KING EDWARD.
This fellow is well read in poetry,
And hath a lusty and persuasive spirit;
I will acquaint him with my passion,
Which he shall shadow with a veil of lawn,
Through which the Queen of beauties Queen shall see
Her self the ground of my infirmity.
[Enter Lodowick.]
KING EDWARD. hast thou pen, ink, and paper ready, Lodowick?
LODOWICK.
Ready, my liege.
KING EDWARD.
Then in the summer arbor sit by me,
Make it our counsel house or cabinet:
Since green our thoughts, green be the conventicle,
Where we will ease us by disburdening them.
Now, Lodowick, invocate some golden Muse,
To bring thee hither an enchanted pen,
That may for sighs set down true sighs indeed,
Talking of grief, to make thee ready groan;
And when thou writest of tears, encouch the word
Before and after with such sweet laments,
That it may raise drops in a Tartar’s eye,
And make a flintheart Scythian pitiful;
For so much moving hath a Poet’s pen:
Then, if thou be a Poet, move thou so,
And be enriched by thy sovereign’s love.
For, if the touch of sweet concordant strings
Could force attendance in the ears of hell,
How much more shall the strains of poets’ wit
Beguile and ravish soft and humane minds?
LODOWICK.
To whom, my Lord, shall I direct my stile?
KING EDWARD.
To one that shames the fair and sots the wise;
Whose bod is an abstract or a brief,
Contains each general virtue in the world.
Better than beautiful thou must begin,
Devise for fair a fairer word than fair,
And every ornament that thou wouldest praise,
Fly it a pitch above the soar of praise.
For flattery fear thou not to be convicted;
For, were thy admiration ten times more,
Ten times ten thousand more the worth exceeds
Of that thou art to praise, thy praises worth.
Begin; I will to contemplate the while:
Forget not to set down, how passionate,
How heart sick, and how full of languishment,
Her beauty makes me.
LODOWICK.
Write I to a woman?
KING EDWARD.
What beauty else could triumph over me,
Or who but women do our love lays greet?
What, thinkest thou I did bid thee praise a horse?
LODOWICK.
Of what condition or estate she is,
Twere requisite that I should know, my Lord.