Poem: An epistle

'Is Friends fled, or Love grown cold?'

Is Friends fled, or Love grown cold?

Do frozen Walls of Ice with-hold

Its Pearly Streams? O let the Sun,

That gave it being, shine upon

The brittle Fence! Or is some Skreen

Injuriously set up between

The gentle Spring, and that bright Ray

Which, conqu’ring Night, brings joyful Day?

Remove that Obstacle away:

Then, tho’ with Grief I may confess,

In Winter-time th’Effects be less,

Because of Distance, or cold Air

Prevailing in our Hemisphere,

And interposing (For Sol’s Pow’r

Is still the same each Day and Hour)

It will dissolve the Frost in time,

If its warm Ray there-on may shine;

Tho’ vacant Clouds do interpose

Its pure refulgent Beam, and those

Inferiour Concrets that have Birth

From the gross Element of Earth.

But stay! Methinks a Spring should be

From Winters chilling force, more free

Than to be Frozen! Inbred Heat

Is then, with purest Springs, more great;

And with its Current soon doth glide

Through Ice besetting either side.

Let Love spring up, that we may see

The same Effects, dear Friend, in thee.

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Mary Mollineux (born Mary Southworth) was an early Friend, imprisoned in Lancaster Castle in 1684 for attending Quaker Meetings. Her The Fruits of Retirement (1702) was published posthumously.

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