The Affectionate Shepherd | Page 8

harmles hart,?Malicious meaning hath in him no part.
He is not troubled with th' afflicted minde,?His cares are onely over silly sheepe;?He is not unto jealozie inclinde,?(Thrice happie man) he knowes not how to weepe;?Whilst I the treble in deepe sorrowes keepe.?I cannot keepe the meane; for why (alas)?Griefes have no meane, though I for meane doe passe.
No briefes nor semi-briefes are in my songs,?Because (alas) my griefe is seldome short;?My prick-song's alwayes full of largues and longs,?(Because I never can obtaine the port?Of my desires: hope is a happie fort).?Prick song (indeed) because it pricks my hart;?And song, because sometimes I ease my smart.
The mightie monarch of a royall realme,?Swaying his scepter with a princely pompe,?Of his desires cannot so steare the healme,?But sometime falls into a deadly dumpe;?When as he heares the shrilly sounding trumpe?Of forren enemies, or home-bred foes,?His minde of griefe, his hart is full of woes.
Or when bad subjects gainst their soveraigne?(Like hollow harts) unnaturally rebell,?How carefull is he to suppresse againe?Their desperate forces, and their powers to quell?With loyall harts, till all againe be well.?When (being subdu'd) his care is rather more,?To keepe them under, than it was before.
Thus is he never full of sweete content,?But either this or that his joy debars:?Now noblemen gainst noblemen are bent,?Now gentlemen and others fall at jarrs:?Thus is his countrey full of civill warrs;?He still in danger sits, still fearing death,?For traitors seeke to stop their princes breath.
The whylst the other hath no enemie,?Without it be the wolfe and cruell fates,?(Which no man spare): when as his disagree,?He with his sheephooke knaps them on the pates,?Schooling his tender lambs from wanton gates.?Beasts are more kinde than men, sheepe seeke not blood, But countrey caytives kill their countreyes good.
The courtier he fawns for his princes favour,?In hope to get a princely ritch reward;?His tongue is tipt with honey for to glaver,?Pride deales the deck, whilst chance doth choose the card; Then comes another and his game hath mard,?Sitting betwixt him and the morning sun;?Thus night is come before the day is done.
Some courtiers, carefull of their princes health,?Attend his person with all dilligence;?Whose hand's their hart, whose welfare is their wealth, Whose safe protection is their sure defence,?For pure affection, not for hope of pence:?Such is the faithfull hart, such is the minde,?Of him that is to vertue still inclinde.
The skilfull scholler, and brave man at armes,?First plies his booke, last fights for countries peace; Th' one feares oblivion, th' other fresh alarmes:?His paines nere ende, his travailes never cease;?His with the day, his with the night increase:?He studies how to get eternall fame,?The souldier fights to win a glorious name.
The knight, the squire, the gentleman, the clowne,?Are full of crosses and calamities,?Lest fickle fortune should begin to frowne,?And turne their mirth to extreame miseries,?Nothing more certaine than incertainties!?Fortune is full of fresh varietie,?Constant in nothing but inconstancie.
The wealthie merchant that doth crosse the seas,?To Denmarke, Poland, Spaine, and Barbarie,?For all his ritches, lives not still at ease;?Sometimes he feares ship-spoyling pyracie,?Another while deceipt and treacherie?Of his owne factors in a forren land;?Thus doth he still in dread and danger stand.
Well is he tearmd a merchant-venturer,?Since he doth venter lands, and goods and all;?When he doth travell for his traffique far,?Little he knowes what fortune may befall,?Or rather, what mis-fortune happen shall:?Sometimes he splits his ship against a rocke,?Loosing his men, his goods, his wealth, his stocke.
And if he so escape with life away,?He counts himselfe a man most fortunate,?Because the waves their rigorous rage did stay,?(When being within their cruell powers of late,?The seas did seeme to pittie his estate).?But yet he never can recover health,?Because his joy was drowned with his wealth.
The painfull plough-swaine, and the husband-man,?Rise up each morning by the breake of day,?Taking what toyle and drudging paines they can,?And all is for to get a little stay;?And yet they cannot put their care away:?When night is come, their cares begin afresh,?Thinking upon their morrowes busines.
Thus everie man is troubled with unrest,?From rich to poore, from high to low degree:?Therefore I thinke that man is truly blest,?That neither cares for wealth nor povertie,?But laughs at Fortune, and her foolerie,?That gives rich churles great store of golde and fee,?And lets poore schollers live in miserie.
O, fading branches of decaying bayes,?Who now will water your dry-wither'd armes??Or where is he that sung the lovely layes?Of simple shepheards in their countrey-farmes??Ah! he is dead, the cause of all our harmes:?And with him dide my joy and sweete delight;?The cleare to clowdes, the day is turnd to night.
SYDNEY, the syren of this latter age;?SYDNEY, the blasing-starre of England's glory;?SYDNEY, the wonder of the wise and sage;?SYDNEY, the subject of true vertues story:?This syren, starre, this wonder, and this subject,?Is dumbe, dim, gone, and mard by fortune's object.
And thou, my