longer if we durst- And though these games must needs be play'd, And not a creature nigh 'em, Might catch his scythe as he doth pass, And cut his wings, and break his glass, And keep him ever by 'em. SONG. [In the Queen of Corinth.] WEEP no more, nor sigh, nor groan, Sorrow calls no time that's gone. Violets pluck'd, the sweetest rain Makes not fresh nor grow again. |