The Power and Pleasure of Love.

"When lo! a voice divinely sweet she hears,
From unseen lips proceeds the heavenly sound;
"Psyche approach! dismiss thy timid fears,

At length his Bride thy longing spouse has found,
And bids for thee immortal joys abound;

For thee the palace rose at his command,

For thee his love a bridal banquet crown'd:
He bids attendant nymphs around thee stand,

Prompt every wish to serve-a fond obedient band.'"

TOM SHADWELL has been already mentioned praisefully in

these pages, when we gave his popular Bacchanalian Song "The Delights of the Bottle and the Joys of good Wine" on our earlier pages, 44 to 47, from his "Tragedy of Psyche," 1675. We are unwilling to delay until a later volume the other song by him from the same Psyche, which is given of lengthened form as a broadside in the Roxburghe Collection of Ballads. So we add it here at once, as conjoining itself agreeably with the present group of Love-ditties beginning "Ah! how pleasant are the charms of Love." It is to a different tune, one composed expressly for it by Matthew Locke, the music of which is given in John Playford's Fourth Book of Choice Ayres (1683), p. 40. It is supposed to be sung at the union of Cupid and Psyche: a most charming theme, acceptable to poets and painters, as proved of old in the graceful designs of Raffaelle Sanzio at the Aldobrandini Palace in Rome, and in modern time by the tender lines of Mrs. Mary Tighe, a poet deserving of remembrance.

Shadwell's original "Song at the Treat of Cupid and Psyche" is reproduced almost verbatim in the broadside "Power and Pleasure of Love," beginning "All joy to fair Psyche!" The only changes or corruptions of text are "her Master" for "our Master," Cupid, in second line; "do nothing" for "does nothing," in ninth line; and "In one happy moment they'd fully be paid" for "By one happy," in the sixteenth line. These three verses complete the original, the other nine being the additions of the broadside-ballad-writer. Shadwell adapted this play of Psyche (which is called a Tragedy on the music-less quartos, but rightly designated an "English Opera" on the title-page of Locke's Music,) from Molière. Thomas Duffet burlesqued Shadwell's workmanship, somewhat grossly, in 1678, by his Psyche Debauched. This includes, in the fifth Act, a parody on the song already given on our p. 44: Duffett's beginning, "The Delights of the Bottle and the charms of a Drab." A different Mock-Song is in Rawlinson Collection, 566, fol. 22, and Wood's E. 25, art. 123, "The Rich and flourishing Cuckold well satisfied;" beginning, "The Delights of a Cuckold that doth not repine." We meet another of Shadwell's songs, on p. 483, in "England's Triumph."

[Roxb. Coll., IV. 68; Douce's, II. 183; Pepys, III. 93; Wood's, E. 25, 144.]

The Power and Pleasure of Love.

Is here describ'd an Antidote of joy

Against all grief, which doth the heart annoy;
For the greatest Monarch, Clown, and Fool,
Love's power doth conquer, and keeps all in rule:
And those who Love, and kind and constant be,
Live in a continued Extasie:

But those who do in sorrows constant dwell

Were ne'er in Love, and can't its pleasures tell.

TO A NEW PLAY-HOUSE TUNE; OR, All Joy to fair Psyche, &c.

Α'

Ll joy to fair Psyche in this happy place,

And to our great Master, who her shall embrace, ["to her"

May never his Love nor her Beauty decay,

prove,

But be warm as the Spring, and as fresh as the day:
No Mortals on earth ever wretched cou'd
If still while they lived they'd be always in love.
There's none without Love ever happy can be,
Without it each Brute were as happy as we;
The Knowledge men boast of do[es] nothing but vex,
And their wand'ring thoughts their minds do perplex:

No Mortals on earth ever wretched cou'd prove, &c.

12

Love's sighs and his tears are mix'd with delights;
But were he still pester'd with cares and with frights,
Shou'd a thousand more torments a Lover invade,
In one happy moment they'd fully be paid:

No Mortals on earth ever wretched cou'd prove, &c.

Then lose not a moment, but in pleasure imploy it,
Your Youth requires Love, let it fully enjoy it;
For a moment once lost will always be so,
Then make no delay, but to plundering go:

No Mortals on earth ever wretched cou'd prove, &c.
No pleasuring like that when true hearts do unite,
'Tis sweet all the day, and more pleasant at night;
Nay, one of her smiles, and her balmy white hand,
Would conquering Mars in a moment command:

No Mortals on earth ever wretched cou'd prove,
If still while they liv'd they'd be always in love.

The second part.

TO THE SAME TUNE.

He Merchant that Roves, with labour and pain,
Through tempests and storms, much treasure to gain,
His sorrow forgets, when his Love he doth meet,
And prostrates himself and his wealth at her feet:

No Mortals on earth ever wretched cou'd prove,
If still while they liv'd they'd be always in love.
To think of the torments a Lover goes through,
And how every hour his sorrows renew,
But though he each minute a Martyr must be,
Yet a smile from his Love will set him quite free:

No Mortals on earth ever wretched cou'd prove, &c.

Nay, though a bright virgin most scornful will prove,
And seems to disdain all the powers of Love;
Yet when all alone with her Lover she be,
She thinks that no Empress' so happy as she:

No Mortals on earth ever wretched cou'd prove, &c.

The Grave and the Sage, who blames a young heir,
Much wond'ring how he for a Nymph can despair,
When he sees a brisk Girl, though one foot['s] in the Grave,
He no greater pleasure desires to have:

No Mortals on earth ever wretched cou'd prove, &c.

18

24

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36

42

48

54

All the great Hero's, that mighty did prove,
First took their brave Courage from powerful Love;
Though daily in sorrow, and ever in pain,
The thoughts of his dearest revives him again:

No Mortals on earth ever wretched cou'd prove, &c.
The rustical Clown that lives constant in care,
A smile from his Betty will make him to swear
No Monarch on earth so happy can be,
Though Mountains of treasure he daily do see:

No Mortals on earth ever wretched cou'd prove, &c.

Then let every Monarch and rustical Clown
Disband all false joys, and in Love now lye down;
For there are no joys, that we Mortals can shew,
But conquering Love, that all Monarchs subdue:

No Mortals on earth ever wretched cou'd prove,
If still while they liv'd they'd be always in Love.

Printed for T. Coles, T. Vere, J. Wright, J. Clarke.

60

66

72

[Black-letter, with one woodcut. Date of original, 1675; but of this broadside a few years later. The following cuts belong to "Musical Shepherdess," p. 462.]

ONE

The Musical Shepherdess.

"You rurall God that guards the plains,
And chast'neth unjust disdains,
Oh, do not censure him for this,
It was my error and not his:
This only boon of thee I crave,
To fix these lines upon my grave,
"With Icarus I soar'd too high,
For which, alas! I fall and dye.""

-Choice Drollery, 1656.

NE more ballad on "the pleasures and follies of Love" seems to press its claim for being included in the present musical group, instead of awaiting its turn at a far distant portion of the collection. We secure "Dorinda's Lamentation for the loss of Amintas," by right of sympathy; having ourselves, no less than the Musical Shepherdess, lost sight of Amintas, and his Farewell, to which song the present ditty had originally been intended as an Answer, or continuation; unless, indeed, it be "The Faithful Shepherdess" (Douce Coll., I. 75), which begins, "Amintas was walking one evening alone," and it is appointed to the same tune of Digby's Farewell; or, Farewell, fair Arminda (Dryden's song). The music of our ballad was composed by James Hart, and had appeared in 1676, along with most of the present words, as "A Pastoral Song," in the First Book of John Playford's Choice Ayres, p. 73. The words alone were in print, not only in 1676 in A Collection of Songs now in Mode (unpaged, sheet signature C 6), but also at the beginning of a similarly-entitled publication dated 1675. The author's initials, "W. P," appear on another ballad of the Roxburghe Collection, "The Forced Marriage; or Unfortunate Celia," and we can leave the question of identification until we reach this ballad in our next volume (Roxb. Coll., II. 158), as the eleventh of the F-initialed. The present ballad must have been very popular, there being no less than five broadside copies known to us (Pepys, III. 342; C. 22, e. 2, fol. 154; Douce, II. 271; Wood's, E. 25, fol. 6; and B. H. Bright's), in addition to the three in book form. It was a "Play-house Song." Of Digby's Farewell we have written, on pp. 393, 397, and 400. Here is Henry Purcell's song, mentioned on our p. 447.