kindling holy fires Circled round about with spies Never dreaming loose desires Doting at the Altar dies Ilion in a short Tower higher He can once more build and once more fire The third Song HOnour that is ever living Honour that is ever giving Honour that sees all and knows Both the ebbs of man and flowes Honour that rewards the best Sends thee thy rich labours rest Thou hast studied still to please her Therefore now she cals thee Caesar Chorus haile haile Caesar haile and stand And thy name out-live the Land Noble Fathers to his brows Bind this wreath with thousand vows The fourth Song GOd Lizus ever young Ever renown'd ever sung Stain'd with blood of lusty Grapes In a thousand lusty shapes Dance upon the Mazers brim In the Crimson Liquor swim From thy plentious hand divine Let a River run with Wine God of youth let this day here Enter neither care nor feare The Prologue to the Play called Loves Pilgrimage TO this place Gentlemen full many a day We have bid ye welcome and to many a Play And those whose angry soules were not displeas'd With law or lending money we have pleas'd And make no doubt to do againe this night No mighty matter nor no light We must intreat you looke for A good tale Told in two houres we will not faile If we be perfect to rehearse ye New I am sure it is and hansome but how true Let them dispute that writ it Ten to one We please the women and I would know that man Follows not their example If ye meane To know the Play well travell with the Scene For it lies upon the road if we chance tire As ye are good men leave us not i' th' mire Another bait may mend us If you grow A little gald or wearie cry but hoa And wee 'l stay for ye when our journey ends Every man's Pot I hope and all part friends The Honest Man's Fortune YOu that can look through heaven and tell the Stars Observe their kind Conjunctions and their wars Find out new lights and give them where you please To these men honours pleasures to those ease You that are Gods surveyers and can show How far and when and why the Wind doth blow Know all the charges of the dreadfull Thunder And when it will shoot over or fall under Tell me by all your Art I conjure ye Yes and by truth what shall become of me Find out my star if each one as you say Have his peculiar Angell and his way Observe my Fate next fall into your dreames Sweep cleane your houses and new line your sceames Then say your worst or have I none at all Or is it burnt out lately or did fall Or am I poore not able no full flame My Star like me unworthy of a name Is it your Art can only worke on those That deale with dangers dignities and cloaths With love or new opinions you all lye A Fish-wife hath a Fate and so have I But far above your finding he that gives Out of his providence to all that lives And no man knows his treasure no not you He that made Egypt blind from whence you grew Scabby and Lousie that the world might see Your Calculations are as blind as ye He that made all the stars you daily read And from thence filtch a knowledge how to feed Hath hid this from you your conjectures all Are drunken things not how but when they fall Man is his own star and the soule that can Render an honest and a perfect man Command all light all influence all fate Nothing to him fals early or too late Our Acts our Angels are or good or ill Our fatall shadows that walke by us still And when the stars are labouring we believe It is not that they governe but they grieve For stubborne ignorance all things that are Made for our generall uses are at war Even we among our selves and from the strife Your first unlike opinions got a life O man thou Image of thy Makers good What canst thou feare when breath'd into thy blood His Spirit is that built thee what dull sence Makes thee suspect in need that providence Who made the Morning and who plac'd the light Guide to thy labours who call'd up the night And bid her fall upon thee like sweet show'rs In hollow murmurs to lock up thy powers Who gave thee knowledge who so trusted thee To let thee grow so neare himselfe the tree Must he then be distrusted shall his frame Discourse with him why thus and thus I am He made the Angels thine thy fellows all Nay even thy servants when Devotions call O canst thou be so stupid then so dim To seeke a saving influence and lose him Can stars protect thee or can poverty Which is the light to heaven put out his eye He is my star in him all truth I find All influence all fate and when my mind Is furnished with his fulnesse my poore story Should out-live all their Age and all their glory The hand or Danger cannot fall amisse When I know what and in whose power it is Nor want the cause of man shall make me groane A holy Hermit is a mind alone Doth not experience teach us all we can To worke our selves into a glorious man Love 's but an Exhalation to best eyes The matter spent and then the fooles fire dies Were I in love and could that bright star bring Increase to wealth honour and ev'ry thing Were she as perfect good as we can aime The first was so and yet she lost the game My Mistris then be knowledge and faire truth So I enjoy all beauty and all youth And though to Time her lights and Laws she lends She knows no Age that to corruption bends Friends promises may lead me to believe But he that is his own friend knows to live Affliction when I know it is but this A deep allay vvhereby man tougher is To beare the hammer and the deeper still We still arise more Image of his vvill Sicknesse an hum'rous cloud ' tvvixt us and light And death at longest but another night Man is his ovvn star and that soule that can Be honest is the only perfect man Mr Francis Beaumont's Letter to Ben Iohnson written before he and Mr Fletcher came to London with two of the precedent Comedies then not finished which deferred their merry meetings at the Mermaid THe Sun which doth the greatest comfort bring To absent friends because the selfe-same thing They know they see however absent is Here our best hay-maker forgive me this It is our Countries stile in this warme shine I lie and dreame of your full Mermaid wine O we have water mixt with Claret Lees Drinke apt to bring in drier heresies Than here good only for the Sonnets straine With Fustian Metaphors to stuffe the braine So mixt that given to the thirstiest one 'T will not prove Almes unlesse he have the stone Thinke with one draught mans
my senses to enspire Far livelier than the stoln Promethean fire Then might I live then by the sunny light That should proceed from thy chiefe radiant sight I might survive to ages but that missing At that same word he would have fain been kissing I pine fair Nymph O never let me dye For one poore glance from thy translucent eye Far more transparent than the clearest brooke The Nymph was taken with his golden hook Yet she turn'd back and would have tript away But Bacchus forc'd the lovely maid to stay Asking her why she strugled to be gone Why such a Nymph should wish to live alone Heaven never made her faire that she should vaunt She kept all beauty yet would never grant She should be borne so beatious from her mother But to reflect her beauty on another Then with a sweet kisse cast thy beames on me And I 'le reflect them back againe on thee At Naxos stands my Temple and my shrine Where I do presse the lusty swelling Vine There with green Ivy shall thy head be bound And with the red grape be incircled round There shall Silenus sing unto thy praise His drunken reeling songs and tipling laies Come hither gentle Nymph here blusht the maid And faine she would have gone but yet she staid Bacchus perceiv'd he had o'recome the Lasse And down he throws her in the dewy grasse And kist the helplesse Nymph upon the ground And would have strai'd beyond that lawfull bound This saw bright Phoebus for his glittering eye Sees all that lies below the starry sky And for an old affection that he bore Unto this lovely Nymph long time before For he would oft times in his circle stand And sport himselfe upon her snowy hand He kept her from the sweets of Bacchus bed And ' gainst her will he sav'd her maiden-head Bacchus perceiving this apace did hie Unto the Pallace of swift Mercury But he did find him far below his birth Drinking with theeves and Catchpoles on the earth And they were parting what they stole to day In consultation for to morrows prey To him went youthfull Bacchus and begun To shew his cause of griefe against the Sun How he bereft him of his heavenly blisses His sweet delight his Nectar-flowing kisses And other sweeter sweets that he had won But for the malice of the bright fac'd Sun Intreating Mercury by all the love That had him born amongst the sons of Jove Of which they two were part to stand his friend Against the God that did him so offend The quaint tongu'd issue of great Atlas race Swift Mercurie that with delightfull grace And pleasing accents of his feigned tongue Hath oft reform'd a rude uncivill throng Of Mortals that great messenger of Iove And all the meaner gods that dwell above He whose acute wit was so quick and sharp In the invention of the crooked Harp He that 's so cunning with his jesting slights To steale from heavenly gods or earthly wights Bearing a great hate in his grieved breast Against that great Commander of the West Bright fac'd Apollo for upon a day Young Mercury did steale his beasts away Which the great God perceiving streight did show The piercing arrows and the fearefull bow That kill'd great Pithon and with that did threat him To bring his beasts againe or he would beat him Which Mercury perceiving unespi'd Did closely steale his arrows from his side For this old grudge he was the easier won To help young Bacchus ' gainst the fiery Sun And now the Sun was in the middle way And had o'recome the one halfe of the day Scorching so hot upon the reeking sand That lies upon the meere Aegyptian land That the hot people burnt even from their birth Do creep againe into their Mother earth When Mercury did take his powerfull wand His charming Caduceus in his hand And the thick beaver which he us'd to weare When ought from Jove he to the Sun did beare That did protect him from the piercing light Which did proceed from Phoebus glittering sight Clad in these powerfull ornaments he flies With out-stretcht wings up to the Azur skies Where seeing Phoebus in his orient shrine He did so well revenge the god of wine That whil'st the Sun wanders his Charriot reeles The crafty god had stoln away his wheeles Which when he did perceive he down did slide Laying his glittering Coronet aside From the bright spangled firmament above To seek the Nymph that Bacchus so did love And found her looking in her watry glass To see how cleare her radiant beauty was And for he had but little time to stay Because he meant to finish out his day At the first sight he 'gan to make his moane Telling her how his fiery wheels were gone Promising her if she would but obtaine The wheeles that Mercury had stoln againe That he might end his day she should enjoy The heavenly sight of the most beautious boy That ever was The Nymph was pleas'd with this Hoping to reape some unaccustom'd blisse By the sweet pleasure that she should enjoy In the blest sight of such a melting boy Therefore at his request she did obtaine The burning wheels that he had lost againe Which when he had receiv'd he left the land And brought them thither where his coach did stand And there he set them on for all this space The horses had not stirr'd from out their place Which when he saw he wept and 'gan to say Would Mercury had stoln my wheels away When Phaeton my haire-brain'd issue try'd What a laborious thing it was to guide My burning Chariot then he might have pleas'd me And of a Fathers griefe he might have eas'd me For then the steeds would have obey'd his will Or else at least they would have rested still When he had done he took his whip of steele Whose bitter smart he made his horses feele For he did lash so hard to end the day That he was quickly at the westerne sea And there with Thetis did he rest a space For he did never rest in any place Before that time but ever since his wheels Were stoln away his burning Charriot reeles Towards the declining of the parting day Therefore he lights and mends them in the sea And though the Poets faine that Jove did make A treble night for faire Alcmena's sake That he might sleep securely with his love Yet sure the long night was unknown to Iove But the Suns wheels one day disordered more Were thrice as long a mending as before Now was the Sun inviron'd with the sea Cooling his watry tresses as he lay And in dread Neptunes kingdome while he sleeps Faire Thetis clips him in the watry deeps There Mair-maids and the Tritons of the west Straining their voices to make Titan rest The while the black night with her pithy hand Took just possession of the swarthy land He spent the darksome houres in this delight Giving his power up to the gladsome night For ne'r before he
little or so long Yet still the morning will attend her song All creatures that beneath bright Cinthia be Have appetite unto society The overflowing waves would have a bound Within the confines of the spacious ground And all their shady currents would be plac'd In hollow of the sollitary vaste But that they loath to let their soft streams sing Where none can heare their gentle murmuring Yet still the boy regardlesse what she said Strugled apace to overswim the maid Which when the Nymph perceiv'd she 'gan to say Struggle thou maiest but never get away So grant just gods that never day may see The separation 'twixt this boy and me The gods did heare her prayer and feele her woe And in one body they began to grow She felt his youthfull bloud in every veine And he felt hers warm his cold breast againe And ever since was womans love so blest That it will draw bloud from the strongest breast Nor man nor maid now could they be esteem'd Neither and either might they well be deem'd When the young boy Hermaphroditus said With the set voice of neither man nor maid Swift Mercury thou Author of my life And thou my mother Vulcans lovely wife Let your poore off-springs latest breath be blest In but obtaining this his last request Grant that whoe're heated by Phoebus beams Shall come to coole him in these silver streams May never more a manly shape retaine But halfe a virgin may returne againe His parents harkned to his last request And with that great power they the fountaine blest And since that time who in that fountaine swims A maiden smoothnes seizeth halfe his limbs THE REMEDIE OF LOVE WHen Cupid read this Title straight he said Wars I perceive against me will be made But spare oh Love to tax thy Poet so Who oft hath born thy Ensign ' gainst thy so I am not he by whom thy Mother bled When she to heaven on Mars his horses fled I oft like other Youths thy flame did prove And if thou aske what I do still I Love Nay I have taught by Art to keep loves course And made that reason which before was force I seek not to betray thee pretty boy Nor what I once have written to destroy If any love and find his Mistris kind Let him go on and saile with his own wind But he that by his Love is discontented To save his life my Verses were invented Why should a Lover kill himselfe or why Should any with his own griefe wounded die Thou art a boy to play becomes thee still Thy reign is soft play then and do not kill Or if thou 'lt needs be vexing then do this Make Lovers meet by stealth and steale a kisse Make them to feare least any over-watch them And tremble when they thinke some come to catch them And with those teares that Lovers shed all night Be thou content but do not kill out-right Love heard and up his silver wings did heave And said Write on I freely give thee leave Come then all ye despis'd that Love endure I that have felt the wounds your Love will cure But come at first for if you make delay Your sicknesse will grow mortall by your stay The Tree which by delay is grown so big In the beginning was a tender twig That which at first was but a span in length Will by delay be rooted past mans strength Resist beginnings med'cines bring no curing Where sicknesse is grown strong by long enduring When first thou seest a Lasse that likes thine eye Bend all thy present powers to descry Whether her eye or carriage first would shew If she be fit for Loves delights or no Some will be easie such an one elect But she that beares too grave and sterne aspect Take heed of her and make her not thy Jewell Either she cannot Love or will be cruell If love assaile thee there betime take heed Those wounds are dangerous that inward bleed He that to day cannot shake off Loves sorrow Will certainly be more unapt to morrow Love hath so eloquent and quick a tongue That he will lead thee all thy life along And on a sudden claspe thee in a yoke Where thou must either draw or striving choak Strive then betimes for at the first one hand May stop a water drill that weares the sand But if delayed it breakes into a floud Mountaines will hardly make the passage good But I am out for now I do begin To keep them off not heale those that are in First therefore Lovers I intend to shew How love came to you then how he may go You that would not know what Loves passions be Never be idle learne that rule of me Ease makes you love as that o'recomes your wils Ease is the food and cause of all your ills Turne ease and idlenesse but out of doore Loves darts are broke his flame can burne no more As reeds and Willows loves the Waters side So Love loves with the idle to abide If then at liberty you faine would be Love yeelds to labour Labour and be free Long sleeps soft beds rich vintage and high feeding Nothing to do and pleasure of exceeding Dulls all our senses makes our vertue stupid And then creeps in that crafty villaine Cupid That boy loves ease alife hates such as stir Therefore thy mind to better things prefer Behold thy Countries enemies in Armes At home love gripes thy heart in his slie charmes Then rise and put on armour cast off sloath Thy labour may at once o'recome them both If this seem hard and too unpleasant then Behold the Law set forth by God and men Sit down and study that that thou maiest know The way to guide thy selfe and others show Or if thou lov'st not to be shut up so Learne to assaile the Deere with trusty bow That through the Woods thy well-mouth'd hounds may ring Whose Eccho better joyes than Love will sing There maiest thou chance to bring thy love to end Diana unto Venus is no friend The Country will afford thee meanes enough Sometimes disdaine not to direct the Plough To follow through the fields the bleating Lambe That mournes to misse the comfort of his Dam. Assist the harvest help to prune the Trees Graft plant and sow no kind of labour leese Set nets for birds with hook'd lines bait for fish Which will imploy thy mind and fill thy dish That being weary with these paines at night Sound sleeps may put the thoughts of Love to flight With such delights or labours as are these Forget to love and learne thy selfe to please But chiefly learne this lesson for my sake Fly from her far some journey undertake I know thou 'lt grieve and that her name once told Will be enough thy journey to with-hold But when thou find'st thy selfe most bent to stay Compell thy feet to run with thee away Nor do thou wish that raine or stormy weather May stay your steps and bring you back together
A thing not fit for gravity For theirs are foule and hardly three Pas Ha ha ha Bas Ho ho ho. Pas Democritus thou ancient Fleerer Now I misse thy laugh and ha since Bas There you nam'd the famous Jeerer That ever jeer'd in Rome or Athens Pas Ha ha ha Bas Ho ho ho. Pas How brave lives he that keeps a foole Although the rate be deeper Pas But he that is his own foole sir Does live a great deale cheaper Pas Sure I shall burst burst quite breake thou art so witty Bas 'T is rare to breake at Court for that belongs to th' Citty Pas Ha ha my spleene is almost worn to the last laughter Bas O keepe a corner for a friend a jest may come hereafter The Prologue to the Tamer Tamed LAdies to you in whose defence and right Fletchers brave Muse prepar'd her selfe to fight A battle without bloud 't was well fought too The Victorie's yours though got with much adoe We do present this Comedy in which A rivulet of pure wit flows strong and rich In Fancy Language and all parts that may Adde Grace and Ornament to a merry Play Which this may prove Yet not to go too far In promises from this our Female war We do intreat the angry men would not Expect the Mazes of a subtle plot Set speeches high expressions and what 's worse In a true Comedy Politique discourse The end we aime at is to make you sport Yet neither gaule the City nor the Court Heare and observe his Comique straine and when Y' are sick of Melancholly see 't agen 'T is no deare Physick since 't will quit the cost Or his Intentions with our paines are lost The Epilogue THe Tamers tam'd but so as nor the men Can find one just cause to complaine of when They fitly do consider in their lives They should not raigne as Tyrants or'e their wives Nor can the woman from this president Insult or triumph it being aptly meant To teach both Sexes due equality And as they stand bound to love mutually If this effect arising from a cause Well laid and grounded may deserve applause We something more then hope our honest ends Will keep the men and women too our friends The Prologue to the Martiall Maid STatues and Pictures challenge praise and Fame If they can justly boast and prove they came From Phydeas or Apelles None deny Poets and Picture Painters hold a Sympathy Yet their workes may decay and lose their grace Receiving blemish in their Limbs or Face When the Minds Art hath this Preheminence She still retaineth her first Excellence Then why should not this deare peece be esteem'd Child to the richest Fancies that e're teem'd When not their meanest Off-spring that came forth But bore the image of their Fathers worth Beaumonts and Fletchers whose desert out-weighs The best Applause and their least sprig of Bayes Is worthy Phoebus and who comes to gather Their fruits of Wit he shall not rob the Treasure Nor can you ever surfeit of the plenty Nor can you call them rare though they be dainty The more you take the more you do them right And we will thanke you for your own delight The Epilogue OUr Author feares there are some Rebels hearts Whose dulnesse doth oppose Loves piercing Darts Such will be apt to say there wanted wit The Language low very few Scenes are writ With spirit and life such odd things as these He cares not for nor never meanes to please For if your selves a Mistris or loves friends Are lik'd with this smooth Play he hath his ends A Song to the Play called Wit at severall Weapons FAine would I wake you Sweet but feare I should invite you to worse cheare In your dreames you cannot fare Meaner than Musick no compare None of your slumbers are compil'd Under the pleasure makes a Child Your day-delights so well compact That what you thinke turnes all to Act I 'de wish my life no better play Your dreame by night your thought by day Wake gently wake Part softly from your dreames The morning flies To your faire eyes To take her speciall beames The Prologue to the Faire Maid of the Inne PLaies have their fates not as in their true sence They 're understood but as the influence Of idle custome madly works upon The drosse of many tongu'd opinion A worthy story howsoever writ For language modest mirth conceit oâ— wit Mercies oft times with the sweet Commendation Of hang 't 't is scurvey when for approbation A Jigge shall be clapt at and every Rhime Prais'd and applauded by a clam'rous chyme Let ignorance and laughter dwell together They are beneath the Muses petty Hether Came Nobler Judgements and to those the straine Of our invention is not bent in vaine The faire maid of the Inne to you commends Her hopes and welcomes and withall intends In the entertaines to which she doth invite ye All things to please and some things to delight ye The Epilogue VVE would faine please ye and as faine be pleas'd 'T is but a little liking both are eas'd We have your money and you have our ware And to our understanding good and faire For your own wisdomes sake be not so mad To acknowledge ye have bought things deare and bad Let not a brack i' th stuffe or here and there The fading glosse a generall losse appeare We know ye take up worse Commodities And dearer pay yet thinke your bargains wise We know in meat and wine ye fling away More time and wealth which is but dearer pay And with the Reckoning all the pleasure lost We bid you not unto repenting cost The price is easie and so light the Play That ye may new digest it ev'ry day Then Noble friends as ye would choose a Mistris Only to please the Eye a while and kisse Till a good wife be got So let this Play Hold ye a while untill a better may First Song to the Tragedy of Valentinian NOw the lusty spring is seene Golden yellow gaudy blew Daintily invite the view Every where on every Greene Roses blushing as they blow And inticing men to pull Lillies whiter than the snow Woodbines of sweet honey full All Loves Emblems and all cry Ladies if not pluck'd we dye Yet the lusty Spring hath stayd Blushing red and purest white Daintily to love invite Every woman every maid Cherries kissing as they grow And inviting men to taste Apples even ripe below Winding gently to the waste All loves Emblems and all cry Ladies if not pluckt we dye The second Song HEare ye Ladies that despise What the mighty love hath done Feare Examples and be wise Feare Calisto was a Nun. Leda sailing on the streame To deceive the hopes of man Love accounting but a dreame Doted on a silver Swan Danae in a brazen Tower Where no love was loov'd a Flower Heare ye Ladies that are coy What the mighty love can do Feare the fiercenesse of the Boy The chaste Moone he makes to wooe Vesta