Here lyeth ye Body of Matthew Harvie Esq, he dyed ye 14th of Janu", 1693. On the opposite side to this inscription are Dryden's lines to Lady Whitmore, whose name does not occur on the monument at all." Dryden's verses were first printed in Examen Poeticum, 1693. The text is essentially the same as that on the monument.] FAIR, kind, and true, a treasure each alone; A wife, a mistress, and a friend in one; Rest in this tomb, rais'd at thy husband's cost, Here sadly summing what he had, and lost. Come, virgins, ere in equal bands you join, Come first, and offer at her sacred shrine; Pray but for half the virtues of this wife, Compound for all the rest with longer life; And wish your vows like hers may be return'd, So lov'd when living, and when dead so mourn'd. EPITAPH ON THE POET'S NEPHEW, ERASMUS LAWTON [On a mural tablet in the church of Great Catworth, Huntingdonshire, there is the following inscription. The date of the verses contained in it cannot be determined: they are placed here for convenience.] Near this Place He was a Pious man and learned, both in Divinity: and And to the good of His Neighbour. She was daughter of Erasmus Driden: Son of St Erasmus Driden of Canons Ashby in Northamptonshir and Mr [Mary Pickering His wife by whom He had 14 children, the Eldest was John Dryden Esqr the Laureat of his time who Married the Lady Elizabeth Howard Daughter to Henry [Earl of Berkshire By whom she [sic] had 3 sons, Charles, John & Erasmus [who all died fine young Gentlemen The 2nd Brother to Mrs Lawton is the present S! Eras[mus Dryden of Canons Ashby By lineal descent an ancient Baronet. She was very beautifull and Pleasant in Her Youth [allways Good & Charitable allmost beyond her power, in which she [followed the rare Example of her Exelent Mother. Mr Lawton lived in this [Town near 40 years And died Lamented Decem 26. 1710. in the 77 Yeare [of her age Having first buried her only child Erasmus Lawton on whom her Brother wrote these lines Stay Stranger Stay and drop one Tear She allways weeps that layd him Here And will do, till her race is Run This was placed here by a Relation of Hers THE LADY'S SONG [This song is printed, with title, The Lady s Song, by Mr. Dryden, in Poetical Miscellanies, the Fifth Part, 1704, from which the present text is taken. It also appears, with the heading, The Beautiful Lady of the May, written by Mr. Dryden in the year 1691, in a volume of Miscellaneous Works, written by his Grace, George, late Duke of Buckingham... the second edition .. printed for S. Briscoe, 1704, to which is added a collection of State Poems by several Hands. The song obviously refers to the banishment of James II and his queen.] I A PANEGYRICAL POEM DEDICATED TO THE MEMORY OF THE LATE COUNTESS OF ABINGDON [The following poem was written in memory of Eleonora, Countess of Abingdon, who died on May 31, 1691. Dryden, as he tells us in his dedication, was requested by the Earl of Abingdon, with whom he was not personally acquainted, to write an elegy upon his deceased wife, whom the poet had never seen. Eleonora was first published in March, 1692 (see reference to the London Gazette in Scott-Saintsbury edition, xviii, 296), and was not reprinted until it was included in the folio Poems and Translations, 1701.] TO THE RIGHT HONORABLE THE EARL OF ABINGDON, &c. MY LORD, THE commands with which you honor'd me some months ago are now perform'd: they had been sooner; but betwixt ill health, some business, and many troubles, I was forc'd to defer them till this time. Ovid, going to his banishment, and writing from on shipboard to his friends, excus'd the faults of his poetry by his misfortunes; and told them that good verses never flow but from a serene and compos'd spirit. Wit, which is a kind of Mercury, with wings fasten'd to his head and heels, can fly but slowly in a damp air. I therefore chose rather to obey you late than ill: if at least I am capable of writing anything, at any time, which is worthy your perusal and your patronage. I cannot say that I have escap'd from a shipwreck; but have only gain'd a rock by hard swimming, where I may pant a while and gather breath; for the doctors give me a sad assurance, that my disease never took its leave of any man, but with a purpose to return. However, my Lord, I have laid hold on the interval, and menag'd the small stock which age has left me, to the best advantage, in performing this inconsiderable service to my Lady's memory. We, who are priests of Apollo, have not the inspiration when we please; but must wait till the god comes rushing on us, and invades us with a fury which we are not able to resist: which gives us double strength while the fit continues, and leaves us languishing and spent, at its departure. Let me not seem to boast, my Lord, for I have really felt it on this occasion, and prophesied beyond my natural power. Let me add, and hope to be believ'd, that the excellency of the subject contributed much to the happiness of the execution; and that the weight of thirty years was taken off me, while I was writing. I swam with the tide, and the water under me was buoyant. The reader will easily observe, that I was transported by the multitude and variety of my similitudes; which are generally the product of a luxuriant fancy, and the wantonness of wit. Had I call'd in my judgment to my assistance, I had certainly retrench'd many of them. But I defend them not; let them pass for beautiful faults amongst the better sort of critics for the whole poem, tho' written in that which they call heroic verse, is of the Pindaric nature, as well in the thought as the expression; and, as such, requires the same grains of allowance for it. It was intended, as your Lordship sees in the title, not for an elegy, but a panegyric: a kind of apotheosis, indeed, if a heathen word may be applied to a Christian use. And on all occasions of praise, if we take the ancients for our patterns, we are bound by prescription to employ the magnificence of words, and the force of figures, to adorn the sublimity of thoughts. Isocrates amongst the Grecian orators, and Cicero, and the younger Pliny, amongst the Romans, have left us their precedents for our security for I think I need not mention the inimitable Pindar, who stretches on these pinions out of sight, and is carried upward, as it were, into another world. This, at least, my Lord, I may justly plead, that, if I have not perform'd so well as I think I have, yet I have us'd my best endeavors to excel myself. One disadvantage I have had; which is, never to have known or seen my Lady; and to draw the lineaments of her mind, from the description which I have receiv'd from others, is for a painter to set himself at work without the living original before him: which, the more beautiful it is, will be so much the more difficult for him to conceive, when he has only a relation given him of such and such features by an acquaintance or a friend, without the nice touches which give the best resemblance and make the graces of the picture. Every artist is apt enough to flatter himself (and I amongst the rest) that their own ocular observations would have discover'd more perfections, at least others, than have been deliver'd to them: tho' I have receiv'd mine from the best hands, that is, from persons who neither want a just understanding of my Lady's worth nor a due veneration for her memory. Doctor Donne, the greatest wit, tho' not the greatest poet of our nation, acknowledges, that he had never seen Mrs. Drury, whom he has made immortal in his admirable Anniversaries. I have had the same fortune, tho' I have not succeeded to the same genius. However, I have follow'd his footsteps in the design of his panegyric; which was to raise an emulation in the living, to copy out the example of the dead. And therefore it was, that I once intended to have call'd this poem The Pattern: and tho', on a second consideration, I chang'd the title into the name of that illustrious person, yet the design continues, and Eleonora is still the pattern of charity, devotion, and humility; of the best wife, the best mother, and the best of friends. But And now, my Lord, tho' I have endeavor'd to answer your commands, yet I could not answer it to the world, nor to my conscience, if I gave not your Lordship my testimony of being the best husband now living: I say my testimony only; for the praise of it is given you by yourself. They who despise the rules of virtue both in their practice and their morals, will think this a very trivial commendation. But I think it the peculiar happiness of the Countess of Abingdon, to have been so truly lov'd by you, while she was living, and so gratefully honor'd after she was dead. Few there are who have either had, or could have, such a loss; and yet fewer who carried their love and constancy beyond the grave. The exteriors of mourning, a decent funeral, and black habits, are the usual stints of common husbands; and perhaps their wives deserve no better than to be mourn'd with hypocrisy, and forgot with ease. you have distinguish'd yourself from ordinary lovers, by a real and lasting grief for the deceas'd; and by endeavoring to raise for her the most durable monument, which is that of verse. And so it would have prov'd, if the workman had been equal to the work, and your choice of the artificer as happy as your design. Yet as Phidias, when he had made the statue of Minerva, could not forbear to ingrave his own name, as author of the piece: so give me leave to hope that, by subscribing mine to this poem, I may live by the goddess, and transmit my name to posterity by the memory of hers. "Tis no flattery to assure your Lordship that she is remember'd, in the present age, by all who have had the honor of her conversation and acquaintance; and that I have never been in any company since the news of her death was first brought me, where they have not extoll'd her virtues, and even spoken the same things of her in prose, which I have done in verse. I therefore think myself oblig'd to thank your Lordship for the commission which you have given me: how I have acquitted myself of it, must be left to the opinion of the world, in spite of any protestation which I can enter against the present age, as incompetent or corrupt judges. For my comfort, they are but Englishmen, and, as such, if they think ill of me to-day, they are inconstant enough to think well of me to-morrow. And, after all, I have not much to thank my fortune that I was born amongst them. The good of both sexes are so few, in England, that they stand like exceptions against general rules: and tho' one of them has deserv'd a greater commendation than I could give her, they have taken care that I should not tire my pen with frequent exercise on the like subjects; that praises, like taxes, should be appropriated, and left almost as individual as the person. They say, my talent is satire: if it be so, 't is a fruitful age, and there is an extraordinary crop to gather. But a single hand is insufficient for such a harvest: they have sown the dragon's teeth themselves, and 't is but just they should reap each other in lampoons. You, my Lord, who have the character of honor, tho' 't is not my happiness to know you, may stand aside, with the small remainders of the English nobility, truly such, and, unhurt yourselves, behold the mad combat. If I have pleas'd you, and some few others, I have obtain'd my end. You see I have disabled myself, like an elected Speaker of the House; yet like him I have undertaken the charge, and find the burden sufficiently recompens'd by the honor. pleas'd to accept of these my unworthy labors, this paper monument; and let her pious memory, which I am sure is sacred to you, not only plead the pardon of my many faults, but gain me your protection, which is ambitiously sought by, My Lord, Your Lordship's Most Obedient Servant, ELEONORA Be Who, then, perhaps, were offering vows in vain, For his long life, and for his happy reign: But most the poor, whom daily of her charity. she supplied, Beginning to be such, but when she died. For, while she liv'd, they slept in peace by night, Secure of bread, as of returning light; So Pharaoh, or some greater king than he, In his economy, and bounds his gift: Of which our earthly dunghill is the worst. |