To find out virtues strangely hid in me;
Ay, there's the art and learned poetry!
To make one striding of a barbed steed,
Prancing a stately round—I use indeed20
To ride Bat Jewel's jade—this is the skill,
This shows the poet wants not wit at will.
I must admire aloof, and for my part
Be well contented, since you do 't with art.
LOVE'S BURNING-GLASS
Wondering long, how I could harmless see
Men gazing on those beams that fired me,
At last I found it was the crystal, Love,
Before my heart that did the heat improve:
Which, by contracting of those scatter'd rays5
Into itself, did so produce my blaze.
Now, lighted by my love, I see the same
Beams dazzle those, that me are wont t' inflame;
And now I bless my love, when I do think
By how much I had rather burn than wink.10
But how much happier were it thus to burn,
If I had liberty to choose my urn!
But since those beams do promise only fire,
This flame shall purge me of the dross, Desire.
THE MIRACLE
If thou be'st ice, I do admire
How thou couldst set my heart on fire;
Or how thy fire could kindle me,
Thou being ice, and not melt thee;
But even my flames, light as thy own,5
Have hard'ned thee into a stone!
Wonder of love, that canst fulfil,
Inverting nature thus, thy will;
Making ice one another burn,
Whilst itself doth harder turn!10
[Εἰ μὲν ἦν μαθεῖν]
Εἰ μὲν ἦν μαθεῖν
Ἅ δεῖ παθεῖν
Καὶ μὴ παθεῖν,
Καλὸν ἦν τὸ μαθεῖν·
