WIT.
Nature, my sovereign queen and parent passing dear,
Whose force I am enforced to know and 'knowledge everywhere,
This care of mine, though it be bred within my breast,
Yet it is not so ripe as yet to breed me great unrest,
So run I to and fro with hap luck as I find,
Now fast, now loose: now hot, now cold: inconstant as the wind,
I feel myself in love, yet not inflamed so,
But causes move me now and then to let such fancies go,
Which causes prevailing sets each thing else in doubt
Much like the nail, that last came in, and drives the former out.
Wherefore my suit is this: that it would please your grace
To settle this unsettled head in some assured place:
To lead me through the thick, to guide me all the way,
To point me where I may achieve my most desired pray,
For now again of late I kindle in desire,
And pleasure pricketh forth my youth to feel a greater fire.
What though I be too young to show her sport in bed,
Yet are there many in this land that at my years do wed,
And though I wed not yet, yet am I old enou'
To serve my lady to my power, and to begin to woo.
NATURE.
What is that lady, son, which thus thy heart doth move?
WIT.
A lady, whom it might beseem high Jove himself to love.
NATURE.
Who taught thee her to love, or hast thou seen her face?
WIT.
Nor this nor that, but I heard men talk of her apace.
NATURE.
What is her name?
WIT.
Reason is her sire, Experience her dame,
The lady now is in her flower, and Science is her name.
Lo, where she dwells; lo, where my heart is all possest;
Lo, where my body would abide; lo, where my soul doth rest.
Her have I borne good-will these many years tofore,
But now she lodgeth in my thought a hundred parts the more,
And since I do persuade myself that this is she,
Which ought above all earthly wights to be most dear to me;
And since I wot not how to compass my desire,
And since for shame I cannot now nor mind not to retire,
Help on, I you beseech, and bring this thing about
Without your hurt to my great ease, and set all out of doubt.
NATURE.
Thou askest more than is in me to give,
More than thy cause, more than thy state, will bear,
They are two things to able thee to live,
And to live so, that none should be thy peer,
The first from me proceedeth everywhere;
But this by toil and practice of the mind,
Is set full far, God wot, and bought full dear,
By those that seek the fruit thereof to find,
To match thee then with Science in degree,
To knit that knot that few may reach unto,
I tell thee plain, it lieth not in me.
Why should I challenge that I cannot do?
But thou must take another way to woo,
And beat thy brain, and bend thy curious head,
Both ride and run, and travel to and fro,
If thou intend that famous dame to wed.
WIT.
You name yourself the lady of this world.
NATURE.
It is true.