We'll sport and be free with Moll, Betty, and Dolly,
Have oysters and lobsters to cure melancholy:
Fish-dinners will make a man spring like a flea,
Dame Venus, love's lady,
Was born of the sea;
With her and with Bacchus we'll tickle the sense,
For we shall be past it a hundred years hence.
Your most beautiful bride who with garlands is crown'd
And kills with each glance as she treads on the ground,
Whose lightness and brightness doth shine in such splendour
That none but the stars
Are thought fit to attend her,
Though now she be pleasant and sweet to the sense,
Will be damnable mouldy a hundred years hence.
Then why should we turmoil in cares and in fears,
Turn all our tranquill'ty to sighs and to tears?
Let's eat, drink, and play till the worms do corrupt us,
'Tis certain, Post mortem Nulla voluptas. For health, wealth and beauty, wit, learning and sense, Must all come to nothing a hundred years hence.
RICHARD CRASHAW
1613?-1649
336. Wishes to His Supposed Mistress
Whoe'er she be—
That not impossible She
That shall command my heart and me:
Where'er she lie,
Lock'd up from mortal eye
In shady leaves of destiny:
