I hate when Vice can bolt 1 her arguments,
And Virtue has no tongue to check her pride.
Impostor, do not charge most innocent Nature,
As if she would her children should be riotous
With her abundance: she, good cateress,
Means her provision only to the good,
That live according to her sober laws,
And holy dictate of spare Temperance.
If ev'ry just man, that now pines with want,!
Had but a mod'rate and beseeming share
Of that which lewdly-pampered Luxury
Now heaps upon some few with vast excess,
Nature's full blessings would be well dispensed
In unsuperfluous ev'n proportiön,
And she no whit incumbered with her store;
And then the Giver would be better thanked,
His praise due paid for swinish Gluttony
Ne'er looks to Heav'n amidst his gorgeous feast,
But with besotted, base ingratitude
Crams, and blasphemes his Feeder. Shall I go on?
Or have I said enough? To him that dares
Arm his profane tongue with contemptuous words
Against the sun-clad pow'r of Chastity
Fain would I something say; yet to what end ?
Thou hast nor ear nor soul to apprehend
The sublime notion, and high mystery
That must be uttered to unfold the sage
And serious doctrine of virginity;
And thou art worthy that thou shouldst not know
More happiness than this thy present lot.
Enjoy your dear wit and gay rhetoric,
That hath so well been taught her dazzling fence:
Thou art not fit to hear thyself convinced;
Yet, should I try, the uncontrolled worth
Of this pure cause would kindle my rapt sp'rits
1 Sift, refine; as a bolting-mill sifts and refines flour.
To such a flame of sacred vehemence
That dumb things would be moved to sympathize, And the brute Earth would lend her nerves, and shake,
Till all thy magic structures, reared so high,
Were shattered into heaps o'er thy false head.
Comus. She fables not: I feel that I do fear
Her words set off by some superior pow'r ;
And though not mortal, yet a cold shuddʼring dew
Dips me all o'er, as when the wrath of Jove
Speaks thunder, and the chains of Erebus,
To some of Saturn's crew.1 I must dissemble,
And try her yet more strongly.-Come, no more!
This is mere moral babble, and direct
Against the canon-laws of our foundation.
I must not suffer this; yet 'tis but the lees
And settlings of a melancholy blood.
But this will cure all straight; one sip of this
Will bathe the drooping spirits in delight
Beyond the bliss of dreams. Be wise, and taste. –
The Brothers rush in with swords drawn, wrest his glass out of his hand, and break it against the ground; his rout make sign of resistance, but are all driven in. The Attendant Spirit comes in
Spirit. What, have you let the false Enchanter 'scape?
Oh, ye mistook, ye should have snatched his Wand, And bound him fast; without his rod reversed,
And backward mutters of dissev'ring pow'r,
We cannot free the Lady that sits here
In stony fetters fixed, and motionless.
-Yet stay, be not disturbed. Now I bethink me,
1 An allusion to the ten-years contest between Zeus (Jupiter) and Chronos (Saturn) and his crew of Titans.
Some other means I have which may be used,
Which once of Melibœus1 old I learnt,
The soothest shepherd that e'er piped on plains.
There is a gentle Nymph not far from hence,
That with moist curb sways the smooth Severn
stream,
Sabrina is her name, a virgin pure ;
Whilom she was the daughter of Locrine,
That had the sceptre from his father Brute.2
She, guiltless damsel, flying the mad pursuit
Of her enraged stepdame Guendolen,
Commended her fair innocence to th' flood,
That stayed her flight with his cross-flowing course.
The Water-Nymphs, that in the bottom played,
Held up their pearlèd wrists, and took her in,
Bearing her straight to agèd Nereus' hall;
Who, piteous of her woes, reared her lank head,
And gave her to his daughters to imbathe
In nectared lavers, strewed with asphodel;
And through the porch and inlet of each sense
Dropped in ambrosial oils, till she revived,
And underwent a quick immortal change,
Made Goddess of the river: she still retains
Her maiden gentleness, and oft at eve
Visits the herds along the twilight meadows,
Helping all urchin blasts, and ill-luck signs
That the shrewd meddling elf delights to make,
Which she with precious vialed liquors heals ;
For which the shepherds at their festivals
Carol her goodness loud in rustic lays,
And throw sweet garland wreaths into her stream
1 One of the speakers in Virgil's first Eclogue; but it is possible that the reference is to Spenser, who had told the story of Sabrina in the "Faery Queene," Book ii. c. x.
A mythical King of Britain, and a supposed descendant of Æneas, the son of Anchises. Hence the reference later to Sabrina as 66 sprung of old Anchises' line."
Of pansies, pinks and gaudy daffodils.
And, as the old swain said, she can unlock
The clasping charm, and thaw the numbing spell,
If she be right invoked in warbled song :
For maidenhood she loves, and will be swift
To aid a virgin, such as was herself,
In hard-besetting need. This will I try,
And add the pow'r of some adjuring verse.
Listen where thou art sitting
Under the glassy, cool, translucent wave,
In twisted braids of lilies knitting
The loose train of thy amber-dropping hair;
Listen for dear honour's sake,
Goddess of the silver lake,
Listen, and save.
Listen, and appear to us,
In name of great Oceanus;
By the earth-shaking Neptune's mace,
And Tethys' grave majestic pace,
By hoary Nereus' wrinkled look,
And the Carpathian Wisard's hook,1
By scaly Triton's winding shell,
And old sooth-saying Glaucus' spell,
By Leucothea's lovely hands,
And her son that rules the strands,
By Thetis' tinsel-slippered feet,
And the songs of Syrens sweet,
By dead Parthenope's dear tomb,
And fair Ligea's golden comb,
Wherewith she sits on diamond rocks,
Sleeking her soft alluring locks;
Proteus, who lived in the island of Carpathus, between Crete and Rhodes.
By all the Nymphs that nightly dance
Upon thy streams with wily glance,
Rise, rise, and heave thy rosy head,
From thy coral-paven bed,
And bridle in thy headlong wave,
Till thou our summons answered have.
Sabrina rises, attended by water-nymphs, and sings
By the rushy-fringèd bank,
Where grows the willow, and the osier dank,
My sliding chariot stays,
Thick set with agate, and the azure sheen
Of turkis blue, and emerald green,
That in the channel strays;
Whilst from off the waters fleet
Thus I set my printless feet
O'er the cowslip's velvet head,
That bends not as I tread;
Gentle swain, at thy request,
I am here.
We implore thy pow'rful hand
To undo the charmed band
Of true virgin here distressed,
Through the force, and through the wile
Of unblest enchanter vile.
Sab. Shepherd, 'tis my office best
To help ensnared chastity :
Brightest Lady, look on me.
Thus I sprinkle on thy breast
Drops, that from my fountain pure
I have kept, of precious cure ;
Thrice upon thy finger's tip,
Thrice upon thy rubied lip:
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