ページの画像
PDF
ePub

A thousand pleasures do me bless,
And crown my soul with happiness.
All my joys besides are folly,
None so sweet as melancholy.
When I lie, sit, or walk alone,
I sigh, I grieve, making great moan,
In a dark grove, or irksome den,
With discontents and furies, then
A thousand miseries at once
Mine heavy heart and soul ensconce.
All my griefs to this are jolly,
None so sour as melancholy.
Methinks I hear, methinks I see,
Sweet music, wondrous melody,
Towns, palaces, and cities fine,

Here now, then there, the world is mine;
Rare beauties, gallant ladies shine,
Whate'er is lovely or divine.

All other joys to this are folly,
None so sweet as melancholy.

Methinks I hear, methinks I see
Ghosts, goblins, fiends, my fantasy
Presents a thousand ugly shapes,
Headless bears, black men, and apes:
Doleful outcries and fearful sights
My sad and dismal soul affrights.
All my griefs to this are jolly,
None so damn'd as melancholy.

Methinks I court, methinks I kiss,
Methinks I now embrace my miss:
O blessed days, O sweet content!
In Paradise my time is spent!

Such thoughts may still my fancy move,
So may I ever be in love!

All my joys to this are folly,
Nought so sweet as melancholy.

When I recount love's many frights,
My sighs and tears, my waking nights,
My jealous fits; O, mine hard fate
I now repent, but 'tis too late.
No torment is so bad as love,
So bitter to my soul can prove.
All my griefs to this are jolly,
Nought so harsh as melancholy.

Friends and companions, get you gone! "Tis my desire to be alone;

Ne'er well but when my thoughts and I Do domineer in privacy.

No gem, no treasure like to this,

'Tis my delight, my crown, my bliss.
All my joys to this are jolly,
Nought so sweet as melancholy.

'Tis my sole plague to be alone;
I am a beast, a monster grown;
I will no light, nor company,
I find it now my misery.

The scene is turn'd, my joys are gone,
Fear, discontent, and sorrows come.
All my griefs to this are jolly,
Nought so fierce as melancholy.

I'll not change life with any king;
I ravish'd am! can the world bring
More joy than still to laugh and smile,
In pleasant toys time to beguile ?

Do not, O, do not trouble me,
So sweet content I feel and see.
All my joys to this are folly,
None so divine as melancholy.

I'll change my state with any wretch
Thou canst from gaol or dunghill fetch :
My pain past cure; another hell;
I may not in this torment dwell;
Now, desperate, I hate my life;
Lend me a halter or a knife.

All my griefs to this are jolly,
Nought so damn'd as melancholy.

BURTON.

INVOCATION TO SLEEP.

SOFT power of slumbers, dewy-feather'd Sleep,
Kind nurse of Nature! whither art thou fled,
A stranger to my senses, wearied out

With pain, and aching for thy presence? Come,
O, come! embrace me in thy liquid arms;
Exert thy drowsy virtue, wrap my limbs
In downy indolence, and bathe in balm,
Fast flowing from the' abundance of thy horn,
With nourishment replete, and richer stored
Than Amalthea's; who (as poets feign)
With honey and with milk supplied a god,
And fed the thunderer. Indulgent quit
Thy couch of poppies! steal thyself on me
(In rory mists suffused and clouds of gold),
On me, thou mildest cordial of the world!

The shield his pillow, in the tented field,
By thee, the soldier, bred in iron war,

Forgets the mimic thunders of the day,
Nor envies Luxury her bed of down.
Rock'd by the blast, and cabin'd in the storm,
The sailor hugs thee to the doddering mast,
Of shipwreck negligent, while thou art kind.
The captive's freedom, thou! the labourer's hire;
The beggar's store; the miser's better gold;
The health of Sickness; and the youth of Age!
At thy approach the wrinkled front of Care
Subsides into the smooth expanse of smiles.
And, stranger far! the monarch, crown'd by thee,
Beneath his weight of glory gains repose.

What guilt is mine, that I alone am wake,
E'en though my eyes are seal'd, am wake alone?
Ah! seal'd, but not by thee! the world is dumb;
Exhaled by air, an awful silence rules,
Still as thy brother's reign, or foot of time;
E'en nightingales are mute, and lovers rest,
Steep'd in thy influence, and cease to sigh,
Or only sigh in slumbers. Fifteen nights
The moon has walk'd in glory o'er the sky;
As oft the Sun has shone her from the sphere,
Since, gentle Sleep, I felt thy cordial dews.
Then listen to my moaning; nor delay
To soothe me with thy softness; to o'ershade
Thy suppliant with thy pinions: or at least
Lightly to touch my temples with thy wand.

So, full and frequent, may the crimson fields With poppies blush, nor feel a Tarquin's hand. So may the west winds sigh, the murmuring brook, The melody of birds, Ianthe's lute,

And music of the spheres, be all the sounds
That dare intrude on thy devoted hour.
Nor Boreas bluster, nor the thunder roar,
Nor screechowl flap his wing, nor spirit yell,

[graphic]
[ocr errors]
« 前へ次へ »