"I will take thy scorpion blood,
And lay it to my grief till I have ease."—"Anna Bullen."
[148] Our author, who everywhere shows his great penetration into human nature, here outdoes himself: where a less judicious poet would have raised a long scene of whining love, he, who understood the passions better, and that so violent an affection as this must be too big for utterance, chooses rather to send his characters off in this sullen and doleful manner, in which admirable conduct he is imitated by the author of the justly celebrated Eurydice. Dr. Young seems to point at this violence of passion:
"Passion chokes
Their words, and they're the statues of despair."
And Seneca tells us, "Curæ leves loquuntur, ingentes stupent." The story of the Egyptian king in Herodotus is too well known to need to be inserted; I refer the more curious reader to the excellent Montaigne, who hath written an essay on this subject.
"To part is death.
'Tis death to part.