Song
Flow my tears fall from your springs,
Exilded for euer : let mee mourne
Where nightes black bird hir sad infamy sings,
There let mee liue forlorne.
Downe vaine lightes shine you no more,
No nightes are dark enough for those
That in dispaire their lost fortuns deplore,
Light doth but shame disclose.
Neuer may my woes be relieued,
Since pittie is fled,
And teares and sighes and grones my wearie dayes
Of all ioyes haue depriued.
From the highest spire of contentment
My fortune is throwne,
And feare and griefe and paine for my deserts
Are my hopes since hope is gone.
Harke you shadowes that in darkness dwell,
Learne to contemne light
Happie happy they that in hell
Feele not the worlds despite.
Reading
When Jupiter himself wept for Sarpedon, what else did the
poet insinuate, but that some sorrow is good. Beside, as
Plutarch holds, 'tis not in our power not to lament, Indolentia
non cuivis contingit, it takes away mercy and pity, not to be
sad; 'tis a natural passion to weep for our friends, an
irresistible passion to lament and grieve. "I know not how"
(saith Seneca) "but sometimes 'tis good to be miserable in
misery: and for the most part all grief evacuates itself by
tears,"
Song
If fluds of teares could cleanse my follies past,
And smoakes of sighes might sacrifice for sinne,
If groning cries might salue my fault at last,
Or endles mone, for error pardon win,
Then would I cry, weepe, sigh, and euer mone,
Mine errors, fault, sins, follies past and gone.
I see my hopes must wither in their bud,
I see my fauours are no lasting flowers,
I see that woords will breede no better good,
Then losse of time and lightening but at houres,
Thus when I see then thus I say therefore,
That fauours hopes and words, can blinde no more.
Reading
A young gentlewoman in Basil was married to an ancient man
against her will, whom she could not affect; she was
continually melancholy, and pined away for grief; and though
her husband did all he could possibly to give her content, in a
discontented humour at length she hanged herself. Thus men
are plagued with women; they again with men, when they are
of divers humours and conditions; he a spendthrift, she
sparing; one honest, the other dishonest, &c
Song
I saw my Lady weepe,
And sorrow proud to bee aduanced so :
In those faire eies where all perfections keepe,
Hir face was full of woe,
But such a woe (beleeue me) as wins more hearts,
Than mirth can doe, with hir intysing parts.
Sorrow was there made faire,
And passion wise, teares a delightfull thing,
Silence beyond all speech a wisdome rare,
Shee made her sighes to sing,
And all things with so sweet a sadnesse moue,
As made my heart at once both grieue and loue.
O fayrer than ought ells,
The world can shew, leaue of in time to grieue,
Inough, inough, your ioyfull lookes excells,
Teares kills the heart belieue,
O striue not to bee excellent in woe,
Which onely breeds your beauties ouerthrow.
Reading
When to myself I act and smile,
With pleasing thoughts the time beguile,
By a brook side or wood so green,
Unheard, unsought for, or unseen,
A thousand pleasures do me bless,
And crown my soul with happiness.
All my joys besides are folly,
None so sweet as melancholy.
Lute Solo
Merry Melancholie
Reading
I'll change my state with any wretch,
Thou canst from gaol or dunghill fetch;
My pain's past cure, another hell,
I may not in this torment dwell!
Now desperate I hate my life,
Lend me a halter or a knife;
All my griefs to this are jolly,
Naught so damn'd as melancholy.
Lute Solo
Semper Dowland, Semper Dolens
Reading
But the most familiar and usual cause of love is that which
comes by sight, which conveys those admirable rays of
beauty and pleasing graces to the heart. Plotinus derives love
from sight, "the eyes are the harbingers of love," and the first
step of love is sight, as Lilius Giraldus proves at large, they as
two sluices let in the influences of that divine, powerful, soul-
ravishing, and captivating beauty, which, as one saith, "is
sharper than any dart or needle, wounds deeper into the
heart; and opens a gap through our eyes to that lovely wound,
which pierceth the soul itself" Least that inforst by your disdaine, I sing,
Song Fye, fye on loue, it is a foolish thing.
Song Mourne, mourne, day is with darknesse fled,
Now cease my wandring eies, What heauen then gouernes earth, My hart where haue you laid O cruell maide,
Strange beauties to admire, O none, but hell in heauen stead, To kill when you might saue,
In change least comfort lies, Choakes with his mistes our mirth. Why haue yee cast it forth as nothing worth,
Long ioyes yeeld long desire. Mourne, mourne, looke now for no more day Without a tombe or graue.
One faith one loue, Nor night, but that from hell,
Makes our fraile pleasures eternall, Then all must as they may, O let it bee intombed and lye,
And in sweetnesse proue. In darknesse learne to dwell. In your sweet minde and memorie,
New hopes new ioyes, But yet this change must needes change our delight, Least I refound on euery warbling string,
Are still with sorrow declining, That thus the Sunne should harbour with the night. Fye fye on loue that is a foolish thing.
Vnto deepe anoies.
Reading Reading
One man hath but one soule, Idleness overthrows all, love tyranniseth in an idle person. If I'th' under column there doth stand
Which art cannot deuide, thou hast nothing to do, thou shalt be haled in pieces with Inamorato with folded hand;
If all one soule must loue, envy, lust, some passion or other. Homines nihil agendo Down hangs his head, terse and polite,
Two loues most be denide, male agere discunt; 'tis Aristotle's simile, "as match or Some ditty sure he doth indite.
One soule one loue, touchwood takes fire, so doth an idle person love." The poets His lute and books about him lie,
By faith and merit vnited cannot remoue, therefore did well to feign all shepherds lovers, to give As symptoms of his vanity.
Distracted spirits, themselves to songs and dalliances, because they lived such If this do not enough disclose,
Are euer changing & haplesse in their delights. idle lives. For love, as Theophrastus defines it, is an affection To paint him, take thyself by th' nose.
of an idle mind, or as Seneca describes it, youth begets it, riot
Nature two eyes hath giuen, maintains it, idleness nourisheth it, &c. which makes Lute Solo
All beautie to impart, Gordonius the physician call this disease the proper passion Lachrimae Pavan
Aswell in earth as heauen, of nobility.
But she hath giuen one hart, Reading
That though wee see, Song Secondary peculiar causes efficient; The first of these, which
Ten thousand beauties yet in vs one should be, A Shepeard in a shade, his plaining made is natural to all, and which no man living can avoid, is old age,
One stedfast loue, Of loue and louers wrong, which being cold and dry, and of the same quality as
Because our harts stand fixt although our eies do moue. Vnto the fairest lasse that trode on grasse, melancholy is, must needs cause it, by diminution of spirits
And thus beegan his song. and substance, and increasing of adust humours; therefore
Reading Melancthon avers out of Aristotle, as an undoubted truth, that
"Will not any windows to be opened in the night." Montanus Since loue and Fortune will, I honour still old men familiarly dote, for black choler, which is then
discommends especially the south wind, and nocturnal air: So Your faire and louely eye, superabundant in them: and Rhasis, that Arabian physician,
doth Plutarch. The night and darkness makes men sad, the What conquest will it bee, Sweet Nimph for thee, calls it "a necessary and inseparable accident," to all old and
like do all subterranean vaults, dark houses in caves and If I for sorrow dye. decrepit persons. After seventy years (as the Psalmist saith)
rocks, desert places cause melancholy in an instant, "all is trouble and sorrow;" and common experience confirms
especially such as have not been used to it, or otherwise Restore, restore my hart againe, the truth of it in weak and old persons, especially such as
accustomed. Which loue by thy sweet lookes hath slaine, have lived in action all their lives, had great employment,
much business, much command, and many servants to
oversee, and leave off ex abrupto; they are overcome with
melancholy in an instant: or if they do continue in such
courses, they dote at last and are not able to manage their
estates through common infirmities incident in their age; full of
ache, sorrow and grief, children again, dizzards, they carl
many times as they sit, and talk to themselves, they are
angry, waspish, displeased with every thing, "suspicious of all,
wayward, covetous, hard" (saith Tully,) "self-willed,
superstitious, self-conceited, braggers and admirers of
themselves," as Balthazar Castilio hath truly noted of them.
Song
Times eldest sonne, olde age the heyre of ease,
Strengths foe, loues woe, and foster to deuotion,
Bids gallant youths in martial prowes please,
As for him selfe, hee hath no earthly motion,
But thinks, sighes, teares, vowes, praiers, and sacrifices
As good as showes, maskes, iustes, or tilt deuises.
Then sit thee downe and say thy Nunc demittis,
With De profundis, Credo and Te Deum,
Chant Miserere, for what now so fit is,
As that, or this, Paratum est cor meum,
O that thy Saint would take in worth thy heart,
Thou canst not please hir with a better part.
When others sings Venite exultemus,
Stand by and turne to Noli emulari,
For quare fremuerunt vse oremus
Viuat Eliza, for an aue mari,
And teach those swains that liues about thy cell,
To say Amen when thou dost pray so well.
Reading
And so they continue, till with some fresh discontent they be
molested again, and then they are weary of their lives, weary
of all, they will die, and show rather a necessity to live, than a
desire. Claudius the emperor, as Sueton describes him, had
a spice of this disease, for when he was tormented with the
pain of his stomach, he had a conceit to make away himself.
Julius Caesar Claudin so affected, that through fear and
sorrow, with which he was still disquieted, hated his own life,
wished for death every moment, and to be freed of his misery.
Mercurialis another, and another that was often minded to
despatch himself, and so continued for many years.
Song
Dye not before thy day, poore man condemned,
But lift thy low lookes from the humble earth,
Kisse not dispaire and see sweet hope contemned:
The hag hath no delight, but mone for mirth,
O fye, o fye poore fondling, fye be willing,
To preserue thy selfe from killing,
Hope thy keeper glad to free thee,
Bids thee goe and will not see thee,
Hye thee quickly from thy wrong,
So shee endes hir willing song.
Intermission
Reading
Ariadne,
"Is no more mov'd with those sad sighs and tears,
Of her sweetheart, than raging sea with prayers:
Thou scorn'st the fairest youth in all our city,
And mak'st him almost mad for love to die:"
Lute Solo
Melancholly Galliard
Reading
The time's quickly gone that's spent in her company, the miles
short, the way pleasant; all weather is good whilst he goes to
her house, heat or cold; though his teeth chatter in his head,
he moves not; wet or dry, 'tis all one; wet to the skin, he feels
it not, cares not at least for it, but will easily endure it and
much more, because it is done with alacrity, and for his
mistress's sweet sake; let the burden be never so heavy, love
makes it light.
Song
Cleare or cloudie sweet as Aprill showring.
Smoth or frowning so it is hir face to mee,
Pleasd or smiling like milde May all flowring,
When skies blew silke and medowes carpets bee,
Hir speeches notes of that night bird that singeth,
Who thought all sweet yet iarring notes outringeth.
Hir grace like Iune, when earth and trees bee trimde,
In best attire of compleat beauties height,
Hir loue againe like sommers daies bee dimde,
With little cloudes of doubtfull constant faith,
Hir trust hir doubt, like raine and heat in Skies,
Gently thundring, she lightning to mine eies.
Sweet sommer spring that breatheth life and growing,
In weedes as into hearbs and flowers,
And sees of seruice diuers sorts in sowing,
Some haply seeming and some being yours,
Raine on your hearbs and flowers that truely serue,
And let your weeds iack dew and duely sterue.
Reading
They delight in floods and waters, desert places, to walk alone
in orchards, gardens, private walks, back lanes, averse from
company, they abhor all companions at last, even their
nearest acquaintances and most familiar friends, for they have
a conceit (I say) every man observes them, will deride, laugh
to scorn, or misuse them, confining themselves therefore
wholly to their private houses or chambers, they will diet
themselves, feed and live alone. It was one of the chiefest
reasons why the citizens of Abdera suspected Democritus to
be melancholy and mad, because that he forsook the city,
lived in groves and hollow trees, upon a green bank by a
brook side, or confluence of waters all day long, and all night."
which is an ordinary thing with melancholy men.
Song
O sweet woods the delight of solitarinesse,
O how much doe I loue your solitarinesse.
From fames desire, from loues delight retir'd,
In these sad groues an Hermits life I led,
And those false pleasures which I once admir'd,
With sad remembrance of my fall, I dread,
To birds, to trees, to earth impart I this,
For thee lesse secret and as sencelesse is.
Experience which repentance onely brings,
Doth bid mee now my hart from loue estrange,
Loue is disdained when it doth looke at Kings,
And loue loe placed base and apt to change :
Then power doth take from him his liberty,
Hir want of worth makes him in cradell die.
O sweet woods ,&c.
O how much ,&c.
You men that giue false worship vnto Loue,
And seeke that which you neuer shall obtaine,
The endlesse worke od Sisiphus you procure,
Whose end is this to know you striue in vaine,
Hope and desire which now your Idols bee,
You needs must loose and feele dispaire with mee.
O sweet woods ,&c.
O how much ,&c.
You woods in you the fairest Nimphs haue walked,
Nimphes at whose sight all harts did yeeld to Loue,
You woods in whom deere louers oft haue talked,
How doe you now a place of mourning proue,
Wansted my Mistres saith this is the doome,
Thou art loues Childbed, Nursery, and Tombe.
O sweet woods ,&c.
O how much ,&c.
Reading
Bellerophon
"That wandered in the woods sad all alone,
Forsaking men's society, making great moan."
Lute Solo
Philips Dump
Reading
In a word, the world itself is a maze, a labyrinth of errors, a
desert, a wilderness, a den of thieves, cheaters, &c., full of
filthy puddles, horrid rocks, precipitiums, an ocean of
adversity, an heavy yoke, wherein infirmities and calamities
overtake, and follow one another, as the sea waves; and if we
scape Scylla, we fall foul on Charybdis, and so in perpetual
fear, labour, anguish, we run from one plague, one mischief,
one burden to another, and you may as soon separate weight
from lead, heat from fire, moistness from water, brightness
from the sun, as misery, discontent, care, calamity, danger,
from a man.
Song
Sorrow stay, lend true repentant teares,
To a woefull wretched wight,
Hence dispair with thy tormenting feares:
O doe not my poor heart affright,
Pitty, help now or neuer,
Mark me not to endlesse paine,
Alas I am condempned euer,
No hope, no help there doth remain,
But down, down, down, down I fall,
Down and arise I never shall.