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To St Mary Magdalen |
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few nights' solace in delicious bed Where heat of lust did kindle flames of hell, Thou nak'd on naked rock in desert cell Lay thirty years, and tears of grief did shed. But for that time thy heart there sorrowed Thou now in heaven eternally dost dwell, And for each tear which from thine eyes then fell, A sea of pleasure now is rendered. If short delights entice my heart to stray, Let me by thy long penance learn to know How dear I should for trifling pleasures pay; And if I virtue's rough beginning shun, Let thy eternal joys unto me show What high rewards by little pain is won. |
The "desert cell" in which Constable claims Mary "Lay thirty years" alludes to a French tradition which held that, eventually, Mary withdrew to "La Sainte-Baume", a hill on which she is said to have paid penance for thirty years. | |
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Henry Constable (1562-1613) |
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created by Heather C. Milligan |