MY MINDE TO ME A KINGDOM IS:

My minde to me a kingdom is;

Such perfect joy therein I finde As farre exceeds all earthly blisse

That God or nature hath assignde; Though much I want that most would have, Yet still my minde forbids to crave.

Content I live; this is my stay,

I seek no more than may suffice.
I presse to beare no haughtie sway;
Look, what I lack my mind supplies.
Loe, thus I triumph like a king,
Content with that my minde doth bring.

I see how plentie surfets oft,

And hastie clymbers soon do fall;

I see that such as sit aloft

Mishap doth threaten most of all.

These get with toile, they keepe with feare;
Such cares my minde could never beare.

No princely pompe nor welthie store,
No force to win the victorie,

No wylie wit to salve a sore,

No shape to winne a lover's eye,-
To none of these I yeeld as thrall;
For why, my mind despiseth all.

Some have too much, yet still they crave;
I little have, yet seek no more.

They are but poore, though much they have,
And I am rich with little store.

They poor, I rich; they beg, I give;
They lacke, I lend; they pine, I live.

I laugh not at another's losse,

I grudge not at another's gaine; No worldly wave my mind can tosse; I brooke that is another's bane. I feare no foe, I fawne no friend; I lothe not life, nor dread mine end.

I joy not in no earthly blisse;

I weigh not Croesus' wealth a straw; For care, I care not what it is;

I feare not fortune's fatal law; My minde is such as may not move For beautie bright, or force of love.

I wish but what I have at will;

I wander not to seeke for more;

I like the plaine, I clime no hill;

In greatest stormes I sitte on shore, And laugh at them that toile in vaine To get what must be lost againe.

I kisse not where I wish to kill;

I feigne not love where most I hate; I breake no sleepe to winne my will; I wayte not at the mightie's gate. I scorne no poore, I feare no rich; I feele no want, nor have too much.

The court ne cart I like ne loath,

Extreames are counted worst of all; The golden meane betwixt them both Doth surest sit, and feares no fall;

This is my choyce; for why, I finde
No wealth is like a quiet minde.

My wealth is health and perfect ease;
My conscience clere my chiefe defence;
I neither seeke by bribes to please,

Nor by desert to breed offence.
Thus do I live; thus will I die;
Would all did so as well as I!

SIR EDWARD DYER.

ΤΟ

ONE WHO HAD SCOFFED AT THE
POET'S POVERTY.

YES, I am poor, Callistratus! I own;
And so was ever; yet not quite unknown,
Graced with a knight's degree; nor this alone:

But through the world my verse is often sung;

And "That is he!" sounds buzzed from every

tongue;

And what to few, when dust, the Fates assign,
In bloom and freshness of my days is mine.
Thy ceilings on a hundred columns rest;
Wealth as of upstart freedman bursts thy chest;
Nile flows in fatness o'er thy ample fields;
Cisalpine Gaul thy silky fleeces yields.
Lo! Such thou art, and such am I like me,
Callistratus! thou canst not hope to be;
A hundred of the crowd resemble thee!

From the Latin of MARTIAL.