Oh you thathear this voice,
Oh you that see this face,
Say whether of the choice
Deserves the former place:
Fear not to judge this 'bate,
For it is void of hate.
This side doth Beauty take,
For that doth Music speak,
Fit orators to make
The strongest judgments weak:
The bar to plead their right
Is only true delight.
Thus doth the voice and face
These gentle lawyers wage
Like loving brothers' case
For father's heritage:
That each, while each contends,
Itself to other lends.
For Beauty beautifies
With heav'nly hue and grace
The heav'nly harmonies;
And in this faultless face
The perfect beauties be
A perfect harmony.
Music more loft'ly swells
In speeches nobly plac'd:
Beauty as far excels
In action aptly grac'd:
A friend each party draws
To countenance his cause.
Love more affected seems
To Beauty's lovely light,
And Wonder more esteems
Of Music's wondrous might:
But both to both so bent,
As both in both are spent.
Music doth witness call
The ear, his truth to try:
Beauty brings to the hall
The judgment of the eye:
Both in their objects such
As no exceptions touch.
The common sense, which might
Be arbiter of this,
To be forsooth upright,
To both sides partial is:
He lays on this chief praise,
Chief praise on that he lays.
The Reason, princess high,
Whose throne is in the mind,
Which Music can in sky
And hidden beauties find:
Say whether thou wilt crown
With limitless renown.