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SONG FROM "VALENTINIAN."

Care-charming Sleep, thou easer of all woes,
Brother to Death, sweetly thyself dispose
On this afflicted prince: fall like a cloud
In gentle showers; give nothing that is loud
Or painful to his slumbers; easy, sweet,
And as a purling stream, thou son of Night,
Pass by his troubled senses; sing his pain,
Like hollow murmuring wind, or silver rain.
Into this prince gently, oh, gently slide,
And kiss him into slumbers like a bride!

ON THE TOMBS IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY.

FRANCIS BEAUMONT,

Mortality, behold and fear!

What a change of flesh is here!

Think how many royal bones

Sleep within these heaps of stones!
Here they lie, had realms and lands,

Who now want strength to stir their hands,
Where from their pulpits, sealed with dust,
They preach, "In greatness is no trust."
Here's an acre sown indeed
With the richest, royalest seed

That the earth did e'er suck in,

Since the first man died for sin:
Here the bones of birth have cried,
"Though gods they were, as men they died."
Here are sands, ignoble things,
Dropt from the ruined sides of kings:
Here's a world of pomp and state

Buried in dust, once dead by fate.

SONG FROM "ROLLO, DUKE OF NORMANDY."
Take, oh take those lips away,

That so sweetly were forsworn,
And those eyes, the break of day,

Lights that do mislead the morn!
But my kisses bring again,
Seals of love, though sealed in vain.

Hide, oh hide those hills of snow,

Which thy frozen bosom bears, On whose tops the pinks that grow Are of those that April wears: But first set my poor heart free, Bound in those icy chains by thee.

FROM "THE HUMOROUS LIEUTENANT."

Seleucus. Let no man fear to die: we love to sleep all,

And death is but the sounder sleep: all ages,
And all hours call us; 'tis so common, easy,
That little children tread those paths before us.
We are not sick, nor our souls pressed with sorrows,
Nor go we out like tedious tales forgotten:"
High, high, we come, and hearty to our funerals;
And as the sun, that sets in blood, let's fall.
Lysimachus. 'Tis true they have us fast: we can-
not 'scape 'em;

Nor keeps the brow of Fortune one smile for us.
Dishonorable ends we can escape, though,
And worse than those, captivities: we can die;
And, dying nobly, though we leave behind us
These clods of flesh, that are too massy burdens,
Our living souls fly crowned with living conquests.

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FROM "THE CUSTOM OF THE COUNTRY."
What sacrifice of thanks, what age of service,
What danger of more dreadful look than death,
What willing martyrdom to crown me constant,
May merit such a goodness, such a sweetness?
A love so nobly great no power can ruin :
Most blessed maid, go on: the gods that gave
this,

This pure unspotted love, the Child of Heaven,
In their own goodness must preserve and save it,
And raise you a reward beyond our recompense.

Philip Massinger.

Massinger (circa 1584-1640) began to write plays in the reign of James I. Like many of his literary brethren, he was poor, and one morning was found dead in his bed at Southwark. No stone marks his neglected restingplace, but in the parish register appears this brief memorial: "March 20, 1639-1640.-Buried Philip Massinger, a STRANGER." His sepulchre was like his life-obscure. Like the nightingale, he sang darkling-it is to be feared, like the nightingale of the fable, with his breast against a thorn. Eighteen of his plays are in print; and one of these, "A New Way to Pay Old Debts," is still often played at our theatres. Sir Giles Overreach, a greedy, crafty money-getter, is the great character of this powerful drama. This part was among the best personations of Kean and Booth.

FROM "A NEW WAY TO PAY OLD DEBTS." Mary. Your pleasure, sir?

Overreach. Ha! this is a neat dressing!
These orient pearls and diamonds well placed too!
The gown affects me not: it should have been
Embroidered o'er and o'er with flowers of gold;
But these rich jewels and quaint fashion help it.
And how below? since oft the wanton eye,
The face observed, descends unto the foot,
Which, being well-proportioned, as yours is,
Invites as much as perfect white and red,
Though without art.

How like you your new woman,
The Lady Downfallen?

Mary. Well for a companion,

Not for a servant. * ** I pity her fortune.
Over. Pity her? Trample on her!

Mary. You know your own ways; but for me,
I blush

When I command her, that was once attended
With persons not inferior to myself
In birth.

Over. In birth? Why, art thou not my daugh

ter,

The blest child of my industry and wealth?
Why, foolish girl, was 't not to make thee great
That I have run, and still pursue, those ways
That hale down curses on me, which I mind not?
Part with these humble thoughts, and apt thyself
To the noble state I labor to advance thee;
Or, by my hopes to see thee honorable,

I will adopt a stranger to my heir,

And throw thee from my care! do not provoke me!

WAITING FOR DEATH.

FROM "THE EMPEROR OF THE EAST."

Why art thou slow, thou rest of trouble, Death,
To stop a wretch's breath

That calls on thee, and offers her sad heart
A prey unto thy dart?

I am nor young nor fair; be, therefore, bold.
Sorrow hath made me old,

John Ford.

Ford (1586-1639), a Devonshire man, belonged to the brilliant dramatic brotherhood of his period. He united authorship with practice as a lawyer. Hallam says that Ford has "the power over tears;" but his themes are often painful and even revolting.

MUSICAL CONTEST WITH A NIGHTINGALE.

FROM "THE LOVER'S MELANCHOLY."

Menaphon. Passing from Italy to Greece, the tales
Which poets of an elder time have feigned
To glorify their Tempe bred in me
Desire of visiting that Paradise.

To Thessaly I came; and living private,
Without acquaintance of more sweet companions
Than the old inmates to my love, my thoughts,
I day by day frequented silent groves
And solitary walks. One morning early
This accident encountered me: I heard
The sweetest and most ravishing contention
That art and nature ever were at strife in.
Amethus. I cannot yet conceive what you infer
By art and nature.

Men. I shall soon resolve you.

A sound of music touched mine ears, or, rather,
Indeed, entranced my soul: as I stole nearer,
Invited by the melody, I saw

This youth, this fair-faced youth, upon his lute,
With strains of strange variety and harmony,
Proclaiming, as it seemed, so bold a challenge
To the clear choristers of the woods, the birds,
That, as they flocked about him, all stood silent,
Wondering at what they heard. I wondered too.
Amet. And so do I. Good! On-

Men. A nightingale,

Nature's best-skilled musician, undertakes
The challenge; and for every several strain
The well-shaped youth could touch, she sung her

own.

He could not run divisions with more art
Upon his quaking instrument, than she,
The nightingale, did, with her various notes,
Reply to; for a voice, and for a sound,
Amethus, 'tis much easier to believe

That such they were than hope to hear again.
Amet. How did the rivals part?
Men. You term them rightly;

For they were rivals, and their mistress, harmony.
Some time thus spent, the young man grew at last
Into a pretty anger that a bird,

Whom art had never taught cliffs, moods, or notes,
Should vie with him for mastery, whose study
Had busied many hours to perfect practice.
To end the controversy,-in a rapture
Upon his instrument he plays so swiftly,
So many voluntaries, and so quick,
That there was curiosity and cunning,

Concord in discord, lines of differing method
Meeting in one full centre of delight.

Amet. Now for the bird.

Men. The bird, ordained to be

Music's first martyr, strove to imitate

These several sounds; which when her warbling

throat

Failed in, for grief down dropt she on his lute, And brake her heart. It was the quaintest sadness To see the conqueror upon her hearse

To weep a funeral elegy of tears:

That, trust me, my Amethus-I could chide
Mine own unmanly weakness-that made me
A fellow-mourner with him.

Amet. I believe thee.

Men. He looked upon the trophies of his art, Then sighed, then wiped his eyes; then sighed and cried,

"Alas! poor creature, I will soon revenge
This cruelty upon the author of it.
Henceforth this lute, guilty of innocent blood,
Shall nevermore betray a harmless peace
To an untimely end:"-and in that sorrow,
As he was pashing it against a tree,
I suddenly stept in.'

William Drummond.

Drummond (1585-1649), "the first Scotch poet who wrote well in English" (according to Southey), was born at Hawthornden, near Edinburgh. His father, Sir John Drummond, held a situation about the person of James VI. (afterward James I. of England). The poet studied law, but relinquished it, as his delight was in literature. Drayton and Ben Jonson were among his friends; and he says of the latter, "He dissuaded me from poetry for that she had beggared him when he might have been a rich lawyer, physician, or merchant." Drummond reproduced the conventional Italian sonnet with success. He died, it is said, of grief at the execution of Charles I.

THE UNIVERSE.

Of this fair volume which we World do name,
If we the leaves and sheets 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 and period of the same.

1 Crashaw has versified this incident in his "Music's Duel," which, like most imitations, is far inferior, in simplicity and point, to the original.

But silly we, like foolish children, rest

Well pleased with colored vellum, leaves of gold,
Fair dangling ribauds, 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.

Leigh Hunt, and Charles Lamb. He was styled by Philips (1675) "a most profuse pourer forth of English rhyme." A vein of honesty, or at least earnestness in present conviction, seems to run through his inconsistencies. He died in misery and obscurity, at the age of seventy-nine.

MAN'S STRANGE ENDS.

A good that never satisfies the mind,

A beauty fading like the April flowers,

A sweet with floods of gall that runs combined, A pleasure passing ere in thought made ours, An honor that more fickle is than wind,

A glory at opinion's frown that lowers,

A treasury which bankrupt time devours,

A knowledge than grave ignorance more blind,
A vain delight our equals to command,
A style of greatness, in effect a dream,
A swelling thought of holding sea and land,
A servile lot decked with a pompous name,-
Are the strange ends we toil for here below,
Till wisest death makes us our errors know.

THE HUNT.

This world a hunting is;

The prey, poor man; the Nimrod fierce is Death; His speedy greyhounds are,

Lust, Sickness, Envy, Care,

Strife that ne'er falls amiss,

With all those ills which haunt us while we

breathe.

Now, if by chance we fly

Of these the eager chase,

Old Age with stealing pace

Casts on his nets, and there we, panting, die.

George Wither.

Wither (1588-1667) was a native of Hampshire, and a prolific writer in James's reign. In 1613 he was impris oned in the Marshalsea for having written a satire called "Abuses Stript and Whipt." He was a Royalist under Charles I., but changed his politics, and, having sold his estate, raised a troop of horse for the Parliament. Taken prisoner by the Royalists in 1642, he is said to have owed his life to Sir John Denham, who requested the king not to hang Wither, because, while he lived, Denham would not be thought the worst poet in England. Wither has been highly praised by Campbell, Sir Egerton Brydges,

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She doth tell me where to borrow
Comfort in the midst of sorrow;
Makes the desolatest place

To her presence be a grace;
And the blackest discontents
Be her fairest ornaments.
In my former days of bliss,
Her divine skill taught me this,
That from everything I saw,
I could some invention draw,
And raise pleasure to her height,
Through the meanest object's sight;
By the murmur of a spring,
Or the least bough's rustling.
By a daisy, whose leaves spread,
Shut when Titan goes to bed;
Or a shady bush or tree,
She could more infuse in me,
Than all nature's beauties can
In some other wiser man.

By her help, I also now,
Make this churlish place allow
Some things that may sweeten gladness,
In the very gall of sadness.
The dull loneness, the black shade,
That these hanging vaults have made;

The strange music of the waves,
Beating on these hollow caves;
This black den which rocks emboss,
Overgrown with eldest moss;
The rude portals that give light,
More to terror than delight;
This my chamber of neglect,
Walled about with disrespect;
From all these, and this dull air,
A fit object for despair,

She hath taught me by her might
To draw comfort and delight.

Therefore, thou best earthly bliss, I will cherish thee for this: Poesie, thou sweet'st content That e'er Heaven to mortals lent, Though they as a trifle leave thee, Whose dull thoughts cannot conceive thee; Though thou be to them a scorn, That to naught but earth are boru,— Let my life no longer be

Than I am in love with thee!

Though our wise ones call it madness,
Let me never taste of gladness,
If I love not thy maddest fits
Above all their greatest wits.
And though some, too seeming holy,
Do account thy raptures folly,
Thou dost teach me to contemn

What makes kuaves and fools of them.

THE HEAVENLY FATHER AND HIS ERRING

CHILD.

Yet I confess in this my pilgrimage,

I like some infant am, of tender age.

For as the child who from his father hath
Strayed in some grove thro' many a crooked path,
Is sometimes hopeful that he finds the way,
And sometimes doubtful he runs more astray;
Sometime with fair and easy paths doth meet,
Sometime with rougher tracts that stay his feet;
Here goes, there runs, and yon amazéd stays,
Then cries, and straight forgets his care, and plays:
Then, hearing where his loving father calls,
Makes haste, but, thro' a zeal ill-guided, falls;
Or runs some other way, until that he
(Whose love is more than his endeavors be)
To seek the wanderer, forth himself doth come,
And take him in his arms and bear him home:-

So in this life, this grove of ignorance,

As to my homeward, I myself advance,

Sometimes aright, and sometimes wrong I go,
Sometimes my pace is speedy, sometimes slow:
One while my ways are pleasant unto me,
Another while as full of cares they be.

I doubt and hope, and doubt and hope again,
And many a change of passion I sustain,
In this my journey, so that now and then
I lost, perhaps, may seem to other men,-
Yea, to myself, awhile, when sins impure
Do my Redeemer's love from me obscure!
But whatsoe'er betide, I know full well
My Father, who above the clouds doth dwell,
An eye upon his wandering child doth cast,
And he will fetch me to my home at last.

VANISHED BLESSINGS.

The voice which I did more esteem Than music in her sweetest key, Those eyes which unto me did seem

More comfortable than the dayThose now by me, as they have been, Shall never more be heard or seen; But what I once enjoyed in them Shall seem hereafter as a dream.

All earthly comforts vanish thus;
So little hold of them have we,
That we from them, or they from us,
May in a moment ravished be.
Yet we are neither just nor wise,

If present mercies we despise ;
Or mind not how there may be made
A thankful use of what we had.

I WILL SING AS I SHALL PLEASE.

Pedants shall not tie my strains
To our antique poets' veins;
As if we in later days

Know to love, but not to praise;
Being born as free as these,

I will sing as I shall please,
Who as well new paths may run,

As the best before have done.

I disdain to make my song

For their pleasure short or long:

If I please I'll end it here,

If I list I'll sing this year,

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