Christopher Marlowe - The Works of Christopher Marlowe, Vol. 3 (of 3)

Come, come, dear Night! Love's mart of kisses,
Sweet close to his ambitious line,
The fruitful summer of his blisses!
Love's glory doth in darkness shine.
O come, soft rest of cares! come, Night!
Come, naked Virtue's only tire,
The reapèd harvest of the light,
Bound up in sheaves of sacred fire!
Love calls to war;
Sighs his alarms,
Lips his swords are,
The field his arms.

Come, Night, and lay thy velvet hand
On glorious Day's outfacing face;
And all thy crownèd flames command,
For torches to our nuptial grace!
Love calls to war;
Sighs his alarms,
Lips his swords are,
The field his arms.

No need have we of factious Day,
To cast, in envy of thy peace,
Her balls of discord in thy way:
Here Beauty's day doth never cease;
Day is abstracted here,
And varied in a triple sphere.
Hero, Alcmane, Mya, so outshine thee,
Ere thou come here, let Thetis thrice refine thee.
Love calls to war;
Sighs his alarms,
Lips his swords are,
The field his arms.

The evening star I see:
Rise, youths! the evening star
Helps Love to summon war;
Both now embracing be.
Rise, youths! Love's rite claims more than banquets; rise!
Now the bright marigolds, that deck the skies,
Phœbus' celestial flowers, that, contrary
To his flowers here, ope when he shuts his eye,
And shuts when he doth open, crown your sports:
Now Love in Night, and Night in Love exhorts
Courtship and dances: all your parts employ,
And suit Night's rich expansure with your joy.
Love paints his longings in sweet virgins' eyes:
Rise, youths! Love's rite claims more than banquets; rise!

Rise, virgins! let fair nuptial loves enfold
Your fruitless breasts: the maidenheads 110 110 Former editors have not noticed that Chapman is here closely imitating Catullus' Carmen Nuptiale — "Virginitas non tota tua est: ex parte parentum est: Tertia pars patri data, pars data tertia matri, Tertia sola tua est: noli pugnare duobus, Qui genero sua jura simul cum dote dederunt." ye hold
Are not your own alone, but parted are;
Part in disposing them your parents share,
And that a third part is; so must ye save
Your loves a third, and you your thirds must have.
Love paints his longings in sweet virgins' eyes:
Rise, youths! Love's rite claims more than banquets; rise!

Herewith the amorous spirit, that was so kind
To Teras' hair, and comb'd it down with wind,
Still as it, comet-like, brake from her brain,
Would needs have Teras gone, and did refrain
To blow it down: which, staring 111 111 Some eds. "starting." Cf. Julius Cæsar , iv. 3, ll. 278-9— "Art thou some god, some angel, or some devil, That makest my blood cold and my hair to stare ?" up, dismay'd
The timorous feast; and she no longer stay'd;
But, bowing to the bridegroom and the bride,
Did, like a shooting exhalation, glide
Out of their sights: the turning of her back
Made them all shriek, it look'd so ghastly black.
O hapless Hero! that most hapless cloud
Thy soon-succeeding tragedy foreshow'd.
Thus all the nuptial crew to joys depart;
But much-wronged 112 112 "Old eds. 'much-rong,' 'much rongd,' and 'much-wrong'd.'"— Dyce (who reads "much-wrung"). Hero stood Hell's blackest dart:
Whose wound because I grieve so to display,
I use digressions thus t' increase the day.

Leucote flies to all the Winds,
And from the Fates their outrage blinds, 113 113 It should be binds : i.e. , "Leucote flies to the several winds, and, commissioned by the Fates, commands them to restrain their violence." Broughton.
That Hero and her love may meet.
Leander, with Love's complete fleet

" Rose-cheek'd Adonis hied him to the chace."

"The moist star ,
Upon whose influence Neptune's empire stands."

"Dead shepherd, now I find thy saw of might,—
Who ever lov'd, that lov'd not at first sight. "

"Among a number one is reckoned none."

"She with a kind of granting put him by it."

'There is no beldam nurse to powt nor lower
When wantoning we revell in my tower,
Nor need I top my turret with a light,
To guide thee to me as thou swim'st by night.'"— Broughton.