The Works of Abraham Cowley/Volume 2/The Prophet
THE PROPHET.
Teach me to love! go teach thyself more wit;I chief professor am of it.Teach craft to Scots, and thrift to Jews,Teach boldness to the stews;In tyrants' courts teach supple flattery;Teach Jesuits, that have travell'd far, to lye;Teach fire to burn, and winds to blow,Teach restless fountains how to flow,Teach the dull earth fixt to abide.Teach woman-kind inconstancy and pride: See if your diligence here will useful prove;But, pr'ythee, teach not me to love.
The God of Love, if such a thing there be,May learn to love from me;He who does boast that he has beenIn every heart since Adam's sin;I'll lay my life, nay mistress on 't, that's more,I'll teach him things he never knew before;I'll teach him a receipt, to makeWords that weep, and tears that speak;I'll teach him sighs, like those in death,At which the souls go out too with the breath:Still the soul stays, yet still does from me run,As light and heat does with the sun.
’Tis I who Love's Columbus am; ’tis IWho must new worlds in it descry;Rich worlds, that yield of treasure moreThan all that has been known before.And yet like his, I fear, my fate must be,To find them out for others, not for me.Me times to come, I know it, shallLove's last and greatest prophet call;But, ah! what's that, if she refuseTo hear the wholesome doctrines of my Muse;If to my share the prophet's fate must come—Hereafter fame, here martyrdom?