Such expert men are spent for such bad fares
As might have made us Lords of what is theirs.
Stay, stay at home, ye nobler fpirits, and prise
Your lives more high then such base trumperies;
Forbeare to fetch; and they 'le goe neere to fue,
And at your owne dores offer them to you;
Or have their woods and plaines so overgrowne
With poyinous weeds, roots, gums, and feeds unknowne ;
That they would hire fuch weeders as you be
To free their land from fuch fertilitie.
Their spices hot their nature best indures,
But 'twill impayre and much distemper yours.
What our owne foyle affords befits us best;
And long and long, for ever may we rest
Needleffe of help! and may this Ifle alone
Furnish all other lands, and this land none!

Brit. Paft. B. II. Song IV. by W. Browne. Thomp. Edit.

VOL. If.

D

OF

OF THE COURTIER'S LIFE.

MYNE own John Poines, fins ye delight to know

The causes why that homeward I me draw,
And flee the prease of Courtes, wherefo they goe,
Rather then to live thrall under the awe
Of lordly lookes, wrapped within my cloke,
To will and luft learning to fet a law;

It is not, that because I ftorme or mocke

The power of them, whom Fortune here hath lent
Charge over us, of right to strike the stroke;
But true it is, that I have always ment
Lefs to esteeme them, then the common fort,
Of outward thinges that judge in their entent,
Without regarde, what inward doth refort:
I graunt, fome time of Glory that the fyre,
Doth touch my heart, me lift not to report:
Blame by honour and honour to defyre.
But how may I this honour now attaine,
That cannot dye the colour blacke a lyer?
My Poynes, I cannot frame my tune to fayn,
To cloke the truth, for praise, without defert,
Of them that lift all vice for to retayne :
I cannot honour them that set theyr part
With Venus and Bacchus all their life long;
Nor hold my peace of them, although I smart.
I cannot crouche nor knele to fuch a wronge,

To

To worship them like God on Earth alone,
That are as wolves these sely lambes among ;
I cannot with my woordes complayne and mone,
And fuffer nought; nor finart without complaint,
Nor turne the word that from my mouth is gone.
I cannot speake and looke like a Saint,
Ufe wyles for wit, and make defceit a pleasure,
Call craft counfaile, for lucre still to paynt:
I cannot wrest the law to fyll the coffer,
With innocent blood to feed myself fatte,
And do most hurt where that most help I offer.
I am not he that can allow the state

Of hye Cæfar, and damne Cato to dye,
That with his death did scape out of the gate,
From Cæfer's hands, if Livy doth not lye;
And would not live were Liberty was loft,
So did his heart the Common Wealth apply.
I am not he, such eloquence to bost,

To make the crow in finging, as the swanne ;
Nor call the lyon of coward beasts the most,
That cannot take a mouse as the cat can,
And he that dyeth for honger of the golde,
Call him Alexander, and say that Pan
Paffeth Apollo in muficke many folde,
Praise Syr Topas for a noble tale,

And scorn the story that the knight tolde.

Praise him for counsell that is dronke of ale,

Grinne when he laughes, that beareth all the fway,
Frowne when he frownes, and grone when he is pale;

On others luft to hang both night and day,
None of these Poines would ever frame in me,

My wit is nought, I cannot learn the way.
And much the lefs of things that greater be,
That afken helpe of colours to devise,
To joyne the meane with eche extremitie,
With nereft vertue ay to cloke the vyce;
And as to purpose likewise it shall fall,
To preffe the vertue that it may not ryse;

As Dronkenness good fellowship to call,
The frendly foe with his faire double face,
Say he is gentle, and curties therewithall;
Affirme that Favill hath a goodly grace
In eloquente; and cruelty to name,
Zeale of Justice; and change in time and place :
And he that suffereth offence without blame,
Call him pitefull, and him true and playne,
That rayleth rechless unto eche man's shame,
Say he is rude, that cannot lye and fayne;
The lecher a lover, and tyranny
To be right of a Prince's raigne.

I cannot I, no no, it will not be.

This is the cause that I could never yet,

Hang on their fleeves the weigh (as thou maist fee)
A chippe of chaunce, more than a pound of wit :
This makes me at home to hunt and hawke,
And in foul weather at my book to fit,

In froft and fnow, then with my bowe stalke,
No man doth marke whereso I ryde or goe,
In lufty leas at libertie I walke;

And of these newes I fele no weale no woe,
Save that a clogge doth hang yett at my hele,
No force for that, for that is ordered fo,
That I may leape both hedge and dyke full wele.
I am not now in France to judge the wyne,
With favery fauce those delicates to feele,
Nor yet in Spayne, where one must him incline,
Rather then to be, outwardly to feme,
I meddle not with wittes that be so fyne,
Nor Flanders chere lettes to my fight to deme,
Of black and white, nor takes my wittes away,
With beastlinefs, fuch doe those beaftes efteme!
Nor I am not, where truth is geven in pay
For money, pryfon and treafon; of fome
A common practice used night and daye;

But

But I am here in Kent and Christendome,
Among the Mufes, where I reade and ryme,
Where if thou lift, mine own John Poynes to come,
Thou shalt be judge, how I do spende my tyme.

Sir Thomas Wyat,
Tottel's Edit.

The Pleafures of Literary Retirement.

MY free-borne Muse will not, like Danae, be

Wonnne with base droffe to clip with flavery ;
Nor lend her choifer balme to worthleffe men,
Whose names would die but for fome hired pen;
No: if I praise, Vertue fhall draw me to it,
And not a base procurement make me doe it.
What now I fing is but to passe away
A tedious houre, as fome mufitians play;
Or make an other my owne griefes bemone
Or to be least alone when most alone,
In this can I, as oft as 1 will chuse,
Hug sweet Content by my retyred muse,
And in a study finde as much to please
As others in the greatest Palaces.

Each man that lives (according to his powre)
On what he loves beftowes an idle howre;
Inftead of hounds that make the wooded hils
Talke in a hundred voyces to the rils,

I like the pleasing cadence of a line
Strucke by the concert of the facred Nine.
In lieu of Hawkes, the raptures of my foule
Transcend their pitch and bafer earths controule.
For running horfes, Contemplation flyes
With quickest fpeed to winne the greatest prize.
D 3

For