Chapter IV (2)

17. FLETCHER, PHINEAS, who surpassed his brother in poetical genius, took his bachelor's degree at King's College, Cambridge, in 1604, and his master's degree in 1608. Though his poems were not published until 1633, there is convincing proof that they were written before 1610; for Giles, at the close of his "Christ's Victory," printed in this year, thus beautifully alludes not only to his brother's Purple Island, but to his eclogues, as previous compositions:—

"But let the Kentish lad, that lately taught
His _oaten reed_ the trumpets silver sound,
_Young Thyrsilis_; and for his music brought
The willing spheres from Heav'n, to lead around
The dancing nymphs and swains, that sung, and crown'd
Eclectas Hymen with ten thousand flowers
Of choicest praise, and hung her heav'nly bow'rs
With saffron garlands, dress'd for nuptial paramours:

Let his shrill trumpet, with her silver blast
Of fair Eclecta, and her spousal bed,
Be the sweet pipe, and smooth encomiast:
But my green Muse, hiding her younger head,
Under old Camus's flaggy banks, that spread
Their willow locks abroad, and all the day
With their own wa'try shadows wanton play:
Dares not those high amours, and love-sick songs assay."[622:A]

It is, indeed, highly probable, that they were composed even before he took his bachelor's degree; for, in the dedication of his "Purple Island" to his learned friend, Edward Benlowes, Esq., he terms them "raw essays of my very unripe years, and almost childhood."[622:B]

The "Purple Island" is an allegorical description, in twelve cantos, of the corporeal and intellectual functions of man. Its interest and effect have been greatly injured by a too minute investigation of anatomical facts; the first five cantos being little else than a lecture in rime, and productive more of disgust than any other sensation. In the residue of the poem, the bard bursts forth with unshackled splendour, and the passions and mental powers are personified with great brilliancy of imagination, and great warmth of colouring. Like his brother, however, he is defective in taste; the great charm of composition, simplicity, is too often lost amid the mazes of quaint conception and meretricious ornament. Yet are there passages interspersed through this allegory, of exquisite tenderness and sweetness, alike simple and correct in diction, chaste in creative power, and melodious in versification.

The "Piscatory Eclogues," to novelty of scenery, add many passages of genuine and delightful poetry, and the music of the verse is often highly gratifying to the ear; but many of the same faults are discernible in these pieces, which we remarked in the "Purple Island;" pedantry and forced conceits occasionally intrude, and, though the poet has not injured the effect of his delineations by coarseness, or rusticity of expression, he has sometimes forgotten the simple elegance which should designate the pastoral muse.

Our author was presented to the living of Hilgay, in Norfolk, in 1621, and died there about the year 1650.

18. GASCOIGNE, GEORGE, the son of Sir John Gascoigne, was descended from an ancient family in Essex, and, after a private education under the care of Stephen Nevinson, L.L.D. he was sent to Cambridge, and from thence to Gray's Inn, for the purpose of studying the law. Like many men, however, of warm passions and strong imagination, he neglected his profession for the amusements and dissipation of a court, and having exhausted his paternal property, he found himself under the necessity of seeking abroad, in a military capacity, that support which he had failed to acquire at home. He accordingly accepted a Captain's commission in Holland, in 1572, under William Prince of Orange, and having signalised his courage at the siege of Middleburg, had the misfortune to be captured by the Spaniards near Leyden, and, after four month's imprisonment, revisited his native country.

He now resumed his profession and his apartments at Gray's Inn; but in 1575, on his return from accompanying Queen Elizabeth in her progress to Kenelworth Castle, he fixed his residence at his "poore house," at Walthamstow, where he employed himself in collecting and publishing his poems. He was not long destined, however, to enjoy this literary leisure; for, according to George Whetstone, who was "an eye-witness of his godly and charitable end in this world[624:A]," he expired at Stamford, in Lincolnshire, on the 7th of October, 1577, when he was probably under forty years of age.[624:B]

The poetry of Gascoigne was twice collected during his life-time; firstly, in 1572, in a quarto volume, entitled, "A Hundreth sundrie Flowres bounde up in one small Poesie. Gathered partely (by translation) in the fyne outlandish Gardins of Euripides, Ovid, Petrarke, Ariosto, and others: and partly by invention, out of our owne fruitefull Orchardes in Englande: Yielding sundrie sweet savors of Tragical, Comical, and Morall Discourses, both pleasaunt and profitable to the well smellyng noses of learned Readers. Meritum petere, grave. At London, Imprinted for Richarde Smith;" and secondly in 1575, with the title of "The Posies of George Gascoigne Esquire. Corrected, perfected and augmented by the Authour. _Tam Marti, quam Mercurio._ Imprinted at London by H. Bynneman for Richard Smith." The edition is divided into three parts, under the appellation of _Flowers_, _Hearbes_, and _Weedes_, to which are annexed "Certayne notes of Instruction concerning the making of verse or ryme in English, written at the request of Master Edouardo Donati."

Besides these collections, Gascoigne published separately, "The Glasse of Government. A Tragical Comedie," 1575. "The Steele Glas. A Satyre," 1576. "The Princely Pleasures, at the Court at Kenelworth," 1576; and "A Delicate Diet for daintie mouthde Drunkards," a prose tract, 1576. After his death appeared, in 1586, his tract, entitled, "The Droome of Doomes Day;" and in 1587, was given to the world, a complete edition of his works, in small quarto, black letter.

Gascoigne, though patronised by several illustrious characters, among whom may be enumerated, Lord Grey of Wilton, the Earl of Bedford, and Sir Walter Raleigh, appears to have suffered so much from the envy and malignity of his critics, as to induce him to intimate, that the disease of which he died, was occasioned by the irritability of mind resulting from these attacks; and yet, as far as we have an opportunity of judging, his contemporaries seem to have done justice to his talents; at least Gabriel Harvey[625:A] and Arthur Hall[625:B], Nash[625:C], Webbe[625:D], and Puttenham[625:E], have together praised him for his wit, his imagination, and his metre; and in the Glosse to Spenser's Calender, he is styled "the very chief of our late rymers."[626:A]

The poetry of our author has not, in modern times, met with all the attention which it deserves; specimens, it is true, have been selected by Cooper, Percy, Warton, Headley, Ellis, Brydges, and Haslewood; but, with the exception of the re-impression of 1810, in Mr. Chalmers's English Poets, no edition of his works has been published since 1587. This is the more extraordinary, for, as the ingenious editor just mentioned has remarked, "there are three respects in which his claims to originality require to be noticed as æras in a history of poetry. His Steele Glass is among the first specimens of blank verse in our language; his Jocasta is the second theatrical piece written in that measure; and his Supposes is the first comedy written in prose."[626:B] Warton has pronounced him to have "much exceeded all the poets of his age in smoothness and harmony of versification[626:C]," an encomium which peculiarly applies to the lyrical portion of his works, which is indeed exquisitely polished, though not altogether free from affectation and antithesis. Among these pieces, too, is to be discovered a considerable range of fancy, much tenderness and glow of sentiment, and a frequent felicity of expression. In moral and didactic poetry, he has likewise afforded us proofs approaching to excellence, and his satire entitled "The Steele Glass," includes a curious and minute picture of the manners and customs of the age.

To the "Supposes" of Gascoigne, a translation from the Suppotiti of Ariosto, executed with peculiar neatness and ease, Shakspeare has been indebted for a part of his plot of the "Taming of the Shrew."[626:D]

19. GREENE, ROBERT. Of this ingenious and prolific writer, we have already related so many particulars, that nothing more can be wanting here, than a brief character of his poetical genius. Were his poetry collected from his various pamphlets and plays, of which nearly fifty are known to be extant, a most interesting little volume might be formed. The extreme rarity, however, of his productions, may render this an object of no easy attainment; but of its effect a pretty accurate idea may be acquired from what has been done by Mr. Beloe, who, in his Anecdotes of Literature, has collected many beautiful specimens from the following pieces of our author. _Tullie's Love_, 1616; _Penelope's Web_, 1601; _Farewell to Follie_, 1617; _Never Too Late_, 1590; _History of Arbasto_, 1617; _Arcadia, or Menaphon_, 1589; _Orphanion_, 1599; _Philomela_, 1592.[627:A]

Though most of the productions of Greene were written to supply the wants of the passing hour, yet the poetical effusions scattered through his works betray few marks of haste or slovenliness, and many of them, indeed, may be classed among the most polished and elegant of their day. To much warmth and fertility of fancy, they add a noble strain of feeling and enthusiasm, together with many exquisite touches of the pathetic, and so many impressive lessons of morality, as, in a great measure, to atone for the licentiousness of several of his prose tracts.[627:B]

20. HALL, JOSEPH, Bishop of Exeter and Norwich, was born on the first of July 1574, at Brestow Park, Leicestershire. He was admitted of Emanuel College, Cambridge, at the age of fifteen, and when twenty-three years old, published his satires, under the title of Virgidemiarum, Sixe Bookes. First Three Bookes of Tooth-less Satyrs: 1. Poetical; 2. Academicall; 3. Moral; printed by T. Creede for R. Dexter 1597. The Three last Bookes of Byting Satyrs, by R. Bradock for Dexter, 1598. Both parts were reprinted together in 1599, and have conferred upon their author a just claim to the appellation of one of our earliest and best satiric poets. Of the legitimate satire, indeed, he appears to have given us the first example, an honour upon which he justly prides himself, for, in the opening of his prologue, he tells us

"I first adventure, with fool-hardy might,
To tread the steps of perilous despight:
I first adventure, follow me who list,
And be the _second_ English satirist."

On the re-publication of the Virgidemiarum at Oxford, in 1752, Gray, in a letter to Dr. Wharton, speaking of these satires, says, "they are full of spirit and poetry, as much of the first as Dr. Donne, and far more of the latter[628:A];" and Warton, at the commencement of an elaborate and extended critique on Hall's poetic genius, in the Fragment of his fourth volume of the History of English Poetry, gives the following very discriminative character of these satires. They "are marked," he observes, "with a classical precision, to which English poetry had yet rarely attained. They are replete with animation of style and sentiment. The indignation of the satirist is always the result of good sense. Nor are the thorns of severe invective unmixed with the flowers of pure poetry. The characters are delineated in strong and lively colouring, and their discriminations are touched with the masterly traces of genuine humour. The versification is equally energetic and elegant, and the fabric of the couplets approaches to the modern standard. It is no inconsiderable proof of a genius predominating over the general taste of an age when every preacher was a punster, to have written verses, where laughter was to be raised, and the reader to be entertained with sallies of pleasantry, without quibbles and conceits. His chief fault is obscurity, arising from a remote phraseology, constrained combinations, unfamiliar allusions, elliptical apostrophes, and abruptness of expression. Perhaps some will think that his manner betrays too much of the laborious exactness and pedantic anxiety of the scholar and the student. Ariosto in Italian, and Regnier in French, were now almost the only modern writers of satire; and I believe there had been an English translation of Ariosto's Satires. But Hall's acknowledged patterns are Juvenal and Persius, not without some touches of the urbanity of Horace. His parodies of these poets, or rather his adaptations of ancient to modern manners, a mode of imitation not unhappily practised by Oldham, Rochester, and Pope, discover great facility and dexterity of invention. The moral gravity and the censorial declamation of Juvenal, he frequently enlivens with a train of more refined reflection, or adorns with a novelty and variety of images."[629:A]

The Satires of Hall exhibit a very minute and curious picture of the literature and manners, the follies and vices of his times, and numerous quotations in the course of our work will amply prove the wit, the sagacity, and the elegance of his Muse. Poetry was the occupation merely of his youth, the vigour and decline of his days being employed in the composition of professional works, calculated, by their piety, eloquence, and originality, to promote, in the most powerful manner, the best interests of morality and religion. This great and good man died, after a series of persecution from the republican party, at his little estate at Heigham, near Norwich, on the 8th of September 1656, and in the eighty-second year of his age.

21. HARINGTON, SIR JOHN. Among the numerous translators of the Elizabethan period, this gentleman merits peculiar notice, as having, through the medium of his Ariosto, "enriched our poetry by a communication of new stores of fiction and imagination, both of the romantic and comic species, of Gothic machinery and familiar manners."[629:B] His version of the Orlando Furioso, of which the first edition was published in 1591, procured him a large share of celebrity. Stowe, in his Annals, has classed him among those "excellent poets which worthily flourish, in their own works, and lived together in Queen Elizabeth's reign[630:A];" and Fuller[630:B], Philips, Dryden, and others, to the middle of the eighteenth century, have spoken of him in terms of similar commendation. In point of poetical execution, however, his translation, whatever might be its incidental operation on our poetic literature, must now be considered as vulgar, tame, and inaccurate. Sir John was born at Kelston near Bath, in 1561, and died there in 1612, aged fifty-one. His "Epigrams," in four Books, were published after his death; first in 1615, when the fourth book alone was printed; again in 1618, including the whole collection; and a third time in 1625, small 8vo.[630:C] The poetical merit of these pieces is very trifling, but they throw light upon contemporary character and manners.[630:D]

22. JONSON, BENJAMIN. Of this celebrated poet, the friend and companion of Shakspeare, a very brief notice, and limited to his minor pieces, will here be necessary, as his dramatic works and some circumstances of his life, will hereafter occupy their due share of attention. His poems were divided by himself into "Epigrams," "The Forest," "Under-woods," and a translation of "Horace's Art of Poetrie;" to which his late editors have added, "Miscellaneous Pieces." The _general_ cast of these poems is not such as will recommend them to a modern ear; they are but too often cold and affected; but occasionally, instances of a description the very reverse of these epithets, are to be found, where simplicity and beauty of expression constitute the prominent features. It is chiefly, if not altogether, among his minor pieces in the lyric measure that we meet with this peculiar neatness and concinnity of diction: thus, in "The Forest," the lines from Catullus, beginning "Come, my Celia, let us prove," and the well-known song

"Drink to me only with thine eyes;"

in the "Underwoods," the stanzas commencing

"For Love's sake kisse me once again;"

"Or scorne, or pittie on me take;"

and, among his "Songs," these with the initial lines

"Queene and huntresse, chaste and faire;"

"Still to be neat, still to be drest;"

are striking proofs of these excellencies.

We must also remark that, among his "Epistles" and "Miscellaneous Pieces," there are discoverable a few very conspicuous examples of the union of correct and nervous sentiment with singular force and dignity of elocution. Of this happy combination, the Lines to the Memory of Shakspeare, an eulogium which will claim our attention in a future page, may be quoted as a brilliant model.

23. LODGE, THOMAS, M. D. This gentleman, though possessing celebrity, in his day, as a physician, is chiefly entitled to the attention of posterity as a poet. He was a native of Lincolnshire, and born about 1556; educated at Oxford, of which he became a member about 1573, and died of the plague at London, in September 1625. He has the double honour of being the first who published, in our language, a Collection of Satires, so named, and of having suggested to Shakspeare the plot of his AS YOU LIKE IT. Philips, in his Theatrum Poetarum, characterises him as "one of the writers of those pretty old pastoral songs, which were very much the strain of those times[632:A];" but has strangely overlooked his satirical powers; these, however, have been noticed by Meres, who remarks, that "as Horace, Lucilius, Juvenal, Persius and Lucullus are the best for Satyre among the Latins, so with us in the same faculty, these are chiefe: Piers Plowman, LODGE, Hall of Emanuel Colledge in Cambridge, the author of Pigmalion's Image," &c.[632:B] The work which gives him precedence, as a writer of professed satires, is entitled "A FIG FOR MOMUS; containing pleasant Varietie, included in _Satyrs_, Eclogues, and Epistles, by T. L. of Lincolnes Inne, Gent." 1595.[632:C] It is dedicated to "William, Earle of Darbie," and though published two years before the appearance of Hall's Satires, possesses a spirit, ease and harmony, which that more celebrated poet has not surpassed. Than the following lines, selected from the first satire, we know few which, in the same department, can establish a better claim to vigour, truth, and melody:—

"All men are willing with the world to haulte,
But no man takes delight to knowe his faulte—
Tell bleer-eid Linus that his sight is cleere,
Heele pawne himselfe to buy thee bread and beere;—
Find me a niggard that doth want the shift
To call his cursed avarice good thrift;
A rakehell sworne to prodigalitie,
That dares not terme it liberalitie;
A letcher that hath lost both flesh and fame,
That holds not letcherie a pleasant game:—
Thus with the world, the world dissembles still,
And to their own confusions follow will,
Holding it true felicitie to flie,
Not from the sinne, but from the seeing eie."[633:A]

The debt of Shakspeare to our author is to be found in a pamphlet entitled "Rosalynde: Euphues Golden Legacie, found after his Death in his Cell at Silexdra, by T. L. Gent." The poetical pieces interspersed through this tract correspond with the character given of Lodge's composition by Phillips; for they are truly pastoral, and are finished in a style of great sweetness, delicacy, and feeling. Want of taste, or want of intimacy with this production, has induced Mr. Steevens to give a very improper estimate of it; "Shakspeare," he remarks, "has followed Lodge's novel more exactly than is his general custom when he is indebted to such _worthless_ originals; and has sketched some of his principal characters, and borrowed a few expressions from it."[633:B]

The poetry of Lodge is to be gleaned from his pamphlets; particularly from the two which we have mentioned, and from the two now to be enumerated, namely, "Phillis: honoured with pastorall sonnets, elegies and amorous delights. Where-unto is annexed, the tragicall complaynt of Elstred," 1593, 4to., and "A most pleasant historie of Glaucus and Scilla: with many excellent poems, and delectable sonnets," 1610, 4to. He contributed, likewise, to the Collections termed _The Phœnix Nest_, 1593, and _England's Helicon_, 1600; and in the Preface, by Sir Egerton Brydges, to the third edition of the latter Miscellany, so just a tribute is paid to his genius as imperatively demands insertion; more particularly if we consider the obscurity into which this poet has fallen. "In ancient writings," observes the critic, "we frequently meet with beautiful passages; but whole compositions are seldom free from the most striking inequalities; from inharmonious verses; from lame, or laboured and quaint expressions; and creeping or obscure thoughts. In Lodge we find whole pastorals and odes, which have all the ease, polish, and elegance of a modern author. How natural is the sentiment, and how sweet the expression of the following in _Old Damon's Pastoral_:

"Homely hearts do harbour quiet;
Little fear, and mickle solace;
States suspect their bed and diet;
Fear and craft do haunt the palace.
Little would I, little want I,
Where the mind and store agreeth;
Smallest comfort is not scanty;
Least he longs that little seeth.
Time hath been that I have longed.
Foolish I to like of folly,
To converse where honour thronged,
To my pleasures linked wholly:
Now I see, and seeing sorrow
That the day consum'd returns not:
Who dare trust upon to-morrow,
When nor time nor life sojourns not!"

"How charmingly he breaks out in _The Solitary Shepherd's Song_:—

"O shady vale, O fair enriched meads,
O sacred flowers, sweet fields, and rising mountains;
O painted flowers, green herbs where Flora treads,
Refresh'd by wanton winds and watry fountains!"

"Is there one word or even accent obsolete in this picturesque and truly poetical stanza?

"But if such a tender and moral fancy be ever allowed to trifle, is there any thing of the same kind in the whole compass of English poetry more exquisite, more delicately imagined, or expressed with more finished and happy artifice of language, than Rosalind's Madrigal, beginning—

"Love in my bosom, like a bee,
Doth suck his sweet:
Now with his wings he plays with me,
Now with his feet.
Within mine eyes he makes his rest;
His bed amidst my tender breast;
My kisses are his daily feast;
And yet he robs me of my rest.
Ah, wanton, will ye?"—

"Compare Dr. Lodge not only with his cotemporaries but his successors, and who, except Breton, has so happily anticipated the taste, simplicity, and purity of the most refined age."[635:A]

Beside his miscellaneous poetry, Lodge published two dramatic pieces[635:B], and may be considered as a voluminous prose writer. Seven of his prose tracts are described by Mr. Beloe[635:C], and he translated the works of Josephus and Luc. An. Seneca.[635:D]

24. MARLOW, CHRISTOPHER. As the fame of this poet, though once in high repute as a dramatic writer, is now supported merely by one of his miscellaneous pieces, which is, indeed, of exquisite beauty, it has been thought necessary briefly to introduce him here; a more extended notice being deferred to a subsequent page. His earliest attempt appeared in 1587, when he was about twenty-five years of age, in a Translation of Coluthus's Rape of Helen into English rhyme. This was followed by "Certaine of Ovid's Elegies," licensed in 1593, but not printed until 1596. His next and happiest version was given to the public in 1598, under the title of "The Loves of Hero and Leander," being, like the preceding, a posthumous publication; for the author died prematurely in 1593, leaving this translation, of which the original is commonly but erroneously ascribed to Musæus, unfinished. Phillips, in his character of Marlow, comparing him with Shakspeare, says, that he resembled him not only in his dramatic circumstances, "but also because in his begun poem of Hero and Leander, he seems to have a resemblance of that clean, and unsophisticated wit, which is natural to that incomparable poet."[636:A] Marlow translated also "Lucans first booke, line for line," in blank verse, which was licensed in 1593, and printed in 1600; but the production which has given him a claim to immortality, and which has retained its popularity even to the present day, first made its appearance in "England's Helicon," under the appellation of _The Passionate Shepheard to his Love_. Of an age distinguished for the excellence of its rural poetry, this is, without doubt, the most admirable and finished pastoral.

25. MARSTON, JOHN, who has a claim to introduction here, from his powers as a satirical poet. In 1598, he published "The Metamorphosis, or Pigmalion's Image. And certaine Satyres." Of these the former is an elegant and luxurious description of a well-known fable, and to this sportive effusion Shakspeare seems to allude in his "Measure for Measure," where Lucio exclaims, "What, is there none of Pygmalion's images, newly made woman, to be had now?"[636:B] His fame as a satirist was established the year following, by the appearance of his "Scourge of Villanie. Three Bookes of Satyres."

A reprint of these pieces was given to the world by Mr. Bowles, in the year 1764, who terms the author the "_British Persius_," and adds, that very little is recorded of him with certainty. "Antony a Wood," he remarks, "who is generally exact in his accounts of men, and much to be relied upon, is remarkably deficient with respect to him; indeed there seems to be little reason to think he was of Oxford: it is certain from his works, that he was of Cambridge, where he was cotemporary with Mr. Hall, with whom, as it appears from his satyre, called Reactio, and from the Scourge of Villanie, sat. 10., he had some dispute.—It has not been generally known who was the author of Pigmalion and the five satyres: but that they belong to Marston is clear from the sixth and tenth satyres of the Scourge of Villanie: and to this may be added the evidence of the collector of England's Parnassus, printed 1600, who cites the five first lines of the dedication to opinion, prefixed to Pigmalion by the name of J. Marston, p. 221."

"These satyres," says Mr. Warton, "in his observations on Spenser, contain many well drawn characters, and several good strokes of a satyrical genius, but are not, upon the whole, so finished and classical as Bishop Hall's: the truth is, they were satyrists of a different cast: Hall turned his pen against his cotemporary writers, and particularly versifiers; _Marston_ chiefly inveighed against the growing foibles and vices of the age."[637:A]

There is undoubtedly a want of polish in the satirical muse of Marston, which seems, notwithstanding, the result rather of design than inability; for the versification of "Pigmalion's Image," is in many of its parts highly melodious. Strength, verging upon coarseness, is, however, the characteristic of the "Scourge of Villanie," and may warrant the assertion of the author of "The Returne from Parnassus," that he was "a ruffian in his stile."[637:B] Yet he is highly complimented by Fitz-Geoffry, no mean judge of poetical merit, who declares that he is

—————— "satyrarum proxima primæ,
Primaque, fas primas si numerare duas."[637:C]

26. NICCOLS, RICHARD. This elegant poet was born in 1584, was entered of Magdalen College, Oxford, 1602, and took his bachelor's degree in 1606. In 1607, he published "The Cuckow, a Poem," in the couplet measure, which displays very vivid powers of description. His next work was a new and enlarged edition of "The Mirror for Magistrates," dated 1610, and to which, as a third and last part, he has added, with a distinct title, "A Winter Night's Vision. Being an Addition of such Princes, especially famous, who were exempted in the former Historie. By Richard Niccols, Oxon. Magd. Hall, &c." This supplement consists of an Epistle to the Reader, a Sonnet to Lord Charles Howard, an Induction, and the Lives of King Arthur; Edmund Ironside; Prince Alfred; Godwin, Earl of Kent; Robert Curthose; King Richard the First; King John; King Edward the Second; the two young Princes murdered in the Tower, and King Richard the Third; a selection, to which, with little accordancy, he has subjoined, in the octave stanza, a poem entitled "England's Eliza: or the victorious and triumphant reigne of that virgin empresse of sacred memorie, Elizabeth Queene of Englande, &c." This is preceded by a Sonnet to Lady Elizabeth Clere, an Epistle to the Reader, and an Induction.

Niccols' addition to this popular series of Legends merits considerable praise, exhibiting many touches of the pathetic, and several highly-wrought proofs of a strong and picturesque imagination. In the Legend of Richard the Third, he appears to have studied with great effect the Drama of Shakspeare.

In 1615, our author published "Monodia: or, Waltham's Complaint upon the Death of the most virtuous and noble Lady, late deceased, the Lady Honor Hay;" and in the subsequent year, an elaborate poem, under the title of "London's Artillery, briefly containing the noble practise of that worthie Societie; with the moderne and ancient martiall exercises, natures of armes, vertue of Magistrates, Antiquitie, Glorie and Chronography of this honourable Cittie." 4to.[638:A] This work, dedicated to "the Right Honourable Sir John Jolles, Knight, Lord Maior," &c. is introduced by two Sonnets, a Preface to the Reader, and a metrical Induction; it consists of ten cantos, in couplets, with copious illustrative notes; but, in point of poetical execution, is greatly inferior to his Cuckow, and Winter Night's Vision. Niccols, after residing several years at Oxford, left that University for the capital, where, records Wood, he "obtained an employment suitable to his faculty."[639:A]

27. RALEIGH, SIR WALTER. Of this great, this high-minded, but unfortunate man, it will not be expected that, in his military, naval, or political character, any detail should here be given; it is only with Sir Walter, as a poet, that we are at present engaged, and therefore, after stating that he was born in 1552, at Hayes Farm, in the parish of Budley in Devonshire, and that, to the eternal disgrace of James the First, he perished on a scaffold in 1618, we proceed to record the singular circumstance, that, until the year 1813, no lover of our literature has thought it necessary to collect his poetry. The task, however, has at length been performed, in a most elegant and pleasing manner, by Sir Egerton Brydges[639:B], and we have only to regret that the pieces which he has been able to throw together, should prove so few. Yet we may be allowed to express some surprise, that two poems quoted as Sir Walter's in Sir Egerton's edition of Phillips's "Theatrum Poetarum," should not have found a place in this collection. Of these, the first is attributed to Raleigh, on the authority of MSS. in the British Museum, and is entitled, "Sir Walter Raleigh in the Unquiet Rest of his last Sickness," a production equally admirable for its sublimity and Christian morality, and for the strength and concinnity of its expression[639:C]; the second, of which the closing couplet is quoted by Puttenham[639:D] as our author's, is given entire by Oldys from a transcript by Lady Isabella Thynne, where it is designated as "The Excuse written by Sir Walter Raleigh in his younger years[639:E]," and though vitiated by conceit, appears to be well authenticated. These, together with two fragments preserved by Puttenham[640:A], would have proved welcome additions to the volume, and, with the exception of his "Cynthia," a poem in praise of the Queen, and now lost, might probably have included all that has been attributed to the muse of Raleigh.

The poetry of our bard seems to have been highly valued in his own days; Puttenham says, that "for dittie and amorous ode, I finde Sir Walter Rawleygh's vayne most loftie, insolent, and passionate[640:B];" and Bolton affirms, that "the English poems of Sir Walter Raleigh are not easily to be mended[640:C];" opinions which, even in the nineteenth century, a perusal of his poems will tend to confirm. Of vigour of diction, and moral energy of thought, the pieces entitled, "_A Description of the Country's Recreations_;" a "_Vision upon the Fairy Queen_;" the "_Farewell_," and the _Lines_ written in "_his last Sickness_," may be quoted as exemplars: and for amatory sweetness, and pastoral simplicity, few efforts will be found to surpass the poems distinguished as "_Phillida's Love-call_;" "_The Shepherd's Description of Love_;" the "_Answer to Marlow_," and "_The Silent Lover_."

The general estimate of Raleigh as a poet, has been sketched by Sir E. Brydges with his usual felicity of illustration, and as the impression with which he has favoured the public is very limited, and must necessarily soon become extremely scarce, a transcript from this portion of his introductory matter, will have its due value with the reader.

"Do I pronounce RALEIGH a poet? Not, perhaps, in the judgment of a severe criticism. RALEIGH, in his better days, was too much occupied in action to have cultivated all the powers of a poet, which require solitude and perpetual meditation, and a refinement of sensibility, such as intercourse with business and the world deadens!

"But, perhaps, it will be pleaded, that his long years of imprisonment gave him leisure for meditation, more than enough! It has been beautifully said by Lovelace, that

"Stone walls do not a prison make,
Nor iron bars a cage,"

so long as the mind is free. But broken spirits, and indescribable injuries and misfortunes, do not agree with the fervour required by the Muse. Hope, that 'sings of promised pleasure,' could never visit him in his dreary bondage; and Ambition, whose lights had hitherto led him through difficulties and dangers and sufferings, must now have kept entirely aloof from one, whose fetters disabled him to follow as a votary in her train. Images of rural beauty, quiet, and freedom might, perhaps, have added, by the contrast, to the poignancy of his present painful situation; and he might rather prefer the severity of mental labour in unravelling the dreary and comfortless records of perplexing History in remote ages of war and bloodshed, than to quicken his sensibilities by lingering amid the murmurs of Elysian waterfalls!

"There are times when we dare not stir our feelings or our fancies; when the only mode of reconciling ourselves to the excruciating pressure of our sorrows is the encouragement of a dull apathy, which will allow none but the coarser powers of the intellect to operate.

"The production of an _Heroic Poem_ would have nobly employed this illustrious Hero's mighty faculties, during the lamentable years of his unjust incarceration. But how could _He_ delight to dwell on the tale of Heroes, to whom the result of Heroism had been oppression, imprisonment, ruin, and condemnation to death?

"We have no proof that RALEIGH possessed the copious, vivid, and creative powers of Spenser; nor is it probable that any cultivation would have brought forth from him fruit equally rich. But even in the careless fragments now presented to the reader, I think we can perceive some traits of attraction and excellence which, perhaps, even Spenser wanted. If less diversified than that gifted bard, he would, I think, have sometimes been more forcible and sublime. His images would have been more gigantic, and his reflections more daring. With all his mental attention keenly bent on the busy state of existing things in political society, the range of his thoughts had been lowered down to practical wisdom; but other habits of intellectual exercise, excursions into the ethereal fields of fiction, and converse with the spirits which inhabit those upper regions, would have given a grasp and a colour to his conceptions as magnificent as the fortitude of his soul!"[642:A]

28. SACKVILLE, THOMAS, Lord Buckhurst, was born at Withyam, in Sussex, in 1527.[642:B] Though a statesman of some celebrity in the reign of Elizabeth, his fame with posterity rests entirely on his merits as a poet, and these are of the highest order. He possesses the singular felicity of being the first writer of a genuine English tragedy, and the primary inventor of "The Mirrour for Magistrates;" two obligations conferred upon poetry of incalculable extent.

Of Gorboduc, which was acted in 1561, and surreptitiously printed in 1563, we shall elsewhere have occasion to speak, confining our notice, in this place, to his celebrated _Induction_ and _Legend of Henry Duke of Buckingham_, which were first published in the _Second Part_ and _Second Edition of Baldwin's Mirrour for Magistrates_, printed in 1563. To this collection we are, indeed, most highly indebted, if the observation of Lord Orford be correct:—"Our historic plays," he remarks, "are allowed to have been founded on the heroic narratives in the Mirrour for Magistrates; to that plan, and to the boldness of lord Buckhurst's new scenes, perhaps we owe SHAKSPEARE!"[642:C]

Our gratitude to this nobleman will be still further enhanced, when we recollect, that he was more assuredly a model for _Spenser_, the allegorical pictures in his _Induction_ being, in the opinion of Warton, "so beautifully drawn, that, in all probability, they contributed to direct, at least to stimulate, Spenser's imagination." In fact, whoever reads this noble poem of Lord Buckhurst with attention must feel convinced, that it awoke into being the allegorical groupes of Spenser; and that, in force of imagination, in pathos, and in awful and picturesque delineation, it is not inferior to any canto of the Fairie Queen. Indeed from the nature of its plan, the scene being laid in hell, and _Sorrow_ being the conductor of the hapless complainants, it often assumes a deeper tone and exhibits a more sombre hue than the muse of Spenser, and more in consonance with the severer intonations of the harp of Dante. How greatly is it to be lamented that the effusions of this divine bard are limited to the pieces which we have enumerated, and that so early in life he deserted the fountains of inspiration, to embark on a troubled sea of politics. Lord Buckhurst died, full of honours, at the Council-Table at Whitehall, on April 19th, 1608, aged eighty-one.

Sir Egerton Brydges, speaking of his magnificent seat at Knowle in West-Kent, tells us, that, "though restored with all the freshness of modern art, it retains the character and form of its Elizabethan splendour. The visitor may behold the same walls, and walk in the same apartments, which witnessed the inspiration of him, who composed _The Induction_, and _the Legend of the Duke of Buckingham_! He may sit under the same oaks, and behold, arrayed in all the beauty of art, the same delightful scenery, which cherished the day-dreams of the glowing poet! Perchance he may behold the same shadowy beings glancing through the shades, and exhibiting themselves in all their picturesque attitudes to his entranced fancy!"[643:A]

29. SOUTHWELL, ROBERT. This amiable but unfortunate Roman Catholic Priest was born at St. Faith's in Norfolk, 1560; he was educated at the University of Douay, became a member of the Society of Jesus at Rome, when but sixteen, and finally prefect in the English college there. Being sent as a missionary to England, in 1584, he was betrayed and apprehended in 1592, and after being imprisoned three years, and racked ten times, he was executed, as an agent for Popery, at Tyburn, on the 21st of February 1595.

Whatever may have been his religious intemperance or enthusiasm, his works, as a poet and a moralist, place him in a most favourable light; and we are unwilling to credit, that he who was thus elevated, just, and persuasive in his writings, could be materially incorrect in his conduct. In 1595, appeared his "Saint Peters Complaint, with other poems:" 4to., which went through a second impression in the same year, and was followed by "Mœoniæ. Or certaine excellent poems and spiritual Hymns; omitted in the last impression of Peter's complaint; being needefull thereunto to be annexed, as being both divine and wittie," 1595-1596. 4to. These two articles contain his poetical works; his other publications, under the titles of "Marie Magdalen's Funerall Tears;" "The Triumphs over Death; or a consolatorie Epistle, for afflicted minds, in the effects of dying friends," and "Short Rules of Good Life," being tracts in prose, though interspersed with occasional pieces of poetry.

The productions of Southwell, notwithstanding the unpopularity of his religious creed, were formerly in great request; "it is remarkable," observes Mr. Ellis, "that the very few copies of his works which are now known to exist, are the remnant of at least seventeen different editions, of which eleven were printed between 1593 and 1600."[644:A] The most ample edition of his labours was printed in 1620 in 16mo., and exhibits five distinct title-pages to the several pieces which we have just enumerated.

Bolton in his "Hypercritica," written about 1616, does credit, to his taste, by remarking that "never must be forgotten St. Peter's Complaint, and those other serious poems, said to be father Southwells: the English whereof, as it is most proper, so the sharpness and light of wit is very rare in them."[645:A] From this period, however, oblivion seems to have hidden the genius of Southwell from observation, until Warton, by reproducing the criticism of Bolton, in the third volume of his History of English Poetry 1781, recalled attention to the neglected bard. Two years afterwards, Mr. Waldron, in his notes to Ben Jonson's Sad Shepherd, gave us three specimens of Southwell's poetry; Mr. Headley reprinted these in 1787[645:B]; Mr. Ellis extracted an additional piece from the "Mœoniæ" in 1801; in 1802 Ritson presented us with a list of his writings accompanied by the notes of Mr. Park[645:C]; and lastly, in 1808, Mr. Haslewood favoured us with an essay on his life and works.[645:D]

Both the poetry and the prose of Southwell possess the most decided merit; the former, which is almost entirely restricted to moral and religious subjects, flows in a vein of great harmony, perspicuity, and elegance, and breathes a fascination resulting from the subject and the pathetic mode of treating it, which fixes and deeply interests the reader.

Mr. Haslewood, on concluding his essay on Southwell, remarks, that "those who 'least love the religion,' still must admire and praise the author, and regret that neither his simple strains in prose, nor his 'polished metre,' have yet obtained a collected edition of his works for general readers." The promise of such an edition escaped from the pen of Mr. Headley; at least it was his intention to re-publish "the better part of Southwell's poetry;" but death, most unhappily, precluded the attempt.

30. SPENSER, EDMUND. This great poet, who was born in London in 1553, has acquired an ever-during reputation in pastoral and epic poetry, especially in the last. His "Shepheard's Calender: conteining twelve aeglogues, proportionable to the twelve monethes," was published in 1579; it is a work which has conferred upon him the title of the Father of the English pastoral, and has almost indissolubly associated his name with those of Theocritus and Virgil. Yet two great defects have contributed deeply to injure the popularity of his Calender; the adoption of a language much too old and obsolete for the age in which it was written, and the too copious introduction of satire on ecclesiastical affairs. The consequence of this latter defect, this incongruous mixture of church polemics, has been, that the aeglogues for May, July, and September, are any thing but pastorals. Simplicity of diction is of the very essence of perfection in pastoral poetry; but vulgar, rugged, and obscure terms, can only be productive of disgust; a result which was felt and complained of by the contemporaries of the poet, and which not all the ingenuity of his old commentator, E. K., can successfully palliate or defend. The pieces which have been least injured by this "ragged and rustical rudeness," as the scholiast aptly terms it, are the pastorals for January, June, October and December, which are indeed very beautiful, and the genuine offspring of the rural reed.

It is, however, to the _Fairie Queene_ that we must refer for a just delineation of this illustrious bard. It appears to have been commenced about the year 1579; the first three books were printed in 1590, and the fourth, fifth, and sixth, in 1596. Whether the remaining six books, which were to have completed the design, were finished or not, continues yet unascertained; Browne, the author of Britannias Pastorals[646:A], and Sir Aston Cokain[646:B], consider the poem to have been left nearly in its present unfinished state; while Sir James Ware asserts[646:C] that the latter books were lost by the carelessness of the poet's servant whom he had sent before him into England on the breaking out of the rebellion, and, what seems still more to the purpose, Sir John Stradling, a contemporary of Spenser, and a highly respectable character, positively declares that some of his manuscripts were burnt when his house in Ireland was fired by the rebels.[647:A] Now, as two cantos of a lost book, entitled _The Legend of Constancy_, were actually published in 1609 as a part of Spenser's manuscripts which had escaped the conflagration of his castle, it is highly probable that the declaration of Sir John Stradling is correct, and that the poet, if he did not absolutely finish the Fairie Queene, had made considerable progress in the work, and that his labours perished with his mansion.

The defects which have vitiated the _Shepheard's Calender_, are not apparent in the _Fairie Queene_; the charge of obsolete diction, which has been so generally urged against the latter poem, must have arisen from the just censure which, in this respect, was bestowed upon the former, and the transference may be considered as a striking proof of critical negligence, and of the long-continued influence of opinion, however erroneous. The language of the Fairie Queene is, in fact, the language of the era in which it was written, and even in the present day, with few and trifling exceptions, as intelligible as are the texts of Shakspeare and Milton.[647:B]

Had Spenser, in this admirable poem, preserved greater unity in the construction of his fable; had he, following the example of Ariosto, employed human instead of allegorical heroes, he would undoubtedly have been at once the noblest and most interesting of poets. But, as it is, the warmest admirer of his numerous excellencies must confess, that the Personifications which conduct the business of the poem, and are consequently exposed to the broad day-light of observation, are too unsubstantial in their form and texture, too divested of all human organisation, to become the subjects of attachment or anxiety. They flit before us, indeed, as mere abstract and metaphysical essences, as beings neither of this nor any other order of planetary existence. A witch, a fairy, or a magician, is a creation sufficiently blended with humanity, to be capable of exciting very powerful emotion; but the meteor-shades of Holiness or Chastity, personally conducting a long series of adventures, is a contrivance so very remote from all earthly, or even what we conceive of supernatural, agency, as to baffle and revolt the credulities of the reader, however ductile or acquiescent.

Yet, notwithstanding these great and obvious errors in the very foundation of the structure, the merits of Spenser in every other respect are of so decided and exalted a nature, as to place him, in spite of every deduction, in the same class with Homer, Dante, Shakspeare, and Milton. His versification is, in general, uncommonly sweet and melodious; his powers of description such, with respect to beauty, fidelity, and minute finishing, as have not since been equalled; while in strength, brilliancy, and fertility of imagination, it will be no hyperbole to assert, that he takes precedence of almost every poet ancient or modern.

One peculiar and endearing characteristic of the Fairie Queene, is the exquisite tenderness which pervades the whole poem. It is impossible indeed to read it without being in love with the author, without being persuaded that the utmost sweetness of disposition, and the purest sincerity and goodness of heart distinguished him who thus delighted to unfold the kindest feelings of our nature, and whose language, by its singular simplicity and energy, seems to breathe the very stamp and force of truth. How grateful is it to record, that the personal conduct of the bard corresponded with the impression resulting from his works; that gentleness, humility, and piety, were the leading features of his life, as they still are the most delightful characteristics of his poetry.[649:A]

Yet amiable and engaging as is the general cast of Spenser's genius, he has nevertheless exhibited the most marked excellence as a delineator of those passions and emotions which approach to, or constitute, the sublime. No where do we find the agitations of fear, astonishment, terror, and despair, drawn with such bold and masterly relief; they start in living energy from his pen, and bear awful witness to the grandeur and elevation of his powers.

It is almost superfluous to add, after what has been already observed, that the morality of the Fairie Queene is throughout pure and impressive. It is a poem which, more than any other, inculcates those mild and passive virtues, that patience, resignation, and forbearance, which owe their influence to Christian principles. While vice and intemperance are developed in all their hideous deformity, those self-denying efforts, those benevolent and social sympathies, which soften and endear existence, are painted in the most bewitching colours: it is, in short, a work from the study of which no human being can rise without feeling fresh incitement to cherish and extend the charities of life.

Spenser died comparatively, though not actually, indigent, on the 16th of January, 1598.

31. STIRLING, WILLIAM ALEXANDER, EARL OF. This accomplished nobleman was born at Menstrie, in the county of Clackmannan, Scotland, 1580, a descendant of the family of Macdonald. He was a favourite both of James the First, and of his son Charles, and by the latter was created Viscount Canada, and subsequently Earl of Stirling. From an early period he gave promise of more than common genius, and his attachment to poetry was fostered, as in Drummond, by the sorrows of unrequited love. To the stimulus of this powerful passion we are indebted for his "Aurora: containing the first Fancies of the Author's Youth," 4to., which was published, together with some other pieces, in 1604. This elegant production, the solace of a rural retreat, on his return from a tour on the continent, consists of one hundred and six sonnets, ten songs or odes, some madrigals, elegies, &c., and places the talents of the writer in a very favourable point of view: for the versification is often peculiarly harmonious, and many beauties, both in imagery and sentiment, are interspersed through the collection, which, though a juvenile production, must be pronounced the most poetical of his works. The diction approximates, indeed, so nearly to that of the present century, that a specimen may be considered as a curiosity, and will confirm the assertion of Lord Orford, that he "was _greatly superior to the style of his age_."[650:A] With the exception of a little quaintness in the second line, the subsequent sonnet will equal the expectation of the reader:—

SONNET X.

"I SWEARE, Aurora, by thy starrie eyes,
And by those golden lockes whose locke none slips,
And by the corall of thy rosie lippes,
And by the naked snowes which beautie dies;
I sweare by all the jewels of thy mind,
Whose like yet never worldly treasure bought,
Thy solide judgement and thy generous thought,
Which in this darkened age have clearly shin'd:
I sweare by those, and by my spotless love,
And by my secret, yet most fervent fires,
That I have never nurc'd but chast desires,
And such as modestie might well approve.
Then since I love those vertuous parts in thee,
Shouldst thou not love this vertuous mind in me?"[650:B]

The remaining poems of Stirling consist of four tragedies in alternate rhyme, termed by their author "monarchicke;" namely, Darius, published in 1603; Crœsus, in 1604; and the Alexandrean Tragedy, and Julius Cæsar, in 1607. These pieces are not calculated for the stage; but include some admirable lessons for sovereign power, and several choruses written with no small share of poetic vigour. With the Aurora in 1604, appeared his poem entitled, "A Parænesis to the Prince," a production of great value both in a moral and literary light, and which must have been highly acceptable to a character so truly noble as was that of Henry, to whose memory he paid a pleasing tribute, by printing an "Elegie on his Death," in 1612.

The most elaborate of this nobleman's works was given to the public at Edinburgh, in 1614, in 4to., and entitled, "Domes-day; or the great Day of the Lord's Judgment." It is divided into twelve _Houres_ or _Cantos_, and has an encomium prefixed by Drummond. Piety and sound morality, expressed often in energetic diction, form the chief merit of this long poem, for it has little pretension to either sublimity or pathos. It had excited, however, the attention of Addison; for when the first two books of Domes-day were re-printed by A. Johnstoun in 1720, their editor tells us, "that Addison had read the author's whole works with the greatest satisfaction; and had remarked, that 'the beauties of our ancient English poets were too slightly passed over by modern writers, who, out of a peculiar singularity, had rather take pains to find fault than endeavour to excel.'"[651:A]

Lord Stirling republished the whole of his poetical works, with the exception of the "Aurora," in 1637, in a folio volume, including a new but unfinished poem, under the title of _Jonathan_. This impression had undergone a most assiduous revision, and was the last labour of its author, who died on the 12th of February, 1640, in his sixtieth year.