HUMANE LOVE

L'AMOR che move il sole e l'altre stelle.

DANTE

As ye came from the holy land

Of Walsinghame,

Met you not with my true love
By the way as you came?

Old Ballad

THE goodly gate swung oft with many gods
Going and coming, and the spice-winds blew
Music and murmurings, and paradise
Well'd over and enrich'd the outer wild.

DOBELL

ALL thoughts, all passions, all delights,
Whatever stirs this mortal frame,

All are but ministers of Love

And feed his sacred flame.

COLERIDGE

IT was a lover and his lass,

With a hey, and a ho, and a hey nonino.

SHAKESPEARE

The Invocation

LYRIC Love, half angel and half bird
And all a wonder and a wild desire,—
Boldest of hearts that ever braved the sun,
Took sanctuary within the holiest blue,
And sang a kindred soul out to his face,—
Yet human at the red-ripe of the heart—
When the first summons from the darkling earth
Reach'd thee amid thy chambers, blanch'd their blue,
And bared them of the glory-to drop down,
To toil for man, to suffer or to die,-

This is the same voice: can thy soul know change?
Hail them, and hearken from the realms of help!
Never may I commence my song, my due
To God who best taught song by gift of thee,
Except with bent head and beseeching hand—
That still, despite the distance and the dark,
What was, again may be; some interchange
Of grace, some splendour once thy very thought,
Some benediction anciently thy smile:

-Never conclude, but raising hand and head
Thither where eyes, that cannot reach, yet yearn
For all hope, all sustainment, all reward,

Their utmost up and on,—so blessing back

In those thy realms of help, that heaven thy home, Some whiteness which, I judge, thy face makes proud, Some wanness where, I think, thy foot may fall!

ROBERT BROWNING

WOOING SONG

Wooing Song

LOVE is the blossom where there blows Every thing that lives or grows:

Love doth make the Heav'ns to move,

And the Sun doth burn in love:

Love the strong and weak doth yoke,
And makes the ivy climb the oak,
Under whose shadows lions wild,
Soften'd by love, grow tame and mild:
Love no med'cine can appease,

He burns the fishes in the seas:

Not all the skill his wounds can stench,
Not all the sea his fire can quench.
Love did make the bloody spear
Once a leavy coat to wear,

While in his leaves there shrouded lay
Sweet birds, for love that sing and play.
And of all love's joyful flame

I the bud and blossom am.

Only bend thy knee to me,

Thy wooing shall thy winning be!

See, see the flowers that below
Now as fresh as morning blow;
And of all the virgin rose
That as bright Aurora shows;
How they all unleavèd die,
Losing their virginity!

SILVIA

Like unto a summer shade,

But now born, and now they fade.
Every thing doth pass away;
There is danger in delay:
Come, come, gather then the rose,
Gather it, or it you lose!
All the sand of Tagus' shore
Into my bosom casts his ore:
All the valleys' swimming corn
To my house is yearly borne:
Every grape of every vine

Is gladly bruised to make me wine:
While ten thousand kings, as proud,
To carry up my train have bow'd,
And a world of ladies send me
In my chambers to attend me:
All the stars in Heav'n that shine,
And ten thousand more, are mine:
Only bend thy knee to me,
Thy wooing shall thy winning be!

GILES FLETCHER

Silvia

HO is Silvia? What is she?

WH

That all our swains commend her? Holy, fair, and wise is she;

The heaven such grace did lend her, That she might admired be.