Who Aspires Must Down As Low As

Extol Not Riches Then, The Toil Of Fools, The Wise Man's Cumbrance, If Not Snare, More Apt To Slacken Virtue, And Abate Her Edge, Than Prompt Her To Do Aught May Merit Praise.

Straight Mine Eye Hath Caught New Pleasures Whilst The Landscape Round It Measures, Russet Lawns And Fallows Grey, Where The Nibbling Flocks Do Stray, Mountains On Whose Barren Breast The Labouring Clouds Do Often Rest; Meadows Trim With Daisies Pied, Shallow Brooks, And Rivers Wide.

His Form Had Yet Not Lost All Her Original Brightness, Nor Appear'd Less Than Archangel Ruin'd, And Th' Excess Of Glory Obscur'd.

O Fairest Flower! No Sooner Blown But Blasted, Soft Silken Primrose Fading Timelessly.

Bring The Rathe Primrose That Forsaken Dies, The Tufted Crow-toe, And Pale Gessamine, The White Pink, And The Pansy Freaked With Jet, The Glowing Violet, The Musk-rose, And The Well Attir'd Woodbine, With Cowslips Wan That Hang The Pensive Head, And Every Flower That Sad Embroidery Wears: Bid Amaranthus All His Beauty Shed, And Daffadillies Fill Their Cups With Tears, To Strew The Laureate Hearse Where Lycid Lies.