1 The fate of Egypt I sustain, And never feel the dew of rain From clouds which in the head appear; But all my too much moisture owe To overflowings of the heart below. COWLEY. The lover fuppofes his lady acquainted with the ancient laws of augury and rites of facrifice : And yet this death of mine, I fear, When found in every other part, Shall figh out that too, with my breath. That the chaos was harmonifed, has been recited of old; but whence the different founds arofe, remained for a modern to discover: Th' ungovern'd parts no correspondence knew, The tears of lovers are always of great poetical account; but Donne has extended them into worlds. If the lines are not easily understood, they may be read again. On a round ball A workman, that hath copies by, can lay An Europe, Afric, and an Asia, And quickly make that, which was nothing, all. *Cowley appears, by these lines, to have been but little skilled in mufic. Not to speak of the fentiment, had he resembled water alone to the tenor, and air to the contra-tenor, the analogy had been just. So doth each tear, Which thee doth wear, A globe, yea world, by that impreffion grow, Till thy tears mixt with mine do overflow This world, by waters fent from thee my heaven dif. folved fo. On reading the following lines, the reader may perhaps cry out-Confufion worse confounded. Here lies a fhe fun, and a he moon here Or each is both, and all, and fo DONNE. Who but Donne would have thought that a good man is a telescope? Though God be our true glass, through which we see Yet are the trunks, which do to us derive Things in proportion fit, by perspective Deeds of good men; for by their living here, Virtues, indeed remote, feem to be near. Who would imagine it poffible that in a very few lines fo many remote ideas could be brought together: Since 'tis my doom, Love's underfhrieve, The fober Julian were th' account of man, CLEIVELAND. OF enormous and disgusting hyberboles, these may be examples: By every wind, that comes this way, Send me at least a figh or two, Such and fo many I'll repay As fhall themfelves make winds to get to you. In tears I'll wafte thefe eyes, By Love fo vainly fed; COWLEY. So luft of old the Deluge punished. COWLEY. All arm'd in brafs the richeft drefs of war, An univerfal confternation: COWLEY, His bloody eyes he hurls round, his fharp paws Beasts creep into their dens. and tremble there; Echo itself dares fcarce repeat the found. COWLEY. THEIR fictions were often violent and unnatural. Of his Mistress bathing. The fish around her crouded, as they do To the falfe light that treacherous fishes fhew, As fhe at first took me : For ne'er did light fo clear Among Among the waves appear, Though every night the fun himself set there. COWLEY. The poetical effect of a Lover's name upon glass: My name engrav'd herein Doth contribute my firmness to this glass; Which, ever fince that charm, hath been As hard as that which grav'd it was. DONNE. Their conceits were fometimes flight and trifling. On an inconftant woman: He enjoys the calmy funshine now, In the clear heaven of thy brow, No finalleft cloud appears. He fees thee gentle, fair and gay, And trufts the faithlefs April of thy May. COWLEY. Upon a paper written with the juice of lemon, and read by the fire: Nothing yet in thee is feen, But when a genial heat warms thee within, Here sprouts a V, and there a T, COWLEY. As they fought only for novelty, they did not much enquire whether their allufions were to things high or low, elegant or grofs; whether they compared the little to the great, or the great to the little. Phyfick and Chirurgery for a Lover. Gently, ah gently, madam, touch The wound, which you yourself have made; VOL. II. That pain muft needs be very much, For I too weak of purgings grow. The World and a Clock. COWLEY. Mahol, th' inferior world's fantastic face, COWLEY. A coal-pit has not often found its poet; but that it may not want its due honour, Cleiveland has paralleled it with the Sun: The moderate value of our guiltless ore Makes no man atheist, and no woman whore ; Had he our pits, the Perfian would admire The fun's heaven's coalery, and coals our fun, Death, a Voyage : No family Ere rigg'd a foul for heaven's discovery, |