| |
THUS, therefore, he who feels the fiery dart | |
| Of strong desire transfix his amorous heart, | |
| Whether some beauteous boy’s alluring face, | |
| Or lovelier maid, with unresisting grace, | |
| From her each part the winged arrow sends, | 5 |
| From whence he first was struck he thither tends; | |
| Restless he roams, impatient to be freed, | |
| And eager to inject the sprightly seed; | |
| For fierce desire does all his mind employ, | |
| And ardent love assures approaching joy. | 10 |
| Such is the nature of that pleasing smart, | |
| Whose burning drops distil upon the heart, | |
| The fever of the soul shot from the fair, | |
| And the cold ague of succeeding care. | |
| If absent, her idea still appears, | 15 |
| And her sweet name is chiming in your ears. | |
| But strive those pleasing phantoms to remove, | |
| And shun the aerial images of love, | |
| That feed the flame; when one molests thy mind, | |
| Discharge thy loins on all the leaky kind; | 20 |
| For that’s a wiser way than to restrain | |
| Within thy swelling nerves that hoard of pain. | |
| For every hour some deadlier symptom shows, | |
| And by delay the gathering venom grows, | |
| When kindly applications are not used; | 25 |
| The viper, love, must on the wound be bruised: | |
| On that one object ’tis not safe to stay, | |
| But force the tide of thought some other way: | |
| The squandered spirits prodigally throw, | |
| And in the common globe of nature sow. | 30 |
| Nor wants he all the bliss that lovers feign, | |
| Who takes the pleasure, and avoids the pain; | |
| For purer joys in purer health abound, | |
| And less affect the sickly than the sound. | |
| When love its utmost vigor does employ, | 35 |
| Even then ’tis but a restless wandering joy: | |
| Nor knows the lover in that wild excess, | |
| With hands or eyes, what first he would possess: | |
| But strains at all, and, fast’ning where he strains, | |
| Too closely presses with his frantic pains; | 40 |
| With biting kisses hurts the twining fair, | |
| Which shows his joys imperfect, insincere: | |
| For, stung with inward rage, he flings around, | |
| And strives to avenge the smart on that which gave the wound. | |
| But love those eager bitings does restrain, | 45 |
| And mingling pleasure mollifies the pain. | |
| For ardent hope still flatters anxious grief, | |
| And sends him to his foe to seek relief: | |
| Which yet the nature of the thing denies; | |
| For love, and love alone of all our joys, | 50 |
| By full possession does but fan the fire; | |
| The more we still enjoy, the more we still desire. | |
| Nature for meat and drink provides a space, | |
| And, when received, they fill their certain place: | |
| Hence thirst and hunger may be satisfied; | 55 |
| But this repletion is to love denied: | |
| Form, feature, colour, whatsoe’er delight | |
| Provokes the lover’s endless appetite, | |
| These fill no space, nor can we thence remove | |
| With lips, or hands, or all our instruments of love: | 60 |
| In our deluded grasp we nothing find, | |
| But thin aerial shapes, that fleet before the mind. | |
| As he, who in a dream with drought is curst, | |
| And finds no real drink to quench his thirst; | |
| Runs to imagined lakes his heat to steep, | 65 |
| And vainly swills and labors in his sleep; | |
| So love with phantoms cheats our longing eyes, | |
| Which hourly seeing never satisfies: | |
| Our hands pull nothing from the parts they strain, | |
| But wander o’er the lovely limbs in vain: | 70 |
| Nor when the youthful pair more closely join, | |
| When hands in hands they lock, and thighs in thighs they twine, | |
| Just in the raging foam of full desire, | |
| When both press on, both murmur, both expire, | |
| They grip, they squeeze, their humid tongues they dart, | 75 |
| As each would force their way to t’other’s heart: | |
| In vain; they only cruise about the coast; | |
| For bodies cannot pierce, nor be in bodies lost; | |
| As sure they strive to be, when both engage | |
| In that tumultuous momentary rage; | 80 |
| So ’tangled in the nets of love they lie, | |
| Till man dissolves in that excess of joy. | |
| Then, when the gathered bag has burst its way, | |
| And ebbing tides the slackened nerves betray, | |
| A pause ensues; and nature nods awhile, | 85 |
| Till with recruited rage new spirits boil; | |
| And then the same vain violence returns; | |
| With flames renewed the erected furnace burns. | |
| Again they in each other would be lost, | |
| But still by adamantine bars are crossed. | 90 |
| All ways they try, successless all they prove, | |
| To cure the secret sore of ling’ring love. | |
| Besides—— | |
| They waste their strength in the venereal strife, | |
| And to a woman’s will enslave their life; | 95 |
| The estate runs out, and mortgages are made; | |
| All offices of friendship are decayed; | |
| Their fortune ruined, and their fame betrayed. | |
| Assyrian ointment from their temples flows, | |
| And diamond buckles sparkle at their shoes. | 100 |
| The cheerful emerald twinkles on their hands, | |
| With all the luxury of foreign lands: | |
| And the blue coat, that with embroid’ry shines, | |
| Is drunk with sweat of their o’er-labored loins. | |
| Their frugal fathers’ gains they misemploy, | 105 |
| And turn to paint, and pearl, and ev’ry female toy. | |
| French fashions, costly treats are their delight; | |
| The park by day, and plays and balls by night. | |
| In vain:—— | |
| For in the fountain, where their sweets are sought, | 110 |
| Some bitter bubbles up, and poisons all the draught. | |
| First, guilty Conscience does the mirror bring, | |
| Then sharp Remorse shoots out her angry sting; | |
| And anxious thoughts, within themselves at strife, | |
| Upbraid the long misspent, luxurious life. | 115 |
| Perhaps, the fickle fair one proves unkind, | |
| Or drops a doubtful word, that pains his mind, | |
| And leaves a rankling jealousy behind. | |
| Perhaps, he watches close her amorous eyes, | |
| And in the act of ogling does surprise; | 120 |
| And thinks he sees upon her cheeks the while | |
| The dimpled tracks of some foregoing smile; | |
| His raging pulse beats thick, and his pent spirits boil. | |
| This is the product e’en of prosp’rous love: | |
| Think then what pangs disastrous passions prove! | 125 |
| Innumerable ills; disdain, despair, | |
| With all the meager family of care. | |
| Thus, as I said, ’tis better to prevent, | |
| Than flatter the disease, and late repent: | |
| Because to shun the allurement is not hard | 130 |
| To minds resolved, forewarned, and well prepared; | |
| But wondrous difficult, when once beset, | |
| To struggle through the straits, and break the involving net. | |
| Yet, thus ensnared, thy freedom thou may’st gain, | |
| If, like a fool, thou dost not hug thy chain; | 135 |
| If not to ruin obstinately blind, | |
| And wilfully endeavoring not to find | |
| Her plain defects of body and of mind. | |
| For thus the Bedlam train of lovers use | |
| T’ enhance the value, and the faults excuse; | 140 |
| And therefore ’tis no wonder if we see | |
| They doat on dowdies and deformity; | |
| E’en what they cannot praise, they will not blame, | |
| But veil with some extenuating name: | |
| The sallow skin is for the swarthy put, | 145 |
| And love can make a slattern of a slut. | |
| If cat-eyed, then a Pallas is their love; | |
| If freckled, she’s a party-coloured dove; | |
| If little, then she’s life and soul all o’er: | |
| An Amazon, the large two-handed whore. | 150 |
| She stammers; oh what grace in lisping lies! | |
| If she says nothing, to be sure she’s wise. | |
| If shrill, and with a voice to drown a choir, | |
| Sharp-witted she must be, and full of fire. | |
| The lean, consumptive wench, with coughs decayed, | 155 |
| Is called a pretty, tight, and slender maid. | |
| The o’ergrown, a goodly Ceres is exprest, | |
| A bed-fellow for Bacchus at the least. | |
| Flat-nose the name of Satyr never misses, | |
| And hanging blobber lips but pout for kisses. | 160 |
| The task were endless all the rest to trace: | |
| Yet grant she were a Venus for her face | |
| And shape, yet others equal beauty share; | |
| And time was you could live without the fair; | |
| She does no more, in that for which you woo, | 165 |
| Then homelier women full as well can do. | |
| Besides, she daubs; and stinks so much of paint, | |
| Her own attendants cannot bear the scent, | |
| But laugh behind, and bite their lips to hold; | |
| Meantime, excluded, and exposed to cold, | 170 |
| The whining lover stands before the gates, | |
| And there with humble adoration waits: | |
| Crowning with flowers the threshold and the floor, | |
| And printing kisses on the obdurate door: | |
| Who, if admitted in that nick of time, | 175 |
| If some unsav’ry whiff betray the crime, | |
| Invents a quarrel straight, if there be none, | |
| Or makes some faint excuses to be gone; | |
| And calls himself a doting fool to serve, | |
| Ascribing more than woman can deserve. | 180 |
| Which well they understand like cunning queens; | |
| And hide their nastiness behind the scenes, | |
| From him they have allured, and would retain; | |
| But to a piercing eye ’tis all in vain: | |
| For common sense brings all their cheats to view, | 185 |
| And the false light discovers by the true; | |
| Which a wise harlot owns, and hopes to find | |
| A pardon for defects, that run thro’ all the kind. | |
| Nor always do they feign the sweets of love, | |
| When round the panting youth their pliant limbs they move, | 190 |
| And cling, and heave, and moisten ev’ry kiss; | |
| They often share, and more than share the bliss: | |
| From every part ev’n to their inmost soul, | |
| They feel the trickling joys, and run with vigor to the goal. | |
| Stirred with the same impetuous desire, | 195 |
| Birds, beasts, and herds, and mares, their males require: | |
| Because the throbbing nature in their veins | |
| Provokes them to assuage their kindly pains. | |
| The lusty leap the expecting female stands, | |
| By mutual heat compelled to mutual bands. | 200 |
| Thus dogs with lolling tongues by love are tied; | |
| Nor shouting boys nor blows their union can divide: | |
| At either end they strive the link to loose; | |
| In vain, for stronger Venus holds the noose. | |
| Which never would those wretched lovers do, | 205 |
| But that the common heats of love they know; | |
| The pleasure therefore must be shared in common too: | |
| And when the woman’s more prevailing juice | |
| Sucks in the man’s, the mixture will produce | |
| The mother’s likeness; when the man prevails, | 210 |
| His own resemblance in the seed he seals, | |
| But when we see the new-begotten race | |
| Reflect the features of each parents’ face, | |
| Then of the father’s and the mother’s blood | |
| The justly tempered seed is understood: | 215 |
| When both conspire, with equal ardor bent, | |
| From every limb the due proportion sent, | |
| When neither party foils, when neither foiled, | |
| This gives the blended features of the child. | |
| Sometimes the boy the grandsire’s image bears; | 220 |
| Sometimes the more remote progenitor he shares; | |
| Because the genial atoms of the seed | |
| Lie long concealed ere they exert the breed; | |
| And, after sundry ages past, produce | |
| The tardy likeness of the latent juice. | 225 |
| Hence, families such different figures take, | |
| And represent their ancestors in face, and hair, and make; | |
| Because of the same seed, the voice, and hair, | |
| And shape, and face, and other members are, | |
| And the same antique mold the likeness does prepare. | 230 |
| Thus oft the father’s likeness does prevail | |
| In females, and the mother’s in the male; | |
| For, since the seed is of a double kind, | |
| From that where we the most resemblance find, | |
| We may conclude the strongest tincture sent, | 235 |
| And that was in conception prevalent. | |
| Nor can the vain decrees of powers above | |
| Deny production to the act of love, | |
| Or hinder fathers of that happy name, | |
| Or with a barren womb the matron shame; | 240 |
| As many think, who stain with victims’ blood | |
| The mournful altars, and with incense load, | |
| To bless the show’ry seed with future life, | |
| And to impregnate the well-laboured wife. | |
| In vain they weary Heaven with prayer, or fly | 245 |
| To oracles, or magic numbers try: | |
| For barrenness of sexes will proceed | |
| Either from too condensed or wat’ry seed: | |
| The wat’ry juice too soon dissolves away, | |
| And in the parts projected will not stay: | 250 |
| The too condensed, unsouled, unwieldy mass, | |
| Drops short, nor carries to the destined place; | |
| Nor pierces to the parts, nor, tho’ injected home, | |
| Will mingle with the kindly moisture of the womb. | |
| For nuptials are alike in their success: | 255 |
| Some men with fruitful seed some women bless; | |
| And from some men some women fruitful are; | |
| Just as their constitutions join or jar: | |
| And many seeming barren wives have been, | |
| Who after, matched with more prolific men, | 260 |
| Have filled a family with prattling boys: | |
| And many, not supplied at home with joys, | |
| Have found a friend abroad, to ease their smart, | |
| And to perform the sapless husbands’ part. | |
| So much it does import that seed with seed | 265 |
| Should of the kindly mixture make the breed; | |
| And thick with thin, and thin with thick should join, | |
| So to produce and propagate the line. | |
| Of such concernment too is drink and food, | |
| To incrassate, to attenuate the blood. | 270 |
| Of like importance is the posture too, | |
| In which the genial feat of love we do: | |
| For, as the females of the four-foot kind | |
| Receive the leapings of their males behind; | |
| So the good wives, with loins uplifted high, | 275 |
| And leaning on their hands, the fruitful stroke may try: | |
| For in that posture will they best conceive: | |
| Not when, supinely laid, they frisk and heave: | |
| For active motions only break the blow: | |
| And more of strumpets than of wives they show; | 280 |
| When, answering stroke with stroke, the mingled liquors flow; | |
| Endearments eager, and too brisk a bound | |
| Throws off the plowshare from the furrowed ground. | |
| But common harlots in conjunction heave | |
| Because ’tis less their business to conceive | 285 |
| Than to delight, and to provoke the deed; | |
| A trick which honest wives but little need. | |
| Now is it from the gods, or Cupid’s dart, | |
| That many a homely woman takes the heart, | |
| But wives well-humored, dutiful, and chaste, | 290 |
| And clean, will hold their wand’ring husbands fast; | |
| Such are the links of love, and such a love will last. | |
| For what remains, long habitude, and use, | |
| Will kindness in domestic bands produce: | |
| For custom will a strong impression leave. | 295 |
| Hard bodies, which the lightest stroke receive, | |
| In length of time will molder and decay, | |
| And stones with drops of rain are washed away. | |
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