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| HONOUR is so sublime perfection, | |
| And so refined, that when God was alone | |
| And creatureless at first, Himself had none. | |
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| But as of th’ elements, these which we tread, | |
| Produce all things with which we’re joyed or fed, | 5 |
| And those are barren both above our head; | |
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| So from low persons doth all honour flow; | |
| Kings, whom they would have honour’d, to us show, | |
| And but direct our honour, not bestow. | |
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| For when from herbs the pure part must be won | 10 |
| From gross, by ’stilling, this is better done | |
| By despised dung, than by the fire of sun. 1 | |
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| Care not then, madam, how low your praises lie; | |
| In labourers’ ballads oft more piety | |
| God finds, than in Te Deum’s melody; | 15 |
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| And ordnance, raised on towers, so many mile | |
| Send not their voice, nor last so long a while, | |
| As fires from the earth’s low vaults in Sicil isle. | |
| |
| Should I say I lived darker than were true, | |
| Your radiation can all clouds subdue; | 20 |
| But One, ’tis best light to contemplate you; | |
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| You, for whose body God made better clay, | |
| Or took souls’ stuff, such as shall late decay, | |
| Or such as needs small change at the last day. | |
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| This, as an amber drop enwraps a bee, | 25 |
| Covering discovers 2 your quick soul, that we | |
| May in your through-shine front our hearts’ thoughts see. | |
| |
| You teach—though we learn not—a thing unknown | |
| To our late times, the use of specular stone, | |
| Through which all things within without were shown. | 30 |
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| Of such were temples; so, and such you are; | |
| Being and seeming is your equal care; | |
| And virtue’s whole sum is but ‘Know’ and ‘Dare.’ | |
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| But as our souls of growth and souls of sense | |
| Have birthright of our reason’s soul, yet hence | 35 |
| They fly not from that, nor seek precedence, | |
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| Nature’s first lesson; so discretion | |
| Must not grudge zeal a place, nor yet keep none, | |
| Not banish itself, nor religion. | |
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| Discretion is a wise man’s soul, and so | 40 |
| Religion is a Christian’s, and you know | |
| How these are one; her ‘Yea’ is not her ‘No.’ 3 | |
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| Nor may we hope to solder still and knit | |
| These two, and dare to break them; nor must wit | |
| Be colleague to religion, but be it. | 45 |
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| In those poor types of God, round circles, so | |
| Religion’s types the pieceless centres flow, | |
| And are in all the lines which all ways go. | |
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| If either ever wrought in you alone | |
| Or principally, then religion | 50 |
| Wrought your ends, and your ways discretion. | |
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| Go thither still; go the same way you went; | |
| Whoso would change, do covet 4 or repent; | |
| Neither can reach you, great and innocent. | |
