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| AFTER those reverend papers, whose soul is | |
| Our good and great king’s loved hand and fear’d name; | |
| By which to you he derives much of his, | |
| And, how he may, makes you almost the same, | |
| |
| A taper of his torch, a copy writ | 5 |
| From his original, and a fair beam | |
| Of the same warm and dazzling sun, though it | |
| Must in another sphere his virtue stream; | |
| |
| After those learned papers which your hand | |
| Hath stored with notes of use and pleasures 1 too, | 10 |
| From which rich treasury you may command | |
| Fit matter whether you will write or do; | |
| |
| After those loving papers where friends send, | |
| With glad grief to your sea-ward steps, farewell, | |
| Which thicken on you now, as prayers ascend | 15 |
| To heaven in troops, 2 at a good man’s passing-bell; | |
| |
| Admit this honest paper, and allow | |
| It such an audience as yourself would ask; | |
| What you must say at Venice, this means now, 3 | |
| And hath 4 for nature, what you have for task. | 20 |
| |
| To swear much love, not to be changed 5 before | |
| Honour, alone will to your fortune fit; | |
| Nor shall I then honour your fortune, more | |
| Than I have done your honour, wanting it. 6 | |
| |
| But ’tis an easier load, though both oppress, | 25 |
| To want, than govern greatness, for we are | |
| In that, our own and only business, | |
| In this, we must for others’ vices care. | |
| |
| ’Tis therefore well your spirits now are placed | |
| In their last furnace, in activity; | 30 |
| Which fits them—schools and courts and wars o’erpast— | |
| To touch and test 7 in any best degree. | |
| |
| For me—if there be such a thing as I— | |
| Fortune—if there be such a thing as she— | |
| Spies 8 that I bear so well her tyranny, | 35 |
| That she thinks nothing else so fit for me. | |
| |
| But, though she part us, to hear my oft prayers | |
| For your increase, God is as near me here; | |
| And to send you what I shall beg, His stairs | |
| In length and ease are alike everywhere. | 40 |
