THE GHOST of Lucrece
MEdeas Magicke, and
Calipsoes drugges,
Circes enchauntments,
Hecates triforme
Weanes my soule sucking at
Reuenges dugges,
To feed vpon the aire. What wind? what storme
Blew my disseuered limmes into this forme?
And from the Virgin-Paradise of death,
Coniures my Ghost with poetizing breath?
The candle of my shame burnes in the skie,
Set on the crosse-Poles of the firmament,
To feare away diuine Virginitie,
And light this world below, that being bent
To follow me, they goe not as I went:
But when I hope to see the candle waine,
Then
Tarquins spirit falls on the snuffe againe.
So that the snuffe, (the sauour of my shame,
That stinckes before the throne of chastitie)
Is still rekindled with veneriall flame,
To shew that
Tarquins planet plants in me,
The roote of fierie bloud, and luxurie:
First forcing with his breath, one flames retire,
Then takes my bloud for oyle, his lust, for fire.
Now burnes the beacon of my soule, indeede,
Too high for fame, but low enough for fume:
Saints, keep your cloister-house,
Vesta make speede,
Take in thy flowers, for feare the fire consume
Thy eternall-sweete-Virginitie-perfume:
For Lust, and Bloud are mingled in one lampe,
To seale my soule with Rape and Murders stampe.
Before my shame, yon candle had no fire,
Vestals nil feard me, the world saw me not,
Shame was the tinder, and the flint desire
That strucke in
Tarquins bosome, and begot
A childe of fire, a firebrand, and so hot,
That it consumde my chastitie to dust,
And on my heart painted the mouth of lust.
Was I the cradle? O my chastitie,
To rocke and lull this bastard firebrand,
N
[...]rst with my bloud, we and with my tragedie,
Fed at my kniues sharpe point vpon my hand,
Borne and reborne, where ere my spirites stand?
I was the cradle
[...] see the fie
[...]e dart,
That burnes
Dianaes temples in my heart.
Behold this blade varnisht with bloud and teares,
Bloud from my heart, teares from my stilling eies,
Behold (I say) this knife, whereon appeares
Vestaes Vermision melting from her skies,
And teares of pearles in bloudy misteries;
This is the Tragicke knife, here you may see,
Teares striue for fame, and bloud for chastitie.
Right hand, thou act'st Reuenges hand aright:
This knife and thou haue sworne to kisse my breast,
Thou art my
Vestaes antidote, to fright
Lust from the bed of
Colatinus rest:
Performer of thy vow (hand) be thou blest.
For thou in this hast showne me what thou art,
Driuing the foe from scaling of my heart.
Come spirit of fire, bred in a wombe of bloud,
Forgd in a furnace by the Smith of hell,
Begot and formed in that burning floud,
Where
Plutoes Phlegetonticke tennants dwell:
And scalded spirits in their fiery cell,
Breathes from their soule the flame of luxurie.
From that luxurious clime I coniure thee.
Now is my tyde of bloud: Come, quench thy soule,
The sluces of my spirit now runs againe:
Come, I haue made my breast an luorie bowle,
To hold the bloud that streameth from my veyne,
Drinke to my chastitie which thou hast slaine:
" But (woe the while) that labour is in vaine.
" To drinke to that which cannot pledge againe
Quaffe thine owne fill, and let that lustfull flame:
(That circuits in the circle of thy spirite
Pledge thy desire, carowsing off my shame,
Which swimmes amidst my bloud, and doth inherite
The portion of my soule without a merite:
And if this spring of bloud cannot suffize,
Ile raine downe teares from my Elementall eies.
Thou art my nurse-child,
Tarquin: thou art he,
In steede of milke, sucke bloud, and teares, and all,
In liew of teats:
Lucrece, thy nurse, euen she,
By tragicke art seene through a Christall wall,
Hath carued with her knife thy festiuall:
Here's bloud for milke, sucke till thy veines run ouer,
And such a teat, which scarce thy mouth can couer.
Tarquin the rauisher oh at that name
See how mine eies dissolueth into teares.
Tarquin the Roman: I describe my shame,
Frorm
Rome it came, a Romane name it beares.
Tarquin my guest: lo, here began my feares:
Tarquin from
Ardea postes, hence sprang the fire,
" For
Ardeas name sounds ardent hot desire.
Tarquin my kinsman: O Diuinitie,
Where art thou fled? hast thou for sooke thy sphaere?
Where's Vertue, Knight-hood, and Nobilitie?
Faith? Honor? Pietie? they should be neere,
For kinsman sounds all these they are not here.
Tarquin my kinsman: was it thou didst come,
To sacke my
Colatines Collatium?
Tarquin my kinsman, too vnkindly done,
And by a kinsman too: my Ghost auers it,
Doth theresore that same name of kinred run,
To see their kin-redde, and with bloud prefers it?
" O enemie to faith, that still defers it.
Had
Tarquin neuer lustfull
Tarquin beene,
Lucrece the chaste should haue chaste
Lucrece seene.
Tarquin the Prince: had
Rome no better heires,
Thou mistris of the world no better men,
Thou Prodigalitie of Natures faires,
Are Tygers kings? mak'st thou thy throne a den?
Thy siluer-glittering streames, blacke
Lernaes fen?
Thy seauen hilles that should or'e looke thy euilles.
Like seauen helles to nurse vp Roman diuelles.
To thee, (that makst the Moone thy looking glasse,
To view thy triple crowne, and seauen-fold head)
To thee, I say, (the Ghost of what I was)
Plaines mee and it, sith thou so long hast fed
The rauisher, and starude the rauished.
" If Vestaes lines were euer writ in thee,
" Then weigh the blotting of those lines in mee.
Tarquin the Prince: sham'st thou to heare thy name?
Rome, tis thy heire, sham'st thou to call him sonne?
Tarquin the Prince, lo Ile repeate thy shame,
A Roman heire, from him to thee I runne,
Ile shame you both before my shame be done:
Tarquin the Prince,
Tarquin the Roman heire,
Thus wil I haunt, and hunt you to dispaire.
Tarquin the traytor: bid my spirit rise,
And call vp al the senses of my soule,
" For treason should be guarded with more eies,
Then was
Ioues lo vnder his controule,
" For treasons guile doth winne the traitors gole:
Tarquin the traytor: watch when time's in season,
" For treason doth betray all things to treason.
Tarquin the lecher: virgin chastitie,
Melts at the heate of that luxurious word,
(Like maiden snow vpon a promontorie,
Kissing the un her heauenly louely Lord,
Then dies, and melts into a watry ford:)
So did my chastities-white-snow attire,
Dissolue in bloud, at
Tarquins lustfull fire.
Tarquin the night-owle: Chastitie beware,
Thou art beset with millions of deceits,
Thy eies haue leaden liddes, they take no care,
Thy senses rockt asleepe, and thy conceites
Tempred with silence, feare nor snares, nor baites:
Onely the vestall purenesse of thy soule,
Bade me beware that Night-obseruing owle.
Tarquin the Night-owle: in whose flaming eies,
Lust and Desire banded their balles of bloud,
Chasing my spirit with fiery misteries,
Vnto the hazard where destruction stoode,
Ready to strike my soule into a clowde:
So when the Sunne had seene my vapour rise,
Then with his beames to dash me from the skies.
Tarquin the Night-owle: watch destruction,
What? hath the eies of Lust no Iiddes at all?
Or doe they houer for confusion,
Answering in silence when affections call?
" When lust awakes, the eie liddes neuer fall:
" But like a courser holding reasons raine,
" Doth shut the eies, and opens them againe.
Tarquin the Night-owle
Vesta, looke about,
The fourth allarum of my feares now rings,
And yet the houre of dread is scarce runne out,
For midnights face more force of terror brings,
To thinke on that, my sinewes shake like strings:
And chastitie which yet had spirit and breath,
Lay quauering at my heart to tune her death.
Tarquin the Night-owle: turne the glasse againe,
Fiue times my tongue, the hammer of my soule,
(That beates vpon my breath, and strikes a straine,
" Sounding all quauers, thats the song of dole:)
Fiue times my tongue did euen my tongue controule,
" For feare is such a slaue, and coward elfe,
" That fearing others, runnes and feares himselfe.
Tarquin the Night-owle: Enter trecherie,
Sextus Tarquinius, this sixt houre is thine,
Farewell my life, farewell my chastitie,
Farewel (though not mine now) that which was mine,
Thy grapes are now deuour'd, alas poore vine:
The Tyr-ant with his force of luxurie,
Tires mean Ant, through imbecillitie.
Now enters on the stage of
Lucrece heart,
Blacke appe
[...]ites in flamde habiliments:
When they haue acted all, then they depart.
Rape entring next, armed in murders tents,
Wrackes
Vestaes tennants, and takes all her rents:
" This shewes that
Vestaes Deitie is poore,
" She hath the stalke, but
Ve
[...] hath the store.
This is the tragicke sceane: bleede hearts, weepe eies,
Flie soule from bodie, spirit from my veines,
Follow my chastitie where ere it lies,
Which my vnhalowed body now refraines,
Looke to the lampe of chastitie, it waines:
The starre which guided all my elements,
Pulls in her head, and leaues the firmaments.
Rape in his pawes of bloud, and fangs of Lust,
Hath stainde th'immaculate lillie of my field,
And hath sepulchred in the shade of dust
Dianaes milken robe, and
Vestaes shield,
" VVhen Tygers prey, the seely lambes must yeeld:
VVhen
Tarquin postes from
Ardea, by and by
Lucrece must loose her life and chastitie.
O
Colatine, where sleepes thy troubled spirite?
VVhat new come
Morpheus hath arrested thee?
Doth thy heart soundly sleepe? doth nothingstirre it?
Deare
Colatine, awake, wert thou with mee
The arches of mine eies would waken thee
For teares like waues rush at my eie liddes doore,
Striuing together who should goe before.
Come
Colatine the foe hath sackt thy cittie,
Collatium goes to wracke: come
Colatine,
Come
Colatine, all pietie and pittie
Is turnde to pettie treason: what is thine
Is ceazde vppon long since: and what is mine
" Carried away: true man thou sleepst at Rome,
" Euen while a Roman theefe robs thee at home.
Come
Colatine, tis
Lucrece bids thee come,
Or shal I send my purseuant of grones
Vnto prowde
Rome from poore
Collatium,
To make all priuate means by publique mones,
Discoursing my blacke storie to the stones?
Come
Colatine, tis
Tarquins dreadfull drum,
That coniures me to call, and thee to come.
Thy
Lucrece bed, which had faire canopies
Spangled with starres like to the firmament,
And curtaines wrought with many deities,
Resembling
Ioues white lacteall element,
Are stained now by lust and reuishment,
The starres out starde, the deities defied,
These I had storde, the other deified.
The night before
Tarquin and Lust came hither,
(Ill token for a chaste memoriall,)
My maides and I poore maide, did spin together,
Like the three sisters, which the Fates we call,
" And Fortune lent vs wheeles to turne withall;
Round goes our wheeles like worlds, on mine alone
Stoode fortune reeling on a rowling stone.
Yet was my heart so light, that still I said,
Sing merrily my maides, our wheeles goe round,
(VVho would not sing and spin, and be a maide,
To serue so sweete a Goddesse, and be bound
Apprentise, where such mistresses abound?)
Sing merrily my maides (againe she sayes,)
For
Vesta is the Goddesse of our layes.
Maidens, quoth I, but thinke what maidens be,
" They are the verie string that ties their hearts,
" The pillars of their soules pure puritie,
" The distillations of th'essentiall parts,
" Both good deseruers, and the good desarts:
Then seeing
Vesta hath so many trades,
Go round our wheeles, sing merrily my maides.
VVhat nimble fingers hath Virginitie,
To twist the thread, and turne the wheele about?
O Virgines, that same pearle of chastitie
Shines like the Moone, to light your thoughts throughout,
" Pure cogitations neuer harbours doubt,
But like the fairest-purest chrisolite,
Admits no bruise without a cracke with it.
Spin merily my maiden-paradise,
Thus with a merrie cheere I whirld their wheels,
And made them rid at once more then at twice,
" Such prettie pleasure true affection feeles,
" That times olde head runnes swifter then his heeles:
" For mirths fledg'd wings, are of so quicke a flight,
" I hat maks the morn seem noon, the noon seem night
My maides, those ayrie sinewes in your hands,
Were of a finer thred then that you spinne,
It was a merry age in golden bands,
When
Saturne sowed the earth, and did begin
To teach bad husbands a new way to win:
" Then was true labour exercisde and donne,
" When gods did reele, what Goddesses had sponne.
Those times are waxen balde, a prowder ayre
Blowes in the heauen, and breathes vpon the earth,
That age is out of date, another heyre
Claimes his possession by an yron birth,
And in an yron throne of death and dearth
Rules this yong age, sucking vntill it whine,
Euen at the dugges of
Plutoes proserpine.
Thus like
Diana by a lillie fount,
Sate I amidst my vestall elements,
Thus did my selfe still with my selfe account,
To free my thoughts from chained discontents
And stirre vp mirth, the nurse of nourishments:
Thus with a lightsome spirit and soules carouse,
I like a huswife cherisht vp my house.
When Roman dames tickled with pride and lust,
Rauisht with amorous Philosophie,
Printed the measures of their feete in dust,
Tempring their bloud with Musickes harmonie,
" (The very Synode-house of Venerie)
Then I at home insteade of melodie,
Grated my wheele vpon the axeltree.
How like
Arachne turned I my wheele?
Each of my maids how like a shepheardesse?
Had
Colatine my shepheard held the reele,
We foure might well haue made a country messe,
" But one abroade, makes one at home the lesse:
My
Colatine my shepheard was at
Rome,
And left poore me to feede his flocke at home.
Is
Venus made a Laundresse to the Court?
Cupid her sonne elected for a page?
No maruaile if
Dianaes starres doe sport
With
Venus planets vpon
Cupids stage:
" Yron must haue fire, this is an yron age:
" Our soules like smithes with anuills of desire,
" Beate on our flesh, and still we sparkle fire.
The Princes Court is eu'n a firmament,
All wrought with beames by day, and starres by night,
The Prince himselfe the sunnie element,
From whence all beames and starres do borow light,
To paint their faces with a red and white:
Those beames embassadors of his bright array,
Those starres his counsellors by night and day.
How comes it then? speake, speake, Iniquitie,
Thou blur of kingdomes, and thou blot of Kings,
Thou Metamorphosis of puritie,
That shap'st the greater things to lesser things,
How comes it then, that
Cupids bow-string swings
About the heeles of time? Iniquitie,
It is the halter of thy luxurie.
Thou hast burnt out the humour of thy bones,
And made them powders of impietie,
To strew about the earth as thicke as stones,
Like wombes of lust, in toombes of lecherie,
And all thy sinewes, O Iniquitie,
Are so dried vp, and now so slender sponne,
" That
Venus makes them bow-strings for her sonne.
Where is the spring of blouds virginitie,
That wont to serue thy veines like conduit heads,
And clense thy cesterne of iniquitie,
With maiden-humours from chaste
Floraes meads?
Then slepst thou like a Lorde, in Honors beds:
Then Vertue was thy bedfellow, now know,
" As great an ebbe followes as great a flow.
Loe, vnder that base tipe of
Tarquins name,
I cypher figures of iniquitie,
He writes himselfe the shamer, I the shame,
The Actor hee, and I the tragedie,
The stage am I, and he the historie:
The subiect I, and he the rauisher,
He murdring me, made me my murderer.
O Lust, this pen of mine that writes thee lust,
Lies blasted at the sulphure of thy fire,
The quill and fethers burnt to ashie dust,
Like dust and ashes flies before Desire,
Vnable to endure thy flamd attire:
" For in the skie of contrarietie,
" The winners life is, when the loosers die.
If l proceede: O fierie Incolants,
Of that vast hell, which
Pluto tearmes his haule,
Tarquins companions, ye I say that haunts
The bankes of burning baths, to you
I call,
Send me
Prometheus heart t'endite withall:
And from his vultures wings a pen of bloud,
Thrice steept and dipt in
Phlegetonticke floud.
Then shall I stamp the figure of the night
On
Tarquins brow, and marke him for her sonne,
The heire of darknesse, bastard of the light,
The clowde of heauen, th'e clipser of the sunne,
The staine in
Vestaes cheekes, which first begunne
In
Tarquins flesh, begot of fiery dust.
" O thou the hell of loue, vntutred Lust.
" It bribes the flesh to warre against the spirit,
" With tickling bloud mustring in euerie vaine,
" It weanes the conscience from her heauenly merit,
" Deprauing all chaste thoughts, het maiden traine,
" It makes the heart thinke, and vnthinke againe:
" It taints the breath with fire, the braine with bloud,
" And sets a diuel where a God had stood.
Beeing in the eie, Lust is a
Cockatrice,
" Hemlocke in taste, a canker in the thought,
" And in the life a moth, which in a trice
Consumes that treasure which so deare was bought,
And cost so many dropps of bloud (for nought)
So many streames of bloud, and baths of sweate,
To bathe our spirites, and to quench our heate.
O hell-eyde Lust, when I behold thy face
Praefigured in my Ghost, drawne in my mind,
I thinke of
Sydons flowers that grow apace,
And fauour thee by qualitie and kind,
" They looke like faith before, and fame behind:
But if thou sauour these well-fauoured euills,
They haue the sight of gods, the sent of deuills.
If I had like a curious herbalist,
Measurde thy quantitie by qualitie,
Or
Esculapius-wise, on Reasons fist,
Had planted vertue by the propertie,
Or with the lapidaries policie
" Made choice by insight, thats the note of wit,
And not by outward hue to iudge of it,
Then like that skilfull
Esculapius,
(Setting apart the colour of deceit)
I might haue knowne
Tarquin from
Tyreus,
And
Lucrece bed from
Philomelaes baite,
Vesta concei
[...]'d what
Venus did conceit:
But wanting
Esculapius in my choice,
I left sweete verdure for a flattering voice.
" Did Beautie that same bauins blaze, incense thee?
" That flower of
[...]me which buds with vanitie,
" That string of fortunes wheel, which doth commence thee
The graduate of hell borne iniquitie,
Was beautie made the marke of luxurie?
Then heauens from henceforth let the world behold
" Beautie in lead, deformitie in gold.
Say Beauties beames dazled thy clowdie eies,
" This Beautie hangs but at the heeles of time,
And when times wings a loftier measure flies,
Then Beautie like poore
Iearus must clime,
Or plunge into the puddle of her slime:
" For Beauties limmes are of a waxen frame,
" And melts like
Icarus wings at euery flame.
Sawst thou the colours which quaint
Phydias drew,
In dead-liue pictures with a touch of art.
Such red and white hath Beautie being new,
Made onely to amazeth' amazers heart,
Yet
Phydias colours piercing like a dart
Were staind with euery breath, and lost their prime,
" So Beauties blot drops from the pen of time.
But O my heauen, shall I forget thy spheres,
O spheres of heauen, shall I let passe your skies?
O skies which weares out time, and neuer weares,
Shall I make dim the tapers of your eies?
O eies of heauen, Sunne, Moone, and starres that rise
To wake the day, and free imprisoned night,
Shall my obliuious vapour clowde your light?
T'is thou ô chastitie, shall I sorsake thee,
Or drowne thy memorie in my bloudy streame?
Remember ô my soule, did she not make thee
Out of
Dianaes ribbes? did not that beame,
(Which glisters in thy spirit like
Ioues-eie-gleame,)
Reflect from
Vestaes face vpon thy heart,
Like
Phoebus brow the pride of heauens art.
O thou that mak'st the
Via Lactea whiter,
" That virgin-gallery of maiesticke
Ioue,
" Faire
Iunoes maze, to foote it, doth delight her,
" The siluer path of heauen, and bath of loue,
There sits the lambe, the swanne, the turtle doue,
Ensignes of peace, of faith, and chastitie:
" O siluer stage to golden harmonie.
" That quire of saints in virgin-ornament,
" Where Angells sing like queristers of heauen,
" Where all the Martyrs kneele the element
" Where
Cynthiaes robe, and great
Apolloes steauen,
Hangs at the altar of this milken hauen:
And to conclude, not able to begin,
I write of that which flesh hath neuer seene.
Twas thou ô chastitie m'eternall eie,
The want of thee made my ghost reele to hell,
Twas thou ô chastitie, that guild'st the skie
With beames of vertue, it is thou dost dwell
In that white-milken-christall-siluer cell:
Thou laundresse to the gods aud goddesses,
Washing their soules in fonts of holinesse.
O thou that deckst our
Phoebus in the East,
Circling his temples with spirituall beames,
And guides his vestall chariot to the west,
Through that pure christall tracke of lacteall streames,
Siluering his wheeles with alablaster gleames,
Then tempring the bright porphurie of his face,
" With chaste
Endimions blush, the die of grace.
That doing dutie to his father
Ioue
Vpon his knee of fire, bids him arise,
And blessing all his beames with kissing loue,
Like a maiesticke father guilds his eies,
To adde a rarer shine vnto the skies,
Then takes his chariot with a brighter pride,
And cries alowd, S.
Vesta be my guide.
S.
Vesta, O thou sanctifying Saint,
That lends a beame vnto the cleerest Sunne,
Which els within his fiery course would faint,
And end his race ere he had halfe begun,
Making the world beleeue his power were done,
His oyle burnt out, his lampe returnde to slime,
His fires extinguishde by the breath of time.
" O thou the pearle that hangs on
Iunoes brow,
" Like to the Moone the massie pearle of night,
" Thou iewel in the eare of
Ioue, to show
The pride of loue, the puritie of light,
" Thou
Atlas of both worlds, vmpire of right:
" Thou hauen of heauen, th'assigner of each signe,
" Sanctities saint, Diuinities diuine.
" O thou the siluer taper of the Moone,
Set in an alablaster candlesticke,
That by the bed of heauen at afternoone,
Stands like a lillie (which faire virgins picke,
To match it with the lillie of their cheeke:
" Thou lillie lambe, thou christall fether'd doue,
That nestles in the pallace of thy
Ioue.
O touch my veins againe, thou bloud diuine,
O feede my spirit thou foode angelicall,
And all chaste functions with my soule combine.
Colour my ghost with chastitie, whose All
Feedes fat leane Death and time in generall:
Come siluer doue, heauens alablaster nunne,
Ile hugge thee more then euer I haue donne.
Lucrece, alas, thou picture of thy selfe,
" Drawne poore and pale by that old painter time,
" And ouerdasht by Death that meagre elfe,
Which dries our element of bloud to thime,
And tempreth our old ashes with new slime:
Lucrece I say how canst thou
Lucrece bee?
" Wanting a God to giue a life to thee.
Bleede no more lines, (my heart,) this Knife, my pen,
This bloud my incke, hath writ enough to Lust,
"
Tarquin, to thee thou very diuell of men
I send these lines, thou art my fiend of trust,
To thee I dedicate my toombe of dust:
To thee I consecrate this little-Most,
Writ by the bloudy fingers of my Ghost.
This little scrole of fire (that burnes my hand,
In repetition of thy fiery name)
I fold vpon my heart (my bloudy land)
And to thy ghost my ghost doth send the same,
" Intituled,
The lines of bloud and flame,
" The Ghost of
Lucrece, thats the Ghost of bloud,
" The Ghost of
Tarquin, thats the fiery floud.
Now for thy title, and deserued stile,
In dedication to thy worthinesse,
" To thee the second of
Cocytus Ile,
" Chiefe senior to the
Phlegetonticke messe,
" High steward vnto
Plutoes holinesse:
" Temprer of flames, the L.
Tysiphonie,
My bloudy fires begs patronage of thee.
Now lacke I nothing but the post of hell,
To flie like
Vestaes arrow from my bow
With these my red hot newes, and then to tell
" How many times my heart did ebbe and flow,
(Like seas) with teares aboue, and bloud below:
And from poore
Lucrece mouth tell
Tarquin thus,
That
Philomel hath writ to
Tyreus.
Here stops the streame of tragicke bloud and fire,
And now
Melpomene hales my spirit in,
The stage is downe, and
Philomelaes quire
Is husht from prick-song:
Acherons bells begin
To call our ghosts clad in the spirits of sin:
Now
Tyreus meets with rauishde
Philomel,
Lucrece with
Tarquin; in the haule of hell.
FINIS.