"When in a dream presented to our view,
Those airy forms appear so like the true;
Nor heaven nor hell the fancy'd visions sends,
But every breast its own delusion lends:
For when soft sleep the body wraps in ease,
And from th' unactive mass our fancy frees,
Whatever 'tis in which we take delight,
And think of most by day, we dream at night.
Thus he, the now sackt city justly fear'd,
Who all around had death and ruin shar'd.
From fancy'd darts believes a darkned sky,
And troops retreating in confusion fly:
There the sad funeral pomp of kings; here
Conscious plains, half drown'd in blood, appear
He that by day has nois'd it at the bar,
Of knaves and fools now sees the great resort,
And to meet justice vainly fears in court.
Misers amidst their heaps are raising new,
And think they oft their old hid treasure view.
And huntsmen the imagin'd chace pursue.
The merchant dreams of wrecks, the ship wou'd save,
Or now, by sinking it, himself preserve.
The mistress to her distant lover writes;
And, as awake, with flames and darts indites:
The good wife dreaming of her stallion's charms,
Oft seeks the pleasure in her cuckold's arms.
Dogs on full cry, in sleep, the hare pursue,
And hapless wretches their old griefs renew."
But Lycas, when he had thank'd his stars for their care of him, "That
we may not seem," said he, "to condemn the divine powers, what hinders
but we search the vessel?"
Upon which one ?†sius, the passenger that had discover'd us by our
reflection in the water, cry'd out, "these are the men that were
shav'd by moonshine to night.
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