Go then to where the bishop stays,

To make you one, his way, which divers ways

Must be effected, and when all is past,

And that you are one, by hearts and hands made fast, You two have one way left, yourselves to entwine, Besides this bishop's knot, O Bishop Valentine.

5.

But oh, what ails the sun, that here he stays,
Longer to-day, than other days?

Stays he new light from these to get?
And finding here such store, is loth to set?
And why do you two walk

So slowly paced in this procession?
Is all you care but to be look'd upon,
And be to others spectacle, and talk?

The feast, with gluttonous delays,

Is eaten, and too long their meat they praise,
The masquers come too late, and I think, will stay,
Like fairies, till the cock crow them away.

Alas, did not antiquity assign

A night, as well as day, to thee, O Valentine?

6.

They did, and night is come; and yet we see
Formalities retarding thee.

What mean these ladies, which (as though
They were to take a clock in pieces,) go
So nicely about the bride;

A bride, before a good-night could be said,
Should vanish from her clothes, into her bed,
As souls from bodies steal, and are not spied.

But now she is laid; what though she be?
Yet there are more delays, for, where is he?
He comes, and passes through sphere after sphere.
First her sheets, then her arms, then anywhere;
Let not this day, then, but this night be thine,
Thy day was but the eve to this, O Valentine.

7.

Here lies a she sun, and a he moon here,

She gives the best light to his sphere,

Or each is both, and all, and so They unto one another nothing owe,

And yet they do, but are

So just and rich in that coin which they pay,
That neither would, nor needs forbear, nor stay,
Neither desires to be spared, nor to spare,

They quickly pay their debt, and then

Take no acquittances, but pay again;
They pay, they give, they lend, and so let fall
No such occasion to be liberal.

More truth, more courage in these two do shine,
Than all thy turtles have, and sparrows, Valentine.

8.

And by this act of these two phoenixes

Nature again restored is,

For since these two are two no more,
There's but one phoenix still, as was before.
Rest now at last, and we

As Satyrs watch the sun's uprise, will stay
Waiting, when your eyes opened, let out day,
Only desired, because your face we see ;

Others near you shall whispering speak,
And wagers lay, at which side day will break,
And win by observing, then, whose hand it is
That opens first a curtain, hers or his;

This will be tried to-morrow after nine,

Till which hour, we thy day enlarge, O Valentine.

III.

COME live with me, and be my love,
And we will some new pleasures prove
Of golden sands, and crystal brooks:
With silken lines, aud silver hooks.

There will the river whispering run
Warmed by thy eyes, more than the sun.
And there th' enamoured fish will stay,
Begging themselves they may betray.

When thou wilt swim in that live bath,
Each fish, which every channel hath,
Will amorously to thee swim,
Gladder to catch thee, than thou him.

If thou to be so seen beest loth,
By sun, or moon, thou darkenest both,
And if myself have leave to see,
I need not their light, having thee.

Let others freeze with angling reeds,
And cut their legs, which shells and weeds,
Or treacherously poor fish beset,

With strangling snare, or windowy net:

Let coarse bold hands, from slimy nest
The bedded fish in banks out-wrest,
Or curious traitors' sleave-silk* flies
Bewitch poor fishes' wandering eyes.

For thee, thou need'st no such deceit,
For thou thyself art thine own bait,
That fish, that is not catched thereby,
Alas, is wiser far than I.

IV.

A VALEDICTION FORBIDDING MOURNING †.

As virtuous men pass mildly 'away,

And whisper to their souls to go,

Whilst some of their sad friends do say,
The breath goes now, and some say, no:

So let us melt, and make no noise,

No tear-floods, nor sigh-tempests move. "Twere profanation of our joys

To tell the laity our love.

Moving of th' earth brings harms and fears,
Men reckon what it did and meant,

But trepidation of the spheres,

Though greater far, is innocent.

Sleave-silk, knotted or tangled silk.-JOHNSON.

+ This was written to his wife, on his going into France, about the year 1609. Walton appears to have quoted it from memory, as he differs widely from the original edition.-ED.

Dull sublunary lovers' love

(Whose soul is sense) cannot admit
Absence, because it doth remove
Those things which elemented it.

But we by a love, so much refined,
That ourselves know not what it is,
Inter-assured of the mind,

Care less, eyes, lips, and hands to miss.

Our two souls therefore, which are one,
Though I must go, endure not yet
A breach, but an expansion,

Like gold to aery thinness beat.

If they be two, they are two so
As stiff twin compasses are two,
Thy soul the fixed foot, makes no show
To move, but doth, if the other do.

And though it in the centre sit,

Yet when the other far doth roam,
It leans, and hearkens after it,

And grows erect, as that comes home.

Such wilt thou be to me, who must
Like th' other foot, obliquely run.
Thy firmness makes my circle just,
And makes me end, where I begun.

V.

THE WILL*.

BEFORE I sigh my last gasp, let me breathe,
Great love, some legacies; here I bequeath
Mine eyes to Argus, if mine eyes can see,

If they be blind, then, Love, I give them thee;

* Richard of England was satiated with the glory and misfortunes of his first adventure, and he presumed to deride the exhortations of Fulk of Neuilly, who was not abashed in the presence of kings. "You advise me," said Plantagenet, to dismiss my three daughters, pride, avarice, and incontinence; I bequeath them to the most deserving; my pride to the knights templars, my avarice to the monks of Cisteaux, and my incontinence to the prelates.-GIBBON, chap. LX.

My tongue to fame; to ambassadors mine ears;
To women or the sea, my tears;

Thou love, hast taught me heretofore

By making me serve her who had twenty more,

That I should give to none, but such, as had too much before.

My constancy I to the planets give,

My truth to them, who at the court do live;
Mine ingenuity and openness,

To Jesuits; to buffoons my pensiveness;
My silence to any, who abroad hath been;
My money to a Capuchin.

Thou love taught'st me, by appointing me
To love there, where no love received can be,
Only to give to such as have an incapacity.

My faith I give to Roman Catholics;
All my good works unto the schismatics
Of Amsterdam; my best civility
And courtship, to an university;
My modesty I give to soldiers bare;
My patience let gamesters share.

Thou love taught'st me, by making me
Love her that holds my love disparity,

Only to give to those that count my gifts indignity.

I give my reputation to those

Which were my friends; mine industry to focs;

To schoolmen I bequeath my doubtfulness;

My sickness to physicians, or excess ;

To nature, all that I in rhyme have writ;

And to my company my wit;

Thou love, by making me adore

Her, who begot this love in me before,

Taught'st me to make, as though I gave, when I did but

restore.

To him for whom the passing-bell next tolls,

I give my physic books; my written rolls

Of moral counsels, I to Bedlam give;
My brazen medals, unto them which live
In want of bread; to them which pass among
All foreigners, mine English tongue.