Paradoxes and Problemes: With two characters and an essay of valour. Now for the first time reprinted from the editions of 1633 and 1652 with one additional probleme.Donne, John
Philosophy
Paradoxes and Problemes: With two characters and an essay of valour. Now for the first time reprinted from the editions of 1633 and 1652 with one additional probleme.
Donne, John
English wit and humor -- Early works to 1800; Questions and answers -- Early works to 1800
favoured, all this carries no danger with it, but it is to be admitted
to the Title of Valiant Acts, at leaſt the adventuring of his
mortality, and al women take delight to hold him safe in their arms
who hath ’ſcapt thither through many dangers: To ſpeak at once, Man
hath a priviledge in Valour; In clothes and good faces we but imitate
women, and many of that Sex will not think much (as far as an anſwer
goes) to diſſemble wit too. So then theſe neat youths, theſe women in
mens apparel are too near a woman to be beloved of her, They be both
of a Trade, but be grim of aſpect, and ſuch a one as Glaſs dares take,
and ſhe will deſire him for neatneſs and varietie; A ſkar in a mans
face is the ſame that a mole in a womans; a Jewel ſet in white to make
it ſeem more white, for the ſkar in a man is a mark of honour and no
blemiſh, for ’tis a ſkar and a blemiſh too in a Souldier too to be
with out one: Now as for al things elſe which are to procure Love, as
a good face, wit, good clothes, or a good body, each of them I confeſs
may work ſomewhat for want of a better, That is, if _Valour be not
their Rivall_; A good face avails nothing if it be in a coward that is
baſhfull, the utmoſt of it is to be kiſſ’d, which rather encreaſeth
then quencheth appetite; He that ſends her gifts ſends her word alſo,
that he is a man of ſmall gifts otherwiſe, for wooing by ſigns and
tokens implies the Author dumb; and if _Ovid_ who writ _the Law of
Love_, were alive (as he is extant) would allow it as good a
diverſity, that gifts ſhould be ſent as gratuities, not as bribes;
Wit getteth rather promiſe then Love, Wit is not to be ſeen, and no
woman takes advice of any in her loving, but of her own eyes, and her
waiting womans; Nay which is worſe, wit is not to be felt, and ſo no
good fellow; Wit apply’d to a woman makes her diſſolve (or diſcloſe)
her ſimpering, and diſcover her teeth with laughter, and this is
ſurely a purge for love; for the beginning of love is a kind of
fooliſh melancholy, as for the man that makes his Taylor his Bawd, and
hopes to inveagle his Love with ſuch a coloured ſuit, ſurely the ſame
deeply hazards the loſs of her favour upon every change of his
clothes; So likewiſe for the other, that Courts her ſilently with a
good body, let me certifie him that his clothes depend upon the
comelyneſſe of the body, and ſo both upon opinion; ſhe that hath been
ſeduced by Apparel, let me give her to wit, _that men always put off
their clothes before they go to bed_; and let her that hath been
enamour’d of her ſervants body, underſtand, _that if ſhe ſaw him in a
ſkin of cloth_, that is, in a ſuit made to the pattern of his body,
_ſhe would ſee ſlender cauſe to love him ever after_; there are no
clothes ſit ſo well in a woman’s eye, as a ſuit of Steel, though not
of the faſhion, and no man ſo ſoon ſurpriſeth a womans affections as
he that is the ſubject of all whiſperings, and hath always twenty
ſtories of his own deeds depending upon him; Miſtake me not, I
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