With common eye the Supreme should not see:
Henceforth be ours, the more thyself to be.
CRI. Heaven's purest light, whose orb may be eclipsed,
But not thy praise; divinest Cynthia!
How much too narrow for so high a grace,
Thine (save therein) the most unworthy Crites
Doth find himself! for ever shine thy fame;
Thine honours ever, as thy beauties do.
In me they must, my dark world's chiefest lights,
By whose propitious beams my powers are raised
To hope some part of those most lofty points,
Which blessed Arete hath pleased to name,
As marks, to which my endeavour's steps should bend:
Mine, as begun at thee, in thee must end.
THE SECOND MASQUE.
ENTER MERCURY AS A PAGE, INTRODUCING EUCOSMOS, EUPATHES, EUTOLMOS, AND EUCOLOS.
MER. Sister of Phoebus, to whose bright orb we owe, that we not
complain of his absence; these four brethren (for they are
brethren, and sons of Eutaxia, a lady known, and highly beloved of
your resplendent deity) not able to be absent, when Cynthia held a
solemnity, officiously insinuate themselves into thy presence: for,
as there are four cardinal virtues, upon which the whole frame of
the court doth move, so are these the four cardinal properties,
without which the body of compliment moveth not.
Pages:
177
178
179
180
181
182
183
184
185
186
187
188
189
190
191
192
193
194
195
196
197
198
199
200
201