Classic Poem

You , that at a blush can tell
Where the best perfections dwell,
And the substance can conjecture
By a shadow or a picture,
Come and try if you by this
Know my Mistress, who she is.

For though I am far unable
Here to match Apelles' table;
Or draw Zeuxis' cunning lines,
Who so painted Bacchus' vines
That the hungry birds did muster
Round the counterfeited cluster;
Though I vaunt not to inherit
Petrarch's yet unequalled spirit,
Nor to quaff this sacred well
Half so deep as Astrophel,
Though the much commended Caelia,
Lovely Laura, Stella, Delia,
Who in former times excelled,
Live in lines unparalleled,
Making us believe 'twere much
Earth should yield another such:
Yet, assisted but by Nature,
I assay to paint a creature
Whose rare worth in future years
Shall be praised as much as theirs.

Nor let any think amiss
That I have presumed this:
For a gentle nymph is she,
And hath often honoured me,
She's a noble spark of light,
In each part so exquisite,
Had she in times passed been
They had made her beauty's queen.

Then shall cowardly despair
Let the most unblemished fair,
For default of some poor art,
Which her favour may impart,
And the sweetest beauty fade
That was ever born or made?
Shall of all the fair ones she
Only so unhappy be
As to live in such a time,
In so rude, so dull a clime,
Where no spirit can ascend
High enough to apprehend
Her unprized excellence,
Which lies hid from common sense?
Neither shall a stain so vile
Blemish this our Poets' Isle,
I myself will rather run
And seek out for Helicon.
I will wash and make me clean
In the waves of Hippocrene,
And in spite of Fortune's bars
Climb the Hill that braves the stars.
Where, if I can get no Muse
That will any skill infuse,
Or my just attempt prefer,
I will make a Muse of Her:
Whose kind heart shall soon distil
Art into my ruder quill.
By her favour I will gain
Help to reach so rare a strain
That the learned hills shall wonder
How the untaught valleys under
Met with rapture so divine
Without knowledge of the Nine.

I that am a shepherd's swain,
Piping on the lowly plain,
And no other Music can
Than what learned I have of Pan;
I who never sung the lays
That deserve Apollo's bays,
Hope not only here to frame
Measures which shall keep her name
From the spite of wasting times,
But enshrined in sacred rimes,
Place her where her form divine
Shall to after ages shine;
And without respect of odds
Vie renown with demigods.

Then whilst of her praise I sing,
Hearken valley, grove, and spring;
Listen to me, sacred fountains,
Solitary rocks and mountains;
Satyrs, and you wanton elves
That do nightly sport yourselves;
Shepherds, you that on the reed
Whistle while your lambs do feed;
Aged woods and floods that know
What hath been long time ago,
Your more serious notes among
Hear how I can, in my song,
Set a nymph's perfection forth:
And when you have heard her worth,
Say if such another lass
Ever known to mortal was.

Listen, lordings, you that most
Of your outward honours boast;
And you gallants that think scorn
We to lowly fortunes born
Should attain to any graces
Where you look for sweet embraces.
See if all those vanities
Whereon your affection lies
Or the titles or the power
By your fathers' virtues your,
Can your mistresses enshrine
In such state, as I will mine,
Who am forced to importune
Favours in despite of Fortune.

Beauties, listen; chiefly you
That yet know not Virtue's due.
You that think there are no sports
Nor no honours but in Courts,
Though of thousands there live not
Two but die and are forgot:
See, if any palace yields
Aught more glorious than the fields,
And consider well if we
May not as high-flying be
In our thoughts as you that sing
In the chambers of a king.
See, if our contented minds,
Whom Ambition never blinds,
We that, clad in homespun gray,
On our own sweet meadows play,
Cannot honour if we please
Where we list as well as these,
Or as well of worth approve,
Or with equal passion love.
See, if beauties may not touch
Our soon-loving hearts as much,
Or our services effect
Favours with as true respect
In your good conceits to rise,
As our painted butterflies.

And, you Fairest, give her room
When your sex's pride doth come:
For that Subject of my song
I invoke these groves among
To be witness of the lays
Which I carol in her praise:
And because she soon will see
If my measures faulty be,
Whilst I chant them let each rime
Keep a well-proportioned time,
And with strains that are divine
Meet her thoughts in every line.
Let each accent there present
To her soul a new content;
And with ravishings so seize her
She may feel the height of pleasure.

You enchanting spells that lie
Lurking in sweet Poesie,
And to none else will appear
But to those that worthy are,
Make her know there is a power
Ruling in these charms of your
That transcends a thousand heights
Ordinary men's delights,
And can leave within her breast
Pleasures not to be exprest.
Let her linger on each strain
As if she would hear't again,
And were loth to part from thence
Till she had the quintessence
Out of each conceit she meets,
And had stored her with those sweets.
Make her by your art to see,
I that am her swain was he
Unto whom all beauties here
Were alike and equal dear;
That I could of freedom boast
And of favours with the most,
Yet now, nothing more affecting,
Sing of Her, the rest neglecting.

Make her heart, with full compassion,
Judge the merit of true passion,
And as much my love prefer
As I strive to honour her.

Lastly, you, that will, I know,
Hear me, whe'er you should or no;
You that seek to turn all flowers,
By your breath's infectious powers,
Into such rank loathsome weeds
As your dunghill nature breeds,
Let your hearts be chaste, or here
Come not till you purge them clear.
Mark, and mark then what is worst,
For whate'er it seem at first,
If you bring a modest mind
You shall naught immodest find.

But if any too severe
Hap to lend a partial ear,
Or out of his blindness yawn
Such a word as " O, protane! "
Let him know thus much from me
If here's aught protane, 'tis he,
Who applies these excellences
Only to the touch of senses,
And, dim-sighted, cannot see
Where the soul of this may be.

Yet, that no offence may grow,
'Tis their choice to stav or go,
Or if any for despite
Rather comes, than for delight,
For his presence I'll not pray,
Nor his absence; come he may.
Critics shall admitted be,
Though I know they'll carp at me;
For I neither fear nor care,
What in this their censures are.

If the verse here used be
Their dislike, it liketh me,
If my method they deride,
Let them know, love is not tied
In his free discourse to choose
Such strict rules as arts-men use.
These may prate of love, but they
Know him not; for he will play
From the matter now and then,
Off and on, and off again.

If this prologue tedious seem,
Or the rest too long they deem,
Let them know my love they win,
Though they go ere I begin;
Just as if they should attend me
Till the last, and there commend me;
For I will for no man's pleasure
Change a syllable or measure,
Neither for their praises add
Aught to mend what they think bad:
Since it never was my fashion
To make work of recreation.

Pedants shall not tie my strains
To our antique poets' veins,
As if we in latter days
Knew to love, but not to praise.
Being born as free as these,
I will sing as I shall please,
Who as well new paths may run,
As the best before have done.
I disdain to make my song
For their pleasure short or long;
If I please, I'll end it here;
If I list, I'll sing this year:
And though none regard of it,
By myself I pleased can sit,
And with that contentment cheer me,
As if half the world did hear me.

But because I am assured,
All are either so conjured,
As they will my song attend
With the patience of a friend,
Or at least take note that I
Care not much; now willingly
I these goodly colours lay,
Wind nor rain shall wear away,
But retain their purest glass
When the statues made of brass,
For some prince's more renown,
Shall be wholly overthrown,
Or (consumed with cankered rust)
Lie neglected in the dust.

And my reason gives direction,
When I sing of such perfection:
First, those beauties to declare,
Which (though her's) without her are.
To advance her fame I find,
Those are of a triple kind.
Privileges she hath store,
At her birth, since, and before.
From before her birth the fame
She of high descents may claim,
Whose well-gotten honours may
Her deservings more display;
For from heavenly race she springs;
And from high and mighty kings.
At her birth she was by fate
In those parents fortunate
Whose estates and virtues stood
Answerable to their blood.

Then the nation, time, and place
To the rest may add some grace;
For the people with the clime,
And the fashions of the time
(In all which she hath been blest
By enjoying them at best),
Do not only mend the features,
But oft-times make better natures.
Whereas those who hap not so,
Both deform'd and ruder grow.

In these climes and later days
To deserve sweet beauty's praise
(Where so many females dwell
That each seemeth to excel)
Is more glory twenty-fold
Than it was in days of old,
When our ordinary fair ones
Might have been esteemed rare ones,
And have made a subject fit
For the bravest poet's wit.
Little rush-lights or a spark
Shineth fairly in the dark,
And to him occasion gives,
That from sight of lesser lives
To adore it; yet the ray
Of one torch will take away
All the light of twenty more
That shined very well before.
So those pretty beauties, which
Made the times before us rich,
Though but sparkles, seemed a flame,
Which hath been increased by fame,
And their true affections, who
Better never lived to know.
Whereas, her if they had seen,
She had once adored been,
And taught ages past to sing
Sweeter in their sonneting.

Such a ray, so clear, so bright,
Hath outshined all the light
Of a thousand such as theirs
Who were then esteemed stars,
And would have enlightened near
Half the world's wide hemisphere.
She is fairest, that may pass
For a fair one where the lass
Trips it on the country green
That may equal Sparta's queen;
Where in every street you see
Throngs of nymphs and ladies,
That are fair enough to move
Angels, and enamour Jove,
She must matchless beauties bring.
That now moves a muse to sing;
Whenas one small province may
Show more beauties in a day
Than the half of Europe could
Breed them in an age of old.
Such is she, and such a lot
Hath her rare perfections got.

Since her birth to make the colour
Of so true a beauty fuller,
And to give a better grace
To that sweetness in the face,
She hath all the furtherance had
Noble educations add.
And not only knoweth all
Which our ladies courtship call,
With those knowledges that do
Grace her sex, and suit thereto,
But she hath attained to find
(What is rare with womankind)
Excellences, whereby she
May in soul delighted be,
And reap more contentment than
One of twenty thousand can.

By this means hath bettered been
All without her and within;
For it hath by adding arts
To adorn her native parts,
Raised to a noble flame,
Which shall lighten forth her fame,
Those dear sparks of sacred fire
Which the Muses did inspire
At her birth; that she complete
Might with them befit a seat.

But perhaps I do amiss
To insist so long on this.
These are superficial things,
And but slender shadowings
To the work I have in hand:
Neither can you understand
What her excellences may be,
Till herself described you see.
Nor can mine or any pen
Paint her half so lovely then,
As she is indeed; for here
Might those deities appear,
Which young Paris viewed at will
Naked upon Ida hill;
That I from those three might take
All their beauties one to make;
Those, no question, well compact,
Would have made up one exact;
Something yet we miss of might
To express her sweetness right.
Juno's majesty would fit;
Venus' beauty, Pallas' wit,
Might have brought to pattern her's
In some showed particulars;
But they never can express
Her whole form or worthiness
With those excellences which
Make both soul and body rich.

Pallas sometimes was untoward;
Venus wanton; Juno froward;
Yea, all three infected were
With such faults as women are;
And though falsely deified,
Frailties had which she'll deride.

By herself must therefore she,
Or by nothing, patterned be.
And I hope to paint her so
By herself, that you shall know
I have served no common dame
Of mean worth or vulgar fame,
But a nymph that's fairer than
Pen or pencil portrait can.
And to-morrow if you stray
Back again this uncouth way,
I my simple art will show;
But the time prevents me now:
For except at yonder glade,
All the lawn is under shade;
That before these ewes are told,
Those my wethers in the fold,
Ten young weanlings driven down
To the well beneath the town,
And my lambkins changed from
Broom-lease to the mead at home,
'Twill be far in night, and so
I shall make my father woe
For my stay, and be in fear
Somewhat is mischanced here.
On your way I'll therefore bring you,
And a song or two I'll sing you,
Such as I, half in despair,
Made when first I woo'd my fair;
Whereunto my boy shall play,
That my voice assist it may.