Pentadii (Englished)
It is not, y' are deceav'd, it is not blisseWhat you conceave a happy living is:To have your hands with rubies bright to glow,Then on your tortoise-bed your body throw,And sink your self in down, to drink in gold,And have your looser self in purple roll'd;With royal fare to make the tables groan,Or else with what from Lybick fields is mown,Nor in one vault hoard all your magazine,But at no cowards fate t' have frighted bin;Nor with the peoples breath to be swol'n great,Nor at a drawn stiletto basely swear.He that dares this, nothing to him's unfit,But proud o' th' top of fortunes wheel may sit.
Words in this poem
- mown p. p.
- Cut down by mowing, as grass; deprived of grass by mowing; as, a mown field.
- basely adv.
- In a base manner; with despicable meanness; dishonorably; shamefully.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Pentadii (Englished) is in the public domain. This text is taken from Lucasta, Project Gutenberg ebook #703; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Richard Lovelace, Pentadii (Englished), in Lucasta (1649), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #703, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/lovelace-lucasta/pentadii-englished.html, id L13081.
Form and metre
Pentadii (Englished) is 14 lines in a single stanza. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 91%).
See other poems in iambic pentameter.
Measured by Laurel's pipeline, not copied from a handbook: how stress and metre are counted, how rhyme is lettered, how a drifted rhyme is found. Where the dictionary cannot confirm a rhyme the letter is withheld, not guessed.
Rhyme words, stanza by stanza
The word that ends each line, lettered by the rhyme it makes; a dash is a line whose rhyme the dictionary could not confirm.
- 1 --AABB------CC blisse · is · glowA · throwA · goldB · roll'dB · groan · mown · magazine · bin · great · swear · unfitC · sitC
Scansion, line by line
Each line with its syllable count and the stresses the words themselves fix: / stressed, ˘ unstressed, · a syllable the word leaves free and the metre decides. Read against iambic pentameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| It is not, y' are deceav'd, it is not blisse | 11 | ··········· |
| What you conceave a happy living is: | 10 | ·····/˘/˘· |
| To have your hands with rubies bright to glow, | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| Then on your tortoise-bed your body throw, | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| And sink your self in down, to drink in gold, | 10 | ·········· |
| And have your looser self in purple roll'd; | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| With royal fare to make the tables groan, | 10 | ·/˘····/˘· |
| Or else with what from Lybick fields is mown, | 10 | ·········· |
| Nor in one vault hoard all your magazine, | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| But at no cowards fate t' have frighted bin; | 10 | ···/···/˘· |
| Nor with the peoples breath to be swol'n great, | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| Nor at a drawn stiletto basely swear. | 10 | ····˘/˘/˘· |
| He that dares this, nothing to him's unfit, | 10 | ····/˘··˘/ |
| But proud o' th' top of fortunes wheel may sit. | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
The reader shows the same poem with its rhymes coloured and a stress row above each line, the notes beside their stanzas, and any word's definition on a tap; the analysis page takes the whole book apart. How every part of this site was made.