'Greeting,' Reader; and now 'farewell'!
Wherefore shouldst thou on my page dwell,
Where neither jest nor sport inviteth,
That the jocund youth delighteth?
Therefore, Reader, pass thee by
To thine own idle jollity:
The notes that trill from my poor lute
Such as thee shall never suit;
Nor here are Acidalian dews
That Venus' roses sweet suffuse;
Nor breath sets Cupid's torch a-blaze
That lovers on my lines may gaze.
Vainly shall mother and shall son
Look here for lewd emotion.
Cupid, seek thy mother's kirtle,
Or hide thee 'neath her fragrant myrtle.
And, Venus, thy Idalian hills
Will better yield thee sport that thrills:
Thither, therefore, goddess, turn;
O'er thy lost Adonis burn;
Or devise, if grief thee frets,
Other shrines for thy violets:
There, with Flora and the Spring
The green earth enamelling,
Thou mayst fill thy bosom's whiteness,
He his wings in all their brightness,
With all flow'rs that wait on thee
When thou holdest revelry.
Me my own poor flow'r will crown;
Poor 'tis true, yet all my own--
Poor but pure. So let it be,
Those unto others, this to me.
No Circe-cup foams in my verse,
To make fierce lustings still more fierce;
No draft of Lethe here doth flow,
Flow'ry above, deathly below;
No false cheeks, with falser bloom--
A rose up-bursting from a tomb;
No barb hid 'neath treach'rous plume;
No poison spread as honey'd bait;
No line where danger lies in wait:
Here's nor spleen nor melancholy,
That for me were unmeet wholly;
Rarely do I raise a smile,
Ne'er merge my wit in wanton wile;
Never quicken Passion's pulse,
Nor show nude Beauty to convulse,
Until beneath the hoof o' th' flesh
The strong man bound is in Lust's mesh.
If jest I pass, do not repine
To learn it reeks not of the wine;
For my Apollo is celestial,
And from Bacchus shrinks as bestial.
Nothing that's foul my page contains;
Nothing the modest eye arraigns;
Nothing to cause averted face--
Lucretia every line might trace
With calm, serene, unfearing eye,
Nor blush stain cheek of Modesty.
For not more pure the maiden's vow[42]
Whisper'd in tremulous words and low,
As, girt in snowy robe, her breast
Heaves like a wave in sweet unrest,
And the white veil shows whiter brow
In pureness of unfallen snow,
With flame-gleam from meek-dropped hair
Dishevell'd by the am'rous air:
Soft strains with her soft voice blending,
The marriage-rites to heaven ascending:
Yea, not the altar's self exhaleth
More chastely, as its God it haileth,
That keeps far off unholy hands
While there the priest with bow'd head stands.
My verse is not the Queen of Love's,
Nor knows the cooing of her doves:
Her beauty me not overpowers,
Though bright as skies when no cloud low'rs;
Vainly at me her tricksy boy
His arrows shoots. The sweet annoy
I never felt; though oft and oft
He hover'd o'er me, and with soft,
Sly, 'luring glances his torch wav'd,
And look'd to find me swift enslav'd;
Offer'd a quill from his own wing,
E'en from his mother's swan--to sing;
Ay, often Venus' love-wreaths weaving,
On my brow the symbol leaving:
He would laugh, and Poet style me,
And with flatteries beguile me:
'Begone, begone, O wanton boy!
Thy mother too, though Queen of Joy.'
Thus did I speak. Naught of my song
Shall thy tyranny prolong:
Get thee, with thy torch and arrow,
Unto the Veronian sparrow; _Catullus_
Or the Bilbilician win _Martial_
To embalm thy pleasant sin:
Be thy assaults however vile,
He on thee will smile, and smile:
He, thy love-locks curious twining,
Shall ne'er come short of thy inclining:
He thine own poet is, and will
Give thee full license to instill
By jest and quip and jollity
Whate'er it listeth thee to try.
Alas, that genius so august
Should pander to adult'rous lust!
Alas, that he, poet so true,
Should poet be, Cupid, to you!
O, what harvest of rich thought
Judean seed from him had brought,
If, up-climbing holy mountains,
He had drunk from hallow'd fountains!
Mother and son, I see them now,
As round her neck his arms he'd throw,
Nestling with his azure eyes,
Her bosom's splendour for his skies;
Kissing, and kiss'd in sweet reply,
As soft winds o'er violets die:
While she all her love discloses,
Murm'ring on his lips' twin roses:
His lips like hers, and hers like his,
Glued i' the rapture of their bliss.
Visions like these would Martial give
With dainty touch and fugitive.
The heav'nly Weeper there would bow
Before her Lord, and pay her vow:
Now is uttered gentle sigh,
And now great tears gleam in her eye:
That, offspring of the stainless Light;
This, of the Pyx's mystic rite:
In his verse, tears, sighs should fall
Delicate and musical:
In fine, whate'er in mine were mean
Should radiant grow as sunlight's sheen.
Go, then, go, insatiate boy,
Nor me longer seek t' annoy:
I've said it, nor shall e'er unsay:
Go to thy mother, and there play.
Why wilt thou whisper flattery,
And praise my Muse's witchery--
Verses that reck not of thy smarts--
And smite me with thy fire-tipp'd darts?
Go, get thee gone! Thy haunt must be
Where there's wanton revelry,
And the young minx with toss o' curls
Opes her lips to show her pearls;
Opes her lips, with some gross jest
A foolish lover to arrest.
Thither go, where falsely-fair
Beauty is bought and sold; and where,
Flaunting with painted cheek, and eye
A-flame to ev'ry devilry,
Base women seek base men, and tingle
Their hot veins as they commingle,
Baring their charms, 'neath alien roses
Ministering such sweets as Hell composes.
Hence, therefore, Cupid! Venus, hence!
I yield not to your violence:
I've said it, nor shall you allure
My heart to own your sway impure.
Another Cypris holds me now,
Another Love receives my vow:
For Love is here and Mother kind,
But she a Virgin; He not blind.
O Child! O Lord! great Mother blest!
O wonder of thy holy breast!
O Love, whose quiver's sacred pow'rs
Ne'er send forth arrow that devours,
Unless a shaft pierce the pure heart,
That Thou mayst heal the blessed smart.
Me whom Thou piercest, holy Child,
Pierce, pierce me sure with arrows mild.
Let Thy quiver grow more light
As Thou dost me yearning smite:
What my soul pants for, and still drinks
And drinks, and thirsts, and never thinks
To get enough, O give, still give.
Thus would I die; thus would I live.
Transfix this heart, Child: howsoe'er
Thou comest,--crown'd with thorns and bare,
Or great with the awful heraldry
Of nail and spear for Faith to see;
Or greater still, on the holy rood
Wet with the terror of Thy Blood;
Or great'st of all, Thyself alone
In meek might of Thy Passion,--
Still pierce this heart; O pierce it, Child:
_Thus_ would I drink in rapture wild.
O that Thy bow might wound me still!
O that of wounds I had my fill!
Or, if some swifter wing there be,
That it would fly to me--to me!
Behold, my Saviour, this poor breast,
And take it as Thine arrows' nest:
I seek not to be spar'd one blow:
Thus would I have Thee still my foe;
Still yearn that wounded I may be;
For wounds like these are ecstasy.
These are my wishes: and my Books,
May they be his who on them looks!
Seek'st, Reader, to be mine? Then, last,
I ask thy eyes that they be chaste;
Chaste, but not tearless; my dear Love
To meet and know, as from above
He comes, and still the Crucified,
Proclaiming how for man He died
By thorn, and nail, and spear, and cry,
And bitterest words of agony:
Say, should He meet thee thus in blood,
Couldst thou e'en grudge of tears a flood?
Ah, hard thy heart as e'er was stone,
That all unmov'd can hear Him groan,
Nor by a throb of feeling show
Thou hast a sense of His great woe;
While here He treasured human tears
Hushing sad Mary in her fears,
As to His feet in shame she crept,
And with white drops them all bewept:
More than Assyrian gold to thee
Such tears, if thou their worth couldst see.
His love with thine again will glow,
His tears afresh with thine will flow.
Here, Reader, glancing through my Book,
Thou shalt upon His cradle look:
To His sweet obsequies now turn,
And mark how still my love shall burn.
Here, with His Mother and with me,
My ceaseless sacred joys shalt see:
Whether Earth's Princes speechless stand
As sudden darkness wraps the land;
Or He lies hidden in the Cave,
A temple now, and not a grave;
But the third morning shall restore Him:
Ah, much too slow those days pass o'er Him!
Be true, ye shadows of the tomb;
Enfold Him in a kindly gloom:
Thus wilt thou pray; while my dear Light
(O strange!) demands the help of Night.
In fine, whate'er my Book shall say
To my dear Love--however pray,
However fear, however weep,
And with sweet tears its pages steep--
My words thy willing words will move.
'O, not enough these things I love;
But they are sweet all things above;
And certainly the love of Him
Deserves all other loves to dim.'
If it seem to you, good Reader, that I have promised overmuch on behalf
of him to whom this tractate shall be pleasing, know that I do not look
merely on those things which you possess here, but also on those which,
by cherishing such as you now have, you may hereafter obtain; for I have
been unwilling, if hitherto I have not been a-wanting to my friends
earnestly entreating me that I should allow them, even at the risk of
their own peril, to encroach on your good-will, however great--I have
been unwilling, I say, to give myself up to your fastidious criticism.
You have enough here either to hand over to the rod which it deserves
(for none of these things ask or claim for themselves maturer years), or
to lay it up in your bosom as a pledge of more and of advanced
attempts. Choose for yourself an alternative. As for myself, my aim has
not deceived me. I have already attained the utmost pinnacle of my
ambition, at the time when this somewhat indifferent murmur of my
almost-infantine Muse sounded not unmusically in those ears, than which
from the world at large I have none more learned to fear, none more
indulgent to hope for; so that, as regards your applause, I will speak
candidly and at once: I am neither over-confident nor over-solicitous of
it. Firstly, my respect for you, Reader, whoever you are, and of whose
decision I can hope everything, restrains; and next, my respect for
those of whose penetration I am unable not to persuade myself to hope
the greatest things. Yet still, how I do wish that I were of service
whenever my Country desires to cast aside its own particular custom, so
unworthy its own worth--that custom particularly by which, all her own
things being despised, she only prizes those things to which having
crossed the Alps and lived over the sea has given a value! But these
wishes of too rash hope being put aside, let me turn to the acygnian
gentlemen, whom I know--although I shall name none personally--to have
angrily abandoned me on account of some of my recent sayings. Still, let
them compose their temper, and let them confess--may they pardon such a
great saying from a forward young man!--I say, let them confess that
they owe me this: that, in truth, in so grand an argument, in which
they have not recourse to the stale untruths concerning their own
services, nor to the nauseous calumnies concerning ours. With regard to
this slight statement of mine, I have yielded to the importance of those
from whence it springs. And let it spring, forsooth! I speak
seriously--and let them know that they will always find me most
tranquilly reposing under that shadow which their greater light has cast
around me!