For though the poet's matter nature be,
His art doth give the fashion; and, that he
Who casts to write a living line, must sweat-
Such as thine are-and strike the second heat
Upon the Muses' anvil; turn the same,

45

And himself with it, that he thinks to frame;
Or for the laurel, he may gain a scorn;
For a good poet's made as well as born.

And such wert thou! Look how the father's face
Lives in his issue, even so the race

50

Of Shakspeare's mind and manners brightly shines

In his well-turned and true-filed lines:

In each of which he seems to shake a lance,

As brandished at the eyes of ignorance.

Sweet Swan of Avon! what a sight it were

To see thee in our water yet appear,

And make those flights upon the banks of Thames

That so did take Eliza and our James !

But stay, I see thee in the hemisphere

Advanced, and made a constellation there!

Shine forth, thou Star of Poets, and with rage,

Or influence, chide, or cheer the drooping stage,

Which since thy flight from hence hath mourned like night,
And despairs day, but for thy volume's light!

Hymn on the Nativity.

I sing the birth was born to-night,
The Author both of life and light:
The angels so did sound it,
And like the ravished shepherds said,
Who saw the light, and were afraid,

Yet searched, and true they found it.

The Son of God, th' Eternal King,

That did us all salvation bring,

And freed the soul from danger;

He whom the whole world could not take,
The Word, which heaven and earth did make;
Was now laid in a manger.

The Father's wisdom willed it so,
The Son's obedience knew no No,

Both wills were in one stature ;
And as that Wisdom had decreed,
The Word was now made flesh indeed,
And took on Him our nature.

What comfort by him do we win,
Who made Himself the price of sin,
To make us heirs of glory!

See this Babe, all innocence;
A martyr born in our defence:
Can man forget the story?

contain

Beaumont and Fletcher.

(FRANCIS BEAUMONT, 1586-1615: JOHN FLETCHER, 1576-1625.)

William Drummond: 1585-1649.

Spring.

Sweet Spring, thou com'st with all thy goodly train, Thy head with flames, thy mantle bright with flowers, The zephyrs curl the green locks of the plain,

The clouds for joy in pearls weep down their showers. Sweet Spring, thou com'st-but ah! my pleasant hours, And happy days, with thee come not again,

The sad memorials only of my pain

Do with thee come, which turn my sweet to sours.
Thou art the same which still thou wert before,
Delicious, lusty, amiable, fair,

But she whose breath embalmed thy wholesome air,
Is gone; nor gold, nor gems, can her restore.
Neglected virtue! seasons go and come,
While thine forgot lie closèd in a tomb.

The Book of the World.

Of this fair volume which we 'World' do name
If we the sheets and leaves could turn with care,
Of Him who it corrects and did it frame

We clear might read the art and wisdom rare;

Find out His power which wildest powers doth tame,

His providence extending everywhere,

His justice, which proud rebels doth not spare,
In every page-no period of the same.
But silly we, like foolish children, rest

Well pleased with coloured vellum, leaves of gold,
Fair dangling ribands; leaving what is best,
On the great Writer's sense ne'er taking hold;
Or if by chance we stay our minds on aught,
It is some picture on the margin wrought.

Thomas Carew: 1589-1639.
Spring.

Now that the winter 's gone, the earth hath lost
Her snow-white robes, and now no more the frost
Candies the grass, or casts an icy cream
Upon the silver lake, or crystal stream:
But the warm sun thaws the benumbèd earth,
And makes it tender, gives a sacred birth
To the dead swallow, wakes in hollow tree
The drowsy cuckoo and the humble bee.
Now do a quire of chirping minstrels bring
In triumph to the world, the youthful Spring:
The valleys, hills, and woods, in rich array,
Welcome the coming of the longed-for May.
Now all things smile; only my love doth lower;
Nor hath the scalding noon-day sun the power
To melt that marble ice, which still doth hold
Her heart congealed, and makes her pity cold.

John Milton: 1608-1674.

Lycidas.

[In this monody the author bewails a learned friend, unfortunately drowned in his passage from Chester, on the Irish Sea, 1637; and by occasion foretells the ruin of our corrupted clergy, then in their height.]

Yet once more, O ye laurels, and once more,
Ye myrtles brown, with ivy never sere,

I come to pluck your berries harsh and crude;
And, with forced fingers rude,

Shatter your leaves before the mellowing year :
Bitter constraint, and sad occasion dear,
Compels me to disturb your season due :
For Lycidas is dead, dead ere his prime,
Young Lycidas, and hath not left his peer.
Who would not sing for Lycidas? he knew
Himself to sing, and build the lofty rhyme.
He must not float upon his watery bier
Unwept, and welter to the parching wind,
Without the meed of some melodious tear.
Begin, then, Sisters of the sacred well,1

That from beneath the seat of Jove doth spring;
Begin, and somewhat loudly sweep the string.
Hence with denial vain, and coy excuse:
So may some gentle Muse

With lucky words' favour my destined urn;
And as he passes turn,

And bid fair peace be to my sable shroud.
For we were nursed upon the self-same hill,

Fed the same flock, by fountain, shade, and rill.3
Together both, ere the high lawns appeared
Under the opening eyelids of the Morn,
We drove a-field, and both together heard

5

10

roll to and fro

15

poet

20

20

25

to the fields

What time the gray-fly winds her sultry horn,
Battening our flocks with the fresh dews of night,

feeding

Oft till the star that rose at evening, bright,

30

Toward heaven's descent had sloped his westering wheel.

Meanwhile the rural ditties were not mute,

Now thou art gone, and never must return!

Thee, Shepherd, thee the woods and desert caves,

With wild thyme and the gadding vine o'ergrown,
And all their echoes, mourn :

40

The willows and the hazel copses green
Shall now no more be seen

Fanning their joyous leaves to thy soft lays.

1 A fount of the poet's own creation.

2 Lucky words, words of good omen.

3 They belonged to the same college, and had the same pursuits.

4 One of Virgil's characters, supposed to have reference here to some person of eminence in the college.

As killing as the canker to the rose,

Or taint-worm to the weanling herds that graze,
Or frost to flowers, that their gay wardrobe wear,
When first the white-thorn blows;

Such, Lycidas, thy loss to shepherds' ear.

newly weaned

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Where were ye, Nymphs, when the remorseless deep
Closed o'er the head of your loved Lycidas?
For neither were ye playing on the steep,

50

Where your old bards, the famous Druids, lie,

Nor on the shaggy top of Mona high,

Nor yet where Deva spreads her wizard stream:

Anglesea

the Dee 55

Ay me! I fondly dream!

Had ye been there-for what could that have done?
What could the Muse herself that Orpheus bore,1

The Muse herself, for her enchanting son,
Whom universal Nature did lament,

When by the rout that made the hideous roar,
His gory visage down the stream was sent,
Down the swift Hebrus, to the Lesbian shore?
Alas! what boots it with incessant care
To tend the homely, slighted, shepherd's trade,
And strictly meditate the thankless Muse?

practise

Were it not better done, as others use,

To sport with Amaryllis in the shade,
Or with the tangles of Neæra's 3 hair?

Fame is the spur that the clear spirit doth raise-
That last infirmity of noble mind-

To scorn delights, and live laborious days;
But the fair guerdon when we hope to find,
And think to burst out into sudden blaze,
Comes the blind Fury with the abhorrèd shears,
And slits the thin-spun life. But not the praise,'
Phoebus replied, and touched my trembling ears;
'Fame is no plant that grows on mortal soil,
Nor in the glistering foil

Set-off to the world, nor in broad rumour lies;
But lives, and spreads aloft by those pure eyes,
And perfect witness of all-judging Jove;

As he pronounces lastly on each deed,

Of so much fame in heaven expect thy meed.'
O fountain Arethuse,5 and thou honoured flood,
Smooth-sliding Mincius, crowned with vocal reeds,
That strain I heard was of a higher mood:

But now my oat proceeds,

And listens to the herald of the sea

That came in Neptune's plea.

He asked the waves, and asked the felon winds,

1 Calliope, the Muse of epic poetry, was the mother of Orpheus. Orpheus was torn to pieces by the women of Thrace, whom he had treated with contempt. His head was thrown upon the river Hebrus, down which it rolled to the sea, and was borne across to the island of Lesbos. 2 The mistress of the shepherd Tityrus, one of Virgil's characters.

3 The mistress of the shepherd Egon, one of Virgil's characters.

4 Apollo, the god of poetry.

5 A celebrated fountain near Syracuse.

6 The river Mincio, near which Virgil was born.

7 Triton, deputed by Neptune, the god of the sea, to make a judicial inquiry into the matter. M