Wit, seeking Truth, from cause to cause ascends,
And neuer rests, till it the first attaine:
Will, seeking Good, finds many middle ends,
But neuer stayes, till it the last doe gaine.
Now God, the Truth, and First of Causes is:
God is the Last Good End, which lasteth still;
Being Alpha and Omega nam'd for this;
Alpha to Wit, Omega to the Will.
Sith[145] then her heauenly kind shee doth bewray,
In that to God she doth directly moue;
And on no mortall thing can make her stay,
She cannot be from hence, but from aboue.
And yet this First True Cause, and Last Good End,
Shee cannot heere so well, and truely see;
For this perfection shee must yet attend,
Till to her Maker shee espousèd bee.
As a king's daughter, being in person sought
Of diuers princes, who doe neighbour neere;
On none of them can fixe a constant thought,
Though shee to all doe lend a gentle eare:
Yet she can loue a forraine emperour,
Whom of great worth and power she heares to be;
If she be woo'd but by embassadour,
Or but his letters, or his pictures see:
For well she knowes, that when she shalbe brought
Into the kingdome where her Spouse doth raigne;
Her eyes shall see what she conceiu'd in thought,
Himselfe, his state, his glory, and his traine.
So while the virgin Soule on Earth doth stay,
She woo'd and tempted is ten thousand wayes,
By these great powers, which on the Earth beare sway;
The wisdom of the World, wealth, pleasure, praise:
With these sometime she doth her time beguile,
These doe by fits her Fantasie possesse;
But she distastes them all within a while,
And in the sweetest finds a tediousnesse.
But if upon the World's Almighty King
She once doe fixe her humble louing thought;
Who by His picture, drawne in euery thing,
And sacred messages, her loue hath sought;