LAUSO. If I the good within my thought confessed, What good I do possess would turn to ill. The good I feel is not to be expressed. Even from me let my desire conceal Itself, and herein let my tongue be dumb, And let its trophy be that it is still. Let artifice stop here, nor art presume To praise enow the pleasure and the balm Which to a soul from Love's kind hand doth come. Suffice to say that I in peaceful calm Cross o'er the sea of Love, setting my trust In noble triumph and victorious palm. The cause unknown, let what the cause produced Be known, for 'tis a good so measureless That for the soul alone 'tis kept in trust. Now I new being have, now life possess, Now I in all the earth can win a name For lofty glory and renowned success. For the pure purpose and the loving flame, Which is enclosed within my loving side, Can unto loftiest Heaven exalt my fame. In thee I hope, Silena, and confide In thee, Silena, glory of my thought, Pole-star that doth my roving fancy guide. I hope that, by thy peerless judgment taught, Thou wilt adjudge that I in truth do merit By faith what in deserving lieth not. And, shepherdess, I trust that soon thy spirit Will show, when thy experience makes thee sure, The liberty that noble breasts inherit. What wealth of bliss thy presence doth assure! What evils doth it banish! When 'tis gone, Who for a moment absence will endure? Oh thou that art more beauteous on thy throne Than beauty's self, and more than wisdom wise, Star to my sea, unto my eyes a sun! She who in famous Crete became the prize Of the false lovely bull, and bowed to Love, Did not unto thy perfect beauty rise; Nor she who felt descending from above The golden rain, that turned her heart aside (To guard her maidenhood no more she strove); Nor she whose angry ruthless hand, in pride Of purity, did her chaste bosom smite, And in her blood the piercing dagger dyed;