PARADOX. That Fruition destroyes Love
Love is our Reasons Paradox, which still
Against the judgment doth maintain the Will:
And governs by such arbitrary laws,
It onely makes the Act our Likings cause:
We have no brave revenge, but to forgo
Our full desires, and starve the Tyrant so.
They whom the rising blood tempts not to taste,
Preserve a stock of Love can never waste;
When easie people who their wish enjoy,
Like Prodigalls at once their wealth destroy.
Adam till now had stayd in Paradise
Had his desires been bounded by his eyes.
When he did more then look, that made th' offence,
And forfeited his state of innocence.
Fruition therefore is the bane t'undoe
Both our affection and the subject too.
'Tis Love into worse language to translate,
And make it into Lust degenerate:
'Tis to De-throne, and thrust it from the heart,
To seat it grossely in the sensual part.
Seek for the Starre that's shot upon the ground,
And nought but a dimme gelly there is found.
Thus foul and dark our female starres appear,
If fall'n or loosned once from Vertues Sphear.
Glow-worms shine onely look't on, and let ly,
But handled crawl into deformity:
So beauty is no longer fair and bright,
Then whil'st unstained by the appetite:
And then it withers like a blasted flowre
Some poys'nous worm or spider hath crept ore.
Pigmaleon's dotage on the carved stone,
Shews Amorists their strong illusion.
Whil'st he to gaze and court it was content,
He serv'd as Priest at beauties Monument:
But when by looser fires t'embraces led,
It prov'd a cold hard Statue in his bed.
Irregular affects, like mad mens dreams
Presented by false lights and broken beams,
So long content us, as no neer address
Shews the weak sense our painted happiness.
But when those pleasing shaddowes us forsake,
Or of the substance we a trial make,
Like him, deluded by the fancies mock,
We ship-wrack 'gainst an Alabaster rock.
What though thy Mistress far from Marble be?
Her softness will transform and harden thee.
Lust is a Snake, and Guilt the Gorgons head,
Which Conscience turns to Stone, & Joyes to Lead.
Turtles themselves will blush, if put to name
The Act, whereby they quench their am'rous flame.
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poem by Henry King
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