No More Learning

AMETAS.

Then let's both lay by our rope,
And go kiss within the hay.



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100 THE POEMS



MUSICS EMPIRE.

First was the world as one great cymbal made^
Where jarring winds to infant nature played ;
AH music was a solitary sound,
To hollow rocks and murmuring fountains bound.
Jubal first made the wilder notes agree,
And Jubal tuned Music's Jubilee ;
He called the echoes from their sullen cell.
And built the organ's city, where they dwell ;
Each sought a consort in that lovely place,
And virgin trebles wed the manly base,
From whence the progeny of numbers new
Into harmonious colonies withdrew ;
Some to the lute, some to the viol went,
And others chose the comet eloquent ;
These practising the wind, and those the win*.
To sing man's triumphs, or in heaven's choir.
Then music, the mosaic of the air.
Did of all these a solemn noise prepare,
With which she gained the empire of the ear,
Including all between the earth and sphcri? .



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OP MARVELL. 101

Victorious sounds ! yet here your homage do
Unto a gentler conqueror tlian you ;
Who, though he flies the music of iiis praise,
Would with you heaven's hallelujahs raise.



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102 THE POEMS



TO HIS

WORTHY FRIEND DOCTOR WITTY,

UPON HIS TBANSLATION OF THE POPULAR ERltOK. S.
Sit farther and make room for thine own fame,
Where just desert enrolls thj honoured name.
The Grood Interpreter. Some in this task
Take off the cypress veil, but leave a mask,
Changing the Latin, but do more obscure
That sense in English which was bright and

pure.
So of translators they are authors grown.
For ill translators make the book their own.
Others do strive with words and forced phrase
To add such lustre, and so many rays.
That but to make the vessel shining, they
Much of the precious metal rub away.
He is translation's thief that addeth more,
As much as he that taketh from the store
Of the first author. Here he maketh blots,
That mends ; and added beauties are but spots.

C^LIA whose English doth more richly flow
Than Tagus, purer than dissolved snow.



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OP MARVELL. 103

And sweet as are her lips that speak it, she

Now learns the tongues of France and Italy ;

But she is C^elia still ; no other grace

But her own smiles commend that lovely face ;

Her native beauty's not Italianated,

Nor her chaste mind into the French translated ;

Her thoughts are English, tl>ough her speaking

wit
With other language doth them featly fit.

Translators, learn of her : but stay, I slide
Down into error with the vulgar tide ;
Women must not teach here : the doctor doth
Stint them to cordials, almond-milk, and broth.
Now I reform, and surely so will all
Whose happy eyes on thy translation fall.
I see the people hastening to thy book.
Liking themselves the worse the more they look.