_, his servant,
Prudence
Baldwin.
Robert Herrick
Let me sleep this night away,
Till the dawning of the day;
Then at th' opening of mine eyes
I, and all the world, shall rise.
550. PITY TO THE PROSTRATE.
'Tis worse than barbarous cruelty to show
No part of pity on a conquered foe.
552. HIS CONTENT IN THE COUNTRY.
Here, here I live with what my board
Can with the smallest cost afford.
Though ne'er so mean the viands be,
They well content my Prew and me.
Or pea, or bean, or wort, or beet,
Whatever comes, content makes sweet.
Here we rejoice, because no rent
We pay for our poor tenement,
Wherein we rest, and never fear
The landlord or the usurer.
The quarter-day does ne'er affright
Our peaceful slumbers in the night.
We eat our own and batten more,
Because we feed on no man's score;
But pity those whose flanks grow great,
Swell'd with the lard of others' meat.
We bless our fortunes when we see
Our own beloved privacy;
And like our living, where we're known
To very few, or else to none.
_Prew_, _i. e.
_, his servant, Prudence Baldwin.
553. THE CREDIT OF THE CONQUEROR.
He who commends the vanquished, speaks the power
And glorifies the worthy conqueror.
554. ON HIMSELF.
Some parts may perish, die thou canst not all:
The most of thee shall 'scape the funeral.
556. THE FAIRIES.
If ye will with Mab find grace,
Set each platter in his place;
Rake the fire up, and get
Water in, ere sun be set.
Wash your pails, and cleanse your dairies;
Sluts are loathsome to the fairies;
Sweep your house, who doth not so,
Mab will pinch her by the toe.
557. TO HIS HONOURED FRIEND, M. JOHN WEARE, COUNCILLOR.
Did I or love, or could I others draw
To the indulgence of the rugged law,
The first foundation of that zeal should be
By reading all her paragraphs in thee,
Who dost so fitly with the laws unite,
As if you two were one hermaphrodite.
Nor courts[t] thou her because she's well attended
With wealth, but for those ends she was intended:
Which were,--and still her offices are known,--
_Law is to give to ev'ry one his own_;
To shore the feeble up against the strong,
To shield the stranger and the poor from wrong.
