Good form there is, years apt to play together:
Unmeet is beauty without use to wither.
She may deceive thee, though thou her protect;
What two determine never wants effect.
Our prayers move thee to assist our drift,
While thou hast time yet to bestow that gift.

FOOTNOTES:

[248] Not in Isham copy or ed. A.

ELEGIA IV.

Quod amet mulieres, cujuscunque formae sint.

I mean not to defend the scapes[249] of any,
Or justify my vices being many;
For I confess, if that might merit favour,
Here I display my lewd and loose behaviour.
I loathe, yet after that I loathe I run:
Oh, how the burthen irks, that we should[250] shun.
I cannot rule myself but where Love please;
Am[251] driven like a ship upon rough seas.
No one face likes me best, all faces move,
A hundred reasons make me ever love. 10
If any eye me with a modest look,
I burn,[252] and by that blushful glance am took;
And she that's coy I like, for being no clown,
Methinks she would be nimble when she's down.
Though her sour looks a Sabine's brow resemble,
I think she'll do, but deeply can dissemble.
If she be learned, then for her skill I crave her;
If not, because she's simple I would have her.
Before Callimachus one prefers me far;
Seeing she likes my books, why should we jar? 20
Another rails at me, and that I write,
Yet would I lie with her, if that I might:
Trips she, it likes me well; plods she, what than[253]?
She would be nimbler lying with a man.
And when one sweetly sings, then straight I long,
To quaver on her lips even in her song;
Or if one touch the lute with art and cunning,
Who would not love those hands[254] for their swift running?
And her I like that with a majesty,
Folds up her arms, and makes low courtesy. 30
To[255] leave myself, that am in love with all,
Some one of these might make the chastest fall.
If she be tall, she's like an Amazon,
And therefore fills the bed she lies upon:
If short, she lies the rounder: to speak[256] troth,
Both short and long please me, for I love both.
I[257] think what one undecked would be, being drest;
Is she attired? then show her graces best.
A white wench thralls me, so doth golden yellow:
And nut-brown girls in doing have no fellow.