Love and Honour: Or,
The Lovers Farewel to Calista.
Being sent from Sea in the late Engagement against the Dutch, to his Mistris, under the
Name of Calista. With the Ladies deploring and ingenious Answer.
To a New sad Air much in request; Or, Tune of, Now the Tyrant hath stolen.
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FArewel my Calista my joy and my grief,
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In vain have I lov'd thee, and found no relief;
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Undone by your Virtues so strict and severe,
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Your eyes gave me love, but you gave me despair.
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Now cal'd by my honour, I seek with content,
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That fate which in pitty you would not prevent.
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To languish in love were to find by delay,
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A death that's more welcome the speediest way.
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On Seas, and in Battails, mongst bullets and fire
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The danger is less then in hopeless desire.
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The deaths-wound you gave me, though far off, I bear
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My fall from y[o]ur sight's not to cost you a tear.
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But if the kind flood on a wave should convey,
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And under your window my body should lay,
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The wound on my breast, when you happen to see
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you would say with a sigh, It was given by me,
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When Suitors are wounded with stabs of disdain
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'Tis happiness to be put out of their pain:
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The grave is a place to bid torment farewel,
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But Lovers are tortur'd 'twixt Heaven and Hell
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When frowns of a Mistriss do turn a man o're,
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'Tis safer on Ship-board then 'tis on the shore:
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I find by experience, though with loss of breath
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worse to encounter with Cupid then Death
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What strength hath a Lady with cast of her eye,
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To make a man live, or compel him to dye:
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Such power had Calista with smile and with frown
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She'd raise me to heaven, then tumble me down.
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But dearest take care how you put faith in men,
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For I fear you will never be lov'd so agen.
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You needs must acknowledge, whilst I could draw breath
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I was your unchangeable servant till death,
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ONce more my last farewel I breath in a blast
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The cloud on my vitals is much over-cast:
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I faint, fail, I perish, and suddenly dye,
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Yet sure should recover if thou wert but by:
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That I nere enjoy'd thee I do not repine,
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Thou liv[']st with thy honour, and I dye with mine:
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For to after ages this story will prove,
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I dyed in the war for my King and my Love.
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The Ladies Answer.
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BLame not your Calista, nor call her your grief
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'Twas Honour, not she, that deny'd you relief:
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Abuse not her vertues, nor term them severe,
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Who loves without honour, must look for despair.
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Now prompted by pitty I truly lament,
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The force of your fate, which I could not prevent:
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And languish to think that your blood should defray
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The expence of your love, though so noble a way.
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On Seas and in Battails that you did expire,
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Was caus'd by your Valour, not hopeless desire;
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Of your Fame, there acquired, I greedily hear,
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And grieve when I think that it cost you so dear:
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But when your sad friends shall your body convey
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By my window your funeral duties to pay,
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I'le sigh that your fate then I could not revers
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And all my kind wishes I'le shew on your Herse
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When Suitors petition and run upon shelves,
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Or shot, if deny'd, they do murder themselves:
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The grave is a couch where the vertuous remain,
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Without expectation of sorrow or pain.
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If the frowns of a Mistriss can rule a mans fate,
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He values his life at a pitiful rate:
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Though now she look cloudy, when she draws the sceane
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Who knows but the day-light may clear up again
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The looks of a Lady you falsely do scan,
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'Tis not strength in the woman, but weakness in Man
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When men set up Idols of flesh, blood, and bone
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And bow down to worship, the fault is their own.
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I hope I shall ne'r be deceived by Men:
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For your sake I never shall trust them agen:
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fatal when Lovers do suffer such strife,
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That one must lose honour, or th' other lose life.
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My mind never can your last farewel forget,
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My tears shall confess I'le not dye in your debt:
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I heartily wish I had been by your side,
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That you might recover, or I might have dyed;
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Then both to Elezium we had been convey'd,
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Where Ladies by Lovers are never betray'd
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But in future ages in sonets they'l sing,
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Twas long of your love that you dy'd for your King
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