SO soft streams meet, so springs with gladder smiles Meet after long divorcement by the isles ; When love, the child of likeness, urgeth on Their crystal natures to a union : So meet stolen kisses, when the moonoy nights Call forth fierce lovers to their wish'd delights ; So kings and queens, meet when desire convinces All thoughts but such as aim at getting princes, As I meet thee.   Soul of my life and fame ! Eternal lamp of love ! whose radiant flame Out-glares the heaven's Osiris,* and thy gleams Out-shine the splendour of his mid-day beams. Welcome, O welcome, my illustrious spouse ; Welcome as are the ends unto my vows ; Aye ! far more welcome than the happy soil The sea-scourged merchant, after all his toil, Salutes with tears of joy ; when fires betray The smoky chimneys of his Ithaca. Where hast thou been so long from my embraces, Poor pitied exile ?   Tell me, did thy graces Fly discontented hence, and for a time Did rather choose to bless another clime ? Or went'st thou to this end, the more to move me, By thy short absence, to desire and love thee ? Why frowns my sweet ?   Why won't my saint confer Favours on me, her fierce idolater ? Why are those looks, those looks the which have been Time-past so fragrant, sickly now drawn in Like a dull twilight ?   Tell me, and the fault I'll expiate with suplhur, hair and salt ; And, with the crystal humour of the spring, Purge hence the guilt and kill this quarrelling. Wo't thou not smile or tell me what's amiss ? Have I been cold to hug thee, too remiss, Too temp'rate in embracing ?   Tell me, has desire To thee-ward died i' th' embers, and no fire Left in this rak'd-up ash-heap as a mark To testify the glowing of a spark ? Have I divorc'd thee only to combine In hot adult'ry with another wine ? True, I confess I left thee, and appeal 'Twas done by me more to confirm my zeal And double my affection on thee, as do those Whose love grows more inflam'd by being foes. But to forsake thee ever, could there be A thought of such-like possibility ? When thou thyself dar'st say thy isles shall lack Grapes before Herrick leaves canary sack, Thou mak'st me airy, active to be borne, Like Iphiclus, upon the tops of corn. Thou mak'st me nimble, as the winged hours, To dance and caper on the heads of flowers, And ride the sunbeams.   Can there be a thing Under the heavenly Isis * that can bring More love unto my life, or can present My genius with a fuller blandishment ? Illustrious idol ! could th' Egyptians seek Help from the garlic, onion, and the leek And pay no vows to thee, who wast their best God, and far more transcendent than the rest ? Had Cassius, that weak water-drinker, known Thee in thy vine, or had but tasted one Small chalice of thy frantic liquor, he, As the wise Cato, had approv'd of thee. Had not Jove's son, * that brave Tirynthian swain, Invited to the Thesbian banquet, ta'en Full goblets of thy gen'rous blood, his sprite Ne'er had kept heat for fifty maids that night. Come, come and kiss me ; kiss, we will be friends Too strong for fate to break us.   Look upon Me with that full pride of complexion As queens meet queens, or come thou unto me As Cleopatra came to Anthony, When her high carriage did at once present To the triumvir love and wonderment. Sweel up my nerves with spirit ; let my blood Run through my veins like to a hasty flood. Fill each part full of fire, active to do What thy commanding soul shall put it to ; And till I turn apostate to thy love, Which here I vow to serve, do not remove Thy fires from me, but Apollo's curse Blast these-like actions, or a thing that's worse, When these circumstants shall but live to see The time that I prevaricate from thee. Call me the son of beer, and then confine Me to the tap, the toast, the turf ; let wine Ne'er shine upon me ; may my numbers all Run to a sudden death and funeral. And last, when thee, dear spouse, I disavow, Ne'er may prophetic Daphne crown my brow.

Frans Hals. The Merry Drinker. 1627.

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