As _Phæbus_ bright; she’s too, as _Phæbus_ wise.
The Muses to our sex perverse and coy
_Astrea_ do’s familiarly enjoy.
She do’s their veiled Glorys understand,
And what we court with pain, with ease command.
Their charming secrets they expanded lay,
Reserv’d to us, to her they all display.
Upon her Pen await those learned Nine. }
She ne’re but like the Phosph’rus draws a line, }
As soon as toucht her subjects clearly shine. }
The femal Laurels were obscur’d till now,
And they deserv’d the Shades in which they grew:
But _Daphne_ at your call return’s her flight,
Looks boldly up and dares the God of light.
If we _Orinda_ to your works compare, }
They uncouth, like her countrys soyle, appear, }
Mean as its Pesants, as its Mountains bare: }
_Sappho_ tasts strongly of the sex, is weak and poor, }
At second hand she russet Laurels wore, }
Yours are your own, a rich and verdant store. }
If Loves the Theme, you out-do _Ovid’s_ Art, }
Loves God himself can’t subtiller skill impart, }
Softer than’s plumes, more piercing than his Dart. }
If _Pastoral_ be her Song, she glads the Swains
With Livelier notes, with spritelier smiles the plains.
More gayly than the Springs she decks the Bowrs
And breaths a second _May_ to Fields and Flowrs.
If e’re the golden Age again return
And flash in shining Beames from’s Iron Urn,
That Age not as it was before shall be,
But as th’ Idea is refin’d by thee.
That seems the common; thines the Elixir, Gold,
So pure is thine, and so allay’d the old.
Happy, ye Bards, by fair _Astrea_ prais’d,
If you’r alive, to brighter life you’re rais’d;
For cherisht by her Beams you’ll loftyer grow,
You must your former learned selves out-do,
Thô you’d the parts of _Thirsis_ and of _Strephon_ too.
Hail, mighty Prophetess! by whom we see
Omnipotence almost in Poetry:
Your flame can give to Graves _Promethean_ fire,
And _Greenhill’s_ clay with living paint inspire;
For like some Mystick wand with awful Eyes
You wave your Pen, and lo the dead Arise.
_Kendrick._
LYCIDUS:
or, the Lover in Fashion, &c.
I Have receiv’d your melancholy Epistle, with the Account of your
Voyage to the _Island of Love_; of your Adventures there, and the
Relation of the death of your _Aminta_: At which you shall forgive
me if I tell you I am neither surpris’d nor griev’d, but hope to see
you the next Campagne, as absolutely reduc’d to reason as myself.
When Love, that has so long deprived you of Glory, shall give you
no more Sighs but at the short remembrances of past Pleasures; and
that after you have heard my Account of the Voyage I made to the same
place, with my more lucky one back again, (for I, since I saw you,
have been an Adventurer) you will by my Example become of my Opinion,
(notwithstanding your dismal Tales of Death and the eternal Shades,)
which is, that if there be nothing that will lay me in my Tomb till
Love brings me thither, I shall live to Eternity.
I must confess ‘tis a great Inducement to Love, and a happy Advance
to an Amour, to be handsom, finely shap’d, and to have a great deal
of Wit; these are Charms that subdue the Hearts of all the Fair: And
one sees but very few Ladies, that can resist these good Qualities,
especially in an Age so gallant as ours, yet all this is nothing if
Fortune do not smile: And I have seen a Man handsom, well shap’d,
and of a great deal of Wit, with the advantage of a thousand happy
Adventures, yet finds himself in the end, fitter for an Hospital than
the Elevation of Fortune: And the Women are not contented we should
give them as much Love as they give us, (which is but reasonable,)
but they would compel us all to Present and Treat ‘em lavishly, till
a Man hath consumed both Estate and Body in their Service. How many
do we see, that are wretched Examples of this Truth, and who have
nothing of all they enjoyed remaining with ‘em, but a poor _Idæa_ of
past Pleasures, when rather the Injury the Jilt has done ‘em, ought
to be eternally present with ‘em. Heaven keep me from being a Woman’s
Property. There are Cullies enough besides you or I, _Lysander_.
One would think now, That I, who can talk thus Learnedly and Gravely,
had never been any of the number of those wretched, whining, sighing,
dying Fops, I speak of, never been jilted and cozen’d of both my Heart
and Reason; but let me tell those that think so, they are mistaken,
and that all this Wisdom and Discretion, I now seem replenish’d with,
I have as dearly bought as any keeping Fool of ‘em all. I was Li’d
and flattered into Wit, jilted and cozen’d into Prudence, and, by ten
thousand broken Vows and perjured Oaths, reduced to Sense again; and
can laugh at all my past Follies now.
After I have told you this, you may guess at a great part of my Story;
which, in short, is this: I would needs make a Voyage, as you did, to
this fortunate Isle, and accompanyed with abundance of young Heirs,
Cadets, Coxcombs, Wits, Blockheads, and Politicians, with a whole Cargo
of Cullies all, nameless and numberless we Landed on the Inchanted
Ground; the first I saw, and lik’d, was charming _Silvia_; you believe
I thought her fair as Angels; young, as the Spring, and sweet as all
the Flowers the blooming Fields produce; that when she blush’d, the
Ruddy Morning open’d, the Rose-buds blew, and all the Pinks and Dazies
spread; that when she sigh’d or breath’d, _Arabia’s_ Spices, driven
by gentle Winds, perfum’d all around; that when she look’d on me, all
Heaven was open’d in her Azure Eyes, from whence Love shot a thousand
pointed Darts, and wounded me all over; that when she spoke, the
Musick of the Spheres, all that was ravishing in Harmony, blest the
Adoring Listener; that when she walk’d, _Venus_ in the Mirtle Grove
when she advanced to meet her lov’d _Adonis_, assuming all the Grace
young Loves cou’d give, had not so much of Majesty as _Silvia_: In
fine, she did deserve, and I compared her to all the Fopperies, the
Suns, the Stars, the Coral, and the Pearl, the Roses and Lillies,
Angels Spheres, and Goddesses, fond Lovers dress their Idols in. For
she was all, fancy and fine imagination could adorn her with, at least,
the gazing Puppy thought so. ‘Twas such I saw and lov’d; but knowing
I did Adore, I made my humble Court, and she, by all my trembling,
sighings, pantings, the going and returning of my Blood, found all my
Weakness and her own Power; and using all the Arts of her Sex, both to
ingage and secure me, play’d all the Woman over: She wou’d be scornful
and kind by turns, as she saw convenient, This to check my Presumption
and too easy hope; That to preserve me from the brink of despair. Thus
was I tost in the Blanket of Love, sometimes up, and sometimes down,
as her Wit and Humour was in or out of tune, all which I watch’d, and
waited like a Dog, that still the oftner kick’d wou’d fawn the more.
Oh, ‘tis an excellent Art this managing of a Coxcomb, the Serpent first
taught it our Grandam _Eve_: and _Adam_ was the first kind Cully: E’re
since they have kept their Empire over Men, and we have, e’re since,
been Slaves. But I, the most submissive of the whole Creation, was long
in gaining Grace; she used me as she meant to keep me, Fool enough
for her Purpose. She saw me young enough to do her Service, handsom
enough to do her Credit, and Fortune enough to please her Vanity and
Interest: She therefore suffer’d me to Love, and Bow among the Crowd,
and fill her Train. She gave me hope enough to secure me too, but gave
me nothing else, till she saw me languish to that degree, she feared,
to lose the Glory of my Services, by my death; only this Pleasure kept
me alive, to see her treat all my Rivals with the greatest Rigour
imaginable, and to me all sweetness, exposing their foibles; and having
taken Notice of my Languishment, she suffered me Freedoms that wholly
Ravish’d me, and gave me hopes I shou’d not be long a dying for all she
cou’d give.
But, since I have a great deal to say of my Adventures in passing out
of this _Island of Love_: I will be as brief as I can in what arrived
to me on the Place; and tell you, That after Ten thousand Vows of
eternal Love on both sides, I had the Joy, not only to be believ’d and
lov’d, but to have her put herself into my Possession, far from all
my Rivals: Where, for some time I lived with this charming Maid, in
all the Raptures of Pleasure, Youth, Beauty, and Love could create.
Eternally we loved, and lived together, no day nor night separated
us, no Frowns interrupted our Smiles, no Clouds our Sun-shine; the
Island was all perpetual Spring, still flowery and green, in Bowers,
in Shades, by purling Springs and Fountains, we past our hours,
unwearied and uninterrupted. I cannot express to you the happy Life I
led, during this blessed Tranquility of Love, while _Silvia_ still was
pleased and still was gay. We walked all day together in the Groves,
and entertained ourselves with a thousand Stories of Love; we laught at
the foolish World, who could not make their Felicity without Crowds and
Noise: We pitied Kings in Courts in this Retirement, so well we liked
our Solitude; till on a day, (blest be that joyful day, though then
’.was most accurst,) I say upon that day, I know not by what accident I
was parted from my Charmer, and left her all alone, but in my absence,
there incountred her a Woman extremely ugly, and who was however very
nice and peevish, inconstant in her temper, and no one place could
continue her: The finest things in the World were troublesom to her,
and she was Shagreen at every thing; her Name is _Indifference_; she
is a Person of very great Power in this Island, (though possibly you
never incountred her there,) and those that follow her, depart from the
_Isle of Love_ without any great pains. She brought _Silvia_ to the
Lake of Disgust, whether, in persuing her (at my return,) I found her,
ready to take Boat to have past quite away, and where there are but
too many to transport those Passengers, who follow _Indifference_ over
the Lake of _Disgust_. I saw this disagreeable Creature too, but she
appeared too ugly for me to approach her, but forcing _Silvia_ back, I
returned again to the Palace of _True Pleasure_, where some days after
there arrived to me a Misfortune, of which, I believed I should never
have seen an end. I found _Silvia_ inviron’d round with new Lovers,
still adoring and pleasing her a thousand ways, and though none of ‘em
were so rich, so young, or so handsom as I, she nevertheless failed
not to treat ‘em with all the Smiles and Caresses ‘twas possible to
imagin; when I complain’d of this, she would satisfy my fears with so
many Vows and Imprecations, that I would believe her, and think myself
unreasonable, but when she would be absent whole days, in a hundred
places, she would find such probable Excuse, and lye with such a Grace,
no mortal cou’d have accused her, so that all the whole Island took
notice that I was a baffled Cuckold, before I could believe she would
deceive me, so heartily she damn’d herself: Through all the Groves I
was the pointed Coxcomb, laught at aloud, and knew not where the jest
lay; but thought myself as secure in the Innocence of my deceiving
fair one, as the first hour I Charmed her, and like a keeping Cully,
lavish’d out my Fortune, my plenteous Fortune, to make her fine to
Cuckold me. ‘Sdeath! how I scorn the Follies of my Dotage; and am
resolv’d to persue Love for the future, in such a manner as it shall
never cost me a Sigh: This shall be my method.
A Constancy in Love I’ll prise,
And be to Beauty true:
And doat on all the lovely Eyes,
That are but fair and new.
On _Cloris_ Charms to day I’ll feed,
To morrow _Daphne_ move;
For bright _Lucinda_ next I’ll bleed,
And still be true to Love.
But Glory only and Renown
My serious hours shall charm;
My Nobler Minutes those shall Crown,
My looser hours, my Flame.
All the Fatigues of Love I’ll hate,
And _Phillis’s_ new Charms
That hopeless Fire shall dissipate,
My Heart for _Cloe_ warms.
The easie Nymph I once enjoy’d
Neglected now shall pass,
Possession, that has Love destroy’d
Shall make me pitiless.
In vain she now attracts and mourns,
Her moving Power is gone,
Too late (when once enjoy’d,) she burns,
And yeilding, is undone.
My Friend, the little charming Boy
Conforms to my desires,
And ‘tis but to augment my Joy
He pains me with his Fires;
All that’s in happy Love I’ll tast,
And rifle all his store,
And for one Joy, that will not last,
He brings a thousand more.
Perhaps, my Friend, at this Account of my Humor you may smile, but
with a reasonable consideration you will commend it, at least, though
you are not so wise as to persue my Dictates. Yet I know you will be
diverted with my Adventures; though there be no love in ‘em that can
resemble ‘em to yours. Take then the History of my Heart, which I
assure you, boasts itself of the Conquests it has made.
A thousand Martyrs I have made,
All sacrific’d to my desire;
A thousand Beauties have betray’d,
That languish in resistless Fire.
The untam’d Heart to hand I brought,
And fixt the wild and wandring Thought.
I never vow’d nor sigh’d in vain
But both, thô false, were well receiv’d.
The Fair are pleas’d to give us pain,
And what they wish is soon believ’d.
And thô I talk’d of Wounds and Smart,
Loves Pleasures only toucht my Heart.
Alone the Glory and the Spoil
I always Laughing bore away;
The Triumphs, without Pain or Toil,
Without the Hell, the Heav’n of Joy.
And while I thus at random rove
Despise the Fools that whine for Love.
I was a great while, (like you,) before I forgot the remembrance of my
first Languishments, and I almost thought (by an excess of Melancholy,)
that the end of my Misfortunes were with my Life at hand: Yet still
like a fond Slave, willing to drag my Fetters on, I hop’d she would
find Arguments to convince me she was not false; and in that Humor,
fear’d only I should not be handsomly and neatly jilted. Could she but
have dissembled well, I had been still her Cully. Could she have play’d
her Game with discretion, but, vain of her Conquest, she boasted it to
all the World, and I alone was the kind keeping Blockhead, to whom
’.was unperceived, so well she swore me into belief of her Truth to
me. Till one day, lying under a solitary Shade, with my sad Thoughts
fixt on my declining Happiness, and almost drown’d in Tears, I saw a
Woman drest in glorious Garments, all loose and flowing with the wind,
scouring the Fields and Groves with such a pace, as _Venus_, when she
heard her lov’d Youth was slain, hasted to behold her ruin. She past
me, as I lay, with an unexpressible swiftness, and spoke as she run,
with a loud Voice. At her first approach, I felt a strange trembling at
my Heart without knowing the reason, and found at last this Woman was
_Fame_. Yet I was not able to tell from whence proceeded my Inquietude.
When her Words made me but too well understand the Cause: The fatal
Subject of what she cry’d, in passing by me, were these:
Poor _Lycidus_, for shame arise,
And wipe _Loves_ Errors from thy Eyes;
Shake off the God that holds thy Heart;
Since _Silvia_ for another burns,
And all thy past Indurement scorns
While thou the Cully art.
I believed, as she spoke, that I had ill understood her, but she
repeated it so often, that I no longer doubted my wretchedness. I leave
you, who so well can guess, to imagin, what Complaints I made, filling
the Grove, where I was laid, with my piteous Cries; sometimes I rose
and raved, and rail’d on Love, and reproached the fair Fugitive. But
the tender God was still pleading in my Heart, and made me ever end my
noisy Griefs in Sighs and silent Tears. A thousand Thoughts of revenge
I entertained against this happy Rival, and the charming ingrate:
But those Thoughts, like my Rage, would also end in soft reproaching
murmurs and regret only. And I would sometimes argue with Love in this
manner.
Ah, cruel _Love_! when will thy Torments cease?
And when shall I have leave to dye in Peace?
And why, too charming and too cruel Maid,
Cou’d’.t thou not yet thy fleeting Heart have stay’d?
And by degrees thy fickle Humor shewn,
By turns the Enemy and Friend put on:
Have us’d my Heart a little to thy scorn,
The loss at least might have been easier born.
With feigned Vows, (that poor Expence of Breath,)
Alas thou might’st have sooth’d me to my death.
Thy Coldness, and thy visible decays
In time had put a period to my days.
And lay’d me quietly into my Tomb,
Before thy proof of Perjuries had come.
You might have waited yet a little space }
And sav’d mine, and thy, Honour this disgrace; }
Alas I languish’d and declin’d apace. }
I lov’d my Life too eagerly away
To have disturb’d thee with too long a stay.
Ah! cou’d you not my dying Heart have fed
With some small Cordial Food, till I was dead?
Then uncontroul’d, and unreproach’d your Charms
Might have been render’d to my Rival’s Arms.
Then all my right to him you might impart,
And Triumph’d o’re a true and broken Heart.
Though I complained thus for a good while, I was not without some
secret hope, that what I had heard was not true; nor would I be
persuaded to undeceive myself of that hope which was so dear and
precious to me. I was not willing to be convinced I was intirely
miserable, out of too great a fear to find it true; and there were
some Moments in which I believed _Fame_ might falsly accuse _Silvia_,
and it did not seem reasonable to me, that, after all the Vows and
Oaths she had made, she should so easily betray ‘em, and forgetting my
Services, receive those of another, less capable of rend’ring them to
her advantage. Sometimes I would excuse her ingratitude with a thousand
things that seem’d reasonable, but still that was but to make me more
sensible of my disgrace; and then I would accuse myself of a thousand
weaknesses below the Character of a Man; I would even despise and loath
my own easiness, and resolve to be no longer a _Mark-out-fool_ for all
the Rhiming Wits of the Island to aim their Dogrel at. And grown, as I
imagined, brave at this thought, I resolved first to be fully convinced
of the perfidy of my Mistress, and then to rent my Heart from the
attachment that held it.
You know, that from the _Desart of Remembrance_, one does, with great
facility, look over all the _Island of Love_. I was resolved to go
thither one day; and where indeed I could survey all things that past,
in the Groves, the Bowers, by Rivers, or Fountains, or whatever other
place, remote or obscure ‘twas from thence, that one day I saw the
faithless _Silvia_, in the Palace of _True Pleasure_, in the very Bower
of Bliss with one of my Rivals, but most intimate Friend.
‘Twas there, I saw my Rival take
Pleasures, he knew how to make;
There he took, and there was given,
All the Joys that Rival Heaven;
Kneeling at her Feet he lay,
And in transports dy’d away:
Where the faithless suffer’d too
All the amorous Youth cou’d do.
The Ardour of his fierce desire
Set his Face and Eyes on fire.
All their Language was the Blisses
Of Ten thousand eager Kisses;
While his ravish’d Neck she twin’d
And to his Kisses, Kisses join’d;
Till, both inflam’d, she yeilded so
She suffer’d all the Youth cou’d do.
In fine, ‘twas there I saw that I must lose the day. And I saw in this
Lover Ten thousand Charms of Youth and Beauty; on which the ingrate
with greedy languishing Eyes, eternally gazed with the same Joy she
used to behold me when she made me most happy. I confess, this Object
was so far from pleasing me, (as I believed a confirmation would,)
that the change inspired me with a rage, which nothing else could
do, and made me say things unbecoming the Dignity of my Sex, who
ought to disdain those faithless Slaves, which Heaven first made to
obey the Lords of the Creation. A thousand times I was about to have
rush’d upon ‘em, and have ended the Lives of the loose betrayers of
my repose, but Love stepp’d in and stay’d my hand, preventing me from
an Outrage, that would have cost me that rest of Honour, I yet had
left: But when my rage was abated, I fell to a more insupportable
Torment, that of extream Grief to find another possest of what I had
been so long, and with so much Toil in gaining: ‘Twas thus I retir’d,
and after a little while brought myself to make calm Reflections upon
this Adventure, which reduced me to some reason. When one day as I was
walking in an unfrequented Shade, whither my Melancholy had conducted
me, I incountred a Man, of a haughty look and meen, his Apparel rich
and glorious, his Eyes awful, and his Stature tall; the very sight of
him inspired me with coldness, which render’d me almost insensible of
the infidelity of _Silvia_. This Person was _Pride_, who looking on me,
as he past, with a fierce and disdainful Smile, over his Shoulder, and
regarding me with scorn, said;
Why shou’d that faithless wanton give
Thy Heart so mortal pain,
Whose Sighs were only to deceive,
Her Oaths all false and vain?
Despise those Tears thou shedd’st for her,
Disdain to sigh her Name.
To _Love_, thy Liberty prefer;
To faithless _Silvia_, Fame.
I knew by his words he was _Pride_, or _Disdain_, and would have
embraced him; but he put me off, seeing _Love_ still by me, who had not
yet abandoned me, and turned himself from me with a regardless scorn,
but I, who was resolved not to forsake so discreet a Counsellor, rather
chose to take my leave of little _Love_; who had ever accompanyed me
in this Voyage. But oh! this adieu was not taken so easily and soon as
I imagined. _Love_ was not to be quitted without abundance of Sighs
and Tears at parting, he had been a Witness to all my Adventures, my
Confident in this Amour, and not to be deserted without a great deal of
pain; I stayed so long in bidding the dear Boy adieu, that I had almost
forgot _Disdain_; at last, though my Heart were breaking to part with
the dear fondling, I was resolved and said;
Farewel, my little charming Boy!
Farewel, my fond delight,
My dear Instructor all the day,
My soft repose at night.
Thou, whom my Soul has so carest,
And my poor Heart has held so fast,
Thou never left me in my pain,
Nor in my happier hours;
Thou eas’d me when I did complain,
And dry’d my falling showrs.
When _Silvia_ frown’d still thou woud’st smile,
And all my Cares and Griefs beguile.
But _Silvia’s_ gone, and I have torn
Her Witchcrafts from my Heart;
And nobly fortify’d by scorn
Her Empire will subvert;
The Laws establish’d there destroy,
And bid adieu to the dear charming Boy.
In quitting _Love_ I was a great while before I could find _Disdain_,
but I, at last, overtook him: He accompanyed me to a Village, where
I received a Joy I had not known since my Arrival to the _Isle of
Love_, and which Repose seemed the sweeter because it was new. When I
came to this place, I saw all the World Easie, Idle, and at Liberty:
This Village is like a Desart, and all the Inhabitants live within
themselves, there is only one Gate, by which we enter into it from the
_Isle of Love_.
This place is called _Indifference_, and takes its Name from a Princess
inhabiting there, a Person very fair and well made; but has a Grace
and Meen of so little Wit, and seems so inutile and so silly, that it
renders her even ridiculous. As soon as I arrived there, I called to my
remembrance all those affronts and cheats of Love, that _Silvia_ had
put upon me, and which now served for my diversion, and were agreeable
thoughts to me; so that I called myself Ten thousand Sots and Fools
for resenting ‘em; and that I did not heartily despise ‘em, laugh at
’.m, and make my Pleasure with the false One as well as the rest; for
she dissembled well, and for ought I knew, ‘twas but dissembled Love
she paid my Rivals. But I, forsooth, was too nice a Coxcomb, I cou’d
not feed as others did, and be contented with such Pleasures as she
cou’d afford, but I must ingross all, and unreasonably believe a Woman
of Youth and Wit had not a longer Race of Love to run than to my Arms
alone. Well, ‘tis now confest I was a Fool, nor could I hinder myself
from saying a thousand times a day;
That Coxcomb can ne’re be at ease,
While Beauty inslaves his Soul.
‘Tis Liberty only can please,
And he that’s Fetter’d is an Owl.