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The Nymphes.
The best estate and fare,
Where he doth see himselfe that loueth best,
Brings nothing els but care:
And yet doth neuer spare
With flames to burne the dame and seruants brest:
And he that’s fauour’d most,
Is changed in the twinkling of an eie:
For with disfauours tost,
And in obliuion lost,
It kils his hart and makes his ioyes to die.
The Shepherdes.
To leese a good estate
By falling from it, is a greefe and paine:
Blamelesse is Loue, but fate
It is, and Fortunes hate,
That no exception makes from his disdaine:
Vniust and far vnfit
Is death, if Loue doth say that we shall liue,
If death it promis’d yet,
No fault he doth commit:
For in the ende his promise he doth giue.
The Nymphes.
Fierce Loue they doe excuse,
That finde themselues entangled with his fetter:
And blame those that refuse
Him, but of these to chuse
The blamed mans estate is far the better.
The Shepherdes.
Faire Nymphes, it is denied
The free and bond with one toong to debate,
Liue men and those that died,
The loued, and defied,
All speake according to their owne estate.
Sage Felicia and the Shepherdesse Felismena gaue attentiue eare vnto the mu∣sicke, that the Nymphes and Shepherdes made, and to the sundry opinions, which on both sides they shewed by singing. And Felicia smyling on Felismena, saide to her in her eare. Who beleeues not (faire Shepherdesse) but that most of these words haue touched thy soule to the quicke? who with a milde and sober grace, answered
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