Thus he addreffes his Mistress: Thou who, in many a propriety, So truly art the fun to me, Add one more likeness, which I'm fure you can, And let me and my fun beget a man. Thus he represents the meditations of a Lover: Though in thy thoughts fcarce any tracts have been So much as of original fin, Such charms thy beauty wears as might Defires in dying confeft faints excite. Thou with ftrange adultery Awake, all men do luft for thee, The true taste of Tears. Hither with cryftal vials, lovers, come, And try your mistress' tears at home; For all are falfe, that tafte not just like mine. This is yet more indelicate: As the sweet sweat of roses in a still, As that which from chaf'd musk-cat's pores doth trill, As the almighty balm of th' early East; Such are the sweet drops of my mistress' breast. ror, DONNE. THEIR expreffions fometime raise horwhen they intend perhaps to be pathetic: As men in hell are from difeafes free, COWLEY. THEY were not always strictly curious, whether the opinions from which they drew their illuftrations were true; it was enough that they were popular. Bacon remarks, that fome falfehoods are continued by tradition, becaufe they fupply commodious allufions. It It gave a piteous groan, and fo it broke: COWLEY. IN forming defcriptions, they looked out not for images, but for conceits. Night has been a common subject, which poets have contended to adorn. Dryden's Night is well known; Donne's is as follows: Thou seeft me here at midnight, now all reft: IT must be however confeffed of thefe writers, that if they are upon common fubjects often unneceffarily and unpoetically fubtle; yet where fcholaftick speculation can be properly E 3 properly admitted, their copiousness and acutenefs may justly be admired. What Cowley has written upon Hope fhews an unequalled fertility of invention: Hope, whose weak being ruin'd is, Of bleffing thee; If things then from their end we happy call, 'Tis Hope is the most hopeless thing of all. Hope, thou bold tafter of delight, [it quite! Who, whilft thou should'st but taste, devour'st Thou bring'ft us an eftate, yet leav'st us poor, By clogging it with legacies before! The joys which we entire should wed, Come deflower'd virgins to our bed; Good fortunes without gain imported be, Such mighty cuftom's paid to thee: For joy, like wine kept clofe, does better taste; If it take air before its spirits waste. To the following comparison of a man that travels, and his wife that stays at home, with a pair of compaffes, it may be doubted whe whether abfurdity or ingenuity has the bet ter claim ; Our two fouls therefore, which are one, Like gold to airy thinnefs beat. Yet, when the other far doth roam, And grows erect, as that comes home. Thy firmness makes my circle juft, DONNE. In all thefe examples it is apparent, that whatever is improper or vitious, is produced by a voluntary deviation from nature in purfuit of something new and strange; and that the writers fail to give delight, by their defire of exciting admiration. |