196
PRELIMINARY OBSERVATIONS.
I daily learned, but could not pleased be,
I saw such things as pity was to see.———
To lead that kind of life, I wearied fast;
In better hope I left it at the last;
And to the court I shortly me addrest,
Believing well to chuse it for the best;
But from the rocks of Cyclades, from hand,
I struck into Charybdis' sinking sand———
But such as should it mend, let them lament;
I haunted court too long; now I repent.———
These cursed times, this worse than iron age,
Where virtue lurks, where vice doth reign and rage;
Where faith and love, where friendship is neglected,
Contagiously, with time, have me infected.
As others are, of force so mon I be;
How can I do, but as men do to me?
A true man ta'en with pirates on the sea,
Is forced to take a part in piracy.———
True Damon's part to play, I would me bind;
But Pythia as kind yet can I never find.———
My heart is stone within and iron without;
With triple brass my breast is set about.———
The line of love I have almost forget it,
For why, think I, to none I am addebted.
I saw such things as pity was to see.———
To lead that kind of life, I wearied fast;
In better hope I left it at the last;
And to the court I shortly me addrest,
Believing well to chuse it for the best;
But from the rocks of Cyclades, from hand,
I struck into Charybdis' sinking sand———
But such as should it mend, let them lament;
I haunted court too long; now I repent.———
These cursed times, this worse than iron age,
Where virtue lurks, where vice doth reign and rage;
Where faith and love, where friendship is neglected,
Contagiously, with time, have me infected.
As others are, of force so mon I be;
How can I do, but as men do to me?
A true man ta'en with pirates on the sea,
Is forced to take a part in piracy.———
True Damon's part to play, I would me bind;
But Pythia as kind yet can I never find.———
My heart is stone within and iron without;
With triple brass my breast is set about.———
The line of love I have almost forget it,
For why, think I, to none I am addebted.
Retiring from the court, he entered into orders, and was appointed rector or minister of Logie, the names of ecclesiastical offices then floating between presbytery and prelacy. If, as has been conjectured with some plausibility, he was the author of the Invectives or Flytings, addressed to Montgomery under the signature of Polwart, these must have been composed while he retained the character of a courtier; and his disgust was probably completed by the superior applause which his adversary
