Classic Poem

Let the dull brutish world that know not love
Continue haeretiques, and disapprove
That noble flame; but the refined know
'Tis all the heaven we have here below.
Nature subsists by Love, and they ty
Things to their causes but by Sympathy
Love chaines the differing Elements in one
Great harmony, link'd to the heavenly throne;
And as on Earth, so the blest quire above
Of Saints and Angells are maintain'd by love;
That is their business and felicity,
And will be so to all eternity.
That is the Ocean, our affections here.
Are but streams borrow'd from the fountaine there;
And 'tis the noblest argument to prove
A beauteous mind, that it knows how to love
Those kind impressions which fate can't controule,
Are heaven's mintage on a worthy soule;
For love is all the arts epitomy,
And is the summe of all divinity
Hee's worse then beast that cannot love, and yet
It is not bought by money, paines or wit;
So no chance nor design can spirits move,
But the eternall destiny of Love.
For when two soules are chang'd and mixed soe,
It is what they and none but they can doe;
And this is friendship, that abstracted flame
Which creeping mortalls know not how to name.
All Love is sacred, and the marriage ty
Hath much of Honour and divinity;
But Lust, design, or some unworthy ends
May mingle there, which are despis'd by friends
Passion hath violent extreams, and thus
All oppositions are contiguous.
So when the end is serv'd the Love will bate,
If friendship make it not more fortunate:
Friendship! that Love's Elixar, that pure fire
Which burns the clearer 'cause it burns the higher;
For Love, like earthy fires (which will decay
If the materiall fuell be away)
Is with offensive smoake accompany'd,
And by resistance only is supply'd:
But friendship, like the fiery element,
With its own heat and nourishment content,
(Where neither hurt, nor smoke, nor noise is made)
Scorns the assistance of a forreign ayde.
Friendship (like Heraldry) is hereby known:
Richest when plainest, bravest when alone;
Calme as a Virgin, and more inocent
Then sleeping Doves are, and as much content
As saints in visions; quiet as the night,
But cleare and open as the summer's light;
United more then spirits facultys,
Higher in thoughts then are the Eagle's eys;
Free as first agents are true friends, and kind,
As but themselves I can no likeness find.