Classic Poem

IV.

   Question . B Y what power was love confined
  To one object? Who can bind,
Or fix a limit to the free-born mind?

   Answer . Nature: for as bodies may
  Move at once but in one way,
So nor can minds to more than one love stray.

   Question . Yet I feel a double smart,
  Love's twinn'd flame, his forked dart.
Answer . Then hath wild lust, not love, possess'd thy heart.

   Question . Whence springs love? Ans. From beauty. Question . Why
  Should th' effect not multiply
As fast i' th' heart, as doth the cause i' th' eye?

   Answer . When two beauties equal are,
  Sense preferring neither fair,
Desire stands still, distracted 'twixt the pair.

 So in equal distance lay
 Two fair lambs in the wolf's way,
The hungry beast will starve ere choose his prey.

 But where one is chief, the rest
 Cease, and that's alone possess'd,
Without a rival, monarch of the breast.