That cures one sickness with another,
This routs by wholesale altogether,
And drowns them in a flood.

This poets makes, else how could I
Thus ramble into poetry,

Nay, and write sonnets too?

If there's such power in junior wines,
To make one venture upon lines,
What could Canary do?

Then squeeze the vessel's bowels out,
And deal it faithfully about,—

Crown each hand with a brimmer:
Since we're to pass through this Red Sea,
Our noses fhall our pilots be,

And every soul a swimmer!

ALEXANDER BROME,

SONG.

THE SOLDIER GOING TO THE FIELD.

[1666?]

PRESERVE thy fighs, unthrifty girl,
To purify the air:

Thy tears to thread instead of pearl
On bracelets of thy hair.

The trumpet makes the echo hoarse,
And wakes the louder drum;
Expense of grief gains no remorse,

When sorrow should be dumb.

For I must go where lazy Peace
Will hide her drowsy head,
And, for the sport of kings, increase
The number of the dead!

But first I'll chide thy cruel theft.
Can I in war delight,
Who being of my heart bereft

Can have no heart to fight?

Thou know' the sacred laws of old
Ordained a thief fhould pay,
To quit him of his theft, seven-fold
What he had stolen away.

Thy payment shall but double be:
O then with speed refign
My own seduced heart to me,

Accompanied with thine.

SIR WILLIAM DAVENANT.

SONG.

[1666]

THE lark now leaves his watery nest,
And climbing Shakes his dewy wings;
He takes this window for the East,
And to implore your light he fings.
Awake, awake, the morn will never rise
Till he can dress her beauty at your eyes.

The merchant bows unto the seaman's star,
The ploughman from the sun his season takes;
But ftill the lover wonders what they are,

Who look for day before his mistress wakes. Awake, awake, break through your veils of lawn, Then draw your curtains, and begin the dawn.

SIR WILLIAM DAVENANT.

TO CHLORIS.

[1670?]

FAREWELL, my sweet, until I come,
Improved in merit, for thy sake,
With characters of honour home,
Such as thou canst not then but take.

To loyalty my love must bow,

My honour too calls to the field,
Where, for a lady's bufk, I now

Muft keen and sturdy iron wield.

Yet, when I rush into those arms,
Where death and danger do combine,

I fhall less subject be to harms,
Than to those killing eyes of thine.

Since I could live in thy disdain,
Thou art so far become my Fate,
That I by nothing can be flain,
Until thy sentence speaks my date.

But if I seem to fall in war,
T'excuse the murder you commit,
Be to my memory just, so far

As in thy heart t' acknowledge it.

That's all I afk; which thou must give
To him, that, dying, takes a pride
It is for thee, and would not live,
Sole Prince of all the world befide.

SONG.

CHARLES COTTON.

[1670?]

I.

PHILLIS, men say that all my vows

Are to thy fortune paid;
Alas! my heart he little knows

Who thinks my love a trade.

II.

Were I of all these woods the lord,
One berry from thy hand
More real pleasure would afford
Than all my large command.

III.

My humble love has learned to live
On what the nicest maid,

Without a conscious blush, may give

Beneath the myrtle-shade.

SIR CHARLES SEDLEY.

SONG.

[1670?]

NOT, Celia, that I jufter am,

Or better than the reft,

For I would change each hour like them,
Were not my heart at reft.

But I am tied to very thee,
By every thought I have;
Thy face I only care to see,
Thy heart I only crave.

All that in roman is adored
In thy dear self I find;

For the whole sex can but afford
The handsome, and the kind.

Why then should I seek farther store,
And ftill make love anew?

When change itself can give no more,
'Tis easy to be true.

SIR CHARLES SEDLEY.

OUT OF LYCOPHRON.

[1670?]

WHAT fhall become of Man so wise,
When he dies?

None can tell

Whether he goes to Heaven or Hell: