ELEGIES.
111
This shall say what I was; and thou shalt say,
“Do his hurts reach me? doth my worth decay?
Or do they reach his judging mind, that he
Should now love less, what he did love to see?
That which in him was fair and delicate,
Was but the milk, which in love’s childish state
Did nurse it; who now is grown strong enough
20To feed on that, which to weak tastes seems tough.”
“Do his hurts reach me? doth my worth decay?
Or do they reach his judging mind, that he
Should now love less, what he did love to see?
That which in him was fair and delicate,
Was but the milk, which in love’s childish state
Did nurse it; who now is grown strong enough
20To feed on that, which to weak tastes seems tough.”
ELEGY VI.
O, let me not serve so, as those men serve,
Whom honour’s smokes at once fatten and starve,
Poorly enrich’d with great men’s words or looks;
Nor so write my name in thy loving books
As those idolatrous flatterers, which still
Their princes’ style with many realms fulfil,
Whence they no tribute have, and where no sway.
Such services I offer as shall pay
Themselves; I hate dead names. O, then let me
10Favourite in ordinary, or no favourite be.
When my soul was in her own body sheathed,
Not yet by oaths betroth’d, nor kisses breathed
Into my purgatory, faithless thee,
Thy heart seemed wax, and steel thy constancy.
Whom honour’s smokes at once fatten and starve,
Poorly enrich’d with great men’s words or looks;
Nor so write my name in thy loving books
As those idolatrous flatterers, which still
Their princes’ style with many realms fulfil,
Whence they no tribute have, and where no sway.
Such services I offer as shall pay
Themselves; I hate dead names. O, then let me
10Favourite in ordinary, or no favourite be.
When my soul was in her own body sheathed,
Not yet by oaths betroth’d, nor kisses breathed
Into my purgatory, faithless thee,
Thy heart seemed wax, and steel thy constancy.
l. 20. So 1650; 1633, disused tastes
l. 6. So St. MS., and Addl. MS. 25,707; 1633, styles which many realms; 1669, styles which many names
l. 7. 1669, bear no sway
