VISIONS OF THE WORLDS VANITIE. I. ONE day, whiles that my daylie cares did fleepe, My fpirit, fhaking off her earthly prison, Of things exceeding reach of common reafon; On which when as my thought was throghly placed, Unto my eyes strange showes prefented were, 10 Picturing that, which I in minde embraced, That yet thofe fights empaffion me full nere. Such as they were (faire Ladie!) take in worth, That when time ferves may bring things better forth. 1. 5. note, F. Q. vi. iv. 37. TODD. geafon,] Rare. See the I. 13. faire Ladie!] See alfo the conclufion of the Vifions of Petrarch. Thefe were dedicated probably to the fame Lady; to whofe name, however, we have II. In fummers day, when Phoebus fairly fhone, 15 20 That he all wallowed in the weedes downe beaten, Ne car'd with them his daintie lips to fweeten: Till that a Brize, a fcorned little creature, 10 Through his faire hide his angrie fting did threaten,, ta £25 And vext fo fore, that all his goodly feature And all his plenteous pafture nought him pleafed : So by the fmall the great is soft difeafed. III. Befide the fruitfull fhore of muddie Nile, 30 no other guide than the circumftance of thefe Visions immediately following, in the edition of 1591, the Muiopotmos, which is dedicated to Lady Carey; and of no feparate title to the Visions. TODD. II. 3. this word, F. Q. i. ix. 19. TODD. II. 10. embowed] See the notes on a Brize,] A gad or horfe-fly. Cotgrave writes it the "brizze or gadbee," See Shakipeare's Troil, and Cr. A. i. S. iii.. "The herd hath more annoyance by the brize, In monftrous length, a mightie Crocodile, That, cram'd with guiltles blood and greedie pray Of wretched people travailing that way, The leaft of thoufands which on earth abide, Upon 35 his iawes, that with blacke venime fwell. Why then should greatest things the leaft difdaine, 41 Sith that fo fmall fo mightie can constraine? IV. The kingly bird, that beares Ioves thunder-clap, One day did fcorne the simple scarabee, Proud of his highest service, and good hap, 45 That made all other foules his thralls to bee: The filly Flie, that no redreffe did fee, Tedula,] I fuppofe he III. 7. means the little bird Trochila; which, Gefner informs us, is a fmall fea-bird that picks her meat out of the teeth of the crocodile, which, being thus eased, never molefts her. Barnabie Rich, condemning the covetous and their fupporters, makes the following allufion to this bird, Faults and nothing but Faults, 1606, fol. 11. b. "And how many haue we that be of the Trochiles kinde, that doe cleanse the iawes of these devouring Serpents that eate vp the meanes that the poore haue to live by, &c." TODD. IV. 2. fcarabee,] Beetle. Spide where the Eagle built his towring neft, But drove in Ioves owne lap his egs to lay; 55 Iove, "Lo! how the least the greatest may reprove." V. Toward the fea turning my troubled eye, dame Natures wonder, V. 6. The huge Leviathan, Making his fport,] tion of the fea, Pf. civ. 26. is that Leviathan, whom thou therein." TODD. V. 8. A Sword-fifh fmall &c.] This fifh has a long blade of an horny fubftance proceeding from his upper jaw, with which he kills his prey. See the Catalogue of Fishes, at the end of Oppian's Halieuticks, tranflated by Jones, Oxf. 8vo. 1722, p. 226. TODD. And all the waves were ftain'd with filthie hewe. Hereby I learned have not to defpife Whatever thing feemes fmall in common An hideous Dragon, dreadfull to behold, Whose backe was arm'd against the dint of fpeare With fhields of braffe that fhone like burnisht golde, And forkhed fting that death in it did beare, Strove with a Spider his unequall peare ; 75 And bad defiance to his enemie. VII. High on a hill a goodly Cedar grewe, 85 VI. 10. bruft,] Spenfer's accustomed mode of spelling burst, agreeably to the practice of our old writers. See the note on bruft, F. Q. iii. i. 48. Some modern editions read burst, TODD. |