The Attendant Spirit, From Comus

TO the ocean now I fly, And those happy climes that lie Where day never shuts his eye, Up in the broad fields of the sky. There I suck the liquid air, All amid the gardens fair Of Hesperus, and his daughters three That sing about the golden tree. Along the crisped shades and bowers Revels the spruce and jocund Spring; The Graces and the rosy-bosomed Hours Thither all their bounties bring. There eternal Summer dwells, And west winds with musky wing About the cedarn alleys fling Nard and cassia’s balmy smells. Iris there with humid bow Waters the odorous banks, that blow Flowers of more mingled hue Than her purpled scarf can show, And drenches with Elysian dew (List, mortals, if your ears be true) Beds of hyacinth and roses, Where young Adonis oft reposes, Waxing well of his deep wound In slumber soft, and on the ground Sadly sits the Assyrian queen. But far above, in spangled sheen, Celestial Cupid, her famed son, advanced, Holds his dear Psyche, sweet entranced, After her wandering labours long, Till free consent the gods among Make her his eternal bride, And from her fair unspotted side Two blissful twins are to be born, Youth and Joy; so Jove hath sworn.

But now my task is smoothly done: I can fly or I can run Quickly to the green earth’s end, Where the bowed welkin slow doth bend, And from thence can soar as soon To the corners of the moon. Mortals that would follow me, Love Virtue; she alone is free, She can teach ye how to climb Higher than the sphery chime; Or if feeble Virtue were, Heaven itself would stoop to her.

JAMES GRAHAM, MARQUIS OF MONTROSE 1612–1650