Amaryllis Quotes
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I
care not for these ladies that must be wooed and prayed. Give me kind
Amaryllis, the wanton country maid.
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More Amaryllis Quotes
Alas! What boots it with uncessant care To tend the homely slighted Shepherd's trade, And strictly meditate the thankless muse; Were it not better done as others use, To sport with Amaryllis in the shade, Or with the tangles of Neaera's hair? Fame is the spur that the clear spirit doth raise (That last infirmity of noble mind) To scorn delights, and live laborious days; But the fair guerdon when we hope to find, And think to burst out into sudden blaze, Comes the blind Fury with th'abhorred shears, And slits the thin-spun life.
john milton— 1637 Lycidas, l.64-76.
Alas! what boots it with incessant care To tend the homely slighted shepherd's trade, And strictly meditate the thankless Muse? Were it not better done as others use, To sport with Amaryllis in the shade, Or with the tangles of Neaera's hair? Fame is the spur that the clear spirit doth raise (That last infirmity of noble mind) To scorn delights, and live laborious days; But the fair guerdon when we hope to find, And think to burst out into sudden blaze, Comes the blind Fury with th' abhorrèd shears, And slits the thin-spun life.
john milton— Line 64. Compare: "Erant quibus appetentior famæ videretur, quando etiam sapientibus cupido gloriae novissima exuitur" (Translated: "Some might consider him as too fond of fame, for the desire of glory clings even to the best of men longer than any other passion"), Tacitus, Historiae, iv. 6; said of Helvidius Priscus.
I care not for these ladies, That must be wooed and prayed; Give me kind Amaryllis, The wanton country maid. Nature art disdaineth; Her beauty is her own.
thomas campion— Thomas Campion, I Care Not for These Ladies (1601), reported in Arthur Henry Bullen, More lyrics from the song-books of the Elizabethan Age (1888), p. 48.
