"Yet, what is love? good shepherd, saine!"-- It is a sunshine mix'd with rain; It is a toothache, or like pain; It is a game where none doth gain: The lass saith No, and would full fain! And this is love, as I hear saine. "Yet, shepherd, what is love, I pray?"-- It is a "Yea," it is a "Nay," A pretty kind of sporting fray; It is a thing will soon away; Then, nymphs, take vantage while ye may, And this is love, as I hear say. "Yet what is love? good shepherd, show!"-- A thing that creeps, it cannot go, A prize that passeth to and fro, A thing for one, a thing for moe; And he that proves shall find it so; And, shepherd, this is love, I trow. Sir Walter Raleigh. THE SHEPHERDESS'S REPLY TO THE PASSIONATE SHEPHERD. If all the world and Love were young, And truth in every shepherd's tongue, These pretty pleasures might me move To live with thee and be thy love. But time drives flocks from field to fold, When rivers rage, and rocks grow cold; Then Philomel becometh dumb, The rest complains of cares to come. The flowers do fade, and wanton fields To wayward winter reckoning yields; A honey tongue, a heart of gall, Is fancy's spring: but sorrow's fall. Thy gowns, thy shoes, thy bed of roses, Thy cup, thy kirtle, and thy posies, Soon break, soon wither, soon forgotten;-- In folly ripe, in reason rotten. The belt of straw and ivy-buds, Thy coral clasps and amber studs,-- All these in me no means can move, To come to thee, and be thy love. What should we talk of dainties, then, Of better meat than's fit for men? These are but vain: that's only good Which God hath bless'd and sent for food. But could youth last, and love still breed; Had joys no date, nor age no need; Then those delights my mind might move, To live with thee, and be thy love. Sir Walter Raleigh. [See "The Passionate Shepherd to His Love," page 50.] LOVE FOR LOVE. Away with these self-loving lads Whom Cupid's arrow never glads! Away, poor souls, that sigh and weep, In love of them that lie and sleep! For Cupid is a merry god, And forceth none to kiss the rod. Sweet Cupid's shafts, like Destiny, Do causeless good or ill decree; Desert is borne out of his bow, Reward upon his wing doth go: What fools are they that have not known That Love likes no laws but his own! My songs, they be of Cynthia's praise: I wear her rings on holy days; On every tree I write her name, And every day I read the same: Where Honour Cupid's rival is, There miracles are seen of his. If Cynthia crave her ring of me, I blot her name out of the tree; If doubt do darken things held dear, Then "farewell nothing," once a year: For many run, but one must win; Fools only hedge the cuckoo in.