Faerie Queene Quotes

“Then trembling yet through feare, the Squire bespake,
That Geauntesse Argante is behight,
A daughter of the Titans which did make
Warre against heauen, and heaped hils on hight,
To scale the skyes, and put Ioue from his right:
Her sire Typhœus was, who mad through merth,
And drunke with bloud of men, slaine by his might,
Through incest, her of his owne mother Earth
Whilome begot, being but halfe twin of that berth.

For at that berth another Babe she bore,
To weet the mighty Ollyphant, that wrought
Great wreake to many errant knights of yore,
And many hath to foule confusion brought.
These twinnes, men say, (a thing far passing thought)
Whiles in their mothers wombe enclosd they were,
Ere they into the lightsome world were brought,
In fleshly lust were mingled both yfere,
And in that monstrous wise did to the world appere.

So liu’d they euer after in like sin,
Gainst natures law, and good behauioure:
But greatest shame was to that maiden twin,
Who not content so fowly to deuoure
Her natiue flesh, and staine her brothers bowre,
Did wallow in all other fleshly myre,
And suffred beasts her body to deflowre:
So whot she burned in that lustfull fyre,
Yet all that might not slake her sensuall desyre.

But ouer all the countrey she did raunge,
To seeke young men, to quench her flaming thurst,
And feed her fancy with delightfull chaunge:
Whom so she fittest finds to serue her lust,
Through her maine strength, in which she most doth trust,
She with her brings into a secret Ile,
Where in eternall bondage dye he must,
Or be the vassall of her pleasures vile,
And in all shamefull sort him selfe with her defile.”
― Edmund Spenser, Faerie Queene

“(Lament about the Evils of Darkness)

Night thou foule Mother of annoyance sad,
Sister of heauie death, and nourse of woe,
Which wast begot in heauen, but for thy bad
And brutish shape thrust downe to hell below,
Where by the grim floud of Cocytus slow
Thy dwelling is, in Herebus blacke hous,
(Blacke Herebus thy husband is the foe
Of all the Gods) where thou vngratious,
Halfe of thy dayes doest lead in horrour hideous.

What had th’eternall Maker need of thee,
The world in his continuall course to keepe,
That doest all things deface, ne lettest see
The beautie of his worke? Indeed in sleepe
The slouthfull bodie, that doth loue to steepe
His lustlesse limbes, and drowne his baser mind,
Doth praise thee oft, and oft from Stygian deepe
Calles thee, his goddesse in his error blind,
And great Dame Natures handmaide, chearing euery kind

But well I wote, that to an heauy hart
Thou art the root and nurse of bitter cares,
Breeder of new, renewer of old smarts:
Instead of rest thou lendest rayling teares,
Instead of sleepe thou sendest troublous feares,
And dreadfull visions, in the which aliue
The drearie image of sad death appeares:
So from the wearie spirit thou doest driue
Desired rest, and men of happinesse depriue.

Vnder thy mantle blacke there hidden lye,
Light-shonning theft, and traiterous intent,
Abhorred bloudshed, and vile felony,
Shamefull deceipt, and daunger imminent;
Foule horror, and eke hellish dreriment:
All these I wote in thy protection bee,
And light doe shonne, for feare of being shent:
For light ylike is loth’d of them and thee,
And all that lewdnesse loue, doe hate the light to see.

For day discouers all dishonest wayes,
And sheweth each thing, as it is indeed:
The prayses of high God he faire displayes,
And his large bountie rightly doth areed.
Dayes dearest children be the blessed seed,
Which darknesse shall subdew, and heauen win:
Truth is his daughter; he her first did breed,
Most sacred virgin, without spot of sin.
Our life is day, but death with darknesse doth begin.”
― Edmund Spenser, Faerie Queene