Says he, There is as weighty reason 415
For secresy in love as treason. 
Love is a burglarer, a felon,
That at the windore-eyes does steal in
To rob the heart, and with his prey
Steals out again a closer way, 420
Which whosoever can discover,
He’s sure (as he deserves) to suffer. 
Love is a fire, that burns and sparkles
In men as nat’rally as in charcoals,
Which sooty chymists stop in holes 425
When out of wood they extract coals: 
So lovers should their passions choak,
That, tho’ they burn, they may not smoak. 
’Tis like that sturdy thief that stole
And dragg’d beasts backwards into’s hole:  430
So Love does lovers, and us men
Draws by the tails into his den,
That no impression may discover,
And trace t’ his cave, the wary lover,
But if you doubt I should reveal 435
What you entrust me under seal. 
I’ll prove myself as close and virtuous
As your own secretary albertus.

Quoth she, I grant you may be close
In hiding what your aims propose. 440
Love-passions are like parables,
By which men still mean something else,
Though love be all the world’s pretence,
Money’s the mythologick sense;
The real substance of the shadow, 445
Which all address and courtship’s made to.

Thought he, I understand your play,
And how to quit you your own way: 
He that will win his dame, must do
As Love does when he bends his bow; 450
With one hand thrust the lady from,
And with the other pull her home. 
I grant, quoth he, wealth is a great
Provocative to am’rous heat. 
It is all philters, and high diet, 455
That makes love rampant, and to fly out: 
’Tis beauty always in the flower,
That buds and blossoms at fourscore: 
’Tis that by which the sun and moon
At their own weapons are out-done:  460
That makes Knights-Errant fall in trances,
And lay about ’em in romances: 
’Tis virtue, wit, and worth, and all
That men divine and sacred call: 
For what is worth in any thing, 465
But so much money as ’twill bring? 
Or what, but riches is there known,
Which man can solely call his own
In which no creature goes his half;
Unless it be to squint and laugh? 470
I do confess, with goods and land,
I’d have a wife at second-hand;
And such you are.  Nor is ’t your person
My stomach’s set so sharp and fierce on;
But ’tis (your better part) your riches, 475
That my enamour’d heart bewitches. 
Let me your fortune but possess,
And settle your person how you please: 
Or make it o’er in trust to th’ Devil;
You’ll find me reasonable and civil. 480