434
HUDIBRAS.
[EPISTLE TO
And disobey'd in making love,
Have vow'd to all the world to prove.
And make ye suffer as you ought,
For that uncharitable fault: 310
But I forget myself, and rove
Beyond th' instructions of my love.
Forgive me, Fair, and only blame
Th' extravagancy of my flame,
Since 'tis too much at once to show 315
Excess of love and temper too.
All I have said that's bad, and true,[1]
Was never meant to aim at you,
Who have so sov'reign a control
O'er that poor slave of yours, my soul, 320
That, rather than to forfeit you,
Has ventur'd loss of heaven too;
Both with an equal pow'r possest,
To render all that serve you blest;
But none like him, who's destin'd either 325
To have or lose you both together;
And if you'll but this fault release,
For so it must be, since you please,
I'll pay down all that vow, and more,
Which you commanded, and I swore, 330
And expiate, upon my skin,
Th' arrears in full of all my sin:
For 'tis but just that I should pay
Th' accruing penance for delay,
Which shall be done, until it move 335
Your equal pity and your love.
Have vow'd to all the world to prove.
And make ye suffer as you ought,
For that uncharitable fault: 310
But I forget myself, and rove
Beyond th' instructions of my love.
Forgive me, Fair, and only blame
Th' extravagancy of my flame,
Since 'tis too much at once to show 315
Excess of love and temper too.
All I have said that's bad, and true,[1]
Was never meant to aim at you,
Who have so sov'reign a control
O'er that poor slave of yours, my soul, 320
That, rather than to forfeit you,
Has ventur'd loss of heaven too;
Both with an equal pow'r possest,
To render all that serve you blest;
But none like him, who's destin'd either 325
To have or lose you both together;
And if you'll but this fault release,
For so it must be, since you please,
I'll pay down all that vow, and more,
Which you commanded, and I swore, 330
And expiate, upon my skin,
Th' arrears in full of all my sin:
For 'tis but just that I should pay
Th' accruing penance for delay,
Which shall be done, until it move 335
Your equal pity and your love.
The Knight, perusing this Epistle,
Believ'd he 'ad brought her to his whistle;
And read it, like a jocund lover,
With great applause, t' himself, twice over: 340
Believ'd he 'ad brought her to his whistle;
And read it, like a jocund lover,
With great applause, t' himself, twice over: 340
- ↑ See Butler's "Character of a Wooer."
or Hugh Peters. Most probably the latter, as in several volumes and tracts of the time Peters is distinctly accused of gross lechery; and in Thurloe's State Papers (vol. iv. p. 784) it is stated that he was found with a whore a-bed, and grew mad, and said nothing but "O blood, blood, that troubles me."
