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HESPERIDES.

THE ARGUMENT OF HIS BOOK.

I SING of brooks, of blossomes, birds, and bowers;
Of April, May, of June, and July flowers.

I sing of May-poles, hock-carts, wassails, wakes;
Of bridegrooms, brides, and of their bridall-cakes.
I write of youth, of love, and have accesse
By these to sing of cleanly wantonnesse.
I sing of dewes, of raines, and, piece by piece,
Of balme, of oyle, of spice, and ambergreece.
I sing of times trans-shifting; and I write
How roses first came red, and lillies white.
I write of groves, of twilights, and I sing
The court of Mab, and of the Fairie-king.
I write of hell; I sing, and ever shall,
Of heaven, and hope to have it after all.

TO HIS MUSE.

WHITHER, mad maiden, wilt thou roame?

Farre safer 'twere to stay at home,

Where thou mayst sit and piping please

The poore and private cottages.

Since coats and hamlets best agree
With this thy meaner minstralsie.

There with the reed, thou mayst expresse
The shepherds' fleecie happinesse:

And with thy eclogues intermixe

Some smooth and harmlesse beucolicks.
There on a hillock thou mayst sing
Unto a handsome shephardling;
Or to a girle, that keeps the neat,
With breath more sweet then violet.
There, there, perhaps, such lines as these
May take the simple villages.

But for the court, the country wit

Is despicable unto it.

Stay then at home, and doe not goe
Or flie abroad to seèke for woe.
Contempts in courts and cities dwell;
No critick haunts the poore man's cell:
Where thou mayst hear thine own lines read
By no one tongue, there, censured.

That man's unwise will search for ill,
And may prevent it, sitting still.

TO HIS BOOK.

WHILE thou didst keep thy candor undefil'd, Deerely I lov'd thee, as my first-borne child: But when I saw thee wantonly to roame From house, and never stay at home;

I brake my bonds of love, and bad thee goe, Regardlesse whether well thou speď'st, or no. On with thy fortunes then, what e're they be; If good I'le smile, if bad I'le sigh for thee.

ANOTHER.

To read my booke the virgin shie May blush, while Brutus standeth by: But when he's gone, read through what's writ, And never staine a cheeke for it.

ANOTHER.

WHO with thy leaves shall wipe at need The place where swelling piles do breed, May every ill that bites or smarts Perplexe him in his hinderparts.

TO THE SOURE READER.

If thou dislikʼst the piece thou light st on first, Thinke that of all that I have writ the worst: But if thou read'st my booke unto the end, And still do'st this and that verse reprehend, O perverse man! if all disgustfull be,

The extreame scabbe take thee and thine for me.

TO HIS BOOKE.

COME thou not neere those men who are like

bread

O're-leven'd, or like cheese o're-renetted.

WHEN HE WOULD HAVE HIS VERSES READ.

IN sober mornings, doe not thou reherse
The holy incantation of a verse;

But when that men have both well drunke and fed,
Let my enchantments then be sung or read.
When laurell spirts i' th' fire, and when the

hearth

Smiles to it selfe, and guilds the roofe with mirth;
When up the thyrse is rais'd, and when the

sound

Of sacred orgies flyes, a round, a round;

When the rose raignes, and locks with ointments

shine,

Let rigid Cato read these lines of mine.

UPON JULIA'S RECOVERY.

DROOP, droop no more, or hang the head, Ye roses almost withered!

་

Now strength, and newer purple get,
Each here declining violet !

O Primroses! let this day be
A resurrection unto ye;

And to all flowers ally'd in blood,
Or sworn to that sweet sisterhood:
For health on Julia's cheek hath shed
Clarret and creame commingled:
And those her lips doe now appeare
As beames of corrall, but more cleare.

TO SILVIA TO WED.

LET us (though late) at last, my Silvia, wed,
And loving lie in one devoted bed.

Thy watch may stand, my minutes fly poste haste;
No sound calls back the yeere that once is past.
Then, sweetest Silvia, let's no longer stay;
True love, we know, precipitates delay.
Away with doubts, all scruples hence remove;
No man at one time can be wise and love.

THE PARLIAMENT OF ROSES TO JULIA.

I DREAMT the roses one time went
To meet and sit in Parliament:
The place for these, and for the rest
Of flowers, was thy spotlesse breast,