Desire nor reason hath, nor rest, And, blind, doth seldom choose the best : But as the cinders of the fire. As ships in ports desired are drowned; As fruit, once ripe, then falls to ground; So fond Desire, when it attains, 25 The life expires, the woe remains. 30 And yet some poets fain would prove And that Desire is of that kind, No less a passion of the mind, As if wild beasts and men did seek To like, to love, to choose alike. Sir Walter Raleigh. 35 V NATURAL COMPARISONS WITH PERFECT LOVE. The lowest trees have tops; the ant her gall; Where rivers smoothest run, deep are the fords; The turtles cannot sing, and yet they love. 5 IO Anon. VI LIFE. The world's a bubble, and the life of man In his conception wretched; from the womb Curst from his cradle, and brought up to years Who then to frail mortality shall trust, But limns on water, or but writes in dust. Yet whilst with sorrow here we live opprest, What life is best? Courts are but only superficial schools To dandle fools: The rural parts are turned into a den Of savage men : And where's a city from foul vice so free, But may be termed the worst of all the three? Domestic cares afflict the husband's bed, Or pains his head : Those that live single, take it for a curse, Or do things worse: Some would have children; those that have them, moan, Or wish them gone : What is it, then, to have, or have no wife, But single thraldom, or a double strife? Our own affections still at home to please To cross the seas to any foreign soil, 5 ΙΟ 15 20 25 Wars with their noise affright us; when they cease, What then remains, but that we still should cry VII THE SOUL'S ERRAND. Go, Soul, the body's guest, Fear not to touch the best; Lord Bacon. 30 What is the world? tell, worldling, if thou know it. If it be good, why do all ills o'erflow it? If it be friend, why kills it, as a foe, 5 |