And when thou answerest, if it be

To what was ask'd thee properly,
Know this:

Thou lovest amiss

And, to love true,

Thou must begin again and love anew.

If when thy stomach calls to eat
Thou cutt'st not fingers 'stead of meat
And, with much gazing on her face,
Dost not rise hungry from thy place,
Know this:

Thou lovest amiss

And, to love true,

Thou must begin again and love anew.

If by this thou dost discover

That thou art no perfect lover
And, desiring to love true,
Thou dost begin to love anew,
Know this:

Thou lovest amiss

And, to love true,

Thou must begin again and love anew.

A HEALTH

A HEALTH to the nut-brown Lass

With the hazel eyes! Let it pass !
She that hath good eyes

Is a prize.

Let it pass! let it

pass !

As much to the lively grey:
As good i' the night as day!
She that hath good eyes,
Fair and wise

Drink away! drink away!

I pledge, I pledge: what, ho! some wine! and to thine

Here's to thine

The colours are divine:

But O, to the black! the black!

Give me as much again, and let it be sack !
She that hath black eyes

Hath Love's guise

And, it may be, a better knack.

BARLEY-BREAK

OVE, Reason, Hate, did once bespeak
Three mates to play at barley-break.

Love Folly took, and Reason Fancy,
And Hate consorts with Pride: so dance they.
Love coupled last and so it fell

That Love and Folly were in Hell.

They break, and Love would Reason meet,

But Hate was nimble on her feet;
Fancy looks for Pride and thither
Hies, and they two hug together :
Yet this new coupling still doth tell
That Love and Folly were in Hell.

The rest do break again, and Pride
Hath now got Reason on her side;

Hate and Fancy meet, and stand
Untouch'd by Love in Folly's hand:
Folly was dull, though Love ran well :
So Love and Folly were in Hell.

THOMAS NABBES

HER REAL WORTH

WHAT

HAT though with figures I should raise
Above all height my Mistress' praise,

Calling her cheek a blushing rose,
The fairest June did e'er disclose,
Her forehead lilies, and her eyes
The luminaries of the skies;
That on her lips ambrosia grows,
And from her kisses nectar flows?
Too great hyperbolès! unless
She loves me she is none of these.
But if her heart and her desires
Do answer mine with equal fires,
These attributes are then too poor :
She is all these, and ten times more.

JOSEPH RUTTER

SONG OF VENUS

COME, Lovely Boy! unto my court,

And leave these uncouth woods and all
That feed thy fancy with love's gall
But keep away the honey and the sport!
CHORUS OF GRACES - Come unto me!
And with variety

Thou shalt be fed: which Nature loves, and I.

There is no music in a voice

That is but one, and still the same :
Inconstancy is but a name

To fright poor lovers from a better choice. CHORUS - Come then to me!

Orpheus that on Eurydicè

Spent all his love, on others scorn,
Now on the banks of Hebrus torn

Finds the reward of foolish constancy.

CHORUS Come then to me!

And sigh no more for one love lost!
I have a thousand Cupids here
Shall recompense with better cheer
Thy misspent labours and thy bitter cost.
CHORUS Come then to me!

-

MARRIAGE HYMN

HYMEN! God of marriage bed!

Be thou ever honoured:
Thou whose torch's purer light
Death's sad tapers did affright,
And instead of funeral fires
Kindled lovers' chaste desires :
May their love

Ever prove

True and constant; let not age

Know their youthful heat to assuage!

Maids! prepare the genial bed:

Then come, Night! and hide that red Which from her cheeks his heart does burn, Till the envious Day return

And the lusty bridegroom say

I have chased her fears away,
And instead