Here end my chains, and thraldom cease,
If not in joy, I'll live at least in peace;
Since for the pleasures of an hour,
We must endure an age of pain;
I'll be this abject thing no more,
Love, give me back my heart again.
Despair tormented first my breast,
Now falsehood, a more cruel guest;
O! for the peace of human kind,
Make women longer true, or sooner kind;
With justice, or with mercy reign,
O Love! or give me back my heart again.
—George Granville (Lord Lansdowne)
My Little Pretty One
My little pretty one!
My softly winning one!
Oh! thou'rt a merry one!
And playful as can be.
With a beck thou com'st anon;
In a trice, too, thou are gone,
And I must sigh alone,
But sighs are lost upon thee.
Art thou my smiling one,
Art thou my pouting one,
Art thou my teasing one,
A goddess, elf, or grace?
With a frown thou wound'st my heart,
With a smile thou heal'st the smart;
Why play the tyrant's part
With such an innocent face?
—Old Song
Song
Go, lovely Rose,
Tell her that wastes her time and me,
That now she knows
When I resemble her to thee,
How sweet and fair she seems to be.
Tell her that's young,
And shuns to have her graces spied,
That had'st thou sprung
In deserts where no men abide,
Thou must have uncommended died.
Small is the worth
Of beauty from the light retired;
Bid her come forth,
Suffer herself to be desired,
And not blush so to be admired.
—Edmund Waller