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then returned to England and became secretary to the Earl of Essex. On the attainder of that nobleman he again retired into Italy, and was engaged in the secret diplomatic service of the Grand Duke of Tuscany. At King James's accession, he came back to England, was knighted, and employed in many important embassies. In 1623, the provostship of Eton College was given him, and he then took deacon's orders. Besides his prose writings on The State of Christendom, on The Elements of Architecture, etc., he wrote a few poems. One of these, The Character of a Happy Life, is familiar to most readers, though I must quote it none the less. It is said to have been first printed in 1614:

How happy is he born and taught
That serveth not another's will;
Whose armour is his honest thought,
And simple truth his utmost skill!
Whose passions not his masters are ;
Whose soul is still prepared for death,
Untied unto the world by care

Of public fame or private breath;
Who envies none that chance doth raise,
Nor vice; who never understood
How deepest wounds are given by praise,
Nor rules of state, but rules of good.
Who hath his life from rumours freed;
Whose conscience is his strong retreat;
Whose state can neither flatterers feed,
Nor ruin make oppressors great;
Who God doth late and early pray
More of His grace than gifts to lend ;
And entertains the harmless day
With a religious book or friend.

This man is freed from servile band
Of hope to rise, or fear to fall;
Lord of himself, though not of lands;
And having nothing, yet hath all.1

I next extract the greater part of a hymn which he

1 Poems from Reliquia Wottonianæ, etc., in Hannah's Courtly Poets, It does not seem clear that this poem is strictly original, there being a German poem of the same age, very closely resembling it. Note in id.

90.

wrote during his embassy at Venice, when the plague was raging there:

Thus, then, our Strength, Father of life and death,

To whom our thanks, our vows, ourselves we owe,
From me, Thy tenant of this fading breath,

Accept those lines which from Thy goodness flow,
And Thou, that wert Thy regal prophet's muse,
Do not Thy praise in weaker strains refuse !

Let these poor notes ascend unto Thy throne,
Where majesty doth sit with mercy crowned,
Where my Redeemer lives, in whom alone

The errors of my wandering life are drowned;
Where all the Choir of Heaven resound the same,
That only Thine, Thine is the Saving Name!
Well then, my soul, joy in the midst of pain;
Thy Christ, that conquered hell, shall from above
With greater triumph yet return again,

And conquer His own justice with His love!
Commanding earth and seas to render those
Unto His bliss, for whom He paid His woes.
Now have I done; now are my thoughts at peace;
And now my joys are stronger than my grief:
I feel those comforts that shall never cease,

Future in hope, but present in belief:
Thy words are true, Thy promises are just,

And Thou wilt find Thy dearly-bought in dust.1

Sir William Alexander, Earl of Stirling (1580-1640) wrote a number of poems and tragedies, some classical and others biblical. I quote a few lines from a long poem in twelve books upon Doomesday :

Let not the godly man affliction fear;

God wrestle may with some, but none o'erthrows.
Who gives the burden, gives the strength to bear;

And best reward the greatest service [obedience] owes [possesses];
Those who would reap, they at the first must eare [plough],
God's love, his faith, a good man's trouble shows.2

William Cartwright (1611-43) was a man of some note at Oxford, both as a preacher, and reader in

1 Poems from Reliquia Wottonianæ, 92.

2 Poetical Works of Sir W. Alexander, Earl of Stirling, in 3 vols. 1870.

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metaphysics. When the Civil War broke out, he acted with zeal and efficiency for the King, who went into mourning for him when he died of camp-fever. poems and plays were published in 1651.

CONSIDERATION.

Fool that I was, that little of my span
Which I have sinned, until it styles me man,
I counted life till now; henceforth I'll say
'Twas but a drowsy lingering or delay:
Let it forgotten perish, let none tell
That then I was: To live is to live well.
Off then, thou old man, and give place unto
The Ancient of Days! Let Him renew

Mine age like as the eagles, and endow

My breast with innocence, that he, whom thou
Hast made a man of sin and subtly sworn

A vassal to thy tyranny, may turn

Infant again, and having all of child

Want wilt hereafter to be so beguiled.1

His

Francis Quarles (1592-1644), son of an official in Elizabeth's Court, was a member of Lincoln's Inn, then Steward to the Princess Elizabeth, daughter of James I., and afterwards Secretary to Archbishop Usher in Ireland. When the Civil War broke out, his attachment to the King, whom he joined at Oxford, brought upon him the hostility of the Puritan party. His property was plundered, and various manuscripts which he had prepared for the press were destroyed. This loss he took so much to heart that it was thought to have hastened his death. One of his works, The Emblems, Divine and Moral, together with Hieroglyphics of the Life of Man, has been many times reprinted. It is not merely interesting for its quaintness, but valuable for the warm spirit of devotion with which it is penetrated. Each poem is headed by a curious 'hieroglyphic,' or emblematic engraving, with a text and a Latin motto, and is illustrated on the opposite page with quotations from the

1 Cartwright's Poems, Chalmers's English Poets, vi. 528.

early Fathers, and with a short epigram. I give an example:-The hieroglyphic represents a heavenly globe at the top of a hill. A man is painfully riding up to it on an ass—so slowly that he is outstripped by a snail, and looking back the while to the terrestrial world below, towards which another rider, mounted on a stag, is spurring at full speed. The motto is, 'Da mihi fraena, timor; da mihi calcar, amor.' The text is from John iii. 19: 'Loving darkness rather than light.' The quotations are all three from St. Augustine. One is from his Exposition of the Psalms: 'Two several lovers built two several cities: the love of God buildeth a Jerusalem; the love of the world buildeth a Babylon. Let every one inquire of himself what he loveth, and he shall resolve himself of whence he is a citizen.' The other two are from The Confessions: All things are driven by their own weight, and tend to their own centre. My weight is my love; by that I am driven whithersoever I am driven.' 'Lord, he loveth Thee the less, that loveth anything with Thee, which he loveth not for Thee.' The epigram is—

Lord, scourge my ass, if she shall make no haste,

And curb my stag, if he should fly too fast;

If he be over swift, or she prove idle,

Let love lend her a spur; fear, him a bridle.

The poem runs thus :

Lord, when we leave the world, and come to Thee,
How dull, how slug are we !

How backward! how preposterous is the motion
Of our ungain devotion !

Our thoughts are millstones, and our souls are lead,
And our desires are dead:

Our vows are fairly promised, faintly paid;
Or broken, or not made:

Our better work (if any good) attends
Upon our private ends;

In whose performance one poor worldly scoff
Foils us, or beats us off.

If Thy sharp scourge find out some secret fault
We grumble or revolt;

And if Thy gentle hand forbear, we stray,
Ór idly lose the way.

Is the road fair? we loiter. Clogged with mire?
We stick, or else retire:

A lamb appears a lion; and we fear
Each bush we see's a bear.

When our dull souls direct our thoughts to Thee,
As slow as snails are we.

But at the earth we dart our winged desire,
We burn, we burn like fire.

Like as the amorous needle joys to bend
To her magnetic friend;

Or as the greedy lover's eyeballs fly
At his fair mistress' eye,

So, so we cling to earth; we fly and puff,
Yet fly not fast enough.

If pleasure beckon with her balmy hand,
Her beck's a strong command:
If honour call us with her courtly breath,
An hour's delay is death:

If profit's golden-fingered charm inveigles,
We clip more swift than eagles :
Let Auster weep, or blustering Boreas roar,
Till eyes or lungs be sore;

Let Neptune swell until his dropsied sides
Burst into broken tides;

Not threatening rocks, nor winds, nor waves, nor fire,
Can curb our fierce desire :

Not fire nor rocks can stop our furious minds,

Nor waves, nor winds;

How fast and fearless do our footsteps flee!
The light-foot roebuck's not so swift as we.1

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The following is an extract from the poem headed by an emblem which bears the motto, Phosphore redde diem:'

How long! how long shall these benighted eyes
Languish in shades, like feeble flies

Expecting Spring! How long shall darkness soil
The face of earth, and thus beguile

Our souls of sprightful action; when will day

Begin to dawn, whose new-born ray

May gild the weathercocks of our devotion,

And give our unsouled souls new motion!

Sweet Phosphor, bring the day!

Thy light will fray

These horrid mists; sweet Phosphor, bring the day! 2

1 Quarles' Emblems, Divine and Moral, i. 13.

2 Id. i. 14.

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