The Faerie Queene

Those prudent heads, that with their counsels wise
Whylom the pillours of th’earth did sustaine,
And taught ambitious Rome to tyrannise
And in the neck of all the world to rayne;
Oft from those grave affaires were wont abstaine,
With the sweet Lady Muses for to play:
So Ennius the elder Africane,
So Maro oft did Caesars cares allay.
So you, great Lord, that with your counsell sway
The burdeine of this kingdom mightily,
With like delightes sometimes may eke delay
The rugged brow of carefull Policy;
And to these ydle rymes lend litle space,
Which for their titles sake may find more grace.

To you, right noble Lord, whose carefull brest
To menage of most grave affaires is bent;
And on whose mightie shoulders most doth rest
The burdein of this kingdomes governement,
As the wide compasse of the firmament
On Atlas mighty shoulders is upstayd,
Unfitly I these ydle rimes present,
The labor of lost time, and wit unstayd:
Yet if their deeper sence be inly wayd,
And the dim vele, with which from commune vew
Their fairer parts are hid, aside be layd,
Perhaps not vaine they may appeare to you.
Such as they be, vouchsafe them to receave,
And wipe their faults out of your censure grave.

Receive, most Noble Lord, in gentle gree,
The unripe fruit of an unready wit;
Which by thy countenaunce doth crave to bee
Defended from foule Envies poisnous bit.
Which so to doe may thee right well besit,
Sith th’antique glory of thine auncestry
Under a shady vele is therein writ,
And eke thine owne long living memory,
Succeeding them in true nobility:
And also for the love which thou doest beare
To th’ Heliconian ymps, and they to thee;
They unto thee, and thou to them, most deare.
Deare as thou art unto thy selfe, so love
That loves and honours thee, as doth behove.

The sacred Muses have made alwaies clame
To be the Nourses of nobility,
And Registres of everlasting fame,
To all that armes professe and chevalry.
Then, by like right the noble Progeny,
Which them succeed in fame and worth, are tyde
T’embrace the service of sweete Poetry,
By whose endevours they are glorifide;
And eke from all, of whom it is envide,
To patronize the authour of their praise,
Which gives them life, that els would soone have dide,
And crownes their ashes with immortall baies.
To thee, therefore, right noble Lord, I send
This present of my paines, it to defend.

Redoubted Lord, in whose corageous mind
The flowre of chevalry, now bloosming faire,
Doth promise fruite worthy the noble kind
Which of their praises have left you the haire;
To you this humble present I prepare,
For love of vertue and of Martial praise;
To which though nobly ye inclined are,
As goodlie well ye shew’d in late assaies,
Yet brave ensample of long passed daies,
In which trew honor yee may fashiond see,
To like desire of honor may ye raise,
And fill your mind with magnanimitee.
Receive it, Lord, therefore, as it was ment,
For honor of your name and high descent.

Magnificke Lord, whose vertues excellent,
Doe merit a most famous Poets witt
To be thy living praises instrument,
Yet doe not sdeigne to let thy name be writt
In this base Poeme, for thee far unfitt:
Nought is thy worth disparaged thereby;
But when my Muse, whose fethers, nothing flitt,
Doe yet but flagg, and lowly learne to fly,
With bolder wing shall dare alofte to sty
To the last praises of this Faery Queene;
Then shall it make more famous memory
Of thine Heroicke parts, such as they beene:
Till then, vouchsafe thy noble countenaunce
To these first labours needed furtheraunce.

Receive, most noble Lord, a simple taste
Of the wilde fruit which salvage soyl hath bred;
Which, being through long wars left almost waste,
With brutish barbarisme is overspredd:
And, in so faire a land as may be redd,
Not one Parnassus, nor one Helicone,
Left for sweete Muses to be harboured,
But where thy selfe hast thy brave mansione:
There, in deede, dwel faire Graces many one,
And gentle Nymphes, delights of learned wits;
And in thy person, without paragone,
All goodly bountie and true honour sits.
Such, therefore, as that wasted soyl doth yield,
Receive, dear Lord, in worth, the fruit of barren field.

And ye, brave Lord, whose goodly personage
And noble deeds, each other garnishing,
Make you ensample to the present age
Of th’old Heroes, whose famous ofspring
The antique Poets wont so much to sing;
In this same Pageaunt have a worthy place,
Sith those huge castles of Castilian King,
That vainly threatned kingdomes to displace,
Like flying doves ye did before you chace;
And that proud people, woxen insolent
Through many victories, didst first deface:
Thy praises everlasting monument
Is in this verse engraven semblably,
That it may live to all posterity.

Renowmed Lord, that, for your worthinesse
And noble deeds, have your deserved place
High in the favour of that Emperesse,
The worlds sole glory and her sexes grace;
Here eke of right have you a worthie place,
Both for your nearnes to that Faerie Queene,
And for your owne high merit in like cace:
Of which, apparaunt proofe was to be scene,
When that tumultuous rage and fearfull deene
Of Northerne rebels ye did pacify,
And their disloiall powre defaced clene,
The record of enduring memory.
Live, Lord, for ever in this lasting verse,
That all posteritie thy honor may reherse.

Most Noble Lord, the pillor of my life,
And Patrone of my Muses pupillage;
Through whose large bountie, poured on me rife
In the first season of my feeble age,
I now doe live, bound yours by vassalage;
Sith nothing ever may redeeme, nor reave
Out of your endlesse debt, so sure a gage,
Vouchsafe in worth this small guift to receave,
Which in your noble hands for pledge I leave
Of all the rest that I am tyde t’account:
Rude rymes, the which a rustick Muse did weave
In savadge soyle, far from Parnasso Mount,
And roughly wrought in an unlearned Loome:
The which vouchsafe, dear Lord, your favorable doome.

In vain I thinke, right honourable Lord,
By this rude ryme to memorize thy name,
Whose learned Muse hath writ her owne record
In golden verse, worthy immortal fame:
Thou much more fit (were leasure to the same)
Thy gracious Soverains praises to compile,
And her imperiall Majestic to frame
In loftie numbers and heroicke stile.
But, sith thou maist not so, give leave a while
To baser wit his power therein to spend,
Whose grosse defaults thy daintie pen may file,
And unadvised oversights amend.
But evermore vouchsafe it to maintaine
Against vile Zoilus backbitings vaine.

That Mantuane Poets incompared spirit,
Whose girland now is set in highest place,
Had not Mecaenas, for his worthy merit,
It first advaunst to great Augustus grace,
Might long perhaps have lien in silence bace,
Ne bene so much admir’d of later age.
This lowly Muse, that learns like steps to trace,
Flies for like aide unto your Patronage,
That are the great Mecaenas of this age,
As wel to al that civil artes professe,
As those that are inspir’d with Martial rage,
And craves protection of her feeblenesse:
Which if ye yield, perhaps ye may her rayse
In bigger tunes to sound your living prayse.

Who ever gave more honourable prize
To the sweet Muse then did the Martiall crew,
That their brave deeds she might immortalise
In her shril tromp, and sound their praises dew?
Who then ought more to favour her then you,
Moste noble Lord, the honor of this age,
And Precedent of all that armes ensue?
Whose warlike prowesse and manly courage,
Tempred with reason and advizement sage,
Hath fild sad Belgicke with victorious spoile;
In Fraunce and Ireland left a famous gage;
And lately shakt the Lusitanian soile.
Sith, then, each where thou hast dispredd thy fame,
Love him that hath eternized your name.

To thee, that art the sommers Nightingale,
Thy soveraine Qoddesses most deare delight,
Why doe I send this rusticke Madrigale,
That may thy tunefull eare unseason quite?
Thou onely fit this Argument to write,
In whose high thoughts Pleasure hath built her bowre,
And dainty love learnd sweetly to endite.
My rimes I know unsavory and sowre,
To tast the streames that, like a golden showre,
Flow from thy fruitfull head, of thy love’s praise;
Fitter, perhaps, to thonder Martiall stowre,
When so thee list thy lofty Muse to raise:
Yet, till that thou thy Poeme wilt make knowne,
Let thy faire Cinthias praises be thus rudely showne.

Remembraunce of that most Heroicke spirit,
The hevens pride, the glory of our daies,
Which now triumpheth, through immortall merit
Of his brave vertues, crown’d with lasting baies
Of hevenlie blis and everlasting praies;
Who first my Muse did lift out of the flore,
To sing his sweet delights in lowlie laies;
Bids me, most noble Lady, to adore
His goodly image, living evermore
In the divine resemblaunce of your face;
Which with your vertues ye embellish more,
And native beauty deck with heavenlie grace:
For his, and for your owne especial sake,
Vouchsafe from him this toke in good worth to take.

Ne may I, without blot of endlesse blame,
You, fairest Lady, leave out of this place;
But with remembraunce of your gracious name,
Wherewith that courtly garlond most ye grace
And deck the world, adorne these verses base.
Not that these few lines can in them comprise
Those glorious ornaments of hevenly grace,
Wherewith ye triumph over feeble eyes,
And in subdued harts do tyranyse;
For thereunto doth need a golden quill,
And silver leaves, them rightly to devise;
But to make humble present of good will:
Which, whenas timely meanes it purchase may,
In ampler wise it selfe will forth display.

The Chian Peinter, when he was requirde
To pourtraift Venus in her perfect hew,
To make his worke more absolute, desird
Of all the fairest Maides to have the vew.
Much more me needs, to draw the semblant trew
Of beauties Queene, the worlds sole wonderment,
To sharpe my sence with sundry beauties vew,
And steale from each some part of ornament.
If all the world to seeke I overwent,
A fairer crew yet no where could I see
Then that brave court doth to mine eie present;
That the worlds pride seemes gathered there to bee.
Of each a part I stole by cunning thefte:
Forgive it me, faire Dames, sith lesse ye have not lefte.