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Myself from Love’s employ, or be

Accounted mad; but eloquently

Discoursed you of a love beside

The love I’m bound to, which you chide

So sharply. That’s a love, meseems,

So pure as men but meet in dreams,

Where all is fair, and nought is wrong.

I humbly beg thee to prolong

Thy wise discourse, and you may deem

Me fool if I give not extreme

Attent thereto, and hear you out,

For you will teach me thus past doubt

The various forms of love, and show

The loves my spirit fain would know.”

“Good friend, no wiser than a daw

Art thou, who scarce above a straw

Esteem’st my sage discourse; yet fain

Thou seem’st to be that I amain

Should further speak of love. Good will

Have I to teach thee, hoping still,

Though doubtful if ’tis worth the while.

Love doth the soul of man beguile

In many ways, besides that blind,

Tormenting madness of the mind

’Neath which thou sufferest: God permit

That thou mayst free thy heart from it.

One precious kind of love men know

As friendship, where two spirits grow