The Works of Abraham Cowley/Volume 1/Ode. Of Wit

by Abraham Cowley

For works with similar titles, see Ode.

ODE.

OF WIT.

Tell me, O tell, what kind of thing is Wit,
Thou who master art of it?
For the first matter loves variety less;
Less women love't, either in love or dress.
A thousand different shapes it bears,
Comely in thousand shapes appears.
Yonder we saw it plain; and here 't is now,
Like spirits, in a place we know not how.

London, that vents of false ware so much store,
In no ware deceives us more;
For men, led by the colour and the shape,
Like Zeuxis' birds, fly to the painted grape.
Some things do through our judgment pass
As through a multiplying-glass;
And sometimes, if the object be too far,
We take a falling meteor for a star.

Hence 't is a Wit, that greatest word of fame
Grows such a common name;
And Wits by our creation they become,
Just so as titular bishops made at Rome,
'T is is not a tale, 't is not a jest
Admir'd with laughter at a feast,
Nor florid talk, which can that title gain;
The proofs of Wit for ever must remain.

'T is not to force some lifeless verses meet
With their five gouty feet.
All, every-where, like man's, must be the soul,
And Reason the inferior powers control.
Such were the numbers which could call
The stones into the Theban wall.
Such miracles arc ceas'd; and now we see
No towns or houses rais'd by poetry.

Yet 't is not to adorn and gild each part;
That shows more cost than art.
Jewels at nose and lips but ill appear;
Rather than all things Wit, let none be there.
Several lights will not be seen,
If there be nothing else between.
Men doubt, because they stand so thick i' th' sky,
If those be stars which paint the Galaxy.

'Tis not when two like words make up one noise
(Jests for Dutch men and English boys);
In which who finds out Wit, the same may see
In an'grams and acrostick poetry:
Much less can that have any place
At which a virgin hides her face;
Such dross the fire must purge away: 't is just
The author blush there, where the reader must.

'Tis not such lines as almost crack the stage
When Bajazet begins to rage;
Nor a tall metaphor in the bombast way;
Nor the dry chips of short-lung'd Seneca;
Nor upon all things to obtrude
And force some odd similitude.
What is it then, which, like the Power Divine,
We only can by negatives define?

In a true piece of Wit all things must be,
Yet all things there agree;
As in the ark, join'd without force or strife,
All creatures dwelt; all creatures that had life:

Or, as the primitive forms of all
(If we compare great things with small)
Which, without discord or confusion, lie
In that strange mirror of the Deity.

But Love, that moulds one man up out of two,
Makes me forget, and injure you:
I took you for myself, sure, when I thought
That you in any thing were to be taught.
Correct my error with thy pen;
And, if any ask me then
What thing right Wit and height of Genius is,
I'll only shew your lines, and say, 'T is this.

 

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