Chapter XX: Canto II (1)

He that did first this way of writing grace,[1] Conversed with the Almighty face to face; Wonders he did in sacred verse unfold, When he had more than eighty winters told. The writer feels no dire effect of age, Nor verse, that flows from so divine a rage. 60 Eldest of Poets, he beheld the light, When first it triumph'd o'er eternal night; Chaos he saw, and could distinctly tell How that confusion into order fell. As if consulted with, he has express'd The work of the Creator, and His rest; How the flood drown'd the first offending race, Which might the figure of our globe deface. For new-made earth, so even and so fair, Less equal now, uncertain makes the air; 70 Surprised with heat, and unexpected cold, Early distempers make our youth look old; Our days so evil, and so few, may tell That on the ruins of that world we dwell. Strong as the oaks that nourish'd them, and high, That long-lived race did on their force rely, Neglecting Heaven; but we, of shorter date! Should be more mindful of impendent fate. To worms, that crawl upon this rubbish here, This span of life may yet too long appear; 80 Enough to humble, and to make us great, If it prepare us for a nobler seat.

Which well observing, he, in numerous lines, Taught wretched man how fast his life declines; In whom he dwelt before the world was made, And may again retire when that shall fade. The lasting Iliads have not lived so long As his and Deborah's triumphant song. Delphos unknown, no Muse could them inspire, But that which governs the celestial choir. 90 Heaven to the pious did this art reveal, And from their store succeeding poets steal. Homer's Scamander for the Trojans fought, And swell'd so high, by her old Kishon taught. His river scarce could fierce Achilles stay; Hers, more successful, swept her foes away. The host of heaven, his Phoebus and his Mars, He arms, instructed by her fighting stars. She led them all against the common foe; But he (misled by what he saw below!) 100 The powers above, like wretched men, divides, And breaks their union into different sides. The noblest parts which in his heroes shine, May be but copies of that heroine. Homer himself, and Agamemnon, she The writer could, and the commander, be. Truth she relates in a sublimer strain, Than all the tales the boldest Greeks could feign; For what she sung that Spirit did indite, Which gave her courage and success in fight. 110 A double garland crowns the matchless dame; From heaven her poem and her conquest came.

Though of the Jews she merit most esteem, Yet here the Christian has the greater theme; Her martial song describes how Sis'ra fell; This sings our triumph over death and hell. The rising light employ'd the sacred breath 117 Of the blest Virgin and Elizabeth. In songs of joy the angels sung His birth; Here how He treated was upon the earth Trembling we read! th'affliction and the scorn, Which for our guilt so patiently was borne! Conception, birth, and suff'ring, all belong (Though various parts) to one celestial song; And she, well using so divine an art, Has in this concert sung the tragic part.

As Hannah's seed was vow'd to sacred use, So here this lady consecrates her Muse. With like reward may Heaven her bed adorn, With fruit as fair as by her Muse is born! 130

[1] 'Writing grace': Moses.

ON THE PARAPHRASE OF THE LORD'S PRAYER. WRITTEN BY MRS WHARTON.

Silence, you winds! listen, ethereal lights! While our Urania sings what Heaven indites; The numbers are the nymph's; but from above Descends the pledge of that eternal love. Here wretched mortals have not leave alone, But are instructed to approach His throne; And how can He to miserable men Deny requests which His own hand did pen?

In the Evangelists we find the prose Which, paraphrased by her, a poem grows; A devout rapture! so divine a hymn, It may become the highest seraphim! For they, like her, in that celestial choir, Sing only what the Spirit does inspire. Taught by our Lord, and theirs, with us they may For all but pardon for offences pray.

SOME REFLECTIONS OF HIS UPON THE SEVERAL PETITIONS IN THE SAME PRAYER.

1 His sacred name with reverence profound
Should mention'd be, and trembling at the sound!
It was Jehovah; 'tis Our Father now;
So low to us does Heaven vouchsafe to bow![1]
He brought it down that taught us how to pray,
And did so dearly for our ransom pay.

2 _His kingdom come._ For this we pray in vain
Unless he does in our affections reign.
Absurd it were to wish for such a King,
And not obedience to His sceptre bring,
Whose yoke is easy, and His burthen light,
His service freedom, and his judgments right.

3 _His will be done._ In fact 'tis always done;
But, as in heaven, it must be made our own.
His will should all our inclinations sway,
Whom Nature, and the universe, obey.
Happy the man! whose wishes are confined
To what has been eternally designed;
Referring all to His paternal care,
To whom more dear than to ourselves we are.

4 It is not what our avarice hoards up;
'Tis He that feeds us, and that fills our cup;
Like new-born babes depending on the breast,
From day to day we on His bounty feast;
Nor should the soul expect above a day,
To dwell in her frail tenement of clay;
The setting sun should seem to bound our race,
And the new day a gift of special grace.

5 _That he should all our trespasses forgive_,
While we in hatred with our neighbours live;
Though so to pray may seem an easy task,
We curse ourselves when thus inclined we ask,
This prayer to use, we ought with equal care
Our souls, as to the sacrament, prepare.
The noblest worship of the Power above,
Is to extol, and imitate his love;
Not to forgive our enemies alone,
But use our bounty that they may be won.

6 _Guard us from all temptations of the foe_;
And those we may in several stations know;
The rich and poor in slipp'ry places stand.
Give us enough, but with a sparing hand!
Not ill-persuading want, nor wanton wealth,
But what proportion'd is to life and health.
For not the dead, but living, sing thy praise,
Exalt thy kingdom, and thy glory raise.

Favete linguis!...
Virginibus puerisque canto.--HOR.

[1] 'Vouchsafe to bow': Psalm xviii. 9.

ON THE FOREGOING DIVINE POEMS.

When we for age could neither read nor write, The subject made us able to indite; The soul, with nobler resolutions deck'd, The body stooping, does herself erect. No mortal parts are requisite to raise Her that, unbodied, can her Maker praise.

The seas are quiet when the winds give o'er; So, calm are we when passions are no more! For then we know how vain it was to boast Of fleeting things, so certain to be lost. Clouds of affection from our younger eyes Conceal that emptiness which age descries.

The soul's dark cottage, batter'd and decay'd, Lets in new light through chinks that time has made; Stronger by weakness, wiser men become, As they draw near to their eternal home. Leaving the old, both worlds at once they view, That stand upon the threshold of the new.

....Miratur limen Olympi.--VIRG.

END OF WALLER'S POEMS.

* * * * *

THE POETICAL WORKS

OF

SIR JOHN DENHAM.

LIFE OF SIR JOHN DENHAM.

Next to those poets who have exerted an influence on the _matter_, should be ranked those who have improved the _manner_, of our song. So that thus the same list may include the names of a Chaucer and a Waller, of a Milton and a Denham--the more as we suspect none but a true poet can materially improve even a poetical _mode_, can contrive even a new stirrup to Pegasus, or even to retune the awful organ of Pythia. Neither Denham nor Waller were great poets; but they have produced lines and verses so good, and have, besides, exerted an influence so considerable on modern versification, and the style of poetical utterance, that they are entitled to a highly respectable place amidst the sons of British song.

Sir John Denham, although thoroughly English both in descent and in complexion of mind, was born in Dublin in 1615. His father, whose name also was Sir John (of Little Horseley, in Essex), was, at the time of our poet's birth, the Chief Baron of Exchequer in Ireland. His mother was Eleanor More, daughter of Sir Garret More, Baron of Mellefont. Two years after the son's birth, the father, being made an English Baron of Exchequer, returned to his native country, and educated young John in London. Thence, at the age of sixteen, he went to study at Oxford, where he became celebrated rather for dissipation than diligence. He was, although a youth of imaginative temperament, excessively fond of gambling; and it was said of him, that he was more given to "dreams and dice than to study." His future eminence might be foreseen by some of his friends; but, in general, men looked on him rather as an idle and misled youth of fortune, than as a genius. Three years after, he removed to Lincoln's Inn, where he continued occasionally to gamble, and was sometimes punished for his pains, being plundered by more skilful or unscrupulous gamesters, but did not forget his studies. His conscience, on one occasion, aroused by a rebuke from a friend, awoke; and, to confirm the resolutions which it forced upon him, he wrote and published an "Essay on Gaming." In this respect he resembles Sir Richard Steele when a young soldier, who, in order to cure himself of his dissipations, wrote and published "The Christian Hero"--his object being, by drawing the picture of a character exactly opposite to his own, to commit himself irrevocably to virtue, and to break down all the bridges between him and a return to vice. It is, alas! notorious, that Steele's holiness turned out only to be a FIT, of not much longer duration than a morning headache, and that the "Christian Hero" remains not as a model to which its author's conduct was ever conformed, but as a severe, self-written satire on his whole career. And so with Denham. For some time he forsook the gambling-table, and applied his attention partly to law, and partly to poetry, translating, in 1636, the "Second Book of the Aeneid;" but when his father died, two years afterwards, and left him some thousands, he rushed again to the dice-box, and melted them as rapidly as the wind melts the snow of spring.

"In 1642 he broke out," as Waller remarks of him, "like the Irish Rebellion, threescore thousand strong, when nobody was aware, or in the least suspected it," in the play of "Sophy;" and, sooth to say, like that rebellion, his outbreak is lawless and irregular, as well as strong; as in that rebellion, too, there is a rather needless expenditure of blood. What Byron says of Dr. Polidori's tragedy, is nearly true of "Sophy"--

"All stab, and everybody dies."

Nothing can be more horrible and disgusting than many of the incidents. A father suspecting and plotting against a dear and noble son; a son deprived of sight by the command of a father, and meditating in his rage and revenge the murder of his own favourite daughter, because she is beloved by his father; and the deaths of both son and father by poison, administered through means of a courtier who has betrayed both. Such are the main hinges on which the plot of the piece turns. The versification, too, is exceedingly unequal; sometimes swelling into rather full and splendid blank verse, and anon shrinking up into lines stunted and shrivelled, like boughs either touched by frost, or lopped by the axe of the woodman. Still there are in "Sophy" a force of style, a maturity of mind, an energy of declamation, and, here and there, an appreciation of Shakspeare--shewn in a generous though hopeless rivalry of his manner-- which account for the reception it at first met with, and seem to have excited in Denham's contemporaries expectations which were never fulfilled. This uprise, as well as that of the Irish (which took place the year before it), turned out, on the whole, abortive. And yet what fine lines and sentiments are the following, culled from "Sophy" almost _ad aperturam libri_:--

"Fear and guilt
Are the same thing, and when our _actions are not_,
_Our fears are crimes_.
The east and west
Upon the globe, a _mathematic point
Only divides_; thus happiness and misery,
And all extremes, are still contiguous.

More gallant actions have been lost, for want of being
Completely wicked, than have been performed
By being exactly virtuous. 'Tis hard to be
Exact in good, or excellent in ill;
Our will wants power, or else our power wants skill.

When in the midst of fears we are surprised
With unexpected happiness, the first
_Degrees of joy are mere astonishment_.
Fear, the shadow
Of danger, like the shadow of our bodies,
_Is greater, then, when that which is the cause
Is farthest off_."

The blinded prince's soliloquy, in the first scene of the fifth act, is worthy of Shakspeare. We must quote the following lines:--

"Reason, my soul's eye, still sees
Clearly, and clearer for the want of eyes,
For gazing through the windows of the body
It met such several, such distracting objects;
But now confined within itself it sees
A strange and unknown world, and there discovers
_Torrents of anger, mountains of ambition,
Gulfs of desire, and towers of hope, large giants_,
Monsters and savage beasts; to vanquish these
Will be a braver conquest, than the old
Or the new world."

Shortly after the appearance of "Sophy," he was admitted, by the form then usual, Sheriff of Surrey, and appointed governor of Farnham Castle for the king; this important post, however, he soon resigned, and retreated to Oxford, where, in 1643, he published his poem entitled "Cooper's Hill." This instantly became popular, and many who might have seen in "Sophy" greater powers than were disclosed in this new effort, envied its fame, and gave out that he had bought it of a vicar for forty pounds. For this there was, of course, no proof, and it is only worth mentioning because it is one of a large class of cases, in which envious mediocrity, or crushed dulness, or jealous rivalry, has sought to snatch hard-won laurels from the brow of genius. As if these laurels were so smooth, and so soothing, as always to invite ambition, or as if they were so flexible as to suit every brow! As if FIRE lurked not sometimes in their leaves, and as if there were not, besides, a nobler jealousy in the public mind ready to watch and to avenge their misappropriation. Certain it is that not only, as Johnson remarks, was the attempt made to rob Addison of "Cato," and Pope of the "Essay of Criticism," but it has a hundred times taken place in the history of poetry. Rolt, as we saw in our late life of Akenside, tried to snatch the honour of writing "The Pleasures of Imagination" from its author. Lauder accused Milton of plundering the Italians wholesale. Scott's early novels have only the other day been most absurdly claimed for his brother Thomas. And notwithstanding Shakspeare's well-known lines over his sepulchre at Stratford--

"Bless'd be the man who spares these stones,
But curs'd be he who moves my bones"--

a worse outrage has been recently committed on his memory, than were his dust, like Wickliffe's, tossed out of his tomb into the Avon--his plays have been, with as much stupidity as malice, attributed to Lord Bacon! Homer, too, has been found out to be a myth; and we know not if even Dante's originality has altogether passed unquestioned in this age of disbelief and downpulling; although what brow, save that thunder-scathed pile, could wear those scorched laurels, and who but the "man who had been in hell" could have written the "Inferno?" Worst of all, a class of writers have of late sought to prove that there is no such thing as originality--that genius means just dexterous borrowing-that the "Appropriation Clause" is of divine right--and have certainly proved themselves true to their own principles.

In 1647, circumstances brought our poet more closely in connexion with the royal family, and on one occasion he carried a message from the Queen to King Charles, then in prison. He subsequently conducted, with great success, the King's correspondence; and in April 1648 he conveyed the young Duke of York (afterwards James II.) from London to France, and delivered him to the charge of the Queen and the Prince of Wales. He had, ere leaving Britain, written a translation of Cato-Major on Old Age. While in France, attending on the exiled prince, he wrote a number of poetical pieces at his master's desire; among others, a song in honour of an embassy to Poland, which he and Lord Crofts undertook for Charles II., and during which they are said to have collected £10,000 for the royal cause from the Scotchmen who then abounded in that country as travelling merchants or pedlars. Meanwhile his political misdemeanours were punished by the Parliament confiscating the remnant of his estate. In 1652, he returned to England penniless, and was supported by the Earl of Pembroke. After the Restoration, Charles, more mindful of him than of many of his friends and the partners of his exile, bestowed on Denham the Surveyorship of the King's Buildings and the Order of the Bath. The situation of Surveyor, even in his careless and improvident hands, turned out a lucrative one; for it is said that he cleared by it no less than £7000. Of his first wife, we hear little or nothing; but about this time, flushed as he was with prosperity, and the popularity of the writings he continued to produce, he contracted a second marriage, which was so far from happy that its consequences led to a fit of temporary derangement. Butler, then a disappointed and exacerbated man, was malignant enough to lampoon him for lunacy--an act which, Dr. Johnson well remarks, "no provocation could excuse." It was, in Fuller's fine old quaint language, "breaking one whom God had bowed before." Our readers will find Butler's squib in our edition of that poet, vol. ii. p. 200, under the title of "A Panegyrick on Sir John Denham's Recovery from his Madness." It is a piece quite unworthy of Butler's powers, and its sting lies principally in charging Denham with plagiarising "Cooper's Hill" and "Sophy," with gambling, and with overreaching the King as Surveyor of the Public Buildings, and with an overbearing and quarrelsome temper--but it contains no allusion to his domestic infelicity. Some have hinted that the cause of his insanity lay in jealousy--that Denham suspected his wife to be too intimate with the Duke of York--that he poisoned her, and maddened in remorse. Whatever the cause, the distemper was not of long continuance. He recovered in time to write some verses on the death of Cowley, which took place in 1667; but in the next year he himself expired, and was buried by the side of his friend in Westminster Abbey, not very far from Chaucer and Spencer. His funeral took place on the 19th of March 1668. He had attained the age of fifty-three.

This is all we can definitely state of the history of Sir John Denham, and certainly the light it casts on his character is neither very plentiful nor very pleasing. A gambler in his early days, he became a political intriguer, an unhappy husband, a maniac, and died in the prime of life. It need only further be recorded of him, that, according to some accounts, he first discovered the merits of Milton's "Paradise Lost," and went about with the book new from the press in his hands, shewing it to everybody, and exclaiming, "This beats us all, and the ancients too!" If this story be true, it says as much for his heart as his head for the generous disposition which made him praise a political adversary, as for the critical taste which discerned at a glance the value of the world's greatest poem. On the whole, however, Denham as a man stands on the same general level with the Cavalier wits in the days of Charles. If he did not rise so high as Cowley, he did not sink so low as Rochester, or even as Butler.

We may now regret, both that he did not live better, and that he did not write more. He had unquestionably in him greater powers than he ever expressed in his works. These are few, fragmentary, and unequal; but, nevertheless, must be reckoned productions of no ordinary merit. They discover a great deal of the body, and not a little of the soul, of poetry. In the passages we cited from "Sophy," and throughout the whole of that play, there is a vigorous and profound vein of reflection, as well as of imagination. Like Shakspeare, although on a scale very much inferior, he carries on a constant stream of subtle reflection amidst all the windings of his story; and even the most critical points of the drama are studded with pearls. Coleridge speaks of himself, or some one else, as wishing to live "collaterally, or aside, to the onward progress of society;" and thus, in the drama, there should ever be, as it were, a projection, or _alias_, of the author standing collaterally, or aside, to the bustling incidents and whirling passions, and calmly adding the commentary of wisdom, as they rush impetuously on. Such essentially was the chorus of the ancient Greek play; and a similar end is answered in Shakspeare by the subtle asides, the glancing bye-lights, which his wondrous intellect interposes amidst the rapid play of his fancy, the exuberance of his wit, and the crowded incident and interchange of passion created by his genius. Some have maintained that the philosophy of a drama should be chiefly confined to the conceptions of the characters, the development of the plot, and the management of the dialogue--that all the reflection should be molten into the mass of the play, and none of it embossed on the surface; but certainly neither Shakspeare's, nor Schiller's, nor Goethe's dramas answer to this ideal-- all of them, besides the philosophy, so to speak, afoot in the progress of the story, contain a great deal standing still, quietly lurking in nooks and corners, and yet exerting a powerful influence on the ultimate effect and explanation of the whole. And so, according to its own proportions, it is with Denham's "Sophy." Indeed, as we have above hinted, its power lies more in these interesting individual beauties than in its general structure.

"Cooper's Hill," next to "Sophy," is undoubtedly his best production. Dr. Johnson calls it the first English specimen of _local_ poetry--i.e., of poetry in which a special scene is, through the embellishments of traditionary recollection, moral reflections, and the power of association generally, uplifted into a poetical light. This has been done afterwards by Garth, in his "Claremont;" Pope, in his "Windsor Forest;" Dyer, in his "Gronger-hill," and a hundred other instances. The great danger in this class of poems, is lest imported sentiment and historical reminiscence should overpower the living lineaments, and all but blot out the memory of the actual landscape. And so it is to some extent in "Cooper's Hill," the scene beheld from which is speedily lost in a torrent of political reflection and moralising. The well-known lines on the Thames are rhetorical and forcible, but not, we think, highly poetical:--

"Oh, could I flow like thee, and make thy stream
My great example, as it is my theme!
Though deep, yet clear, though gentle, yet not dull,
Strong without rage, without o'erflowing full."

The poem closes with another river-picture, which some will admire:--

"When a calm river, raised with sudden rains
Or snows dissolved, o'erflows the adjoining plains,
The husbandmen, with high-raised banks, secure
Their greedy hopes, and this he can endure;
But, if with bays and dams they strive to force
His channel to a new or narrow course,
No longer then--within his banks he dwells,
First to a torrent, then a deluge swells,
Stronger and fiercer by restraint he roars,
And knows no bound, but makes his power his shores."

Again, he says of Thames:--

"Thames, the most loved of all the ocean's sons
By his old sire, to his embraces runs,
Hasting to pay his tribute to the sea,
Like mortal life to meet eternity.
Though with those streams he no resemblance hold
Whose foam is amber and their gravel gold.
His genuine and less guilty wealth t'explore,
Search not his bottom, but survey his shore."

Yet, though fond of, and great in, describing rivers, he is not, after all, the "river-god" of poetry. Professor Wilson speaks with a far deeper voice:--

"Down falls the drawbridge with a thund'ring shock,
And, in an instant, ere the eye can know,
Binds the stern castle to the opposing rock,
And hangs in calmness o'er the flood below;
A raging flood, that, born among the hills,
Flows dancing on through many a nameless glen,
Till, join'd by all his tributary rills
From lake and tarn, from marsh and from fen,
He leaves his empire with a kingly glee,
And fiercely bids retire the billows of the sea!"

Different poets are made to write on different rivers as well as on different mountains. Denham paints well the calm majestic Thames; Wilson, the rapid Spey; Scott, the immemorial and historic Forth; Burns, the wild lonely Lugar and the Doon; and Thomas Aird (see his exquisitely beautiful "River"), the pastoral Cluden. But the poet of the St. Lawrence, with Niagara flinging itself over its crag like a mad ocean--of the Ganges or the Orellana--has yet to be born, or at least has yet to bring forth his conceptions of such a stupendous object in poetry.

In "Cooper's Hill" we find well, if not fully exhibited, what were Denham's leading qualities--not high imagination or a fertile fancy, although in neither of these was he conspicuously deficient, but manly strength of thought and clearness of language. There are in him no quaintnesses, no crotchets, no conceits, and no involutions or affectations--all is transparent, masculine, and energetic. It is in these respects that he became a model to Dryden and Pope, and may even still be read with advantage for at least his style, which is

"Strong without rage, without o'erflowing full."

His translations we have included, not for their surpassing merit, but because, in the first place, there is little of our author extant, and we are happy to reprint every scrap of him we can find, and because again he, according to Dr. Johnson, was "one of the first that understood the necessity of emancipating translation from the drudgery of counting lines and interpreting single words." There has, indeed, been recently a reaction, attended in some cases with brilliant success--as in Bulwer's "Ballads of Schiller"--in favour of the literal and lineal method; but since such popular pieces as Dryden's "Virgil" and Pope's "Homer" have been written on Denham's plan, it is interesting to preserve the model, however rude, which they avowedly had in their eye.

His smaller pieces are not remarkable, unless we except his vigorous lines "On the Earl of Stafford's Trial and Death," containing such noble sentiments as these--

"Such was his force of eloquence, to make
The hearers more concern'd than he that spake,
Each seem'd to act that part he came to see,
_And none was more a looker-on than he_;
So did he move our passions, some were known
_To wish for the defence, the crime their own_.
Now private pity strove with public hate,
_Reason with rage, and eloquence with fate_."

Nor let us forget his verses on "Cowley's Death," which, although unequal, and in their praise exaggerated, yet are in parts exceedingly felicitous, as for instance, in the lines to which Macaulay, in his "Milton," refers:--

"To him no author was unknown,
Yet what he wrote was all his own;
He melted not the ancient gold,
Nor with Ben Jonson did make bold
To plunder all the Roman stores
Of poets and of orators;
Horace's wit and Virgil's state
He did not steal, but emulate!
And when he would like them appear,
Their _garb_, but not their _clothes_, did wear."

Such is true criticism, which, in our judgment, means clear, sharp, discriminating judgment expressed in the language and with the feelings of poetry.

DENHAM'S POETICAL WORKS.

POEMS UPON SEVERAL OCCASIONS.

COOPER'S HILL.

Sure there are poets which did never dream Upon Parnassus, nor did taste the stream Of Helicon; we therefore may suppose Those made not poets, but the poets those, And as courts make not kings, but kings the court, So where the Muses and their train resort, Parnassus stands; if I can be to thee A poet, thou Parnassus art to me. Nor wonder, if (advantaged in my flight, By taking wing from thy auspicious height) 10 Through untraced ways and airy paths I fly, More boundless in my fancy than my eye: My eye which, swift as thought, contracts the space That lies between, and first salutes the place Crown'd with that sacred pile, so vast, so high, That, whether 'tis a part of earth or sky, Uncertain seems, and may be thought a proud Aspiring mountain, or descending cloud. Paul's, the late theme of such a Muse,[1] whose flight 19 Has bravely reach'd and soar'd above thy height: Now shalt thou stand, though sword, or time, or fire, Or zeal more fierce than they, thy fall conspire, Secure, whilst thee the best of poets sings, Preserved from ruin by the best of kings. Under his proud survey the city lies, And like a mist beneath a hill doth rise; Whose state and wealth, the business and the crowd, Seems at this distance but a darker cloud: And is, to him who rightly things esteems, No other in effect than what it seems: 30 Where, with like haste, though sev'ral ways, they run, Some to undo, and some to be undone; While luxury and wealth, like war and peace, Are each the other's ruin and increase; As rivers lost in seas some secret vein Thence reconveys, there to be lost again. O happiness of sweet retired content! To be at once secure and innocent. Windsor the next (where Mars with Venus dwells, Beauty with strength) above the valley swells 40 Into my eye, and doth itself present With such an easy and unforced ascent, That no stupendous precipice denies Access, no horror turns away our eyes: But such a rise as doth at once invite A pleasure and a rev'rence from the sight: Thy mighty master's emblem, in whose face Sate meekness, heighten'd with majestic grace; Such seems thy gentle height, made only proud To be the basis of that pompous load, 50 Than which, a nobler weight no mountain bears, But Atlas only, which supports the spheres. When Nature's hand this ground did thus advance, 'Twas guided by a wiser power than Chance; Mark'd out for such an use, as if 'twere meant T' invite the builder, and his choice prevent. Nor can we call it choice, when what we choose, Folly or blindness only could refuse. A crown of such majestic towers doth grace The gods' great mother, when her heavenly race 60 Do homage to her, yet she cannot boast, Among that num'rous and celestial host. More heroes than can Windsor; nor doth Fame's Immortal book record more noble names. Not to look back so far, to whom this isle Owes the first glory of so brave a pile, Whether to Cæsar, Albanact, or Brute, The British Arthur, or the Danish Knute, (Though this of old no less contest did move Than when for Homer's birth seven cities strove) 70 (Like him in birth, thou shouldst be like in fame, As thine his fate, if mine had been his flame), But whosoe'er it was, Nature design'd First a brave place, and then as brave a mind; Not to recount those sev'ral kings, to whom It gave a cradle, or to whom a tomb; But thee, great Edward, and thy greater son[2] (The lilies which his father wore, he won), And thy Bellona,[3] who the consort came Not only to thy bed, but to thy fame, so She to thy triumph led one captive king,[4] And brought that son, which did the second bring. Then didst thou found that Order (whether love 83 Or victory thy royal thoughts did move), Each was a noble cause, and nothing less Than the design, has been the great success: Which foreign kings, and emperors esteem The second honour to their diadem. Had thy great destiny but given thee skill To know, as well as power to act her will, 90 That from those kings, who then thy captives were, In after times should spring a royal pair Who should possess all that thy mighty power, Or thy desires more mighty, did devour: To whom their better fate reserves whate'er The victor hopes for, or the vanquish'd fear; That blood, which thou and thy great grandsire shed, And all that since these sister nations bled, Had been unspilt, had happy Edward known. That all the blood he spilt had been his own. 100 When he that patron chose, in whom are join'd Soldier and martyr, and his arms confin'd Within the azure circle, he did seem But to foretell, and prophesy of him, Who to his realms that azure round hath join'd, Which Nature for their bound at first design'd; That bound, which to the world's extremest ends, Endless itself, its liquid arms extends. Nor doth he need those emblems which we paint, But is himself the soldier and the saint. 110 Here should my wonder dwell, and here my praise; But my fix'd thoughts my wand'ring eye betrays, Viewing a neighb'ring hill, whose top of late A chapel crown'd, 'till in the common fate Th' adjoining abbey fell. (May no such storm Fall on our times, when ruin must reform!) Tell me, my Muse! what monstrous dire offence, 117 What crime could any Christian king incense To such a rage? Was't luxury, or lust? Was he so temperate, so chaste, so just? Were these their crimes? They were his own much more; But wealth is crime enough to him that's poor, Who having spent the treasures of his crown, Condemns their luxury to feed his own. And yet this act, to varnish o'er the shame Of sacrilege, must bear devotion's name. No crime so bold, but would be understood A real, or at least a seeming good: Who fears not to do ill, yet fears the name, And, free from conscience, is a slave to fame. 130 Thus he the church at once protects, and spoils: But princes' swords are sharper than their styles; And thus to th'ages past he makes amends, Their charity destroys, their faith defends. Then did Religion in a lazy cell, In empty, airy contemplations dwell; And like the block, unmovèd lay; but ours, As much too active, like the stork devours. Is there no temp'rate region can be known, Betwixt their frigid, and our torrid zone? 140 Could we not wake from that lethargic dream, But to be restless in a worse extreme? And for that lethargy was there no cure, But to be cast into a calenture? Can knowledge have no bound, but must advance So far, to make us wish for ignorance, And rather in the dark to grope our way, Than, led by a false guide, to err by day? Who sees these dismal heaps, but would demand What barbarous invader sack'd the land? 150 But when he hears no Goth, no Turk did bring This desolation, but a Christian king; When nothing but the name of zeal appears 'Twixt our best actions and the worst of theirs, What does he think our sacrilege would spare, When such th'effects of our devotions are? Parting from thence 'twixt anger, shame and fear, Those for what's past, and this for what's too near, My eye descending from the hill, surveys Where Thames among the wanton valleys strays. 160 Thames, the most loved of all the Ocean's sons By his old sire, to his embraces runs; Hasting to pay his tribute to the sea, Like mortal life to meet eternity. Though with those streams he no resemblance hold, Whose foam is amber, and their gravel gold, His genuine and less guilty wealth t'explore, Search not his bottom, but survey his shore, O'er which he kindly spreads his spacious wing, And hatches plenty for th'ensuing spring; 170 Nor then destroys it with too fond a stay, Like mothers which their infants overlay; Nor with a sudden and impetuous wave, Like profuse kings, resumes the wealth he gave. No unexpected inundations spoil The mower's hopes, nor mock the ploughman's toil: But godlike his unwearied bounty flows; First loves to do, then loves the good he does. Nor are his blessings to his banks confined, But free and common as the sea or wind; 180 When he, to boast or to disperse his stores, Full of the tributes of his grateful shores, Visits the world, and in his flying towers Brings home to us, and makes both Indies ours; Finds wealth where 'tis, bestows it where it wants, Cities in deserts, woods in cities plants; So that to us no thing, no place is strange, While his fair bosom is the world's exchange. Oh, could I flow like thee, and make thy stream My great example, as it is my theme! 190 Though deep, yet clear; though gentle, yet not dull; Strong without rage, without o'erflowing full. Heaven her Eridanus no more shall boast, Whose fame in thine, like lesser current, 's lost; Thy nobler streams shall visit Jove's abodes, To shine among the stars,[5] and bathe the gods. Here Nature, whether more intent to please Us or herself with strange varieties, (For things of wonder give no less delight To the wise maker's, than beholder's sight; 200 Though these delights from sev'ral causes move; For so our children, thus our friends, we love), Wisely she knew the harmony of things, As well as that of sounds, from discord springs. Such was the discord, which did first disperse Form, order, beauty, through the universe; While dryness moisture, coldness heat resists, All that we have, and that we are, subsists; While the steep, horrid roughness of the wood Strives with the gentle calmness of the flood, 210 Such huge extremes when Nature doth unite, Wonder from thence results, from thence delight. The stream is so transparent, pure, and clear, That had the self-enamour'd youth[6] gazed here, So fatally deceived he had not been, While he the bottom, not his face had seen. But his proud head the airy mountain hides 217 Among the clouds; his shoulders and his sides A shady mantle clothes; his curlèd brows Frown on the gentle stream, which calmly flows, While winds and storms his lofty forehead beat: The common fate of all that's high or great. Low at his foot a spacious plain is placed, Between the mountain and the stream embraced, Which shade and shelter from the hill derives, While the kind river wealth and beauty gives, And in the mixture of all these appears Variety, which all the rest endears. This scene had some bold Greek or British bard Beheld of old, what stories had we heard 230 Of fairies, satyrs, and the nymphs their dames, Their feasts, their revels, and their am'rous flames? 'Tis still the same, although their airy shape All but a quick poetic sight escape. There Faunus and Sylvanus keep their courts, And thither all the horned host resorts To graze the ranker mead; that noble herd On whose sublime and shady fronts is rear'd Nature's great masterpiece; to show how soon, Great things are made, but sooner are undone. 240 Here have I seen the King, when great affairs Gave leave to slacken, and unbend his cares, Attended to the chase by all the flower Of youth whose hopes a nobler prey devour: Pleasure with praise and danger they would buy, And wish a foe that would not only fly. The stag now conscious of his fatal growth, At once indulgent to his fear and sloth, To some dark covert his retreat had made, Where nor man's eye, nor heaven's should invade 250 His soft repose; when th'unexpected sound Of dogs, and men, his wakeful ears does wound. Roused with the noise, he scarce believes his ear, Willing to think th'illusions of his fear Had given this false alarm, but straight his view Confirms that more than all he fears is true. Betray'd in all his strengths, the wood beset; All instruments, all arts of ruin met; He calls to mind his strength and then his speed, His winged heels, and then his armed head; 260 With these t'avoid, with that his fate to meet: But fear prevails, and bids him trust his feet. So fast he flies, that his reviewing eye Has lost the chasers, and his ear the cry; Exulting, till he finds their nobler sense Their disproportion'd speed doth recompense; Then curses his conspiring feet, whose scent Betrays that safety which their swiftness lent; Then tries his friends; among the baser herd, Where he so lately was obey'd and fear'd, 270 His safety seeks; the herd, unkindly wise, Or chases him from thence, or from him flies; Like a declining statesman, left forlorn To his friends' pity, and pursuers' scorn, With shame remembers, while himself was one Of the same herd, himself the same had done. Thence to the coverts and the conscious groves, The scenes of his past triumphs and his loves; Sadly surveying where he ranged alone Prince of the soil, and all the herd his own, 280 And like a bold knight-errant did proclaim. Combat to all, and bore away the dame, And taught the woods to echo to the stream His dreadful challenge, and his clashing beam; Yet faintly now declines the fatal strife; So much his love was dearer than his life. Now every leaf, and every moving breath Presents a foe, and every foe a death. Wearied, forsaken, and pursued, at last All safety in despair of safety placed, 290 Courage he thence resumes, resolved to bear All their assaults, since 'tis in vain to fear. And now, too late, he wishes for the fight That strength he wasted in ignoble flight: But when he sees the eager chase renew'd, Himself by dogs, the dogs by men pursued, He straight revokes his bold resolve, and more Repents his courage than his fear before; Finds that uncertain ways unsafest are, And doubt a greater mischief than despair. 300 Then to the stream, when neither friends, nor force, Nor speed, nor art, avail, he shapes his course; Thinks not their rage so desperate to assay An element more merciless than they. But fearless they pursue, nor can the flood Quench their dire thirst; alas! they thirst for blood. So t'wards a ship the oar-finn'd galleys ply, Which, wanting sea to ride, or wind to fly, Stands but to fall revenged on those that dare Tempt the last fury of extreme despair. 310 So fares the stag, among th'enraged hounds, Repels their force, and wounds returns for wounds; And as a hero, whom his baser foes In troops surround, now these assails, now those, Though prodigal of life, disdains to die By common hands; but if he can descry Some nobler foe approach, to him he calls, And begs his fate, and then contented falls. So when the king a mortal shaft lets fly 319 From his unerring hand, then glad to die, Proud of the wound, to it resigns his blood, And stains the crystal with a purple flood. This a more innocent, and happy chase, Than when of old, but in the selfsame place, Fair Liberty pursued,[7] and meant a prey To lawless power, here turn'd, and stood at bay; When in that remedy all hope was placed Which was, or should have been at least, the last. Here was that charter seal'd, wherein the crown All marks of arbitrary power lays down: 330 Tyrant and slave, those names of hate and fear, The happier style of king and subject bear: Happy, when both to the same centre move, When kings give liberty, and subjects love. Therefore not long in force this charter stood; Wanting that seal, it must be seal'd in blood. The subjects arm'd, the more their princes gave, Th' advantage only took the more to crave; Till kings by giving, give themselves away, And e'en that power, that should deny, betray. 340 'Who gives constrain'd, but his own fear reviles, Not thank'd, but scorn'd; nor are they gifts, but spoils.' Thus kings, by grasping more than they could hold, First made their subjects, by oppression, bold: And popular sway, by forcing kings to give More than was fit for subjects to receive, Ran to the same extremes; and one excess Made both, by striving to be greater, less. When a calm river, raised with sudden rains, Or snows dissolved, o'erflows th'adjoining plains, 350 The husbandmen with high raised banks secure Their greedy hopes, and this he can endure; But if with bays and dams they strive to force His channel to a new, or narrow course; No longer then within his banks he dwells, First to a torrent, then a deluge, swells; Stronger and fiercer by restraint he roars, And knows no bound, but makes his power his shores.

[1] 'Such a Muse': Mr. Waller. [2] 'Great Edward, and thy greater son': Edward III. and the Black Prince. [3] 'Thy Bellona': Queen Phillippa. [4] 'Captive king': the kings of France and Scotland. [5] 'The stars': the Forest. [6] 'Self-enamour'd youth': Narcissus. [7] 'Liberty pursued': Runimede, where Magna Charta was first sealed.

THE DESTRUCTION OF TROY.

AN ESSAY ON THE SECOND BOOK OF VIRGIL'S AENEIS, WRITTEN IN THE YEAR 1636.

THE ARGUMENT.

The first book speaks of Aeneas's voyage by sea, and how, being cast by tempest upon the coast of Carthage, he was received by Queen Dido, who, after the feast, desires him to make the relation of the destruction of Troy; which is the argument of this book.