John Wilmot (1647 – 1680)
English nobleman, a friend of King Charles II of England, and the writer of much satirical and bawdy poetry.
See the kind seed-receiving earth
To every grain affords a birth:
On her no showers unwelcome fall,
Her willing womb retains ‘em all,
And shall my Caelia be confined?
No, live up to thy mighty mind,
And be the mistress of Mankind!
But oh, how slowly minutes roll
When absent from her eyes,
That feed my love, which is my soul:
It languishes and dies.
There's not a thing on earth that I can name,
So foolish, and so false, as common fame.
For all Men would be Cowards if they durst:
And Honesty’s against all common Sense.
Here lies our sovereign lord the king,
Whose word no man relies on;
He never says a foolish thing,
Nor ever does a wise one.
Farewell, woman! I intend
Henceforth every night to sit
With my lewd, well-natured friend,
Drinking to engender wit.
Before I got married I had six theories about bringing up children; now I have six children and no theories.
Reason, an Ignis fatuus of the Mind,
Which leaves the light of Nature, Sense, behind.
Whilst the misguided Follower climbs with Pain,
Mountains of Whimsies, heapt in his own Brain,
Stumbling from Thought to Thought, falls headlong down
Into Doubt’s boundless Sea, where like to drown,
Books bear him up a-while, and make him try
To swim with Bladders of Philosophy.
Most Men are Cowards, all Men should be Knaves.
The Difference lies, as far as I can see,
Not in the thing it self, but the Degree.