The works of John Dryden, $c now first collected in eighteen volumes. $p Volume 05 eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 415 pages of information about The works of John Dryden, $c now first collected in eighteen volumes. $p Volume 05.

The works of John Dryden, $c now first collected in eighteen volumes. $p Volume 05 eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 415 pages of information about The works of John Dryden, $c now first collected in eighteen volumes. $p Volume 05.

Aur. Rest is not suiting with a lover’s care.  I have not yet my Indamora seen. [Is going.

Emp. Somewhat I had forgot; come back again:  So weary of a father’s company?

Aur. Sir, you were pleased yourself to license me.

Emp. You made me no relation of the fight;
Besides, a rebel’s army is in sight. 
Advise me first:  Yet go—­
He goes to Indamora; I should take [Aside.
A kind of envious joy to keep him back. 
Yet to detain him makes my love appear;—­
I hate his presence, and his absence fear. [Exit.

Aur. To some new clime, or to thy native sky,
Oh friendless and forsaken Virtue, fly! 
Thy Indian air is deadly to thee grown: 
Deceit and cankered malice rule thy throne. 
Why did my arms in battle prosperous prove,
To gain the barren praise of filial love? 
The best of kings by women is misled,
Charmed by the witchcraft of a second bed. 
Against myself I victories have won,
And by my fatal absence am undone.

  To him INDAMORA, with ARIMANT.

But here she comes! 
In the calm harbour of whose gentle breast,
My tempest-beaten soul may safely rest. 
Oh, my heart’s joy! whate’er my sorrows be,
They cease and vanish in beholding thee! 
Care shuns thy walks; as at the cheerful light,
The groaning ghosts and birds obscene take flight. 
By this one view, all my past pains are paid;
And all I have to come more easy made.

Ind. Such sullen planets at my birth did shine,
They threaten every fortune mixt with mine. 
Fly the pursuit of my disastrous love,
And from unhappy neighbourhood remove.

Aur. Bid the laborious hind,
Whose hardened hands did long in tillage toil,
Neglect the promised harvest of the soil. 
Should I, who cultivated love with blood,
Refuse possession of approaching good?

Ind. Love is an airy good, opinion makes;
Which he, who only thinks he has, partakes: 
Seen by a strong imagination’s beam,
That tricks and dresses up the gaudy dream: 
Presented so, with rapture ’tis enjoyed;
Raised by high fancy, and by low destroyed.

Aur. If love be vision, mine has all the fire,
Which, in first dreams, young prophets does inspire: 
I dream, in you, our promised paradise: 
An age’s tumult of continued bliss. 
But you have still your happiness in doubt;
Or else ’tis past, and you have dreamt it out.

Ind. Perhaps not so.

Aur. Can Indamora prove
So altered?  Is it but, perhaps you love? 
Then farewell all!  I thought in you to find
A balm, to cure my much distempered mind. 
I came to grieve a father’s heart estranged;
But little thought to find a mistress changed. 
Nature herself is changed to punish me;
Virtue turned vice, and faith inconstancy.

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The works of John Dryden, $c now first collected in eighteen volumes. $p Volume 05 from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.