Thomas Humphry Ward, ed. The English Poets. 1880–1918.rnVol. II. The Seventeenth Century: Ben Jonson to Dryden

Robert Herrick (1591–1674)

Art above Nature

WHEN I behold a forest spread

With silken trees upon thy head;

And when I see that other dress

Of flowers set in comeliness;

When I behold another grace

In the ascent of curious lace,

Which, like a pinnacle, doth shew

The top, and the top-gallant too;

Then, when I see thy tresses bound

Into an oval, square, or round,

And knit in knots far more than I

Can tell by tongue, or True-love tie;

Next, when those lawny films I see

Play with a wild civility;

And all those airy silks to flow,

Alluring me, and tempting so—

I must confess, mine eye and heart

Dotes less on nature than on art.