"Never season was more fit:
Never room more apt for it.
Smiling air allows my reason;
These birds sing: now use the season!"
"This small wind which so sweet is,
See how it the leaves doth kiss!
Each tree in his best attiring,
Sense of love to love inspiring."
"Love makes earth, the water drink;
Love to earth makes water sink:
And if dumb things be so witty,
Shall a heavenly grace want pity?"
There his hands in their speech, fain
Would have made tongue's language plain:
But her hands, his hands repelling,
Gave repulse, all grace excelling.
[The eight following stanzas are omitted in NEWMAN'S Quartos of 1591.]
Then she spake, her speech was such,
As not ears, but heart did touch;
While such wise she love denied,
As yet love she signified.
"ASTROPHEL!" said she, "my love!
Cease in these effects to prove.
Now be still! yet still believe me,
Thy grief more than death would grieve me."
"If that any thought in me,
Can taste comfort but of thee;
Let me fed with hellish anguish,
Joyless, hopeless, endless languish."
