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Edward Farr, ed. Select Poetry of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth. 1845.

Youth Addressed by Vice and Virtue

LXXXVIII. Walter Quin

Vice.
BRAVE youth! if to this woman, sterne and grim,

Thou care doe give, and wilt her footsteps tread,

In a most irksome way she will thee lead,

With great turmoile and dangers manifold,

In summer’s parching heat and winter’s cold,

Through many a thorny steepe and craggy ground,

Wherein no pleasing mates are to be found,

But savage beasts and monsters fell, to whom,

In end, a wofull prey thou shalt become.

But if thou wilt resolve to goe with mee,

In this my way, thou shalt be wholly free

From all such toile and danger: passing still

Through flowrie fields and medowes, where at will

Thou maist most pleasant company enjoy,

And all delightful sports without annoy.

Virtue.
To please thine eyes

I use no curious art, without disguise

True and unstain’d to be; which to thy view

Her inward falsehood and my truth may shew,

As painfull, dreadfull, dangerous, my path—

Yea, and pernicious, she traduced hath;—

Her’s vaunting to be pleasant and secure,

And such as might all joy to thee procure.

In both she a most shamelesse liar is;

For that my path, though painfull, leads to blisse

And glory: yea, the pains thereof are sweet,

For that with solid inward joyes they meet:

Whereas her way, though pleasant she it name,

Leads to destruction, infamy, and shame.