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To speak of her whose beauties fill

Thy ravished heart.

With ready will,

Thy tongue will every thought confess

That racks thy breast with anxiousness,

And thou wilt counsel with thy friend

How thou most fruitfully mayst spend

Thy life and goods to give delight

To her thou lovest

If the might

Of love hath struck thy friend, ’tis well,

His heart will know the tale ye tell,

And to thy sympathetic ear

Confide his hope, his joy, his fear,

Revealing if his love be maid,

Or light o’ love, or widow staid,

And who she be, and what her name.

Then thou from him wouldst fear no shame,

Or treacherous word, but all he saith

Believe, while he in thee puts faith.

Then shalt thou feel that passing good

It is to have in friendlihood

A man to whom thou dar’st to show

Thine inmost heart, and thou shalt know,

Whenso hereof thou makest proof

How greatly works it thy behoof.

My third gift, hight Sweet-Looks, hath birth

Of amorous eyes; of passing worth

It is to those whose cruel fate

Enforces them long years to wait

Their hope’s fulfilment; have a care

To keep thee near thy flame or ne’er