PEARLS IN LITERATURE
a
range of ideas or in language as beautiful as Edmund Spenser. The tears
of Stella in "The Mourning Muse of Thestylis" are more precious and
gem-like than those in any lines which have followed until now. In
these lines they are priceless jewels royally set.
And from those two bright starres to him sometime so
deere, Her heart sent drops of pearle, which fell in foyson downe Twixt lilly and the rose.
As
a means to wake imagination to the physical charms of woman his use of
the gem is equally happy and graceful, for there is always a soul in
the flesh of his beauty as when he depicts the charms of a fair one in
one of his " Sonnets."
But
fairest she, when so she doth display The gate with pearles and rubyes
richly dight; Throgh which her words so wise do make their way To bear
the message of her gentle spright.
In another place he expresses the worship of his love in this fashion:
For loe, my love doth in her selfe containe
All this worlds riches that may farre be found;
If Pearles, her teeth be Pearles, both pure and round.
Several of his poems show the fashion of pearls in his day as for instance where he
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