III.
That strange force on the ignoble hath renown;
As AURUM FULMINANS, it blows vice down.
'Twere better (heavy one) to crawl
Forgot, then raised, trod on [to] fall.
All your defections now
Are not writ on your brow;
Odes to faults give
A shame must live.
When a fat mist we view, we coughing run;
But, that once meteor drawn, all cry: undone.
IV.
How bright the fair Paulina<73.4> did appear,
When hid in jewels she did seem a star!
But who could soberly behold
A wicked owl in cloath of gold,
Or the ridiculous Ape
In sacred Vesta's shape?
So doth agree
Just praise with thee:
For since thy birth gave thee no beauty, know,
No poets pencil must or can do so.
<73.1> The constellation so called. In old drawings Cassiopeia
is represented as a woman sitting in a chair with a branch in her
hand, and hence the allusion here. Dixon, in his CANIDIA, 1683,
part i. p. 35, makes his witches say:--
"We put on Berenice's hair,
And sit in Cassiopeia's chair."
Randolph couples it with "Ariadne's Crowne" in the following
passage:--
"Shine forth a constellation, full and bright,
Bless the poor heavens with more majestick light,
Who in requitall shall present you there
ARIADNE'S CROWNE and CASSIOPEIA'S CHAYR.
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