The Country Mans Delight.
Or, The Happy Joyes of a Countrey Life.
Being a most pleasant New Song.
How bless'd are they who free from care and strife
In humble Cottages do lead their life?
They there posses those joys for which mankind
Of higher Rank, labour in vain to find.
They live more happy, at Content and Ease,
Than Princes in their stately Pallaces.
They feel not the tempestuous Storms of state,
Live all in peace are strangers to debate.
To a new Tune of, Happy is the Countrey life, Or, Smiling Phillis, etc.
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HAppy is the Countrey life,
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bless'd with content, & health, and ease
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Free from Factious noise and strife,
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we only plot our selves to please:
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Peace of mind's the days d[e]light,
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And Love our welcome joy at night.
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Haile green fields, and shady Woods,
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haile Springs and streams that still run pure
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Nature's uncorrupted good,
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where virtue only is secure.
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Free from vice, and free from care,
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Age is no grief nor Youth no snare.
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No sad fancies fill our breast,
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but happy, still we live at ease,
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Whilest Kings are with fears opprest
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we have joy and lasting peace:
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Natures pride bedecks each part,
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Whilest she to please us straines her art.
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In native green cloathes each Plain
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with blooming sweets perfumes the Ayr,
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And with gentle showres of Rain
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makes us her free bounties share:
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The Birds in Groves, Woods, and Field,
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Do hourly pleasant Musick yeild.
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Whilst purling streams gently glide
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through flowry meads where Flocks do graze
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And loving Swaines on either side
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on slender Reeds tune soft lays,
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To charm each lovely Shepherdess,
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Whose looks her bashful thoughts express.
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Ignorant we are of wiles,
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desirous Mortals to ensnare,
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Who, still after many toiles
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in courting the disdainful fair,
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Nothing get but flouts and scorns,
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have for one role a thousand thorns.
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Whilest like Infant nature we
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bath in the streams of endless bliss,
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Air it self is not more free,
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nor ought exceed our happiness:
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Who then wou'd not toiles lay by?
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and let Ambition-feavour dye?
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Who wou'd not retire from strife?
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from sensless noise, and lewd debate?
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For a happy Countrey life,
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free from all cares and fears of state,
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Free from jealousie and pride,
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of greatness still the restless tide.
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Joys attend the opening Dawn,
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fresh pleasures they do ever spring,
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Courtier-like we cannot fawn,
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yet are as Loyall to our King,
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Flatterers we ever hate,
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those Caterpillers of the State.
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Who strange discord daily breed,
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raising fools hopes above the Sky,
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Yet leave them when they have most need,
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to plunge themselves in misery:
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In wholesome Ware still we deal,
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Such as we need not to conceal.
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On each green Bank we lie down,
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and sport it 'midst a thousand joys,
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Easier than on beds of Doune,
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whilest there no fear our love destroys:
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Violets still perfume our way,
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Till evening does shut up the day.
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Then to homely Cottages
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our bleating flocks we do convey;
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Where soft slumber on us seizes,
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till Phoebus does restore the day:
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Who'd not then thus happy be?
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thus bless'd with all felicity.
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