Opinion
There is no truth of any good
To be discerned on earth ; and, by conversion,
Nought therefore simply bad; but as the stuff
Prepared for Arras pictures, is no picture
Till it be formed, and man hath cast the beams
Of his imaginous fancy thorough it,
In forming ancient kings and conquerors
As he conceives they looked and were attired,
Though they were nothing so: so all things here
Have all their price set down from men's conceits,
Which make all terms and actions good or bad,
And are but pliant and well-coloured threads
Put into feigned images of truth.
poem by George Chapman
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A Coronet for his Mistress, Philosophy
Muses that sing love's sensual empery,
And lovers kindling your enraged fires
At Cupid's bonfires burning in the eye,
Blown with the empty breath of vain desires;
You that prefer the painted cabinet
Before the wealthy jewels it doth store ye,
That all your joys in dying figures set,
And stain the living substance of your glory;
Abjure those joys, abhor their memory,
And let my love the honour'd subject be
Of love, and honour's complete history.
Your eyes were never yet let in to see
The majesty and riches of the mind,
But dwell in darkness; for your god is blind.
poem by George Chapman
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Bridal Song
O COME, soft rest of cares! come, Night!
Come, naked Virtue's only tire,
The reaped harvest of the light
Bound up in sheaves of sacred fire.
Love calls to war:
Sighs his alarms,
Lips his swords are,
The field his arms.
Come, Night, and lay thy velvet hand
On glorious Day's outfacing face;
And all thy crowned flames command
For torches to our nuptial grace.
Love calls to war:
Sighs his alarms,
Lips his swords are,
The field his arms.
poem by George Chapman
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The Shadow Of Night
...
Fall, Hercules, from heaven, in tempests hurl'd,
And cleanse this beastly stable of the world;
Or bend thy brazen bow against the Sun,
As in Tartessus, when thou hadst begun
Thy task of oxen: heat in more extremes
Than thou wouldst suffer, with his envious beams.
Now make him leave the world to Night and dreams.
Never were virtue's labours so envied
As in this light: shoot, shoot, and stoop his pride.
Suffer no more his lustful rays to get
The Earth with issue: let him still be set
In Somnus' thickets: bound about the brows,
With pitchy vapours, and with ebon boughs.
Rich taper'd sanctuary of the blest,
Palace of Ruth, made all of tears, and rest,
To thy black shades and desolat{.i}on
I consecrate my life; and living moan,
Where furies shall for ever fighting be,
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poem by George Chapman
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The Seventeenth Book Of Homer's Odysseys
...
Such speech they chang'd; when in the yard there lay
A dog, call'd Argus, which, before his way
Assum'd for Ilion, Ulysses bred,
Yet stood his pleasure then in little stead,
As being too young; but, growing to his grace,
Young men made choice of him for every chace,
Or of their wild goats, of their hares, or harts.
But his king gone, and he, now past his parts,
Lay all abjectly on the stable's store,
Before the oxstall, and mules' stable door,
To keep the clothes cast from the peasants' hands,
While they laid compass on Ulysses' lands;
The dog, with ticks (unlook'd-to) over-grown.
But by this dog no sooner seen but known
Was wise Ulysses, who new enter'd there,
Up went his dog's laid ears, and, coming near,
Up he himself rose, fawn'd, and wagg'd his stern,
Couch'd close his ears, and lay so; nor discern
Could evermore his dear-lov'd lord again.
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poem by George Chapman
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An Invective Written By Mr. George Chapman Against Mr. Ben Jonson
Great, learned, witty Ben, be pleased to light
The world with that three-forked fire; nor fright
All us, thy sublearned, with luciferous boast
That thou art most great, most learn'd, witty most
Of all the kingdom, nay of all the earth;
As being a thing betwixt a human birth
And an infernal; no humanity
Of the divine soul shewing man in thee.
* * * * *
Though thy play genius hang his broken wings
Full of sick feathers, and with forced things,
Imp thy scenes, labour'd and unnatural,
And nothing good comes with thy thrice-vex'd call,
Comest thou not yet, nor yet? O no, nor yet;
Yet are thy learn'd admirers so deep set
In thy preferment above all that cite
The sun in challenge for the heat and light
Of heaven's influences which of you two knew
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poem by George Chapman
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The Sixth Book Of Homer's Iliads
...
To this great Hector said:
"Be well assur'd, wife, all these things in my kind cares are weigh'd,
But what a shame and fear it is to think how Troy would scorn
(Both in her husbands, and her wives, whom long-train'd gowns adorn)
That I should cowardly fly off! The spirit I first did breathe
Did never teach me that; much less, since the contempt of death
Was settled in me, and my mind knew what a worthy was,
Whose office is to lead in fight, and give no danger pass
Without improvement. In this fire must Hector's trial shine;
Here must his country, father, friends, be, in him, made divine.
And such a stormy day shall come (in mind and soul I know)
When sacred Troy shall shed her towers, for tears of overthrow;
When Priam, all his birth and power, shall in those tears be drown'd.
But neither Troy's posterity so much my soul doth wound,
Priam, nor Hecuba herself, nor all my brothers' woes
(Who, though so many, and so good, must all be food for foes,)
As thy sad state; when some rude Greek shall lead thee weeping hence,
These free days clouded, and a night of captive violence
Loading thy temples, out of which thine eyes must never see,
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poem by George Chapman
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Hero And Leander. The Sixth Sestiad
No longer could the Day nor Destinies
Delay the Night, who now did frowning rise
Into her throne; and at her humorous breasts
Visions and Dreams lay sucking: all men's rests
Fell like the mists of death upon their eyes,
Day's too-long darts so kill'd their faculties.
The Winds yet, like the flowers, to cease began;
For bright Leucote, Venus' whitest swan,
That held sweet Hero dear, spread her fair wings,
Like to a field of snow, and message brings
From Venus to the Fates, t'entreat them lay
Their charge upon the Winds their rage to stay,
That the stern battle of the seas might cease,
And guard Leander to his love in peace.
The Fates consent;--ay me, dissembling Fates!
They showed their favours to conceal their hates,
And draw Leander on, lest seas too high
Should stay his too obsequious destiny:
Who like a fleering slavish parasite,
In warping profit or a traitorous sleight,
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poem by George Chapman
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Hero And Leander. The Fourth Sestiad
Now from Leander's place she rose, and found
Her hair and rent robe scatter'd on the ground;
Which taking up, she every piece did lay
Upon an altar, where in youth of day
She us'd t' exhibit private sacrifice:
Those would she offer to the deities
Of her fair goddess and her powerful son,
As relics of her late-felt passion;
And in that holy sort she vow'd to end them,
In hope her violent fancies, that did rend them,
Would as quite fade in her love's holy fire,
As they should in the flames she meant t' inspire.
Then put she on all her religious weeds,
That decked her in her secret sacred deeds;
A crown of icicles, that sun nor fire
Could ever melt, and figur'd chaste desire;
A golden star shined in her naked breast,
In honour of the queen-light of the east.
In her right hand she held a silver wand,
On whose bright top Peristera did stand.
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poem by George Chapman
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Hero And Leander. The Third Sestiad
New light gives new directions, fortunes new,
To fashion our endeavours that ensue.
More harsh, at least more hard, more grave and high
Our subject runs, and our stern Muse must fly.
Love's edge is taken off, and that light flame,
Those thoughts, joys, longings, that before became
High unexperienc'd blood, and maids' sharp plights,
Must now grow staid, and censure the delights,
That, being enjoy'd, ask judgment; now we praise,
As having parted: evenings crown the days.
And now, ye wanton Loves, and young Desires,
Pied Vanity, the mint of strange attires,
Ye lisping Flatteries, and obsequious Glances,
Relentful Musics, and attractive Dances,
And you detested Charms constraining love!
Shun love's stoln sports by that these lovers prove.
By this, the sovereign of heaven's golden fires,
And young Leander, lord of his desires,
Together from their lovers' arms arose:
Leander into Hellespontus throws
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poem by George Chapman
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