Henry Vaughn (1621-1695)

 The Evening-Watch: A Dialogue

BODY 

Farewell! I go to sleep; but when 

The day-star springs, I’ll wake again. 

SOUL 

Go, sleep in peace; and when thou liest 

Unnumber’d in thy dust, when all this frame 

Is but one dram, and what thou now descriest 

In sev’ral parts shall want a name, 

Then may his peace be with thee, and each dust 

Writ in his book, who ne’er betray’d man’s trust! 

BODY 

Amen! but hark, ere we two stray 

How many hours dost think ’till day? 

SOUL 

Ah go; th’art weak, and sleepy. Heav’n 

Is a plain watch, and without figures winds 

All ages up; who drew this circle, even 

He fills it; days and hours are blinds. 

Yet this take with thee. The last gasp of time 

Is thy first breath, and man’s eternal prime.

John Donne (1572-1631)

Song: Go and catch a falling star

Go and catch a falling star,

    Get with child a mandrake root,

Tell me where all past years are,

    Or who cleft the devil's foot,

Teach me to hear mermaids singing,

Or to keep off envy's stinging,

            And find

            What wind

Serves to advance an honest mind.

If thou be'st born to strange sights,

    Things invisible to see,

Ride ten thousand days and nights,

    Till age snow white hairs on thee,

Thou, when thou return'st, wilt tell me,

All strange wonders that befell thee,

            And swear,

            No where

Lives a woman true, and fair.

If thou find'st one, let me know,

    Such a pilgrimage were sweet;

Yet do not, I would not go,

    Though at next door we might meet;

Though she were true, when you met her,

And last, till you write your letter,

            Yet she

            Will be

False, ere I come, to two, or three.

John Donne (1572-1631)

 

Meditation XVII

No man is an island entire of itself; every man 
is a piece of the continent, a part of the main; 
if a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe 
is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as 
well as any manner of thy friends or of thine 
own were; any man's death diminishes me, 
because I am involved in mankind. 
And therefore never send to know for whom 
the bell tolls; it tolls for thee. 

Henry Vaughn (1562-1695)

 

On Mr. G. Herbert's Book

Know you fair, on what you look; 

Divinest love lies in this book, 

Expecting fire from your eyes, 

To kindle this his sacrifice. 

When your hands untie these strings, 

Think you’have an angel by th’ wings. 

One that gladly will be nigh, 

To wait upon each morning sigh. 

To flutter in the balmy air 

Of your well-perfumed prayer. 

These white plumes of his he’ll lend you, 

Which every day to heaven will send you, 

To take acquaintance of the sphere, 

And all the smooth-fac’d kindred there. 

         And though Herbert’s name do owe 

         These devotions, fairest, know 

         That while I lay them on the shrine 

         Of your white hand, they are mine.

Andrew Marvell (1621-1678)

from The Garden

What wondrous life in this I lead! 

• Ripe apples drop about my head; 
  The luscious clusters of the vine 
  Upon my mouth do crush their wine; 
  The nectarine and curious peach 
  Into my hands themselves do reach; 
  Stumbling on melons, as I pass, 
  Ensnared with flowers, I fall on grass.

• Meanwhile the mind from pleasure less 
  Withdraws into its happiness; 
• 
  The mind, that ocean where each kind 
  Does straight its own resemblance find; 
  Yet it creates, transcending these, 
  Far other worlds, and other seas; 
  Annihilating all that's made 
  To a green thought in a green shade

• Casting the body's vest aside,
  My soul into the boughs does glide.

Andrew Marvell (1621-1678)

The Mower to the Glow-Worms

Ye living lamps, by whose dear light 

The nightingale does sit so late, 

And studying all the summer night, 

Her matchless songs does meditate; 

Ye country comets, that portend 

No war nor prince’s funeral, 

Shining unto no higher end 

Than to presage the grass’s fall; 

Ye glow-worms, whose officious flame 

To wand’ring mowers shows the way, 

That in the night have lost their aim, 

And after foolish fires do stray; 

Your courteous lights in vain you waste, 

Since Juliana here is come, 

For she my mind hath so displac’d 

That I shall never find my home.

Andrew Marvell (1621-1678)

 

To His Coy Mistress

Had we but world enough and time, 

This coyness, lady, were no crime. 

We would sit down, and think which way 

To walk, and pass our long love’s day. 

Thou by the Indian Ganges’ side 

Shouldst rubies find; I by the tide 

Of Humber would complain. I would 

Love you ten years before the flood, 

And you should, if you please, refuse 

Till the conversion of the Jews. 

My vegetable love should grow 

Vaster than empires and more slow; 

An hundred years should go to praise 

Thine eyes, and on thy forehead gaze; 

Two hundred to adore each breast, 

But thirty thousand to the rest; 

An age at least to every part, 

And the last age should show your heart. 

For, lady, you deserve this state, 

Nor would I love at lower rate. 

       But at my back I always hear 

Time’s wingèd chariot hurrying near; 

And yonder all before us lie 

Deserts of vast eternity. 

Thy beauty shall no more be found; 

Nor, in thy marble vault, shall sound 

My echoing song; then worms shall try 

That long-preserved virginity, 

And your quaint honour turn to dust, 

And into ashes all my lust; 

The grave’s a fine and private place, 

But none, I think, do there embrace. 

       Now therefore, while the youthful hue 

Sits on thy skin like morning dew, 

And while thy willing soul transpires 

At every pore with instant fires, 

Now let us sport us while we may, 

And now, like amorous birds of prey, 

Rather at once our time devour 

Than languish in his slow-chapped power. 

Let us roll all our strength and all 

Our sweetness up into one ball, 

And tear our pleasures with rough strife 

Through the iron gates of life: 

Thus, though we cannot make our sun 

Stand still, yet we will make him run.

Sir Thomas Wyatt (1503-1542)

They flee from me that sometime did me seek

With naked foot, stalking in my chamber.

I have seen them gentle, tame, and meek,

That now are wild and do not remember

That sometime they put themself in danger

To take bread at my hand; and now they range,

Busily seeking with a continual change.

Thanked be fortune it hath been otherwise

Twenty times better; but once in special,

In thin array after a pleasant guise,

When her loose gown from her shoulders did fall,

And she me caught in her arms long and small;

Therewithall sweetly did me kiss

And softly said, “Dear heart, how like you this?”

It was no dream: I lay broad waking.

But all is turned thorough my gentleness

Into a strange fashion of forsaking;

And I have leave to go of her goodness,

And she also, to use newfangleness.

But since that I so kindly am served

I would fain know what she hath deserved.