New-blown buds, all scents excelling,
As you pass by, invite your smelling.
Mark the glorious tulips rise
In various dress, to take your eyes,
And how the fairest and all the rest
Strive which shall triumph on your breast.
Thus your rich beauty and rare parts
Excel all flowers, exceed all arts.
Live then, sweet lady, to inherit
Your father's fortune, and his spirit,
Your mother's face and virtuous mind.[33]
Throughout this long poem, John Rea's warmth much exceeds that of the most romantic lovers. One of the latter only observes, that the flowers courted the tread of his fair one's foot; that the sky grew more beautiful in her presence, and that the atmosphere borrowed new splendour from her eyes. Rea's passion seems even warmer than this. In his address to the reader, he says, "I have continued my affection to this honest recreation, without companion or encouragement; and now in my old age, (wearied and weaned from other delights) find myself more happy in this retired solitude, than in all the bustles and busie employments of my passed days." He thus concludes his book:—
—— this is all I crave:
Some gentle hand with flowers may strew my grave,
And with one sprig of bays my herse befriend,
When as my life, as now my book, doth end.
Laus Deo.
Rea gives us also another very long poem, being that of "Flora to the Ladies," which he thus concludes:—
Silent as flow'rs may you in virtues grow,
Till rip'ning time shall make you fit to blow,
Then flourish long, and seeding leave behind
A numerous offspring of your dainty kind;
And when fate calls, have nothing to repent,
But die like flow'rs, virtuous and innocent.
Then all your fellow flow'rs, both fair and sweet,
Will come, with tears, to deck your winding-sheet;
Hang down their pensive heads so dew'd, and crave
To be transplanted to your perfum'd grave.