The Harmony of the muses, or, The gentlemans and ladies choisest recreation full of various, pure and transcendent wit : containing severall excellent poems, some fancies of love, some of disdain, and all the subjects incident to the passionate affections either of men or women / heretofore written by those unimitable masters of learning and invention, Dr. Joh. Donn, Dr. Hen. King, Dr. W. Stroad [et al].

Loves Progress by Dr. Don.

WHo ever lov'd, if he do not propose The right end, love, he is as one that goes To Sea for nothing but to make him sick, And loves a Bear-whelp born, if we o're-lick Our love, and force it strange new shapes to take, We erre, and of a lump a Monster make. Were not a Calf a monster if't were grown, Fac'd like a man, though better then his own; Perfection is in unity, prefer One woman first, and then one thing in her: Or when I value gold, I think upon The ductilness, the application, The whole summes, the ingenuity, From rust, from soyl, from fire ever free; But if I love, it is because 'tis made By our new Natures use, the soul of Trade; All this in women we might think upon, If women have them, and yet love but one: Can men more injure women then to say, (they They love them for that by which they are not Make Vertue woman, must I cool my blood, Till I both be and find one wise and good? May barren Angels love so, but if we Make love to woman, vertue is not she,

As beauty is not, he then that strayes thus, From her to hers, is more adulterous Then he that takes her maid, search every sphear, And Fi••mam••nt, our Cupid is not there, He's an infernal god, and under ground With Pluto dwels, where gold and fire abound, Men to such gods their sacrificing coales Did not on Altars lay, but pits and holes; Although we see celestial bodies move Above the earth, the earth we till and love; So we his heirs contemplate, wounds and heart, And vertues, but we love the rendring part; Nor is the soul more swarthy, nor more fit For love then this, as infinite as it, But in attaining this desired place, How much they stray that set out at the face, The hair a forest is of Ambushes, Of springs, snares, fetters, and of manicles: The brov becalmes us when 'tis smooth & plain And when it wrinckles, shipwracks us again, Smooth, 'tis a Paradise, where we would have Immortall stay, and wrinckled 'tis our grave. The nose like to the first Meridian runs, Not'twixt the East & West, but'twixt two Suns: Her swelling lips, to which when we are come, We Anchor there, and think we are at home, For they seem all the Syrens songs, and there The Delphian Oracles do fill the eare: Then in a creek where chosen pearls do swell, The Remora her charming tongue doth dwell;

These and the glorious promontory her chi•• O're-past, and the straight Hellespont between The Cestos and Abidos of her breasts, Not of two Lovers, but two loves the nests, Succeeds a boundless Sea, but that thine eye Some Iland Moles may scatter'd there discry, And sayling towards her India, in the way, Shall at her fair Atlantick navel stay; Though thence the current be thy Pilot made, Yet er•• thou come where thou wouldst be in-laid Thou shalt upon another Forrest set, Where some do shipwrack and no further get, When thou art there, consider in this Chase, What time they lose that set out at the face; Rather set out below, practise my Art, Some symitry the foot hath with that part, Which thou dost seek, and is a Map for that, Lovely enough to stop, but not stay at; Least subject to disguise and change it is, Men say the Devil never can change his; It is the Embleme that hath figured Firmness, 'tis the first part that comes to bed; Civility we see refin'd the kiss, Which at the foot began, transplanted is Since to the hand, then to the imperial knee, Now at the Papal foot delights to be; If Kings think it the nearest way, and do Rise from the foot, Lovers may do so too, And as free Sphears move faster far then can Birds whom the ayre resists, so may that man

Which goes this empty and aetherial way, Then if at beauties Elements h•• stay: Rich Nature hath in women wisely made Two purses, and their mouthes aversly laid, They then that to the lower tribute owe, That way which that Exchequer looks must goe, He which doth not, his errour is as great, As who by Clysters gives the stomack meat.