LOVE AND MARRIAGE.
Reading edition
Eque brevi verbo ferre perenne malum. SECUNDUS, eleg. vii.
Still the question I must parry, Still a wayward truant prove: Where I love, I must not marry; Where I marry, can not love.
Were she fairest of creation, With the least presuming mind; Learned without affectation; Not deceitful, yet refined;
Wise enough, but never rigid; Gay, but not too lightly free; Chaste as snow, and yet not frigid: Fond, yet satisfied with me:
Were she all this ten times over, All that heaven to earth allows. I should be too much her lover Ever to become her spouse.
Love will never bear enslaving; Summer garments suit him best; Bliss itself is not worth having, If we're by compulsion blest.