Classic Poem

Of all the Tales that ever have beene told,
By homely Shepheards lately, or of old,
The Mooned Man , although the last in place,
Is not the last, And thus befell the case.
It was the time when (for their good Estate)
The thankefull Shepheards yeerely celebrate
A Feast, and Bone-fires on the Vigills keepe,
To the Great Pan , preserver of their Sheepe:
Which whilst in high solemnity they spend,
Lastly the long day grew unto an end:
When as by Night with a devout intent,
About the Field Religiously they went,
With hollowing Charmes the Warwolfe thence to fray,
That them and theirs awayted to betray.
And now the Sunne neere halfe his course had run
Under the Earth, when comming every one,
Backe to the place where usually they met,
And on the Ground together being set:
It was agreed to passe away the time,
That some one Shepheard should rehearse some Rime:
Long as they could their drowping hearts to glad,
Blame not poore Swaynes, though inly they were sad,
For some amongst them perfectly there knew,
That the sad tymes were shortly to ensue,
When they of all the sorts of men neglected,
In barren Fields should wander unrespected.
For carefull Shepheards that doe watch by Night,
In the vast Ayre see many a fearefull sight:
From whose observance they doe wisely gather
The change of Times, as well as of the weather.
But whilst they strove this Story who should tell,
Amongst the rest to R OWLANDS Lot it fell,
By generall voyce, in time that then was growne,
So excellent, that scarce there had bin knowne
Him that exceld in Piping or in Song:
When not a Man the company among
That was not silent. Now the goodly Moone
Was in the Full, and at her Nighted Noone,
Shew'd her great Glory, shining now so bright,
Quoth R OWLAND , Shee that gently lends us light
Shall be our Subject, and her Love alone,
Borne to a Shepheard, Wise E NDIMION ,
Sometime on Latmus that his Flocke did keepe,
Rapted that was in admiration deepe
Of her perfections, that he us'd toly,
All the long night contemplating the Sky,
At her high beauties: often of his store,
As to the God he only did adore,
And sacrific'd: shee perfect in his love,
" For the high Gods inthronized above:
" From their cleere Mansions plainly doe behold,
" All that frayle man doth in this grosser Mold:
For whom bright C YNTHIA gliding from her Spheare,
Used oft times to recreate her there:
That oft her want unto the World was strange,
Fearing that Heaven the wonted course would change,
And P HoeBUS , her oft missing did inquire,
If that elsewhere she borrowed other fire:
But let them doe to crosse her what they could,
Downe unto Latmus every Month shee would.
So that in Heaven about it there was ods,
And as a question troubled all the Gods,
Whether without their generall consent,
She might depart, but nath'lesse, to prevent
Her Lawlesse course, they laboured all in vayne,
Nor could their Lawes her liberty restraine:
For of the Seven, since shee the lowest was,
Unto the Earth nought hindred her to passe:
Before the rest of which she had the Charge,
No lesse her Power was in the Waters large:
From her deriving naturally their Source:
Besides shee being swiftest in her course,
Of all the Planets, therefore him defies,
That her, her ancient liberty denies.
That many a time apparelled in Greene,
Arm'd with her Dart, she Huntresse-like was seene:
Her Hayre tuck'd up in many a curious pleate,
Sometimes in Fields found feeding of her Neate,
A Countrey Mayden, then amongst the Swaynes,
A Shepheardesse, she kept upon the Playnes;
Yet no disguise her Deity could smother,
So farre in beauty she excelled other:
Such was the Vertue of the World, that then
The Gods did use t'accompany with Men,
In Humane Shapes, descending from their Powers,
Often were seene in homely Shepheards Bowers.
But he her course that studied still to know,
Muse not though oft he malcontent did goe,
Seldome in one state that her ever found,
Horned sometime, now halfe-fac'd, and then round,
Shining on that part, then another more,
Then there most darkned, where most light before,
Now all Night shining, now a piece and then,
Observes the Day, and in her course agen,
Sometime to South, then Northward she doth stirre,
Him so amazing, he supposed her
Vayne and inconstant, now herselfe t'attyre,
And helpe her beauties with her Brothers fire,
When most of all accomplish'd is her face,
A sudden darkenesse doth her quite disgrace.
For that the earth by nature cold and dry,
By the much grosenesse and obscurity,
Whose Globe exceeds her compasse being fixt,
Her Surface and her Brothers Beames betwixt:
Within whose shaddow when she haps to fall,
Forceth her Darkenesse to be generall;
That he resolv'd she ever would be strange:
Yet marking well he found upon her change,
If that her Brow with bloudy Red were staynd,
Tempests soone after, and if blacke, it raind:
By his observance that he well discern'd,
That from her course things greater might be learn'd.
Whilst that his brayne he busied yet doth keepe,
Now from the Splene the Melancholy deepe,
Pierceth the Veynes, and like a raging Floud,
Rudely it selfe extending through the Bloud,
Appaulls the spirits denying their defence,
Unto the Organs, when as every sence
Ceaseth the Office, then the labouring Minde,
Strongest in that which all the Powers doth binde,
Strives to high knowledge, being in this plight,
Now the Sunnes Sister, Mistris of the Night,
His sad desires long languishing to cheare,
Thus at the last on Latmus doth appeare,
Her Brothers Beames inforc'd to lay aside,
Her selfe for his sake seeming to divide.
For had she come appareld in her light,
Then should the Swayne have perish'd in her sight.
Upon a Bull as white as Milke she rode,
Which like a Huntresse bravely shee bestrode,
Her Brow with beautie gloriously repleat,
Her count'nance lovely with a swelling Teat;
Gracing her broad Brest curiously inchaste,
With branched Veynes all bared to the Waste.
Over the same she ware a Vapour thin,
Thorow the which her Cleere and dainty Skin,
To the beholder amiably did show,
Like Damaske Roses lightly clad in Snow.
Her Bow and Quiver at her Backe behinde,
That easly mooving with the wanton Winde,
Made a soft rustling, such as you doe heare,
Amongst the Reedes some gliding River neare,
Whence the fierce B OREAS thorow them doth Ride,
Against whose Rage the hollow Canes doe chide;
Which breath, her Mantle amorously did swell,
From her straight Shoulders carelesly that fell.
Now here, now there, now uPand downe that flew,
Of sundry Coloures, wherein you might view
A Sea, that somewhat straitned by the Land,
Two furious Tydes raise their ambitious Hand,
One 'gainst the other, warring in their Pride,
Like two fond Worldlings that themselves devide
For some slight Trifle, opposite in all,
Till both together ruined, they fall.
Some comming in, some out againe doe goe,
And the same way, and the same Winde doth blowe,
Both Sayles their course each labouring to prefer,
By th'Hand of eithers helpefull Marriner:
Outragious Tempest, Shipwracks over-spread
All the rude N EPTUNE , whilst that pale-fac'd dread
Ceaseth the Ship-boy, that his strength doth put
The Ancored Cable presently to cut.
All above Boord, the sturdy E OLOUS casts
Into the wide Seas, whilst on Planks and Masts
Some say to swim: and there you might behold,
Whilst the rude Waters enviously did scold,
Others upon a Promontory hie,
Thrusting his Blue top through the bluer Skie,
Looking upon those lost upon the Seas,
Like Worldly Rich men that doe sit at ease,
Whilst in this vayne World others live in strife,
Warring with sorrow every-where so rife:
And oft amongst the Monsters of the Maine,
Their horrid Foreheads through the Billows straine,
Into the vast Aire driving on their Brests,
The troubled Water, that so ill disgests
Their sway, that it them enviously assailes,
Hanging with white Jawes on their Marble Scales;
And in another in-land part agen,
Were Springs, Lakes, Rivers, Marishes and Fen,
Wherein all kinds of Water-fowle did wonne,
Each in their colours excellently done,
The greedie Sea-maw fishing for the fry,
The hungry Shell-fowle , from whose rape doth flye
Th'unnumbred sholes, the Mallard there did feed.
The Teale and Morecoot raking in the Weed,
And in a Creeke where waters least did stirre,
Set from the rest the nimble Divedopper ,
That comes and goes so quickly and so oft,
As seemes at once both under and aloft:
The jealous Swan , there swimming in his pride,
With his arch'd brest the Waters did divide,
His saily wings him forward strongly pushing,
Against the billowes with such furie rushing,
As from the same, a fome so white arose,
As seem'd to mocke the brest that them oppose:
And here and there the wandring eye to feed,
Oft scattered tufts of Bul-rushes and Reed,
Segges, long-leav'd Willow, on whose bending spray,
The pide Kings-fisher , having got his prey,
Sate with the small breath of the water shaken,
Till he devour'd the Fish that he had taken.
The long-neck'd Herne , there watching by the brimme,
And in a Gutter neere againe to him
The bidling Snite , the Plover on the Moore,
The Curlew , scratching in the Oose and Ore:
And there a Fowler set his Lime and ginne,
Watching the Birds unto the same to winne;
Sees in a Boat a Fisher neere at hand,
Tugging his Net full laden to the Land,
Keepe off the Fowle, whereat the others bloud
Chaf'd; from the place where secretly he stood,
Makes signes, and closely beckneth him away,
Shaketh his hand, as threatning if he stay,
In the same stayned with such naturall grace,
That rage was lively pictured in his face:
Whilst that the other eagerly that wrought,
Having his sence still settled on his draught
More than before, beats, plunges, hales the cord,
Nor but one looke the other can afford.
Buskins she ware, which of the Sea did beare
The pale greene colour, which like waved were,
To that vast N EPTUNE , of two colours mixt,
Yet none could tell the difference was betwixt,
With Rockes of Christall lively that were set,
Covering whose feet with many a curious fret,
Were Groves of Corall , which not feeling weather,
Their limber branches were so lap'd together,
As one inamour'd had of other beene,
Jealous the Ayre t'have intercourse betweene:
'Mongst which, cleere Amber jellyed seem'd to bee,
Through whose transparence you might easly see,
The beds of Pearle whereon the Gum did sleepe,
Cockles , broad Scallops , and their kind that keepe
The precious Seed which of the waters come,
Some yet but thriving, when as other some,
More then the rest that strangely seeme to swell,
With the deare fruit that grew within the shell;
Others againe wide open there did yawne,
And on the Gravell spew'd their orient spawne:
That he became amazed at her sight,
Even as a man is troubled at the light
Newly awaked, and the white and red,
With his eyes twinkling, gathered and fled:
Like as a Mirrour to the Sunne oppos'd,
Within the margent equally inclos'd,
That being moved, as the hand directs,
It at one instant taketh and reflects:
For the affection by the violent heat,
Forming it passion, taketh up the seat
In the full heart, whereby the joy or feare,
That it receives either by the eye or eare,
Still as the object altereth the moode,
Either attracts, or forceth forth the bloud:
That from the chiefe part violently sent,
In either kind thereby is vehement.
Whilst the sad Shepheard in this wofull plight
Perplex'd, the Goddesse with a longing sight
Him now beheld, for worshipped by men:
The heavenly powers so likewise love agen
To shew themselves and make their glories knowne:
And one day marking when he was alone,
Unto him comming, mildly him bespake:
Quoth she, Know, Shepheard, only for thy sake,
I first chose Latmus , as the onely place
Of my abode, and have refus'd to grace
My Menalus , well knowne in every Coast,
To be the Mount that once I loved most:
And since alone of wretched mortals, thou
Hast laboured first my wandring course to know;
To Times succeeding thou alone shalt bee,
By whom my motion shall be taught, quoth she,
For those first simple that my face did marke,
In the full brightnesse suddenly made darke,
Ere Knowledge did the cause thereof disclose,
To be inchanted long did me suppose:
With sounding Brasse and all the while did ply,
The incantation thereby to untye.
But to our purpose, when my Mother went,
The bright L AIONA (and her wombe distent)
With the great burden that by J OVE she bare,
Me and my Brother, the great Thunderer's care:
Whom floting D ELOS wandring in the Maine,
From jealous J UNO , hardly could containe:
Then much distress'd, and in a hard estate,
C ÆUS ' faire Daughter by our Stepdames hate,
Betwixt a Lawrell , and an Olive Tree,
Into the World did bring the Sunne and mee.
When I was borne (as I have heard her say)
Nature alone did rest her on that day:
In J OVES high House the Gods assembled all,
To whom he held a sumptuous festivall:
The Well wherein my Mother bath'd me first,
Hath that high vertue, that he shall not thirst,
Thereof that drinkes, and hath the paine appeased
Of th'inward griev'd, and outwardly diseased:
And being young, the Gods that haunt the Deepe,
Stealing to kisse me softly laid to sleepe:
And having felt the sweetnesse of my breath,
Missing me, mourn'd and languished to death:
I am the Rectresse of this Globe below,
And with my course the Sea doth ebbe and flow,
When from aloft my beames I oblique cast,
Straightwayes it ebbes, and floweth then as fast,
Downward againe my motion when I make:
Twice doth it swell, twice every day doth slake,
Sooner or latter shifting of the tyde
As farre or neere my wandring course doth guide.
That kindly moysture that doth life maintayne,
In every Creature prooves how I doe raigne
In fluxive humour, which is ever found,
As I doe wane, or wax up to my round;
Those fruitfull Trees of Victorie and Peace,
The Palme , and Olive , still with my increase
Shoote forth new branches: and to tell my power,
As my great Brother, so have I a Flowre
To me peculiar, that doth ope and close,
When as I rise, and when I me repose.
No lesse then these that greene and living be,
The precious Gemmes doe sympathize with me:
As most that stone that doth the name derive
From me, with me that lesseneth or doth thrive,
Darkneth and shineth, as I doe, her Queene.
And as in these, in beasts my power is seene.
As he whose grimme face all the lesser feares,
The cruell Panther, on his shoulder beares
A spot, that dayly changeth as I doo,
And as that creature me affecteth too,
It whose deepe craft scarce any creature can,
Seeming in reason to devide with man,
The nimble Babion mourning all the time,
Nor eats betwixt my waning and my prime.
The spotted Cat, whose sharpe and subtill sight
Pierceth the vapour of the blackest night,
My want and fulnesse in her eye doth find,
So great am I and powerfull in that kind.
As those great burgers of the forrest wild,
The Hart , the Goate , and he that slew the child
Of wanton Mirrah , in their strength doe know
The due observance nature doth me owe.
And if thou thinke me heavenly not to bee,
That in my face thou often seem'st to see,
A palenesse, where those other in the skie
Appeare so purely glorious in thine eye:
Those freckles thou supposest me disgrace,
Are those pure parts that in my lovely face,
By their so much tenuity doe slight,
My Brothers Beames assisting me with light,
And keepe that cleerenesse as doth me behove,
Of that pure Heaven me set wherein to move.
My least spot seene unto the Earth so neare,
Wherefore that compasse that doth oft appeare
About my Body, is the dampy Mist,
From earth arising, striving to resist
The Rayes my full Orbe plentiously projects,
On the grosse Cloud, whose thicknesse it reflects,
And mine owne light about my selfe doth fling
In equall parts, in fashion of a Ring;
For neer'st to Mortals though my state I keepe,
Yet not the colour of the troubled Deepe,
Those spots supposed, nor the Fogs that rise
From the dull Earth, me any whit agrize;
Whose perfect beauty no way can indure,
But what like me is excellently pure;
For moyst and cold although I doe respire,
Yet in my selfe had I not Genuine Fire,
When the grosse Earth devided hath the space,
Betwixt the full Orbe and my Brothers Face;
Though I confesse much lessned be my light,
I should be taken utterly from sight,
And for I so irregularly goe,
Therein wise nature most of all doth show
Her searchlesse judgement: for did I in all,
Keepe on in that way, which Star-gazers call
The Lyne Ecliptick, as my glorious Brother
Doth in his course, one opposite to other;
Twise every Month, the Eclipses of our light,
Poore Mortals should prodigiously affright;
Yet by proportion certainely I move,
In rule of Number, and the most I love,
That which you call Full, that most perfect seven,
Of three and foure made, which for odde and even,
Are Male and Female, which by mixture frame,
It most Mysterious, that as mine I clayme;
Quartered thereby, first of which Seven my Prime,
The second Seven accomplisheth the time
Unto my Fulnesse, in the third I range,
Lesning againe, the fourth then to my change:
The which foure Sevens the Eight and Twenty make,
Through the bright Girdle of the Zodiake,
In which I passe; whose Quarters doe appeare,
As the Foure Seasons of my Brothers Yeere.
First in my Birth am moystned as his Spring,
Hot as his Summer, he illumining
My Orbe, the Second: my Third Quarter Dry,
As is his Autumne , when from him I flye,
Depriv'd his bright Beames, and as waxing old,
Lastly, my Wane is as his Winter Cold.
Whereat shee paus'd; who all the while she spake,
The bustling Winds their murmur often brake;
And being silent seemed yet to stay,
To listen if she ought had else to say.
When now the while much troubled was his thought,
And her fayre speech so craftily had caught
Him, that the Spirits soone shaking off the loade
Of the grosse Flesh, and hating her abode;
Being throughly heated in these amorous Fires,
Wholly transported with the deare desires
Of her imbraces: for the living soule,
Being individuall, uniforme and whole,
By her unwearied faculties doth find,
That which the flesh of duller Earth by kind,
Not apprehends, and by her function makes
Good her owne state; E NDIMION now forsakes
All the delights that Shepheards doe preferre,
And sets his minde so gen'rally on her,
That all neglected to the Groves and Springs,
He followes P HoeBE , that him safely brings
(As their great Queene) unto the nymphish Bowres,
Wherein cleere Rivers beautified with Flowres,
The silver Naydes bathe them in the bracke.
Sometime with her the Sea-horse he doth backe,
Amongst the blue Nereides , and when
Wearie of waters, Goddesse like agen,
She the high Mountaynes actively assayes,
And there amongst the light Oriades ,
That ride the swift Roes , P HoeBE doth resort,
Sometime amongst those that with them comport,
The Hamadriades doth the Woods frequent,
And there she stayes not; but incontinent,
Calls downe the Dragons that her Chariot draw,
And with E NDIMION pleased that she saw,
Mounteth thereon, in twinkling of an eye,
Stripping the winds, beholding from the Skye,
The Earth in roundnesse of a perfect Ball,
Which as a point but of this mightie All,
Wise Nature fix'd, that permanent doth stay,
Whereas the Spheares by a diurnall sway,
Of the first Moover carryed are about.
And how the severall Elements throughout,
Strongly infolded, and the vast Ayre spred
In sundry Regions, in the which are bred
Those strange Impressions often that appeare
To fearefull Mortalls, and the causes there,
And lightned by her piercing beames, he sees
The powerfull Planets, how in their degrees,
In their due seasons they doe fall and rise:
And how the Signes in their Triplicities,
Be simpathizing in their Trine consents,
With whose inferiour forming Elements,
From which our bodies the complexions take,
Natures and number: strongly and doe make
Our dispositions like them, and on Earth
The Power, the Heavens have over mortall Birth:
That their effects which men call Fortune, are
As is that good or in-auspicious Starre,
Which at the fraile Nativitie doth raigne.
Yet here her Love could P HoeBE not containe,
And knowledge him so strongly doth inspire,
That in most plentie, more he doth desire;
Raysing him up to those excelling sights,
The glorious Heaven, where all the fixed lights,
Whose Images suppos'd to be therein,
Are fram'd of Starres, whose names did first begin
By those wise Ancients, not to stellifie
The first Worlds Heroes only, but imply
To reach their courses, for distinguished
In Constellations, a delight first bred
In slothfull Man, into the same to looke,
That from those Figures nomination tooke,
Which they resembled here on Earth below,
And the bright P HoeBE subtilly doth know,
The heavenly Motions high her Orbe above,
As well as those that under her doe move.
For with long Titles doe we her invest,
So these great three most powerfull of the rest,
P HoeBE , D IANA , H ECATE , doe tell,
Her Soveraigntie in Heaven, in Earth and Hell,
And wise Apollo , that doth franckly lend
Her his pure beames, with them doth likewise send
His wondrous knowledge, for that God most bright,
King of the Planets, Fountaine of the Light:
That seeth all things, will have her to see,
So farre as where the sacred Angels bee.
Those Hierarchies that J OVES great will supply,
Whose Orders formed in triplicitie,
Holding their places by the treble Trine,
Make up that holy Theologike nine:
Thrones, Cherubin, and Seraphin that rise,
As the first three; when Principalities,
With Dominations, Potestates are plac'd
The second: and the Ephionian last,
Which Vertues, Angels, and Archangels bee.
Thus yonder Man that in the Moone you see,
Rapt up from Latmus , thus she doth preferre,
And goes about continually with her:
Over the World that every moneth doth looke,
And in the same there's scarce that secret nooke,
That he survayes not, and the places hidden,
Whence simple Truth and Candle light forbidden,
Dare not approach: he peepeth with his light,
Whereas suspicious policie by night,
Consults with Murther, basenesse at their hand,
Armed to act what ever they command:
With guiltie conscience and intent so foule,
That oft they start at whooping of an Owle,
And slily peering at a little pore,
See one sometimes content to keepe the doore:
One would not thinke the Bawd that did not know,
Such a brave bodie could descend so low.
And the base Churle, the Sunne that dare not trust,
With his old Gold, yet smelling it doth rust,
Layes it abroad, but lockes himselfe within
Three doubled lockes, or ere he dare begin
To ope his Bags, and being sure of all;
Else, yet therewith dare scarcely trust the wall:
And with a Candle in a filthy stick,
The grease not fully covering the wick;
(Pores o'r his base God) forth a flame that fryes,
Almost as dimme as his foule bleared eyes:
Yet like to a great Murtherer, that gave
Some slight reward unto some bloudie Knave,
To kill: the second secretly doth slay,
Fearing lest he the former should betray:
He the poore Candle murth'reth ere burnt out,
Because that he the secresie doth doubt;
And oftentimes the Mooned Man out-spyes,
The Eve-dropper, and circumspectly eyes
The Thiefe and Lover, specially which two,
With Night and Darknesse have the most to doe.
And not long since, besides this, did behold
Some of you here, when you should tend your Fold,
A Nights were wenching: thus he me doth tell.
With that, they all in such a laughter fell,
That the Field rang, when from a Village neere,
The watchfull Cocke crew, and with Notesfull cleere,
The early Larke soone summoned the Day,
When they departed every one their way.