After the feast, my Shapcot, see The fairy court I give to thee; Where we'll present our Oberon, led Half-tipsy to the fairy bed, Where Mab he finds, who there doth lie, Not without mickle majesty....
I do not love, nor can it be Love will in vain spend shafts on me; I did this godhead once defy, Since which I freeze, but cannot fry. Yet out, alas! the death's the same, Kill'd by a frost or by a flame.
How Love came in, I do not know, Whether by th'eye, or ear, or no; Or whether with the soul it came, At first, infused with the same; Whether in part 'tis here or there,...
Goes the world now, it will with thee go hard: The fattest hogs we grease the more with lard. To him that has, there shall be added more; Who is penurious, he shall still be poor.
Permit mine eyes to see Part, or the whole of Thee, O happy place! Where all have grace, And garlands shar'd, For their reward; Where each chaste soul In long white stole,...
I'll write no more of love, but now repent Of all those times that I in it have spent. I'll write no more of life, but wish 'twas ended, And that my dust was to the earth commended.
Young I was, but now am old, But I am not yet grown cold; I can play, and I can twine 'Bout a virgin like a vine: In her lap too I can lie Melting, and in fancy die; And return to life if she...
Live by thy Muse thou shalt, when others die, Leaving no fame to long posterity; When monarchies trans-shifted are, and gone, Here shall endure thy vast dominion.
The bound, almost, now of my book I see, But yet no end of these therein, or me: Here we begin new life, while thousands quite Are lost, and theirs, in everlasting night.