And yet she is an easie book, Written in plain language for the meaner wit, A stately garb, and [yet] a gracious look, With all things justly fit. But age will undermine This glorious outside, that appeares so fine, When the common Lover Shrinks and gives her over, Then she’s onely mine.
To the Platonick that applies His clear addresses onely to the mind; The body but a Temple signifies, Wherein the Saints inshrin’d, To him it is all one, Whether the walls be marble, or rough stone; Nay, in holy places, which old time defaces, More devotion’s shown.
’Tis late and cold, stir up the fire, Sit close, and draw the table nigher, Be merry, and drink wine that’s old, A hearty medicine ’gainst the cold; Your bed[’s] of wanton down the best, Where you may tumble to your rest: I could well wish you wenches too, But I am dead, and cannot do. Call for the best, the house will ring, Sack, White and Claret, let them bring, And drink apace, whilst breath you have, You’l find but cold drinking in the grave; Partridge, Plover for your dinner, And a Capon for the sinner, You shall finde ready when you are up, And your horse shall have his sup. Welcome, welcome, shall flie round, And I shall smile, though under ground.
_You that delight in Trulls and Minions,_ _Come buy my four ropes of St. ~Omers~ Onions._
_And will this wicked world never prove good?_ 40
_Blacke eyes, in your dark orbs do lye_ 81
_Drink boyes, drink boyes, drink and doe not spare_ 42
_Fuller of wish, than hope, methinks it is_ 62
_He that a Tinker, a Tinker, a Tinker will be_ 52
_How happy’s that Prisoner that conquers, &c._ 93
_I never did hold, all that glisters is gold_ 85
_I tell you all, both great and small_ 68
_Let not, sweet saint, let not these eyes offend you_ 92
_One night the great ~Apollo~, pleas’d with ~Ben~_ 5
_’Tis late and cold, stir up the fire_ 100
_We read of Kings, and Gods that kindly took_ 83
_What ill luck had I, silly maid that I am_ 84
_When ~James~ in Scotland first began_ 70
Compounded of _Witty Ballads_, _Jovial Songs_, and _Merry Catches_.
_These witty Poems though some time [they] may seem to halt on crutches,_ _Yet they’l all merrily please you for your Charge, which not much is._
Printed by _Mer. Melancholicus_, to be sold in _London_ and _Westminster_, 1661.