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Softly on my eyelids laid.

And as I wake, sweet music breathe
Above, about, or underneath,
Sent by some Spirit to mortals good,
Or th' unseen Genius of the wood.
But let my due feet never fail
To walk the studious cloisters pale,
And love the high embowed roof,
With antic pillars massy proof,
And storied windows richly dight,
Casting a dim religious light:
There let the pealing organ blow,
To the full voic'd quire below,

In service high, and anthems clear,

As

may with sweetness, through mine ear, Dissolve me into ecstasies,

And bring all heav'n before mine eyes.

And may at last

my weary age
Find out the peaceful hermitage,
The hairy gown and mossy cell,
Where I may sit and rightly spell
Of
every star that heav'n doth show,
And every herb that sips the dew;
Till old experience do attain
To something like prophetic strain.
These pleasures Melancholy give,
And I with thee will choose to live.

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156 pale] Warton conjectures that the right reading may be 'the studious cloister's pale.' i. e. enclosure.

L'ALLEGRO.

HENCE, loathed Melancholy,

Of Cerberus and blackest Midnight born, In Stygian cave forlorn,

'Mongst horrid shapes, and shrieks, and sights Find out some uncouth cell,

[unholy, Where brooding Darkness spreads his jealous And the night raven sings;

[wings, There under ebon shades, and low-brow'd rocks,

As ragged as thy locks,

In dark Cimmerian desert ever dwell.
But come thou Goddess fair and free,
In heav'n y-clep'd Euphrosyne,
And by Men, heart-easing Mirth,
Whom lovely Venus at a birth
With two sister Graces more,
To ivy-crowned Bacchus bore;
Or whether (as some sager sing)
The frolic wind that breathes the spring,

10

15

Hence] Compare Marston's Scourge of Villanie, b. iii. s. 10. (ed. 1598.) 'Sleepe grim reproof,' &c. Warton. uncouth] 'Searcht out the uncouth cell of thy abode.' Val. Welshman, 1615, act iv. s. 6. Todd.

5

10 Cimmerian] Miltoni Prolus. Dignus qui Cimmeriis occlusus tenebris longam, et perosam vitam transigat.' Warton. 15 two] Meat and Drink, the two sisters of Mirth. War

burton.

Zephyr with Aurora playing,
As he met her once a Maying;
There on beds of violets blue,

And fresh-blown roses wash'd in dew,
Fill'd her with thee a daughter fair,

So buxom, blithe, and debonair.

Haste thee, Nymph, and bring with thee Jest, and youthful Jollity,

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25

Quips, and Cranks, and wanton Wiles,
Nods, and Becks, and wreathed Smiles,
Such as hang on Hebe's cheek,

And love to live in dimple sleek;
Sport that wrinkled Care derides,
And Laughter holding both his sides.
Come, and trip it as you go,
On the light fantastic toe;

And in thy right hand lead with thee
The mountain nymph, sweet Liberty;
And if I give thee honour due,
Mirth, admit me of thy crew,

To live with her, and live with thee,

22 wash'd] Shakesp. Tam. of Shrew, act ii. sc. 1. 'As morning roses newly wash'd with dew.'

Bowle.

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24 buxom] To make one blithe, buxome, and deboneer. Randolph Aristippus, p. 310, ed. 1662. Todd.

28 Nods] With becks, and nods, and smiles againe.' Burton's An. of Melanch. p. 449 (ed. 1628). Warton.

93 Come] Shakes. Tempest, act iv. sc. 2.

Come and go,

Each one tripping on his toe.' Newton.

In unreproved pleasures free ;
To hear the lark begin his flight,
And singing startle the dull night,
From his watch-tow'r in the skies,
Till the dappled dawn doth rise;
Then to come in spite of sorrow,
And at my window bid good morrow,
Through the sweet-briar, or the vine,
Or the twisted eglantine:
While the cock with lively din

Scatters the rear of darkness thin,
And to the stack, or the barn-door,
Stoutly struts his dames before:

Oft list'ning how the hounds and horn
Cheerly rouse the slumb'ring morn,
From the side of some hoar hill,

Through the high wood echoing shrill:
Some time walking, not unseen,
By hedge-row elms, on hillocks green,
Right against the eastern gate,

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46 good morrow] Browne's Brit. Past. iii. 2.

Steevens.

'Twice bid good morrow to the nether world.'

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50 Scatters] Gallum noctem explodentibus alis.' Lucret.

iv. 714.

54 morn] Habington's Castora, p. 8, ed. 1640.

rouse the morne,

With the shrill musicke of the horne.' Warton.

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Where the great sun begins his state,
Rob'd in flames, and amber light,
The clouds in thousand liveries dight;
While the ploughman near at hand
Whistles o'er the furrow'd land,
And the milkmaid singeth blithe,
And the mower whets his scythe,
And every shepherd tells his tale
Under the hawthorn in the dale.

Straight mine eye hath caught new pleasures

Russet lawns, and fallows gray,

Whilst the landscape round it measures;

Where the nibbling flocks do stray,

Mountains, on whose barren breast

The lab'ring clouds do often rest;
Meadows trim with daisies pied,
Shallow brooks, and rivers wide.
Towers and battlements it sees
Bosom'd high in tufted trees,
Where perhaps some Beauty lies,
The Cynosure of neighb'ring eyes.
Hard by, a cottage chimney smokes,
From betwixt two aged oaks,
Where Corydon and Thyrsis met,
Are at their savoury dinner set

Of herbs, and other country messes,

35 messes] Sylv. Du Bartas, p. 171.

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That now taste-curious wanton Plenty dresses.'

Wurton.

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