| |
| WHOE’ER a lover is of art, | |
| May come and learn of me | |
| A new philosophy, | |
| Such as no schools could e’er impart. | |
| Love all my other notions does control, | 5 |
| And reads these stranger lectures to my soul. | |
| |
| This god who takes delight to lie, | |
| Does sacred truths defame, | |
| And Aristotle blame, | |
| Concluding all by subtilty: | 10 |
| His syllogisms with such art are made, | |
| Not Solomon himself could them evade. | |
| |
| So wondrous is his art and skill, | |
| His reasons pierce, like darts, | |
| Men’s intellects and hearts; | 15 |
| Old maxims he destroys at will, | |
| And blinded Plato so, he made him think, | |
| ’Twas water, when he gave him fire to drink. | |
| |
| That water can extinguish fire, | |
| All ages did allow; | 20 |
| But Love denies it now, | |
| And says it makes his flame rage higher; | |
| Which truth myself have prov’d for many years, | |
| Wherein I’ve wept whole deluges of tears. | |
| |
| At the sun’s rays, you, Cynthia, know, | 25 |
| The ice no more can melt, | |
| Nor can the fire be felt, | |
| Or have it wonted influence on snow: | |
| By your relentless heart is this exprest, | |
| Your eyes are suns, the fire is in my breast: | 30 |
| |
| When soul and body separate, | |
| That then the life must die: | |
| This too I must deny, | |
| My soul’s with her, who rules my fate. | |
| Yet still my organs move a proof to give, | 35 |
| That soul and body can divided live. | |
| |
| Remove the cause, the effects will cease. | |
| This is an error too, | |
| And found by me untrue; | |
| My fair when near disturbs my peace, | 40 |
| But when she’s furthest off, no tongue can tell | |
| The raging pangs of Love my heart does feel. | |
| |
| All creatures love not their own kind. | |
| I this new axiom try: | |
| And that all fear to die | 45 |
| By nature—a mistake I find: | |
| For I, a man, do a fierce creature love, | |
| And such, I know, that will my murd’ress prove. | |
| |
| Here two extremes are eas’ly join’d, | |
| Joy and grief in my breast, | 50 |
| Which give my soul no rest; | |
| Both to torment me are combin’d: | |
| For when I view the source of all my wrong, | |
| I sigh my music, mix with tears my song. | |
| |
| That all things like effects produce: | 55 |
| I readily can prove | |
| A paradox in Love, | |
| And my conclusion hence deduce; | |
| Cold Cynthia to my zeal yields no return, | |
| Though ice her heart she makes my heart to burn. | 60 |
| |
| Whilst in this torment I remain, | |
| It is no mystery | |
| To be, and not to be; | |
| I die to joy, and live to pain. | |
| So that, my fair, I may be justly said, | 65 |
| To be, and not to be, alive and dead. | |
| |
| Now, go, my song, yet shun the eyes | |
| Of those ne’er felt Love’s flame, | |
| And if my Cynthia blame | |
| Thy arguments as sopphistries, | 70 |
| Tell her, this is Love’s New Philosophy, | |
| Which none can understand, but such as try. | |
| |
