Chapter XIV: Introduction: To the Poem on the Soul of Man (6)

Shapcot, to thee the fairy state I with discretion dedicate; Because thou prizest things that are Curious and unfamiliar. Take first the feast; these dishes gone, We'll see the fairy court anon.

A little mushroom table spread; After short prayers, they set on bread, A moon-parch'd grain of purest wheat, With some small glittering grit, to eat His choicest bits with; then in a trice They make a feast less great than nice. But, all this while his eye is served, We must not think his ear was starved; But there was in place, to stir His spleen, the chirring grasshopper, The merry cricket, puling fly, The piping gnat, for minstrelsy. And now we must imagine first The elves present, to quench his thirst, A pure seed-pearl of infant dew, Brought and besweeten'd in a blue And pregnant violet; which done, His kitling eyes begin to run Quite through the table, where he spies The horns of pap'ry butterflies, Of which he eats; and tastes a little Of what we call the cuckoo's spittle: A little furze-ball pudding stands By, yet not blessed by his hands-- That was too coarse; but then forthwith He ventures boldly on the pith Of sugar'd rush, and eats the sag And well-bestrutted bee's sweet bag; Gladding his palate with some store Of emmets' eggs: what would he more But beards of mice, a newt's stew'd thigh, A bloated earwig, and a fly: With the red-capp'd worm, that is shut Within the concave of a nut, Brown as his tooth; a little moth, Late fatten'd in a piece of cloth; With wither'd cherries; mandrakes' ears; Moles' eyes; to these, the slain stag's tears; The unctuous dewlaps of a snail; The broke heart of a nightingale O'ercome in music; with a wine Ne'er ravish'd from the flatt'ring rine, But gently press'd from the soft side Of the most sweet and dainty bride, Brought in a dainty daisy, which He fully quaffs up to bewitch His blood to height? This done, commended Grace by his priest, the feast is ended.

THE MAD MAID'S SONG.

1 Good-morrow to the day so fair;
Good-morning, sir, to you;
Good-morrow to mine own torn hair,
Bedabbled with the dew:

2 Good-morning to this primrose too;
Good-morrow to each maid,
That will with flowers the tomb bestrew
Wherein my love is laid.

3 Ah, woe is me; woe, woe is me!
Alack, and well-a-day!
For pity, sir, find out this bee
Which bore my love away.

4 I'll seek him in your bonnet brave,
I'll seek him in your eyes;
Nay, now I think they've made his grave
I' th' bed of strawberries:

5 I'll seek him there; I know ere this
The cold, cold earth doth shake him;
But I will go, or send a kiss
By you, sir, to awake him.

6 Pray hurt him not; though he be dead,
He knows well who do love him,
And who with green turfs rear his head,
And who do rudely move him.

7 He's soft and tender, pray take heed,
With bands of cowslips bind him,
And bring him home;--but 'tis decreed
That I shall never find him!

CORINNA'S GOING A-MAYING.

1 Get up, get up for shame; the blooming morn
Upon her wings presents the god unshorn:
See how Aurora throws her fair
Fresh-quilted colours through the air:
Get up, sweet slug-a-bed, and see
The dew bespangling herb and tree:
Each flower has wept, and bow'd toward the east,
Above an hour since; yet you are not drest;
Nay, not so much as out of bed;
When all the birds have matins said,
And sung their thankful hymns; 'tis sin,
Nay, profanation, to keep in;
When as a thousand virgins on this day,
Spring sooner than the lark, to fetch in May!

2 Rise and put on your foliage, and be seen
To come forth like the spring-time, fresh and green,
And sweet as Flora. Take no care
For jewels for your gown, or hair:
Fear not, the leaves will strew
Gems in abundance upon you:
Besides, the childhood of the day has kept,
Against you come, some orient pearls unwept:
Come and receive them, while the light
Hangs on the dew-locks of the night,
And Titan on the eastern hill
Retires himself, or else stands still
Till you come forth. Wash, dress, be brief in praying;
Few beads are best, when once we go a-Maying!

3 Come, my Corinna, come; and, coming, mark
How each field turns a street, each street a park
Made green, and trimm'd with trees; see how
Devotion gives each house a bough,
Or branch; each porch, each door, ere this
An ark, a tabernacle is
Made up of whitethorn newly interwove,
As if here were those cooler shades of love.
Can such delights be in the street
And open fields, and we not see't?
Come, we'll abroad; and let's obey
The proclamation made for May,
And sin no more, as we have done, by staying;
But, my Corinna, come, let's go a-Maying!

4 There's not a budding boy or girl this day
But is got up, and gone to bring in May:
A deal of youth, ere this, is come
Back, and with whitethorn laden home:
Some have despatch'd their cakes and cream,
Before that we have left to dream;
And some have wept, and woo'd, and plighted troth,
And chose their priest, ere we can cast off sloth:
Many a green gown has been given;
Many a kiss, both odd and even;
Many a glance too has been sent
From out the eye, love's firmament;
Many a jest told of the key's betraying
This night, and locks pick'd; yet we're not a-Maying!

5 Come, let us go, while we are in our prime,
And take the harmless folly of the time:
We shall grow old apace, and die
Before we know our liberty:
Our life is short, and our days run
As fast away as does the sun:
And, as a vapour, or a drop of rain,
Once lost, can ne'er be found again,
So when or you, or I, are made
A fable, song, or fleeting shade,
All love, all liking, all delight
Lies drown'd with us in endless night.
Then, while time serves, and we are but decaying,
Come, my Corinna, come, let's go a-Maying!

JEPHTHAH'S DAUGHTER.

1 O thou, the wonder of all days!
O paragon and pearl of praise!
O Virgin Martyr! ever bless'd
Above the rest
Of all the maiden train! we come,
And bring fresh strewings to thy tomb.

2 Thus, thus, and thus we compass round
Thy harmless and enchanted ground;
And, as we sing thy dirge, we will
The daffodil
And other flowers lay upon
The altar of our love, thy stone.

3 Thou wonder of all maids! list here,
Of daughters all the dearest dear;
The eye of virgins, nay, the queen
Of this smooth green,
And all sweet meads, from whence we get
The primrose and the violet.

4 Too soon, too dear did Jephthah buy,
By thy sad loss, our liberty:
His was the bond and cov'nant; yet
Thou paid'st the debt,
Lamented maid! He won the day,
But for the conquest thou didst pay.

5 Thy father brought with him along
The olive branch and victor's song:
He slew the Ammonites, we know,
But to thy woe;
And, in the purchase of our peace,
The cure was worse than the disease.

6 For which obedient zeal of thine,
We offer thee, before thy shrine,
Our sighs for storax, tears for wine;
And to make fine
And fresh thy hearse-cloth, we will here
Four times bestrew thee every year.

7 Receive, for this thy praise, our tears;
Receive this offering of our hairs;
Receive these crystal vials, fill'd
With tears distill'd
From teeming eyes; to these we bring,
Each maid, her silver filleting,

8 To gild thy tomb; besides, these cauls,
These laces, ribands, and these fauls,
These veils, wherewith we used to hide
The bashful bride,
When we conduct her to her groom:
All, all, we lay upon thy tomb.

9 No more, no more, since thou art dead,
Shall we e'er bring coy brides to bed;
No more at yearly festivals
We cowslip balls
Or chains of columbines shall make
For this or that occasion's sake.

10 No, no; our maiden pleasures be
Wrapt in a winding-sheet with thee;
'Tis we are dead, though not i' th' grave,
Or if we have
One seed of life left,'tis to keep
A Lent for thee, to fast and weep.

11 Sleep in thy peace, thy bed of spice,
And make this place all paradise:
May sweets grow here! and smoke from hence
Fat frankincense.
Let balm and cassia send their scent
From out thy maiden-monument.

12 May no wolf howl or screech-owl stir
A wing upon thy sepulchre!
No boisterous winds or storms
To starve or wither
Thy soft, sweet earth! but, like a spring,
Love keep it ever flourishing.

13 May all thy maids, at wonted hours,
Come forth to strew thy tomb with flowers:
May virgins, when they come to mourn,
Male-incense burn
Upon thine altar! then return
And leave thee sleeping in thy urn.

THE COUNTRY LIFE.

Sweet country life, to such unknown Whose lives are others', not their own! But serving courts and cities, be Less happy, less enjoying thee! Thou never plough'st the ocean's foam To seek and bring rough pepper home; Nor to the Eastern Ind dost rove, To bring from thence the scorched clove: Nor, with the loss of thy loved rest, Bring'st home the ingot from the West. No: thy ambition's masterpiece Flies no thought higher than a fleece; Or how to pay thy hinds, and clear All scores, and so to end the year; But walk'st about thy own dear bounds, Not envying others' larger grounds: For well thou know'st, 'tis not the extent Of land makes life, but sweet content. When now the cock, the ploughman's horn, Calls forth the lily-wristed morn, Then to thy corn-fields thou dost go, Which though well-soil'd, yet thou dost know That the best compost for the lands Is the wise master's feet and hands. There at the plough thou find'st thy team, With a hind whistling there to them; And cheer'st them up by singing how The kingdom's portion is the plough. This done, then to th' enamell'd meads, Thou go'st; and as thy foot there treads, Thou seest a present godlike power Imprinted in each herb and flower; And smell'st the breath of great-eyed kine, Sweet as the blossoms of the vine. Here thou behold'st thy large sleek neat Unto the dewlaps up in meat; And, as thou look'st, the wanton steer, The heifer, cow, and ox, draw near, To make a pleasing pastime there. These seen, thou go'st to view thy flocks Of sheep, safe from the wolf and fox; And find'st their bellies there as full Of short sweet grass, as backs with wool; And leav'st them as they feed and fill; A shepherd piping on a hill. For sports, for pageantry, and plays, Thou hast thy eves and holidays; On which the young men and maids meet, To exercise their dancing feet; Tripping the comely country round, With daffodils and daisies crown'd. Thy wakes, thy quintels, here thou hast; Thy May-poles too, with garlands graced; Thy morris-dance, thy Whitsun-ale, Thy shearing feast, which never fail; Thy harvest-home, thy wassail-bowl, That's toss'd up after fox i' the hole; Thy mummeries, thy Twelfth-night kings And queens, thy Christmas revellings; Thy nut-brown mirth, thy russet wit; And no man pays too dear for it. To these thou hast thy times to go, And trace the hare in the treacherous snow; Thy witty wiles to draw, and get The lark into the trammel net; Thou hast thy cockrood, and thy glade To take the precious pheasant made; Thy lime-twigs, snares, and pitfalls, then, To catch the pilfering birds, not men.

O happy life, if that their good The husbandmen but understood! Who all the day themselves do please, And younglings, with such sports as these; And, lying down, have nought to affright Sweet sleep, that makes more short the night.

SIR RICHARD FANSHAWE.

This gallant knight was son to Sir Henry Fanshawe, who was Remembrancer to the Irish Exchequer, and brother to Thomas Lord Fanshawe. He was born at Ware, in Hertfordshire, in 1607-8. He became a vehement Royalist, and acted for some time as Secretary to Prince Rupert, and was, in truth, a kindred spirit, worthy of recording the orders of that fiery spirit--the Murat of the Royal cause--to whom the dust of the _melee_ of battle was the very breath of life. After the Restoration, Fanshawe was appointed ambassador to Spain and Portugal. He acted in this capacity at Madrid in 1666. He had issued translations of the 'Lusiad' of Camoens, and the 'Pastor Fido' of Guarini. Along with the latter, which appeared in 1648, he published some original poems of considerable merit. He holds altogether a respectable, if not a very high place among our early translators and minor poets.

THE SPRING, A SONNET. FROM THE SPANISH.

Those whiter lilies which the early morn
Seems to have newly woven of sleaved silk,
To which, on banks of wealthy Tagus born,
Gold was their cradle, liquid pearl their milk.

These blushing roses, with whose virgin leaves
The wanton wind to sport himself presumes,
Whilst from their rifled wardrobe he receives
For his wings purple, for his breath perfumes.

Both those and these my Caelia's pretty foot Trod up; but if she should her face display, And fragrant breast, they'd dry again to the root, As with the blasting of the mid-day's ray; And this soft wind, which both perfumes and cools, Pass like the unregarded breath of fools.

ABRAHAM COWLEY.

The 'melancholy' and musical Cowley was born in London in the year 1618. He was the posthumous son of a worthy grocer, who lived in Fleet Street, near the end of Chancery Lane, and who is supposed, from the omission of his name in the register of St Dunstan's parish, to have been a Dissenter. His mother was left poor, but had a strong desire for her son's education, and influence to get him admitted as a king's scholar into Westminster. His mind was almost preternaturally precocious, and received early a strong and peculiar stimulus. A copy of Spenser lay in the window of his mother's apartment, and in it he delighted to read, and became the devoted slave of poetry ever after. When only ten he wrote 'The Tragical History of Pyramus and Thisbe,' and at twelve 'Constantia and Philetus.' Pope wrote a lampoon about the same age as Cowley these romantic narratives; and we have seen a pretty good copy of verses on Napoleon, written at the age of seven, by one of the most distinguished rising poets of our own day. When fifteen (Johnson calls it thirteen, but he and some other biographers were misled by the portrait of the poet being, by mistake, marked thirteen) Cowley published some of his early effusions, under the title of 'Poetical Blossoms.' While at school he produced a comedy of a pastoral kind, entitled, 'Love's Riddle,' but it was not published till he went to Cambridge. To that university he proceeded in 1636, and two years after, there appeared the above-mentioned comedy, with a poetical dedication to Sir Kenelm Digby, one of the marvellous men of that age; and also 'Naufragium Joculare,' a comedy in Latin, inscribed to Dr Comber, master of the college. When the Prince of Wales afterwards visited Cambridge, the fertile Cowley got up the rough draft of another comedy, called 'The Guardian,' which was repeated to His Royal Highness by the scholars. This was afterwards, to the poet's great annoyance, printed during his absence from the country. In 1643 he took his degree of A.M., and was, the same year, through the prevailing influence of the Parliament, ejected, with many others, from Cambridge. He took refuge in St John's College, Oxford, where he published a satire, entitled 'The Puritan and Papist,' and where, by his loyalty and genius, he gained the favour of such distinguished courtiers as Lord Falkland. During this agitated period he resided a good deal in the family of the Lord St Albans; and when Oxford fell into the hands of the Parliament he followed the Queen to Paris, and there acted as Secretary to the same noble lord. He remained abroad about ten years, and during that period made various journeys in the furtherance of the Royal cause, visiting Flanders, Holland, Jersey, Scotland, &c. His chief employment, however, was carrying on a correspondence in cipher between the King and the Queen. Sprat says, 'he ciphered and deciphered with his own hand the greatest part of the letters that passed between their Majesties, and managed a vast intelligence in other parts, which, for some years together, took up all his days and two or three nights every week.' This does not seem employment very suitable to a man of genius. He seems, however, to have found time for more congenial avocations; and, in 1647, he published his 'Mistress,' a work which seems to glow with amorous fire, although Barnes relates of the author that he was never in love but once, and then had not resolution to reveal his passion. And yet he wrote 'The Chronicle,' from which we might infer that his heart was completely tinder, and that his series of love attachments had been an infinite one!

In 1556, being of no more use in Paris, Cowley was sent back to England, that 'under pretence of privacy and retirement he might take occasion of giving notice of the posture of things in this nation.' For some time he lay concealed in London, but was at length seized by mistake for another gentleman of the Royal party; and being thus discovered, he was continued in confinement, was several times examined, and ultimately succeeded, although with some difficulty, in obtaining his liberation, Dr Scarborough becoming his bail for a thousand pounds. In the same year he published a collection of his poems, with a querulous preface, in which he expresses a strong desire to 'retire to some of the American plantations, and to forsake the world for ever.' Meanwhile he gave himself out as a physician till the death of Cromwell, when he returned to France, resumed his former occupation, and remained till the Restoration. In 1657 he was created Doctor of Medicine at Oxford. Having studied botany to qualify himself for his physician's degree, he was induced to publish in Latin some books on plants, flowers, and trees.

The Restoration brought him less advantage than he had anticipated. Probably he expected too much, and had expressed his sanguine hopes in a song of triumph on the occasion. He had been promised, both by Charles I. and Charles II., the Mastership of the Savoy, (a forgotten sinecure office;) but lost it, says Wood, 'by certain persons, enemies to the Muses.' He brought on the stage at this time his old comedy of 'The Guardian,' under the title of 'Cutter of Coleman Street;' but it was thought a satire on the debauchery of the King's party, and was received with coldness. Cowley, according to Dryden, 'received the news of his ill success not with so much firmness as might have been expected from so great a man.' There are few who, like Dr Johnson, have been able to declare, after the rejection of a play or poem, that they felt 'like the Monument.' Cowley not only entertained, but printed his dissatisfaction, in the form of a poem called 'The Complaint,' which, like all selfish complaints, attracted little sympathy or attention. In this he calls himself the 'melancholy Cowley,' an epithet which has stuck to his memory.

He had always, according to his own statement, loved retirement. When he was a young boy at school, instead of running about on holidays, and playing with his fellows, he was wont to steal from them, and walk into the fields alone with a book. This passion had been overlaid, but not extinguished, during his public life; and now, swelled by disgust, it came back upon him in great strength. He seems, too, if we can believe Sprat, to have had an extraordinary attachment to Nature, as it 'was God's;' to the whole 'compass of the creation, and all the wonderful effects of the Divine wisdom.' At all events, he retired first to Barn Elms, and then to Chertsey in Surrey. He had obtained, through Lord St Albans and the Duke of Buckingham, the lease of some lands belonging to the Queen, which brought him in an income of L300 a year. Here, then, having, at the age of forty-two, reached the peaceful hermitage,' he set himself with all his might to enjoy it. He cultivated his fields, and renewed his botanical studies in his woods and garden. He wrote letters to his friends, which are said to have been admirable, and might have ranked with those of Gray and Cowper, but unfortunately they have not been preserved. He renewed his intimacy with the Greek and Latin poets, and he set himself to retouch the 'Davideis,' which he had begun in early youth, but which he never lived to finish, and to compose his beautiful prose essays. But he soon found that Chertsey, no more than Paris, was Paradise. He had no wife nor children. He had sweet solitude, but no one near him to whom to whisper 'how sweet this solitude is!' The peasants were boors. His tenants would pay him no rent, and the cattle of his neighbours devoured his meadows. He was troubled with rheums and colds. He met a severe fall when he first came to Chertsey, of which he says, half in jest and half in earnest--'What this signifies, or may come to in time, God knows; if it be ominous, it can end in nothing less than hanging.' Robert Hall said of Bishop Watson that he seemed to have wedded political integrity in early life, and to have spent all the rest of his days in quarrelling with his wife. So Cowley wedded his long- sought-for bride, Solitude, and led a miserable life with her ever after. Fortunately for him, if not for the world, his career soon came to a close.

One hot day in summer, he stayed too long among his labourers in the meadows, and was seized with a cold, which, being neglected, carried him off on the 28th of July 1667. He was not forty-nine years old. He died at the Porch House, Chertsey, and his remains were buried with great pomp near Chaucer and Spenser; and King Charles, who had neglected him during life, pronounced his panegyric after death, declaring that 'Mr Cowley had not left behind him a better man in England.' It was in keeping with the character of Charles to make up for his deficiency in action, by his felicity of phrase.

If we may differ from such a high authority as 'Old Rowley,' we would venture to doubt whether Cowley was the best--certainly he was not the greatest--man then in England. Milton was alive, and the 'Paradise Lost' appeared in the very year when the author of the 'Davideis' departed. Cowley gives us the impression of having been an amiable and blameless, rather than a good or great man. At all events, there was nothing _active_ in his goodness, and his greatness could not be called magnanimity. He was a scholar and a poet misplaced during early life; and when he gained that retirement for which he sighed, he had, by his habits of life, lost his capacity of relishing it. 'He that would enjoy solitude,' it has been said, 'must either be a wild beast or a god;' and Cowley was neither. How different his grounds of dissatisfaction with the world from those of Milton! Cowley was wearied of ciphering, and his 'Cutter of Coleman Street' had been cut; that was nearly the whole matter of his complaint; while Milton had fallen from being the second man in England into poverty, blindness, contempt, danger, and the disappointment of the most glorious hopes which ever heaved the bosom of patriot or saint.

We find the want of greatness which marked the man characterising the poet. Infinite ingenuity, a charming flexibility and abundance of fancy, a perception of remote analogies almost unrivalled, great command of versification and language, learning without bounds, and an occasional gracefulness and sparkling ease (as in 'The Chronicle') superior to even Herrick or Suckling, are qualities that must be conceded to Cowley. But the most of his writings are cold and glittering as the sun-smitten glacier. He is seldom warm, except when he is proclaiming his own merits, or bewailing his own misfortunes. Hence his 'Wish,' and even his 'Complaint,' are very pleasing and natural specimens of poetry. But his 'Pindaric Odes,' his 'Hymn to Light,' and most of his 'Davideis,' while displaying great power, shew at least equal perversion, and are more memorable for their faults than for their beauties. In the 'Davideis,' he describes the attire of Gabriel in the spirit and language of a tailor; and there is no path so sacred or so lofty but he must sow it with conceits,--forced, false, and chilly. His 'Anacreontics,' on the other hand, are in general felicitous in style and aerial in motion. And in his Translations, although too free, he is uniformly graceful and spirited; and his vast command of language and imagery enables him often to improve his author--to gild the refined gold, to paint the lily, and to throw a new perfume on the violet, of the Grecian and Roman masters.

In prose, Cowley is uniformly excellent. The prefaces to his poems, especially his defence of sacred song in the prefix to the 'Davideis,' his short autobiography, the fragments of his letters which remain, and his posthumous essays, are all distinguished by a rich simplicity of style and by a copiousness of matter which excite in equal measure delight and surprise. He had written, it appears, three books on the Civil War, to the time of the battle of Newbury, which he destroyed. It is a pity, perhaps, that he had not preserved and completed the work. His intimacy with many of the leading characters and the secret springs of that remarkable period,--his clear and solid judgment, always so except when he was following the Daedalus Pindar upon waxen Icarian wings, or competing with Dr Donne in the number of conceits which he could stuff, like cloves, into his subject-matter,--and the bewitching ease and elegance of his prose style, would have combined to render it an important contribution to English history, and a worthy monument of its author's highly-accomplished and diversified powers.

THE CHRONICLE, A BALLAD.

1 Margarita first possess'd,
If I remember well, my breast,
Margarita first of all;
But when a while the wanton maid
With my restless heart had play'd,
Martha took the flying ball.

2 Martha soon did it resign
To the beauteous Catharine:
Beauteous Catharine gave place
(Though loth and angry she to part
With the possession of my heart)
To Eliza's conquering face.

3 Eliza till this hour might reign,
Had she not evil counsels ta'en:
Fundamental laws she broke
And still new favourites she chose,
Till up in arms my passions rose,
And cast away her yoke.

4 Mary then, and gentle Anne,
Both to reign at once began;
Alternately they sway'd,
And sometimes Mary was the fair,
And sometimes Anne the crown did wear,
And sometimes both I obey'd.

5 Another Mary then arose,
And did rigorous laws impose;
A mighty tyrant she!
Long, alas! should I have been
Under that iron-sceptred queen,
Had not Rebecca set me free.

6 When fair Rebecca set me free,
'Twas then a golden time with me:
But soon those pleasures fled;
For the gracious princess died
In her youth and beauty's pride,
And Judith reign'd in her stead.

7 One month, three days, and half an hour,
Judith held the sovereign power:
Wondrous beautiful her face,
But so weak and small her wit,
That she to govern was unfit,
And so Susanna took her place.

8 But when Isabella came,
Arm'd with a resistless flame,
And the artillery of her eye,
Whilst she proudly march'd about,
Greater conquests to find out,
She beat out Susan by the bye.

9 But in her place I then obey'd
Black-eyed Bess, her viceroy made,
To whom ensued a vacancy.
Thousand worst passions then possess'd
The interregnum of my breast.
Bless me from such an anarchy!

10 Gentle Henrietta then,
And a third Mary, next began:
Then Joan, and Jane, and Audria;
And then a pretty Thomasine,
And then another Catharine,
And then a long _et caetera_.

11 But should I now to you relate
The strength and riches of their state,
The powder, patches, and the pins,
The ribands, jewels, and the rings,
The lace, the paint, and warlike things,
That make up all their magazines:

12 If I should tell the politic arts
To take and keep men's hearts,
The letters, embassies, and spies,
The frowns, the smiles, and flatteries,
The quarrels, tears, and perjuries,
Numberless, nameless mysteries!

13 And all the little lime-twigs laid
By Mach'avel the waiting-maid;
I more voluminous should grow
(Chiefly if I like them should tell
All change of weathers that befell)
Than Holinshed or Stow.

14 But I will briefer with them be,
Since few of them were long with me.
An higher and a nobler strain
My present Emperess does claim,
Heleonora! first o' the name,
Whom God grant long to reign.

THE COMPLAINT.

In a deep vision's intellectual scene, Beneath a bower for sorrow made, The uncomfortable shade Of the black yew's unlucky green, Mixed with the mourning willow's careful gray, Where rev'rend Cam cuts out his famous way, The melancholy Cowley lay; And, lo! a Muse appeared to his closed sight (The Muses oft in lands of vision play,) Bodied, arrayed, and seen by an internal light: A golden harp with silver strings she bore, A wondrous hieroglyphic robe she wore, In which all colours and all figures were That Nature or that Fancy can create. That Art can never imitate, And with loose pride it wantoned in the air, In such a dress, in such a well-clothed dream, She used of old near fair Ismenus' stream Pindar, her Theban favourite, to meet; A crown was on her head, and wings were on her feet.

She touched him with her harp and raised him from the ground; The shaken strings melodiously resound. 'Art thou returned at last,' said she, 'To this forsaken place and me? Thou prodigal! who didst so loosely waste Of all thy youthful years the good estate; Art thou returned here, to repent too late? And gather husks of learning up at last, Now the rich harvest-time of life is past, And winter marches on so fast? But when I meant to adopt thee for my son, And did as learned a portion assign As ever any of the mighty nine Had to their dearest children done; When I resolved to exalt thy anointed name Among the spiritual lords of peaceful fame; Thou changeling! thou, bewitch'd with noise and show, Wouldst into courts and cities from me go; Wouldst see the world abroad, and have a share In all the follies and the tumults there; Thou wouldst, forsooth, be something in a state, And business thou wouldst find, and wouldst create: Business! the frivolous pretence Of human lusts, to shake off innocence; Business! the grave impertinence; Business! the thing which I of all things hate; Business! the contradiction of thy fate.

'Go, renegado! cast up thy account, And see to what amount Thy foolish gains by quitting me: The sale of knowledge, fame, and liberty, The fruits of thy unlearned apostasy. Thou thoughtst, if once the public storm were past, All thy remaining life should sunshine be: Behold the public storm is spent at last, The sovereign is tossed at sea no more, And thou, with all the noble company, Art got at last to shore: But whilst thy fellow-voyagers I see, All marched up to possess the promised land, Thou still alone, alas! dost gaping stand, Upon the naked beach, upon the barren sand. As a fair morning of the blessed spring, After a tedious, stormy night, Such was the glorious entry of our king; Enriching moisture dropped on every thing: Plenty he sowed below, and cast about him light. But then, alas! to thee alone One of old Gideon's miracles was shown, For every tree, and every hand around, With pearly dew was crowned, And upon all the quickened ground The fruitful seed of heaven did brooding lie, And nothing but the Muse's fleece was dry. It did all other threats surpass, When God to his own people said, The men whom through long wanderings he had led, That he would give them even a heaven of brass: They looked up to that heaven in vain, That bounteous heaven! which God did not restrain Upon the most unjust to shine and rain.

'The Rachel, for which twice seven years and more, Thou didst with faith and labour serve, And didst (if faith and labour can) deserve, Though she contracted was to thee, Given to another, thou didst see, who had store Of fairer and of richer wives before, And not a Loah left, thy recompense to be. Go on, twice seven years more, thy fortune try, Twice seven years more God in his bounty may Give thee to fling away Into the court's deceitful lottery: But think how likely 'tis that thou, With the dull work of thy unwieldy plough, Shouldst in a hard and barren season thrive, Shouldst even able be to live; Thou! to whose share so little bread did fall In the miraculous year, when manna rain'd on all.'

Thus spake the Muse, and spake it with a smile, That seemed at once to pity and revile: And to her thus, raising his thoughtful head, The melancholy Cowley said: 'Ah, wanton foe! dost thou upbraid The ills which thou thyself hast made? When in the cradle innocent I lay, Thou, wicked spirit, stolest me away, And my abused soul didst bear Into thy new-found worlds, I know not where, Thy golden Indies in the air; And ever since I strive in vain My ravished freedom to regain; Still I rebel, still thou dost reign; Lo, still in verse, against thee I complain. There is a sort of stubborn weeds, Which, if the earth but once it ever breeds, No wholesome herb can near them thrive, No useful plant can keep alive: The foolish sports I did on thee bestow Make all my art and labour fruitless now; Where once such fairies dance, no grass doth ever grow.

'When my new mind had no infusion known, Thou gavest so deep a tincture of thine own, That ever since I vainly try To wash away the inherent dye: Long work, perhaps, may spoil thy colours quite, But never will reduce the native white. To all the ports of honour and of gain I often steer my course in vain; Thy gale comes cross, and drives me back again, Thou slacken'st all my nerves of industry, By making them so oft to be The tinkling strings of thy loose minstrelsy. Whoever this world's happiness would see Must as entirely cast off thee, As they who only heaven desire Do from the world retire. This was my error, this my gross mistake, Myself a demi-votary to make. Thus with Sapphira and her husband's fate, (A fault which I, like them, am taught too late,) For all that I give up I nothing gain, And perish for the part which I retain. Teach me not then, O thou fallacious Muse! The court and better king t' accuse; The heaven under which I live is fair, The fertile soil will a full harvest bear: Thine, thine is all the barrenness, if thou Makest me sit still and sing when I should plough. When I but think how many a tedious year Our patient sovereign did attend His long misfortune's fatal end; How cheerfully, and how exempt from fear, On the Great Sovereign's will he did depend, I ought to be accursed if I refuse To wait on his, O thou fallacious Muse! Kings have long hands, they say, and though I be So distant, they may reach at length to me. However, of all princes thou Shouldst not reproach rewards for being small or slow; Thou! who rewardest but with popular breath, And that, too, after death!'

THE DESPAIR.

1 Beneath this gloomy shade,
By Nature only for my sorrows made,
I'll spend this voice in cries,
In tears I'll waste these eyes,
By love so vainly fed;
So lust of old the deluge punished.
Ah, wretched youth, said I;
Ah, wretched youth! twice did I sadly cry;
Ah, wretched youth! the fields and floods reply.

2 When thoughts of love I entertain,
I meet no words but Never, and In vain:
Never! alas! that dreadful name
Which fuels the infernal flame:
Never! my time to come must waste;
In vain! torments the present and the past:
In vain, in vain! said I,
In vain, in vain! twice did I sadly cry;
In vain, in vain! the fields and floods reply.

3 No more shall fields or floods do so,
For I to shades more dark and silent go:
All this world's noise appears to me
A dull, ill-acted comedy:
No comfort to my wounded sight,
In the sun's busy and impert'nent light.
Then down I laid my head,
Down on cold earth, and for a while was dead,
And my freed soul to a strange somewhere fled.

4 Ah, sottish soul! said I,
When back to its cage again I saw it fly:
Fool! to resume her broken chain,
And row her galley here again!
Fool! to that body to return,
Where it condemned and destined is to burn!
Once dead, how can it be
Death should a thing so pleasant seem to thee,
That thou shouldst come to live it o'er again in me?

OF WIT.

1 Tell me, O tell! what kind of thing is Wit,
Thou who master art of it;
For the first matter loves variety less;
Less women love it, either in love or dress:
A thousand different shapes it bears,
Comely in thousand shapes appears:
Yonder we saw it plain, and here 'tis now,
Like spirits, in a place, we know not how.

2 London, that vends of false ware so much store,
In no ware deceives us more:
For men, led by the colour and the shape,
Like Zeuxis' birds, fly to the painted grape.
Some things do through our judgment pass,
As through a multiplying-glass;
And sometimes, if the object be too far,
We take a falling meteor for a star.

3 Hence 'tis a wit, that greatest word of fame,
Grows such a common name;
And wits by our creation they become,
Just so as tit'lar bishops made at Rome.
'Tis not a tale, 'tis not a jest,
Admired with laughter at a feast,
Nor florid talk, which can that title gain;
The proofs of wit for ever must remain.

4 'Tis not to force some lifeless verses meet
With their five gouty feet;
All everywhere, like man's, must be the soul,
And reason the inferior powers control.
Such were the numbers which could call
The stones into the Theban wall.
Such miracles are ceased; and now we see
No towns or houses raised by poetry.

5 Yet 'tis not to adorn and gild each part;
That shows more cost than art.
Jewels at nose and lips but ill appear;
Rather than all things wit, let none be there.
Several lights will not be seen,
If there be nothing else between.
Men doubt, because they stand so thick i' the sky,
If those be stars which paint the galaxy.

6 'Tis not when two like words make up one noise,
Jests for Dutch men and English boys;
In which who finds out wit, the same may see
In an'grams and acrostics poetry.
Much less can that have any place
At which a virgin hides her face;
Such dross the fire must purge away; 'tis just
The author blush there where the reader must.

7 'Tis not such lines as almost crack the stage,
When Bajazet begins to rage:
Nor a tall met'phor in the bombast way,
Nor the dry chips of short-lunged Seneca:
Nor upon all things to obtrude
And force some old similitude.
What is it then, which, like the Power Divine,
We only can by negatives define?

8 In a true piece of wit all things must be,
Yet all things there agree:
As in the ark, joined without force or strife,
All creatures dwelt, all creatures that had life.
Or as the primitive forms of all,
If we compare great things with small,
Which without discord or confusion lie,
In that strange mirror of the Deity.

OF SOLITUDE.

1 Hail, old patrician trees, so great and good!
Hail, ye plebeian underwood!
Where the poetic birds rejoice,
And for their quiet nests and plenteous food
Pay with their grateful voice.

2 Hail the poor Muse's richest manor-seat!
Ye country houses and retreat,
Which all the happy gods so love,
That for you oft they quit their bright and great
Metropolis above.

3 Here Nature does a house for me erect,
Nature! the fairest architect,
Who those fond artists does despise
That can the fair and living trees neglect,
Yet the dead timber prize.

4 Here let me, careless and unthoughtful lying,
Hear the soft winds above me flying,
With all their wanton boughs dispute,
And the more tuneful birds to both replying,
Nor be myself, too, mute.

5 A silver stream shall roll his waters near,
Gilt with the sunbeams here and there,
On whose enamelled bank I'll walk,
And see how prettily they smile,
And hear how prettily they talk.

6 Ah! wretched, and too solitary he,
Who loves not his own company!
He'll feel the weight of it many a day,
Unless he calls in sin or vanity
To help to bear it away.

7 O Solitude! first state of humankind!
Which bless'd remained till man did find
Even his own helper's company:
As soon as two, alas! together joined,
The serpent made up three.

8 Though God himself, through countless ages, thee
His sole companion chose to be,
Thee, sacred Solitude! alone,
Before the branchy head of number's tree
Sprang from the trunk of one;

9 Thou (though men think thine an unactive part)
Dost break and tame the unruly heart,
Which else would know no settled pace,
Making it move, well managed by thy art,
With swiftness and with grace.

10 Thou the faint beams of reason's scattered light
Dost, like a burning glass, unite,
Dost multiply the feeble heat,
And fortify the strength, till thou dost bright
And noble fires beget.

11 Whilst this hard truth I teach, methinks I see
The monster London laugh at me;
I should at thee, too, foolish city!
If it were fit to laugh at misery;
But thy estate I pity.

12 Let but thy wicked men from out thee go,
And all the fools that crowd thee so,
Even thou, who dost thy millions boast,
A village less than Islington wilt grow,
A solitude almost.

THE WISH.

I.

Lest the misjudging world should chance to say I durst not but in secret murmurs pray, To whisper in Jove's ear How much I wish that funeral, Or gape at such a great one's fall; This let all ages hear, And future times in my soul's picture see What I abhor, what I desire to be.

II.

I would not be a Puritan, though he Can preach two hours, and yet his sermon be But half a quarter long; Though from his old mechanic trade By vision he's a pastor made, His faith was grown so strong; Nay, though he think to gain salvation By calling the Pope the Whore of Babylon.

III.

I would not be a Schoolmaster, though to him His rods no less than Consuls' fasces seem; Though he in many a place, Turns Lily oftener than his gowns, Till at the last he makes the nouns Fight with the verbs apace; Nay, though he can, in a poetic heat, Figures, born since, out of poor Virgil beat.

IV.

I would not be a Justice of Peace, though he Can with equality divide the fee, And stakes with his clerk draw; Nay, though he sits upon the place Of judgment, with a learned face Intricate as the law; And whilst he mulcts enormities demurely, Breaks Priscian's head with sentences securely.

V.

I would not be a Courtier, though he Makes his whole life the truest comedy; Although he be a man In whom the tailor's forming art, And nimble barber, claim more part Than Nature herself can; Though, as he uses men, 'tis his intent To put off Death too with a compliment.

VI.

From Lawyers' tongues, though they can spin with ease The shortest cause into a paraphrase, From Usurers' conscience (For swallowing up young heirs so fast, Without all doubt they'll choke at last) Make me all innocence, Good Heaven! and from thy eyes, O Justice! keep; For though they be not blind, they're oft asleep.

VII.

From Singing-men's religion, who are Always at church, just like the crows, 'cause there They build themselves a nest; From too much poetry, which shines With gold in nothing but its lines, Free, O you Powers! my breast; And from astronomy, which in the skies Finds fish and bulls, yet doth but tantalise.

VIII.

From your Court-madam's beauty, which doth carry At morning May, at night a January; From the grave City-brow (For though it want an R, it has The letter of Pythagoras) Keep me, O Fortune! now, And chines of beef innumerable send me, Or from the stomach of the guard defend me.

IX.

This only grant me, that my means may lie Too low for envy, for contempt too high. Some honour I would have, Not from great deeds, but good alone: The unknown are better than ill known: Rumour can ope the grave. Acquaintance I would have, but when 't depends Not from the number, but the choice of friends.

X.

Books should, not business, entertain the light, And sleep, as undisturbed as death, the night. My house a cottage more Than palace, and should fitting be For all my use, not luxury; My garden, painted o'er With Nature's hand, not Art's, that pleasure yield Horace might envy in his Sabine field.

XI.

Thus would I double my life's fading space; For he that runs it well twice runs his race; And in this true delight, These unbought sports, and happy state, I would not fear, nor wish my fate, But boldly say each night, To-morrow let my sun his beams display, Or in clouds hide them, I have lived to-day.

UPON THE SHORTNESS OF MAN'S LIFE.

1 Mark that swift arrow, how it cuts the air,
How it outruns thy following eye!
Use all persuasions now, and try
If thou canst call it back, or stay it there.
That way it went, but thou shalt find
No track is left behind.

2 Fool! 'tis thy life, and the fond archer thou.
Of all the time thou'st shot away,
I'll bid thee fetch but yesterday,
And it shall be too hard a task to do.
Besides repentance, what canst find
That it hath left behind?

3 Our life is carried with too strong a tide,
A doubtful cloud our substance bears,
And is the horse of all our years:
Each day doth on a winged whirlwind ride.
We and our glass run out, and must
Both render up our dust.

4 But his past life who without grief can see,
Who never thinks his end too near,
But says to Fame, Thou art mine heir;
That man extends life's natural brevity--
This is, this is the only way
To outlive Nestor in a day.

ON THE PRAISE OF POETRY.

'Tis not a pyramid of marble stone, Though high as our ambition; 'Tis not a tomb cut out in brass, which can Give life to the ashes of a man, But verses only; they shall fresh appear, Whilst there are men to read or hear, When time shall make the lasting brass decay, And eat the pyramid away, Turning that monument wherein men trust Their names, to what it keeps, poor dust; Then shall the epitaph remain, and be New graven in eternity. Poets by death are conquered, but the wit Of poets triumph over it. What cannot verse? When Thracian Orpheus took His lyre, and gently on it strook, The learned stones came dancing all along, And kept time to the charming song. With artificial pace the warlike pine, The elm and his wife, the ivy-twine, With all the better trees which erst had stood Unmoved, forsook their native wood. The laurel to the poet's hand did bow, Craving the honour of his brow; And every loving arm embraced, and made With their officious leaves a shade. The beasts, too, strove his auditors to be, Forgetting their old tyranny. The fearful hart next to the lion came, And wolf was shepherd to the lamb. Nightingales, harmless Syrens of the air, And Muses of the place, were there; Who, when their little windpipes they had found Unequal to so strange a sound, O'ercome by art and grief, they did expire, And fell upon the conquering lyre. Happy, oh happy they! whose tomb might be, Mausolus! envied by thee!

THE MOTTO.

TENTANDA VIA EST, ETC.

What shall I do to be for ever known, And make the age to come my own? I shall like beasts or common people die, Unless you write my elegy; Whilst others great by being born are grown, Their mother's labour, not their own. In this scale gold, in the other fame does lie; The weight of that mounts this so high. These men are Fortune's jewels, moulded bright, Brought forth with their own fire and light. If I, her vulgar stone, for either look, Out of myself it must be strook. Yet I must on: What sound is't strikes mine ear? Sure I Fame's trumpet hear: It sounds like the last trumpet, for it can Raise up the buried man. Unpass'd Alps stop me, but I'll cut through all, And march, the Muse's Hannibal. Hence, all the flattering vanities that lay Nets of roses in the way; Hence, the desire of honours or estate, And all that is not above Fate; Hence, Love himself, that tyrant of my days, Which intercepts my coming praise. Come, my best friends! my books! and lead me on, 'Tis time that I were gone. Welcome, great Stagyrite! and teach me now All I was born to know: Thy scholar's victories thou dost far outdo; He conquered th' earth, the whole world you, Welcome, learn'd Cicero! whose bless'd tongue and wit Preserves Rome's greatness yet; Thou art the first of orators; only he Who best can praise thee next must be. Welcome the Mantuan swan! Virgil the wise, Whose verse walks highest, but not flies; Who brought green Poesy to her perfect age, And made that art which was a rage. Tell me, ye mighty Three! what shall I do To be like one of you? But you have climb'd the mountain's top, there sit On the calm flourishing head of it, And whilst, with wearied steps, we upward go, See us and clouds below.

DAVIDEIS.