When flowing cups run swiftly round With no allaying Thames, Our careless heads with roses crowned, Our hearts with loyal flames; When thirsty grief in wine we steep, When healths and draughts go free, Fishes that tipple in the deep Know no such liberty.
When, linnet-like confinèd, I With shriller throat shall sing The sweetness, mercy, majesty, And glories of my King; When I shall voice aloud how good He is, how great should be, Enlargèd winds that curl the flood Know no such liberty.
Stone walls do not a prison make, Nor iron bars a cage; Minds innocent and quiet take That for an hermitage: If I have freedom in my love And in my soul am free, Angels alone that soar above Enjoy such liberty.
Lovelace.
[XXI]
TWO KINGS
The forward youth that would appear Must now forsake his Muses dear, Nor in the shadows sing His numbers languishing.
'Tis time to leave the books in dust, And oil the unusèd armour's rust, Removing from the wall The corselet of the hall.
So restless Cromwell could not cease In the inglorious arts of peace, But through adventurous war Urgèd his active star;
And, like the three-forked lightning, first Breaking the clouds where it was nurst, Did thorough his own side His fiery way divide;
For 'tis all one to courage high, The emulous or enemy, And with such to inclose Is more than to oppose;