Classic Poem

I

Love, (whose hand guides my Hearts strict Reins,
Nor, though he govern it, disdains
To feed the Fire with pious care
Which first himself enkindled there)
Commands my backward Soul to tell
What Flames within her Bosome dwell;
Fear would perswade her to decline
The charge of such a high designe:
But all her weak reluctance fails,
'Gainst greater Force no Force avails.
Love to advance her flight will lend
Those wings by which he did descend
Into my Heart, where he to rest
For ever, long since built his Nest:
I what from thence he dictates write,
And draw him thus by his own Light.

II

Love, flowing from the sacred Spring
Of uncreated Good, I sing:
When born; how Heaven he moves; the Soul
Informs; and doth the World controwl;
How closely lurking in the heart,
With his sharp weapons subtle art
From heavy earth he Man unties,
Enforcing him to reach the skies.
How kindled, how he flames, how burns;
By what laws guided now he turns
To Heaven, now to the Earth descends,
Now rests 'twixt both, to neither bends.
Apollo, Thee I invocate ,
Bowing beneath so great a weight.
Love, guide me through this dark designe,
And imp my shorter wings with thine.

III

When from true Heav'n the sacred Sun
Into th'Angelick Minde did run,
And with enliv'ned Leaves adorn,
Bestowing form on his first-born;
Enflamed by innate Desires,
She to her chiefest good aspires;
By which reversion her rich Brest
With various Figures is imprest;
And by this love exalted, turns
Into the Sun for whom she burns.
This flame, rais'd by the Light that shin'd
From Heav'n into th' Angelick Minde,
Is eldest Loves religious Ray,
By Wealth and Want begot that Day,
When Heav'n brought forth the Queen, whose Hand
The Cyprian Scepter doth Command.

IV

This born in amorous Cypris armes,
The Sun of her bright Beauty, warmes.
From this our first desire accrues,
Which in new fetters caught, pursues
The honourable path that guides
Where our eternal good resides.
By this the fire, through whose fair beams
Life from above to Mankinde streams,
Is kindled in our hearts, which glow
Dying, yet dying greater grow;
By this th'immortal Fountain flows,
Which all Heaven forms below, bestowes;
By this descends that shower of light
Which upwards doth our minds invite;
By this th'Eternal Sun inspires
And Souls with sacred lustre fires.

V

As God doth to the Minde dispence
Its Being, Life, Intelligence,
So doth the Minde the Soul acquaint
How t'understand, to move, to paint;
She thus prepar'd, the Sun that shines
In the Eternal Breast designes,
And here what she includes diffuses,
Exciting every thing that uses
Motion and sense (beneath her state)
To live, to know, to operate.
Inferiour Venus hence took Birth;
Who shines in Heav'n, but lives on Earth,
And o're the World her shadow spreads:
The elder in the Suns Glasse reads
Her Face, through the confused skreen
Of a dark Shade obscurely seen;
She Lustre from the Sun receives,
And to the Other Lustre gives;
Celestial Love on this depends,
The younger, vulgar Love attends.

VI

Form'd by th'eternal Look of God,
From the Suns most sublime abode,
The Soul descends into Mans Heart,
Imprinting there with wondrous Art
What Worth She borrowed of Her Starre,
And brought in her Celestial Carre;
As well as humane Matter yeilds,
She thus her curious Mansion builds;
Yet all those frames from the divine
Impression differently decline:
The Sun, who's figur'd here, his Beams
Into anothers Bosome streams;
In whose agreeing Soul he stayes,
And guilds it with his virtuous Rayes:
The Heart in which Affection's bred,
Is thus by pleasing Errour fed.

VII

The Heart where pleasing Errour raigns,
This object as her Childe maintains,
By the fair Light that in her shines
(A rare Celestial Gift,) refines;
And by degrees at last doth bring
To her first splendours sacred Spring:
From this divine Look, one Sun passes
Through three refulgent Burning-glasses,
Kindling all Beauty, which the Spirit,
The Body, and the Minde inherit.
These rich Spoyles, by th'Eye first caught,
Are to the Souls next Handmaid brought,
Who there resides: She to the Brest
Sends them; reform'd, but not exprest:
The Heart, from Matter Beauty takes,
Of many one Conception makes;
And what were meant by Natures Laws,
Distinct, She in one Picture draws.

VIII

The Heart by Love allur'd to see
Within her self her Progenie;
This, like the Suns reflected Rayes
Upon the Waters face, survayes;
Yet some divine, though clouded Light
Seems here to twinckle, and invite
The pious Soul, a Beauty more
Sublime, and Perfect to adore.
Who sees no longer his dim shade
Upon the Earths vast Globe display'd,
But certain Lustre, of the True
Suns truest Image, now in view.
The Soul thus entring in the Minde,
There such uncertainty doth finde,
That she to clearer Light applies
Her Armes, and near the first Sun flies:
She by his splendour beautious grows,
By loving whom all Beauty flows
Upon the Minde, Soul, World, and All
Included in this spacious Ball.

IX

But hold! Love stops the forward Course
That me beyound my scope would force.
Great Power! if any Soul appears
Who not alone the blossomes wears,
But of the rich Fruit is possest,
Lend him thy Light, deny the rest.