TITYRUS.

Were they not both yeaned by the self-same ewe?
How could they merit then so different hue?
Poor lamb, alas! and could'st thou, yet unborn,
Sin to deserve the guilt of such a scorn!
Thou had'st not yet fouled a religious spring,
Nor fed on plots of hallowed grass, to bring
Stains to thy fleece; nor browsed upon a tree
Sacred to Pan or Pales' deity.

The gods are ignorant if they not foreknow,
And, knowing, 'tis unjust to use thee so.

ALEXIS.

Tityrus, with me contend, or Corydon;
But let the gods and their high wills alone:
For in our flocks that freedom challenge we;
This kid is sacrificed, and that goes free.

TITYRUS.

Feed where you will, my lambs; what boots it us To watch and water, fold, and drive you thus: This on the barren mountains flesh can glean, That fed in flowery pastures will be lean.

ALEXIS.

Plough, sow, and compass, nothing boots at all,
Unless the dew upon the tilths do fall.

So labour, silly shepherds, what we can:
All's vain, unless a blessing drop from Pan.

TITYRUS.

Ill thrive thy ewes, if thou these lies maintain.

ALEXIS.

And may thy goats miscarry, saucy swain.

THYRSIS.

Fie, shepherds, fie! while you these strifes begin, Here creeps the wolf, and there the fox gets in;

To your vain piping on so deep a reed
The lambkins listen, but forget to feed.

It gentle swains befits of love to sing,

How Love left heaven, and heaven's immortal King,
His co-eternal Father: oh! admire,

Love is a son as ancient as his sire;

His mother was a virgin: how could come

A birth so great, and from so chaste a womb?

His cradle was a manger: shepherds, see,

True faith delights in poor simplicity.

He pressed no grapes, nor pruned the fruitful vine,
But could of water make a brisker wine;

Nor did He plough the earth, and to his barn
The harvest bring; nor thresh and grind the corn.
Without all these Love could supply our need,
And with five loaves five thousand hungry feed.
More wonders did He; for all which suppose
How He was crowned with lily or with rose,
The winding ivy, or the glorious bay,

Or myrtle, with the which Venus, they say,

Girts her proud temples! Shepherds, none of them;
But wore, poor head! a thorny diadem.

Feet to the lame He gave; with which they ran

To work their surgeon's last destruction:

The blind from Him had eyes; but used that light
Like basilisks, to kill Him with their sight.

Lastly, he was betrayed (oh! sing of this)-
How Love could be betrayed! 'twas with a kiss.
And then, his innocent hands and guiltless feet
Were nailed unto the cross, striving to meet

In his spread arms his spouse: so mild in show,

He seemed to court the embraces of his foe.

Through his pierced side, through which a spear was sent,

A torrent of all-flowing balsam went.

Run, Amaryllis, run: one drop from thence

Cures thy sad soul, and drives all anguish hence.

Go, sun-burnt Thessylis, go and repair

Thy beauty lost, and be again made fair.

Love-sick Amyntas, get a philtrum here,
To make thee lovely to thy truly dear;
But, coy Licoris, take the pearl from thine,
And take the blood-shot from Alexis' eyne.
Wear this an amulet 'gainst all syrens' smiles,
The stings of snakes, and tears of crocodiles.
Now Love is dead;-Oh! no, He never dies;
Three days He sleeps, and then again doth rise,
(Like fair Aurora from the eastern bay)
And with his beams drives all our clouds away.
This pipe unto our flocks; this sonnet get,
But, lo! I see the sun ready to set:

Good night to all: for the great night is come:

Flocks, to your folds; and shepherds, hie you home;
To-morrow morning, when we all have slept,
Pan's cornet's flown, and the great sheepshear's kept.

THOMAS HEYWOOD.

THOMAS HEYWOOD wrote about the year 1635. He was the author of The Hierarchies of the Blessed Angels; a work rude in metre, yet abounding with powerful and even sublime passages.

SEARCH AFTER GOD.

1 SOUGHT Thee round about, O Thou, my God!

In thine abode.

I said unto the Earth, "Speak, art thou He?"

She answered me,

"I am not."-I inquired of creatures all

In general

Contained therein;-they with one voice proclaim

That none amongst them challenged such a name,

I asked the seas, and all the deeps below,
My God to know:

I asked the reptiles, and whatever is
In the abyss-

Even from the shrimp to the leviathan,

Inquiry ran;

But in those deserts, which no line can sound,
The God I sought for was not to be found.

I asked the air if that were He? but
It told me "No."

I, from the towering eagle to the wren,
Demanded then

If any feathered fowl 'mongst them were such?
But they all, much

Offended with my question, in full quire

Answered-"To find thy, God thou must look higher."

I asked the heavens, sun, moon, and stars, but they Said, "We obey

The God thou seek'st."-I asked, what eye or ear

Could see or hear;

What in the world I might descry or know,

Above, below:

With an unanimous voice all these things said,
"We are not God, but we by Him were made."

I asked the world's great universal mass,
If that God was;

Which, with a mighty and strong voice, replied,
As stupefied,

"I am not He, O man! for know that I

By Him on high,

Was fashioned first of nothing, thus instated

And swayed by Him, by whom I was created."

I sought the court; but smooth-tongued flattery there

Deceived each ear;

In the thronged city there was selling, buying

Swearing and lying;

I' the country, craft in simpleness arrayed:

And then I said,

"Vain is my search, although my pains be great, Where my God is, there can be no deceit."

A scrutiny within myself I then,

Even thus began:

"O man, what art thou?"-What more could I say Than, Dust and clay?

Frail, mortal, fading, a mere puff, a blast,

That cannot last;

Enthroned to-day, to-morrow in an urn;
Formed from that earth to which I must return.

I asked myself what this great God might be
That fashioned me?

I answered-The all-potent, solely immense,
Surpassing sense;

Unspeakable, inscrutable, eternal

Lord over all.

The only terrible, strong, just, and true,
Who hath no end, and no beginning knew.

He is the well of life, for He doth give

To all that live

Both breath and being; He is the Creator

Both of the water,

Earth, air, and fire. Of all things that subsist

He hath the list;

Of all the heavenly host, or what earth claims,
He keeps the scroll, and calls them by their names.

And now, my God, by thine illuming grace,

Thy glorious face,

(So far forth as it may discovered be,)

Methinks I see;

And, though invisible and infinite,

To human sight,

Thou in thy mercy, justice, truth, appearest ;

In which to our weak senses Thou comest nearest.