Thou, that hast fashioned twice this _Soule_ of ours, So that she is by double title Thine; Thou onely knowest her nature and her pow'rs, Her subtill forme Thou onely canst define. To iudge her selfe she must her selfe transcend, As greater circles comprehend the lesse; But she wants power, her owne powers to extend, As fettered men can not their strength expresse. But Thou bright Morning Star, Thou rising _Sunne_, Which in these later times hast brought to light Those mysteries, that since the world begun, Lay hid in darknesse, and eternall night: Thou (_like the sunne_) dost with indifferent ray, Into the _palace_ and the _cottage_ shine, And shew'st the _soule_ both to the clerke and lay[89], By the cleare _lampe_ of Thy _Oracle_ diuine. [Footnote 87: 'Sense' in 1st edn. G.] [Footnote 88: Davies and Southey misprint egregiously 'river.' G.] [Footnote 89: Laymen. G.] This Lampe through all the regions of my braine, Where my _soule_ sits, doth spread such beames of grace, As now, me thinks, I do distinguish plain, Each subtill line of her immortall face. WHAT THE SOULE IS. _The soule a substance_, and a _spirit_ is, Which _God_ Himselfe doth in the body make; Which makes the _Man_: for euery man from this, The _nature_ of a _Man_, and _name_ doth take. And though this[1] spirit be to the body knit, As an apt meane her powers to exercise; Which are _life_, _motion_, _sense_, and _will_, and _wit_, Yet she _suruiues_, although the body _dies_. THAT THE SOULE IS A THING SUBSISTING BY IT SELFE WITHOUT THE BODY. _She is a substance_, and a reall thing, Which hath it selfe an actuall working might; Which neither from the Senses' power doth spring, Nor from the bodie's humors, tempred right. She is a _vine_, which doth no propping need, To make her spread her selfe or spring vpright; She is a _starre_, whose beames doe not proceed From any _sunne_, but from a _natiue_ light. For when she sorts things _present_ with things _past_, And thereby things to _come_ doth oft foresee; When she doth _doubt_ at first, and _chuse_ at last, These acts her owne, without her body bee. When of the deaw,[90] which the _eye_ and _eare_ doe take From flowers abroad, and bring into the braine, She doth within both waxe and hony make: This worke is her's, this is her proper paine.[91] When she from sundry acts, one skill doth draw, Gathering from diuers fights one art[92] of warre, From many cases like, one rule of Law; These her collections, not the _Senses_ are. [Footnote 90: Dew: and so spelled also by the Fletchers and other contemporaries. G.] [Footnote 91: Painstaking. G.] [Footnote 92: Misprinted 'act' in the 1st edn. G.]