SIR HENRY WOTTON. 1568-1639.

How happy is he born or taught,
That serveth not another's will;
Whose armour is his honest thought,
And simple truth his utmost skill!

The Character of a Happy Life.

And entertains the harmless day
With a religious book or friend.

Ibid.

Lord of himself, though not of lands ;

And having nothing, yet hath all.

Ibid.

You meaner beauties of the night,
That poorly satisfy our eyes

More by your number than your light,
You common people of the skies;
What are you when the moon1 shall rise?
To his Mistress, the Queen of Bohemia?

He first deceased; she for a little tried
To live without him, liked it not, and died.
Upon the Death of Sir Albert Morton's Wife.
I am but a gatherer and disposer of other
men's stuff.
Preface to the Elements of Architecture.
Hanging was the worst use man could be
put to.

The Disparity between Buckingham and Essex.

1 “sun” in Reliquiæ Wottoniana, Eds. 1651, 1672, 1685. 2 This was printed with music as early as 1624, in Est's "Sixth Set of Books," &c., and is found in many MSS.- Hannah, The Courtly Poets.

Harrington.-Daniel.- Drayton. 149

Wotton continued.]

An ambassador is an honest man sent to lie abroad for the commonwealth.1

The itch of disputing will prove the scab of churches.2 A Panegyric to King Charles.

SIR JOHN HARRINGTON.

1561-1612.

Treason doth never prosper, what 's the reason? Why if it prosper, none dare call it treason.3

Epigrams. Book iv. Ep. 5.

SAMUEL DANIEL. 1562-1619.
Unless above himself he can

Erect himself, how poor a thing is man!
To the Countess of Cumberland. Stanza 12.

MICHAEL DRAYTON.

1563-1631.

For that fine madness still he did retain, Which rightly should possess a poet's brain. (Of Marlowe.) To Henry Reynolds, of Poets and Poesy.

1 In a letter to Velserus, 1612, Wotton says, "This merry definition of an Ambassador I had chanced to set down at my friend's Mr. Christopher Fleckamore, in his Album."

2 In his will, he directed the stone over his grave to be thus inscribed: :

Hic jacet hujus sententiæ primus author:
DISPUTANDI PRURITUS ECCLESIARUM SCABIES.
Nomen alias quære.

Walton's Life of Wotton.

3 Prosperum ac felix scelus

Virtus vocatur.

Seneca, Herc. Furens, 2, 250.

150

Barnfield. — Donne.

RICHARD BARNFIELD. (Born circa 1570.)

As it fell upon a day

In the merry month of May,
Sitting in a pleasant shade

Which a grove of myrtles made.

Address to the Nightingale.

DR. JOHN DONNE.

1573-1631.

He was the Word, that spake it;
He took the bread and brake it;
And what that Word did make it,
I do believe and take it.2

Her by her sight; her pure and eloquent blood Spoke in her cheeks, and so distinctly wrought, That one might almost say her body thought. Funeral Elegies. On the Death of Mistress Drury. She and comparisons are odious.

Elegy 8.

3

The Comparison. Who are a little wise the best fools be."

The Triple Fool.

1 This song, often attributed to Shakespeare, is now confidently assigned to Barnfield; it is found in his collection of Poems in Divers Humours, published in 1598.-Ellis's Specimens, Vol. ii. p. 316.

Attributed by many writers to the Princess Elizabeth. It is not in the original edition of Donne, but first appears in the edition of 1654, p. 352.

3 See Burton, Anatomy of Melancholy, Pt. iii. Sc. 3. Mem. 1. Subs. 2. Herbert, Facula Prudentum. Granger, Golden Aphroditis.

4 Compare Bacon, Essay xvi. Atheism. Ante, p. 141.

BEN JONSON. 1574-1637.1

Drink to me only with thine eyes,
And I will pledge with mine;
Or leave a kiss but in the cup,
And I'll not look for wine.2

The Forest. To Celia.

Still to be neat, still to be drest,
As you were going to a feast.3

The Silent Woman. Act i. Sc. 1.

Give me a look, give me a face,
That makes simplicity a grace.
Robes loosely flowing, hair as free;
Such sweet neglect more taketh me,
Than all th' adulteries of art;

They strike mine eyes, but not my heart.

Ibid.

In small proportion we just beauties see,
And in short measures life may perfect be.
Good Life, Long Life.

Underneath this stone doth lie
As much beauty as could die;
Which in life did harbour give
To more virtue than doth live.

O rare Ben Jonson.

Epitaph on Elizabeth.

Epitaph by Sir John Young. · Ἐμοὶ δὲ μόνοις πρόπινε τοῖς ὄμμασιν. . . . . Εἰ δὲ βούλει, τοῖς χείλεσι προσφέρουσα, πλήρου φιλημάτων τὸ ἐκπωμα, καὶ OUTWs didov. Philostratus, Letter xxiv.

3 A translation from Bonnefonius.

Underneath this sable hearse
Lies the subject of all verse,
Sidney's sister, Pembroke's mother.
Death! ere thou hast slain another,
Learn'd and fair and good as she,
Time shall throw a dart at thee.

Epitaph on the Countess of Pembroke.
Soul of the age!

The applause! delight! the wonder of our stage!
My Shakespeare rise! I will not lodge thee by
Chaucer, or Spenser, or bid Beaumont lie

A little further, to make thee a room.2

To the Memory of Shakespeare.

Small Latin, and less Greek.

Ibid.

He was not of an age, but for all time.

Ibid.

Sweet swan of Avon!

Ibid.

Get money; still get money, boy;

No matter by what means.3

Every Man in his Humour. Act ii. Sc. 3.

1 This epitaph is generally ascribed to Ben Jonson. It appears in the editions of his works; but in a MS. collection of Browne's poems preserved amongst the Lansdowne MS. No. 777, in the British Museum, it is ascribed to Browne, and awarded to him by Sir Egerton Brydges in his edition of Browne's poems.

2 Renowned Spenser, lie a thought more nigh To learned Chaucer, and rare Beaumont lie

A little nearer Spenser, to make room

For Shakespeare in your threefold, fourfold tomb.

Basse, On Shakespeare.

3 Get place and wealth; if possible, with grace; If not, by any means get wealth and place.

Pope. Horace, Book i. Ep. i. Line 103.