Ah! (weladay) there is no end of pain,
Nor change of labour may intreated be,
Yet I beyond all these am carried fain,
Where other powers far different I see,
And must pass over to th'Elysian plain;
There grim Persephone encountering me,
Doth urge her fellow-furies earnestly
With their bright firebronds me to terrifie.
There chaste Alceste lives inviolate,
Free from all care, for that her husband's days
She did prolong, by changing fate for fate.
Lo, their lives also the immortal praise
Of womankind, most faithfull to her mate,
Penelope! and from her far
A ruless rout of young-men, which her woo'd, All slain with darts, lie wallow'd in their blood.
And sad Eurydice, thence now no more
Must turn to life, but there detained be
For looking back, being forbid before ;
Yet was the guilt thereof, Orpheus, in thee.
Bold sure he was, and worthy spirit bore,
That durst those lowest shadows go to see,
And could believe that any thing could please
Fell Cerberus, or Stygian powers appease.
Ne fear'd the burning waves of Phlegeton,
Nor those same mournful kingdoms, compassed
With rusty horrour and foul fashion,
And deap-dig'd vaults, and Tartar covered
With bloody night and dark confusion,
And judgment-seats, whose judge is deadly dred;
A judge that after death doth punish sore
The faults which life hath trespassed before.
But valiant Fortune made Dan Orpheus bold;
For the swift running rivers still did stand,
And the wild beasts their fury did with-hold,
To follow Orpheus' musick through the land;
And th' oakes, deep grounded in the earthly mold,
Did move as if they could him understand;
And the shrill woods, which were of sense bereav'd,
Through their hard bark his silver sound receav'd.
And eke the moon her hasty steeds did stay,
Drawing in teems along the starry sky;
And didst (O monthly Virgin!) thou delay
Thy nightly course to hear his melody?
The same was able with like lovely lay
The Queen of Hell to move as easily
To yield Eurydice unto her fere,
Back to be borne, though it unlawful were.
Volume VI.
She (Lady) having well before approv'd
The fiends to be too cruel and severe,
Observ'd th' appointed way, as her behov❜d,
Ne ever did her eye-sight turn arere,
Ne ever spake, ne cause of speaking mov'd;
But cruel Orpheus, thou much crueller,
Seeking to kiss her, brok'st the gods' decree
And thereby mad'st her ever damn'd to be.
Ah! but sweet love of pardon worthy is,
And doth deserve to have small faults remitted,
If hell at least, things lightly done amiss
Knew how to pardon when ought is omitted;
Yet are ye both received into bliss,
And to the seats of happy souls admitted;
And you beside the honourable band
Of great heroes do in order stand.
There be the two stout sons of Æacus,
Fierce Peleus, and the hardy Telamon,
Both seeming now full glad and joyeous
Through their sire's dreadful jurisdiction,
Being the judge of all that horrid house;
And both of them by strange occasion
Renown'd in choice of happy marriage
Through Venus' grace and Vertue's carriage.
For th' one was ravish'd of his own bond-maid,
The fair Ixione, captiv'd from Troy;
But th' other was with Thetis' love assaid,
Great Nereus his daughter, and his joy.
On this side them there is a young-man laid,
Their match in glory, mighty, fierce, and coy,
That from th' Argolick ships, with furious ire
Bett back the fury of the Trojan fire.
O! who would not recount the strong divorces
Of that great war which Trojans oft beheld,
And oft beheld the warlike Greekish forces,
When Teucrian soil with bloody rivers swell'd,
And wide Sigean shores were spred with corses,
And Simois and Xanthus' blood out-weld,
Whilst Hector raged with outrageous mind, [tynd!
Flames, weapons, wounds, in Greek's fleet to have
For Ida's self, in aid of that fierce fight,
Out of her mountains ministred supplies,
And like a kindly nurse did yield (for spight)
Store of firebronds out of her nurseries
Unto her foster children, that they might
Inflame the navy of their enemies,
And all the Rhætean shore to ashes turn,
Where lay the ships which they did seek to burn.
'Gainst which the noble son of Telamon
Oppos'd himself, and thwarting his huge shield,
Them battel bad; gainst whom appear'd anon
Hector, the glory of the Trojan field :
Both fierce and furious in contention
Encountred, that their mighty strokes so shrild,
As the great clap of thunder which doth rive
The ratling heavens, and clouds asunder drive.
So th' one with fire and weapons did contend
To cut the ships, from turning home again
To Argos, th' others strove for to defend
The force of Vulcan with his might and main.
Thus th' one, acide, did his fame extend,
But th' other joy'd that on the Phrygian plain,
Having the blood of vanquish'd Hector shed,
He compass'd Troy thrice with his body ded.
Again great dole on either party grew,
That him to death unfaithful Paris sent;
And also him that false Ulysses slew,
Drawn into danger through close ambushment:
Therefore from him Laertes' son his view
Doth turn aside, and boasts his good event
In working of Strymonian Rhesus' fall,
And eft in Dolon's subtile surprisall.
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