A certain nymph did once my heart incline,Whose humor wholly disagreed with mine;(I, your physician, my disease confess)I from my own prescriptions found redress.Her still I represented to my mind,With what defects I could suppose or find,Oh, how ill-shaped her legs, how thick and short!(Though neater limbs did never nymph support,)Her arms, said I, how tawny brown they are!(Though never ivory statue had so fair.)How low of statue! (yet the nymph was tall)Oh, for what costly presents will she call!What change of lovers! - And of all the rest,I find this thought strike deepest in my breast.Such thin partitions good and ill divide,That one for t'other may be misapplied.E'en truth and your own judgment you must strain,Those blemishes you cannot find, to feign:Call her blackmoor, if she's but lovely brown;Monster, if plump; if slender, skeleton.Censure her free discourse as confidence;Her silence, want of breeding and good sense.Discover her blind side, and put her stillUpon the task which she performs but ill;To dance, if she has neither shape nor air;Court her to sing, if she wants voice and ear;If talking misbecomes her, make her talk;If walking, then in malice make her walk.Commend her skill when on the lute she plays,Till vanity her want of skill betrays.Take care, if her large breasts offend your eyes,No dress does that deformity disguise.Ply her with merry tales of what you will,To keep her laughing, if her teeth be ill.Or if blear-eyed, some tragic story find,Till she has read and wept herself quite blind.But one effectual method you may take,-Enter her chamber ere she's well awake:Her beauty's art, gems, gold, and rich attire,Make up the pageant you so much admire:In all that specious figure which you see,The least, least part of her own self is she;In vain for her you love, amidst such cost,You search; the mistress in the dress is lost.Take her disrob'd, her real self surprise,I'll trust you then for cure, to your own eyes.(Yet have I known this very rule to fail,And beauty most, when stript of art prevail.)Steal to her closet, her close tiring place,While she makes up her artificial face.All colours of the rainbow you'll discern,Washes and paints, and what you're sick to learn,