And for, poor bird, thou sing'st not in the day, Some dark, deep desert, seated from the way. To creatures stern sad tunes, to change their kinds : Since men prove beasts, let beasts bear gentle minds.' As the poor frighted deer, that stands at gaze, To live or die which of the twain were better, When life is shamed, and Death Reproach's debtor. To kill myself,' quoth she; it, 'alack! what were But with my body my poor soul's pollution? Who, having two sweet babes, when death takes one, Will slay the other, and be nurse to none. Experiment. My body or my soul, which was the dearer? His leaves will wither, and his sap decay; 'Her house is sack'd, her quiet interrupted; Her sacred temple spotted, spoil'd, corrupted, Then let it not be call'd impiety, If in this blemish'd fort I make some hole, Through which I may convey this troubled soul. 'Yet die I will not, till my Collatine Have heard the cause of my untimely death; My honor I'll bequeathe unto the knife For in my death I murder shameful scorn: • Dear lord of that dear jewel I have lost, Myself, thy friend, will kill myself, thy foe; And, for my sake, serve thou false Tarquin sɔ. This brief abridgment of my will I make :— My soul and body to the skies and ground; My resolution, husband, do thou take; Mine honor be the knife's, that makes my wound; My shame be his that did my fame confound; And all my fame that lives, disbursed be To those that live, and think no shame of me. Thou, Collatine, shalt oversee this will: How was I overseen that thou shalt see it! My blood shall wash the slander of mine ill; My life's foul deed, my life's fair end shall free it. Faint not, faint heart, but stoutly say, 'So be it.' Yield to my hand; my hand shall conquer thee; Thou dead, both die, and both shall victors be." This plot of death when sadly she had laid, Whose swift obedience to her mistress hies: As winter meads, when sun doth melt their snow. Her mistress she doth give demure good-morrow Why her two suns were cloud-eclipsed so, But as the earth doth weep, the sun being set, Of those fair suns, set in her mistress' sky, Who in a salt-waved ocean quench their light. Which makes the maid weep like the dewy night. A pretty while these pretty creatures stand, I Chooses. Grieving themselves to guess at others' smarts: And then they drown their eyes, or break their hearts: For men have marble, women waxen minds, No more than wax shall be accounted evil, Their smoothness, like a goodly champaign plain, Through crystal walls each little mote will peep: looks, Poor women's faces are their own faults' books. No man inveigh against the wither'd flower, But chide rough winter that the flower hath kill'd! With men's abuses: those proud lords, to blame, 1 i. e. held; so spelt for the sake of the rhyme. |