earl, who in blood and nature is interested to And the rather, for that this detractor (whe
take our part in this cause, with others who can-
commendable rhyme, albeit now himself an essay
not, I know, but hold dear the monuments that best notice of his worth) is a man of fair pan
to rhyme, have given heretofore to the world the
have been, left unto the world in this manner of and good reputation, and therefore the repar
composition; and who, I trust, will take in forcibly cast from such a hand, inay throw dos
good part this my defence, if not as it is my par-long time build up again, especially upon the sig
more at once than the labours of many shati:
pery foundation of opinion, and the world's incx-
stancy, which knows not well what it would ban
and

ticular, yet in respect of the cause I undertake,
which I here invoke you all to protect.

DEFENCE OF RHYME.

ΤΟ

WILLIAM HERBERT,

EARL OF PEMBROKE.

Discit enim citius, meminitque libentinus illud
Quod quis deridet quam quod probat et venerate.

And he who is thus become our unkind adver sary, must pardon us if we be as jealous of o fame and reputation, as he is desirous of credit by his new old art, and must consider that we canot, in a thing that concerns us so near, but har a feeling of the wrong done, wherein every rhyme in this universal island, as well as myself, stand interested; so that if his charity had equally drawn with his learning, he would have forborn to THE general custom and use of rhyme in this king- procure the envy of so powerful a number upo dom, noble lord, having been so long (as if from a him, from whom he cannot but expect the retur grant of Nature) held unquestionable, made me to of a like measure of blame, and only have mat imagine that it lay altogether out of the way of way to his own grace, by the proof of his ability, contradiction, and was become so natural, as we without the disparaging of us, who would have should never have had a thought to cast it off into been glad to have stood quietly by him, and perreproach, or be made to think that it ill became haps commended his adventure, seeing that ever our language: but, now I see, when there is oppo- more of one science another may be bom, and sition made to all things in the world by words, we that these sallies, made out of the quarter of our must now at length likewise fall to contend for set knowledges, are the gallant proffers only af words themselves, and make a question whether attemptive spirits, and commendable, though they they be right or not. For we are told how that work no other effect than make a bravado: and i our measures go wrong, all rhyming is gross, vulgar, know it were indecens, et morosum nimis, alieno harbarous: which, if it be so, we have lost much industriæ modum ponere. We could well have labour to no purpose; and for my own particular, allowed of his numbers, had he not disgraced our I cannot but blame the fortune of the times, and rhyme, which both custom and Nature doth most my own genius, that cast me upon so wrong a powerfully defend; custom that is before all lav, course, drawn with the current of custom and an nature that is above all art. Every language hath unexamined example. Having been first encouher proper number or measure fitted to use and raged and framed thereunto by your most worthy delight, which, custom entertaining by the allow and honourable mother, and received the first ance of the ear, doth indenise and make natural notion for the formal ordering of those compo- All verse is but a frame of words confined withsitions at Wilton, which I must ever acknowledge in certain measure, differing from the ordinary to have been my best school, and thereof always speech, and introduced, the better to expres am to hold a feeling and grateful memory, After- men's conceits, both for delight and memory; ward drawn further on by the well-liking and ap-which frame of words, consisting of rythmes er probation of my worthy lord, the fosterer of me and my Muse, I adventured to bestow all my whole powers therein, perceiving it agree so well, both with the complexion of the times, and my own constitution, as I found not wherein I might better employ me: but yet now, upon the great discovery of these new measures threatening to overthrow the whole state of rhyme in this kingdom, I must either stand out to defend, or else be forced to forsake myself, and give over all; and though irresolution and a self distrust be the most apparent faults of my nature, and that the least check of reprehension, if it favour of reason, will as easily shake my resolution as any man's living; yet in this case I know not how I am grown more resolved, and before I sink, willing to examine what those powers of judgment are, that must bear me down, and beat me off from the station of my profession, which by the law of nature I am set to defend.

metrum, number or measure, are disposed into divers fashions, according to the humour of the composer, and the set of the time and there rhythmi, as Aristotle saith, are familiar amongst all nations, and è naturali et sponte fasa compositione. And they fall as naturally already in our language as ever art can make them, being such as the ear of itself doth marshal in their proper rooms, and they of themselves will not willingly be put out of rank, and that in such a verse as best comports with the nature of our language: and for our rhyme (which is an excellency added to this work of measure, and a harmony far happier than any proportion antiquity could ever show ES doth add more grace, and hath more of delight than ever bare numbers, howsoever they can be forced to run in our slow language, can possibly yield; which, whether it be deriv'd of rhythmus, or of romance, which were songs the Bards and Druids above rhymes used, and therefore were

...........

.................non ego paucis Offendor maculis quas aut incuria fudit Aut humana parum cavet natura.

For all men have their errours, and we must take the best of their powers, and leave the rest, as not appertaining unto us.

Ill customs are to be left, I grant it; but I see not how that can be taken for an ill custom, which nature hath thus ratified, all nations received, time so long confirmed, the effects such, as it performs those offices of motion for which it is employed; delighting the ear, stirring the heart, and satisfying the judgment in such sort, as I doubt whether ever single numbers will do in our climate, if they show no more work of wonder than yet we see: and if ever they prove to become any thing, it must be by the approbation of many ages that must give them their strength for any operation, or before the world will feel where the pulse, life, and energy lies, which now we are sure where to have in our rhymes, whose known frame hath those

called romansi, as some Italians hold; or, howsoever, it is likewise number and harmony of words, consisting of an agreeing sound in the last syllables of several verses, giving both to the ear an echo of a delightful report, and to the memory a deeper impression of what is delivered therein; for as Greek and Latin verse consists of the number and quantity of syllables, so doth the English verse of measure and accent: and though it doth not strictly observe long and short syllables, yet it most religiously respects the accent; and as the short and the long make number, so the accute and grave accent yield harmony, and harmony is likewise number; so that the English verse then hath number, measure, and harmony, in the best proportion of music; which being more certain and more resounding, works that effect of motion with as happy success as either the Greek or Latin: and so natural a melody is it, and so universal, as it seems to be generally born with all the nations of the world, as an hereditary eloquence proper to all mankind. The universality argues the general power of it; for if the barba-due stays for the mind, those encounters of touch, rian use it, then it shows that it sways the affection of the barbarian; if civil nations practise it, it proves that it works upon the hearts of civil nations; if all, then that it hath a power in nature on all. Georgieuez de Turcarum moribus, hath an example of the Turkish, rhymes, just of the measure of our verse, of eleven syllables, in feminine rhyme; never begotten, I am persuaded, by any example in Europe, but born, no doubt, in Scythia, and brought over Caucasus and Mount Taurus. The Sclavonian and Arabian tongues acquaint a great part of Asia and Afric with it; the Moscovite, Polac, Hungarian, German, Italian, French, and Spaniard, use no other harmony of words; the Irish, Briton, Scot, Dane, Saxon, English, and all the inhabiters of this island, either have hither brought, or here found the same in use: and such a force hath it in nature, or so made by nature, as the Latin numbers, notwithstanding their excellency, seemed not sufficient to satisfy the ear of the world thereunto accustomed, without this harmonical cadence, which made the most learned of all nations labour, with exceeding travail, to bring those numbers likewise unto it; which many did, with that happiness, as neither their purity of tongue, nor their material contempiations, are thereby any way disgraced, but rather deserve to be reverenced of all grateful posterity, with the due regard of their worth. And for Schola Salerna, and those Carmina Proverbiaira, who finds not therein more precepts for use, concerning diet, health, and conversation, than Cato, Theognes, or all the Greeks and Latins can show us in that kind of teaching; and that in so few words, both for delight to the ear, and the hold of the memory, as they are to be embraced of all modest readers, that study to know and not to deprave

Methinks it is a strange imperfection, that men should thus over-run the estimation of good things with so violent a censure, as though it must please nowe else, because it likes not them; whereas, Oportet arbitratores esse non contradictores eos qui verum judicaturi sunt, saith Aristotle, though be could not observe it himself. And mild charity tells as:

as makes the motion certain, though the variety be infinite. Nor will the general sort, for whom we write (the wise being above books) taste these laboured measures but as an orderly prose when we have all done. For this kind acquaintance and continual familiarity ever had betwixt our ear and this cadence, is grown to so intimate a friendship, as it will now hardly ever be brought to miss it. For be the verse never so good, never so full, it seems not to satisfy nor breed that delight, as when it is met and combined with a like sounding accent; which seems as the jointure, without which it hangs loose, and cannot subsist, but runs wildly on, like a tedious fancy, without a close: suffer the world to enjoy that which it knows, and what it likes; seeing whatsoever form of words doth move, delight and sway the affections of men, in what Scythian sort soever it be disposed or uttered, that is, true number, measure, eloquence, and the perfection of speech; which I said, hath as many shapes as there be tongues or nations ip the world, nor can with all the tyrannical rules of idle rhetoric be governed otherwise than custom, and present observation will allow. And being now the trim and fashion of the times, to suit a man otherwise, cannot but give a touch of singularity, for when he hath done all, he hath but found other clothes to the same body, and peradventure not so fitting as the former. But could our adversary hereby set up the music of our times to a higher note of judgment and discretion, or could these new laws of words better our imperfections, it were a happy attempt; but when hereby we shall but, as it were, change prison, and put off these fetters to receive others, what have we gained? as good still to use rhyme and a little reason, as neither rhyme nor reason? For no doubt, as idle wits will write, in that kind, as do now in this; imitation will after, though it break her neck. Scribimus indocti doctique poemata passim. And this multitude of idle writers can be uo disgrace to the good, for the same fortune in one proportion or other is proper in a like season to all states in their turn; and the same unmeasurable confluence of scribblers happened, when measures were most in use among the Romans, as we find by this reprohension,

Mutavit mentem populus levis, et calet uno
Scribendi studio, pueri, patresque severi
Fronde comas vincti cœnant, et carmina dictant.

tation, and comparable to the best inventions of the world; for sure in an eminent spirit who nature hath fitted for that mystery, rhyme is impediment to his conceit, but rather gives a wings to mount, and carries him not out of ha course, but as it were beyond his power to a fær happier flight. All excellencies being sold us at the hard price of labour, it follows, where we bestow most thereof, we buy the best success; and rhyme being far more laborious than loose measure (whatsoever is objected) must needs, meeting with wit and industry, breed greater and worthier effects in our language. So that if our labours base wrought out a manumission from bondage, and that we go at liberty, notwithstanding these ties, we are no longer the slaves of rhyme, but we make it a most excellent instrument to serve us. Nor is this certain limit observed in sonnets, any tyran

So that their plenty seems to have bred the same waste and contempt as ours doth now, though it had not power to disvalue what was worthy of posterity, nor keep back the reputation of excellencies, destined to continue for many ages. For seeing it is matter that satisfies the judicial, appear it in what habit it will, all these pretended proportions of words, howsoever placed, can be but words, and peradventure serve but to embroil our understanding, whilst seeking to please our ear, we enthral our judgment; to delight an exterior sense, we smooth up a weak confused sense, affecting sound to be unsound, and all to seem servum pecus, only to imitate the Greek and Latins, whose felicity, in this kind, might be something to them-nical bounding of the conceit, but rather a redac selves, to whom their own idiom was natural, but to us it can yield no other commodity than a sound. We admire them not for their smooth gliding words, nor their measures, but for their inventions; which treasure, if it were to be found in Welsh and Irish, we should hold those languages in the same estimation, and they may thank their sword that made their tongues so famous and universal as they are. For to say truth, their verse is many times but a confused deliverer of their excellent conceits, whose scattered limbs we are fain to look out and join together, to discern the image of what they represent unto us. And even the Lutines, who profess not to be so licentious as the Greeks, shows us many times examples, but of strange cruelty, in torturing and dismembering of words in the middle, or disjoining such as naturally should be married and march together, by setting them as far asunder as they could possibly stand; that sometimes, unless the kind reader, out of his own good nature, will stay them up by their measure, they will fall down into flat prose, and sometimes are no other indeed in their natural sound; and then again, when you find them disobedient to their own laws, you must hold it to be licentia poetica, and so dispensable. The striving to show their changeable measures in the variety of their odes, have been very painful, no doubt, unto them, and forced them thus to disturb the quiet stream of their words, which by a natural succession otherwise desire to follow in their due

course.

ing it in girum, and a just form, neither too long for the shortest project, nor too short for the longest, being but only employed for a present passion. For the body of our imagination being as an unformed chaos, without fashion, without day, if by the divine power of the spirit it be wrought into an orb of order and form, is it not more pleasing to nature, that desires a certainty, and comports not with what is infinite? to have these closes, rather than not to know where to end, or how far to go, especially seeing our passions are often without measure: and we find the best of the Latins many times, either not concluding, or else otherwise in the end then they began. Besides, is it not most delightful to see much excellency ordered in a small room, or little gallantry disposed and made to fill up a space of like capacity, in such surt, that the one would not appear so beautiful in a larger circuit, nor the other do well in a less? which often we find to be so, according to the powers of nature, in the workman. And these limited proportions, and rests of stanzas, consisting of six, seven, or eight lines, are of that happiness, both for the disposition of the matter, the apt planting the sentence where it may best stand to hit the certain close of delight with the full body of a just period well carried, is such, as neither the Greeks or Latins ever attained unto. For their boundless running on often so confounds the reader, that having once lost himself, must either give off unsatisfied, or uncertainly cast back to retrieve the escaped sense, and to find way again into his matter.

Methinks we should not so soon yield up our consents captive to the authority of antiquity, unless we saw more reason; all our understandings are not to be built by the square of Greece and Italy. We are the children of nature as well as they, we are not so placed out of the way of judg

But such affliction doth laboursome curiosity still lay upon our best delights (which ever must be made strange and variable) as if art were ordained to afflict nature, and that we could not go but in fetters. Every science, every profession, must be so wrapt up in unnecessary intrications, as if it were not to fashion, but to confound the under-ment, but that the same sun of discretion shineth standing, which makes me much to distrust man, and fear that our presumption goes beyond our ability, and our curiosity is more than our judgment; labouring ever to seem to be more than we are, or laying greater burthens upon our minds than they are well able to bear, because we would not appear like other men.

And indeed I have wished there were not that multiplicity of rhymes as is used by many in sonnets, which yet we see in some so happily to succeed, and hath been so far from hindering theirinventions, as it hath begot conceit beyond expec

upon us; we have our portion of the same virtues as well as of the same vices, et Catilinam quocunque in populo videas, quocunque sub axe. Time and the turn of things bring about these faculties according to the present estimation; and, res temporibus non tempore rebus servire opportet. So that we must never rebel against use; quem penes arbitrium est, et vis et norma loquendi. It is not the observing of trochaics nor their iambies, that will make our writings ought the wiser: all their poesy, and all their philosophy, is nothing, unless we bring the discerning light of conceit

verse.

with us to apply it to use. It is not books, but | cients, in any other form than the accustomed only that great book of the world, and the all overspreading grace of Heaven that makes men truly And with Petrarch lived his scholar Boccacius, judicial. Nor can it but touch of arrogant igno- and near about the same time Johannes Ravenenrance, to hold this or that nation barbarous, these sis, and from these tanquam ex equo Trojano, or those times gross, considering how this mani- seems to have issued all those famous Italian fold creature man, wheresoever he stand in the writers, Leonardus Aretinus, Laurentius Valla, world, hath always some disposition of worth, Poggius, Blondus, and many others. Then Emaentertains the order of society, affects that which nuel Chrysolarus, a Constantinopolitan gentleman, is most in use, and is eminent in some one thing renowned for his learning and virtue, being emor other that fits his humour and the times. The ployed by John Paleologns, emperor of the east, to Grecians held all other nations barbarous but implore the aid of Christian princes, for the sucthemselves; yet Pyrrhus, when he saw the well couring of perishing Greece; and understanding ordered marching of the Romans, which made in the mean time, how Bajazeth was taken prisoner them see their presumptuous errour, could say it by Tamburlane, and his country freed from danwas no barbarous manner of proceeding. The ger, staid still at Venice, and there taught the Goths, Vandals, and Longobards, whose coming Greek tongue, discontinued before in these parts down like an inundation overwhelmed, as they the space of seven hundred years. say, all the glory of learning in Europe, have yet left us still their laws and customs, as the originals of most of the provincial constitutions of Christen-phy, beaten by the Turk out of Greece, into Christdom; which well considered with their other courses of government, may serve to clear them from this imputation of ignorance. And though the vanquished never speak well of the conqueror, yet even thorough the unsound coverings of malediction appear those monuments of truth, as argue well their worth, and proves them not without judgment, though without Greek and Latin.

Him followed Bessarion, George Trapezantius, Theodorus Gaza, and others, transporting philoso

endom. Hereupon came that mighty confluence of learning in these parts, which returning, as it were per post liminium, and here meeting then with the new invented stamp of printing, spread itself indeed in a more universal sort than the world ever heretofore had it.

When Pomponius Lætus, Æneas Sylvius, Angelus Politianus, Hermolaus Barbarus, Johannes Picus de Mirandula, the miracle and phoenix of the world, adorned Italy, and wakened other nations likewise with this desire of glory, long before it brought forth Rewclin, Erasmus, and Moore, worthy men, I confess, and the last a great orna→ ment to this land, and a rhymer.

Will not experience confute us, if we should say the state of China, which never heard of anapestics, trochies, and tribracs, were gross, barbarous, and uncivil? And is it not a most apparent ignorance, both of the succession of learning in Europe, and the general course of things, to say, that all lay pitifully deformed in those lack- And yet long before all these, and likewise with learning times from the declining of the Roman these, was not our nation behind in her portion of empire, till the light of the Latin tongue was re- spirit and worthiness, but concurrent with the best vived by Reweline, Erasmus, and Moore. When of all this lettered world; witness venerable Bede, for three hundred years before them, about the that flourished about a thousand years since; Alcoming down of Tamburlaine into Europe, Fran- delmus Durotelmus, that lived in the year 739, of ciscus Petrarcha (who then no doubt likewise found whom we find this commendation registered: Omwhom to imitate) showed all the best notions of nium poetarum sui temporis facile primus, tantæ learning, in that degree of excellence, both in eloquentiæ, majestatis et eruditionis homo fuit, ut Latin, prose, and verse, and in the vulgar Italian, nunquam satis admirari possim unde illi in tam as all the wits of posterity have not yet over barbara ac rudi ætate facundia accerverit, usque matched him in all kinds to this day; his great adeo omnibus numeris tersa, elegans et rotunda, volumes written in moral philosophy, show his in- versus edidit cum antiquitate de palma contenfinite reading, and most happy power of dispo- dentes. Witness Josephus Devonius, who wrote sition; his twelve eclogues, his Africa, containing De Bello Trojano, in so excellent a manner, and so Bine books of the last Punic war, with his three near resembling antiquity, as printing his work bebooks of epistles in Latin verse, show all the trans-yond the seas, they have ascribed it to Cornelius formations of wit and invention, that a spirit naturally born to the inheritance of poetry and judicial knowledge could express: all which, notwithstanding, wrought him not that glory and fame with his own nation, as did his poems in Italian, which they esteem above all, whatsoever wit could have invented in any other form than wherein it is; which questionless they will not change with the best measures Greeks or Latins can show them, howsoever our adversary imagines.

Nor could this very same innovation in verse, begun amongst them by C. Tolomæi, but die in the attempt, and was buried as soon as it came born, neglected as a prodigious and unnatural issue amongst them; nor could it ever induce Tasso, the wonder of Italy, to write that admirable poem of Jerusalem, comparable to the best of the an

Nepos, one of the ancients.

What should I name Walterus Mape, Gulielmus Nigellus, Gervasius Tilburiensis, Bracton, Bacon, Ockam, and an infinite catalogue of excellent men, most of them living about four hundred years since, and have left behind them monuments of most profound judgment and learning in all sciences. So that it is but the clouds gathered about our own judgment that makes us think all other ages wrapped up in mists, and the great distance betwixt us, that causes us to imagine men so far off to be so little in respect of ourselves.

We must not look upon the immense course of times past, as men overlook spacious and wide countries, from off high mountains, and are never the nearer to judge of the true nature of the soil, or the particular site and face of those territories they see. Nor must we think, viewing the super

ficial figure of a region in a map, that we know straight the fashion and place as it is. Or reading an history, which is but a map of men, and doth no otherwise acquaint us with the true substance of circumstances, than a superficial card doth the seamen with a coast never seen (which always proves other to the eye than the imagination forecasts it) that presently we know all the world, and can distinctly judge of times, men, and manners, just as they were.

When the best measure of man is to be taken by his own foot, bearing ever the nearest proportion to himself, and is never so far different and unequal in his powers, that he hath all in perfection at one time, and nothing at another.

| the ornaments that do but deck the house of state, et imitatur publicos mores: hunger is as well atisfied with meat served in pewter as silver. Ds cretion is the best measure, the rightest foot in what pace soever it run. Erasmus, Rewchin, and Moore, brought no more wisdom into the world, with all their new revived words, than we find was before; it bred not a profounder divine than Saint Thomas, a greater lawyer than Bartolus, a more acute logician than Scotus; nor are the effects of all this great amass of eloquence so admirable, or of that consequence, but that impexa illa antiqui tas can yet compare with it.

Let us go no further, but look upon the wonderful architecture of this state of England, and see whether they were deformed times that could give it such a form. Where there is no one the least pillar of majesty, but was set with most profound judgment, and borne up with the just conveniency of prince and people. No court of justice, but laid by the rule and square of Nature, and the best of the best commonwealths that ever were in the world; so strong and substantial as it hath stood against all the storms of factions, both of belief and ambition, which so powerfully beat upon it, and all the tempestuous alterations of humorous times whatsoever; being continually, in all ages, furnished with spirits fit to maintain the majesty of her own greatness, and to march in an equal concurrency all other kingdoms round about her with whom it had to encounter.

But this innovation, like a viper, must ever make way into the world's opinion, thorough the bowels of her own breeding, and is always born with reproach in her mouth; the disgracing others is the best grace it can put on, to win reputation of wit, and yet it is never so wise as it would seem, Dor doth the world ever get so much by it as it ima

The distribution of gifts are universal, and all seasons have them in some sort. We must not think but that there were Scipios, Cæsars, Catos, and Pompeys, born elsewhere than at Rome; the rest of the world hath ever had them in the same degree of nature, though not of state; and it is our weakness that makes us mistake, or misconceive in these delineations of men the true figure of their worth; and our passion and belief is so apt to lead us beyond truth, that unless we try them by the just compass of humanity, and as they were men, we shall cast their figures in the air, when we should make their models upon Earth. It is not the contexture of words, but the effects of action that gives glory to the times: we find they had Mercurium in pectore, though not in lingua; and in all ages, though they were not Ciceronians, they knew the art of men, which only is, ars artium, the greatest gift of Heaven, and the chief grace and glory on Earth; they had the learning of government and ordering their state, eloquence enough to show their judgments, and, it seems, the best times followed Lycurgus's council: Literas ad usum saltem discebant, reliqua omnis disciplinagineth; which being so often deceived, and seeing erat, ut pulchre parerent, ut labores preferrent, &c. Had not unlearned Rome laid the better foundation, and built the stronger frame of an admirable state, eloquent Rome had confounded it utterly, which we saw ran the way of all confusion, the plain course of dissolution in her greatest skill; and though she had not power to undo herself, yet wrought she so, that she cast herself quite away from the glory of a commonwealth, and fell upon that form of state she ever most feared and abhorred of all other; and then scarce was there seen any shadow of policy under her first emperors, but the most horrible and gross confusion that could be conceived; notwithstanding it still endured, preserving not only a monarchy, locked up in her own limits, but therewithal held under her obedience so many nations, so far distant, so ill affected, so disorderly commanded and unjustly conquered, as it is not to be attributed to any other fate, but to the first frame of that commonwealth, which was so strongly jointed, and with such infinite combinations interlinked, as one nail or other ever held up the majesty thereof.

There is but one learning, which omnes gentes habent scriptum in cordibus suis, one and the selfsame spirit that worketh in all. We have but one body of justice, one body of wisdom throughout the whole world, which is but apparelled according to the fashion of every nation.

Eloquence and gay words are not of the substance of wit; it is but the garnish of a nice time,

it never performs so much as it promises, methinks men should never give more credit unto it: for, let us change never so often, we cannot change man, our imperfections must still run on with us, and therefore the wiser nations have taught men always to use, Moribus legibusque presentibus etiamsi deteriores sint. The Lacedemonians, when a musician, thinking to win himself credit by his new invention, and be before his fellows, had added one string more to his crowd, brake his fiddle, and banished him the city, holding the innovater, though in the least things, dangerous to a public society. It is but a fantastic giddiness to forsake the way of other men, especially were it lies tolerable: Ubi nunc est respublica, ibi simus potius quam dum illum veterem sequimur, simus in nulla.

But shall we not tend to perfection? Yes, and that ever best by going on in the course we are in, where we have advantage, being so far onward, of him that is but now setting forth; for we shall never proceed, if we be ever beginning, nor arrive at any certain port, sailing with all winds that blow, non convalescit planta quæ sæpius transfertur, and theretore let us hold on in the course we have undertaken, and not still be wandering. Perfection is not the portion of man; and if it were, why may we not as well get to it this way as another? And suspect these great undertakers, lest they have conspired with envy to betray our proceedings, and put us by the honour of our at