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While in his hold-fast foot the weak mouse panteth;

Her sad behaviour feeds his vulture folly,

A swallowing gulf that even in plenty wanteth:

His ear her prayers admits, but his heart granteth

No penetrable entrance to her plaining:

Tears harden lust, though marble wear with raining.

Her pity-pleading eyes are sadly fix'd

In the remorseless wrinkles of his face;

Her modest eloquence with sighs is mix'd,

Which to her oratory adds more grace.

She puts the period often from his place,

And midst the sentence so her accent breaks,

That twice she doth begin ere once she speaks.

She conjures him by high almighty Jove,

By knighthood, gentry, and sweet friendship's oath,

By her untimely tears, her husband's love,

By holy human law, and common troth,

By heaven and earth, and all the power of both,

That to his borrow'd bed he make retire,

And stoop to honour, not to foul desire.

Quoth she, 'Reward not hospitality

With such black payment as thou hast pretended;

Mud not the fountain that gave drink to thee;

Mar not the thing that cannot be amended;

End thy ill aim before the shoot be ended:

He is no woodman that doth bend his bow

To strike a poor unseasonable doe.

'My husband is thy friend; for his sake spare me;

Thyself art mighty; for thine own sake leave me;

Myself a weakling, do not then ensnare me;

Thou look'st not like deceit; do not deceive me;

My sighs, like whirlwinds, labour hence to heave thee.

If ever man were mov'd with woman's moans,

Be moved with my tears, my sighs, my groans:

'All which together, like a troubled ocean,

Beat at thy rocky and wreck-threatening heart;

To soften it with their continual motion;

For stones dissolv'd to water do convert.

O, if no harder than a stone thou art,

Melt at my tears, and be compassionate!

Soft pity enters at an iron gate.

'In Tarquin's likeness I did entertain thee;

Hast thou put on his shape to do him shame?

To all the host of heaven I complain me,

Thou wrong'st his honour, wound'st his princely name.

Thou art not what thou seem'st; and if the same,

Thou seem'st not what thou art, a god, a king;

For kings like gods should govern every thing.

'How will thy shame be seeded in thine age,

When thus thy vices bud before thy spring!

If in thy hope thou dar'st do such outrage,

What dar'st thou not when once thou art a king!

O, be remember'd, no outrageous thing

From vassal actors can he wip'd away;

Then kings' misdeeds cannot be hid in clay.

'This deed will make thee only lov'd for fear,

But happy monarchs still are fear'd for love:

With foul offenders thou perforce must bear,

When they in thee the like offences prove:

If but for fear of this, thy will remove;

For princes are the glass, the school, the book,

Where subjects eyes do learn, do read, do look.

'And wilt thou be the school where Lust shall learn?

Must he in thee read lectures of such shame:

Wilt thou be glass, wherein it shall discern

Authority for sin, warrant for blame,

To privilege dishonour in thy name?

Thou back'st reproach against long-living laud,

And mak'st fair reputation but a bawd.

'Hast thou command? by him that gave it thee,

From a pure heart command thy rebel will:

Draw not thy sword to guard iniquity,

For it was lent thee all that brood to kill.

Thy princely office how canst thou fulfill,

When, pattern'd by thy fault, foul Sin may say

He learn'd to sin, and thou didst teach the way?

'Think but how vile a spectacle it were

To view thy present trespass in another.

Men's faults do seldom to themselves appear;

Their own transgressions partially they smother:

This guilt would seem death-worthy in thy brother.

O how are they wrapp'd in with infamies

That from their own misdeeds askaunce their eyes!

'To thee, to thee, my heav'd-up hands appeal,

Not to seducing lust, thy rash relier;

I sue for exil'd majesty's repeal;

Let him return, and flattering thoughts retire:

His true respect will 'prison false desire,

And wipe the dim mist from thy doting eyne,

That thou shalt see thy state, and pity mine.'