Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

Seccombe and Arber, comps. Elizabethan Sonnets. 1904.

Parthenophil and Parthenophe

Sonnet XLIV. O dart and thunder! whose fierce violence

Barnabe Barnes (1569?–1609)

O DART and thunder! whose fierce violence

Surmounting Rhetoric’s dart and thunder bolts,

Can never be set out in eloquence!

Whose might all metals’ mass asunder moults!

Where be the famous Prophets of old Greece?

Those ancient Roman poets of account?

MUSÆUS, who went for the Golden Fleece

With JASON, and did HERO’s love recount!

And thou, sweet NASO, with thy golden verse;

Whose lovely spirit ravished CÆSAR’s daughter!

And that sweet Tuscan, PETRARCH, which did pierce

His LAURA with Love Sonnets, when he sought her!

Where be all these? That all these might have taught her,

That Saints divine, are known Saints by their mercy!

And Saint-like beauty should not rage with pierce eye!