The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) Volume I.

by Theophilus Cibber

PETER HAUSTED.

This gentleman was born at Oundle in Northamptonshire, and received his education in Queen's-College, Cambridge. After he had taken his degrees, he entered into holy orders, became curate of Uppingham in Rutlandshire; and according to Wood in his Fasti Oxon. was at length made rector of Hadham in Hertfordshire. Upon the breaking out of the civil wars, he was made chaplain to Spencer Earl of Northampton, to whom he adhered in all his engagements for the Royal Interest, and was with him in the castle of Banbury in Oxfordshire, when it was vigorously defended against the Parliament's forces. In that castle Mr. Wood says, he concluded his last moments in the year 1645, and was buried within the precincts of it, or else in the church belonging to Banbury.

This person, whom both Langbaine and Wood account a very ingenious man, and an excellent poet, has written the following pieces:

Rival Friends, a Comedy; acted before the King and Queen when their Majesties paid a Visit to the University of Cambridge, upon the 19th of March, 1631; which Mr. Langbaine thus characterizes. "It was cried down by Boys, Faction, Envy, and confident Ignorance; approved by the Judicious, and exposed to the Public by the Author, printed in 4to. Lond. 1632, and dedicated by a copy of Verses, to the Right Honourable, Right Reverend, Right Worshipful, or whatever he be, shall be, or whom he hereafter may call patron. The Play is commended by a copy of Latin Verses, and two in English. The Prologue is a Dialogue between Venus, Thetis, and Phoebus, sung by two Trebles, and a Base. Venus appearing at a Window above, as risen, calling to Sol, who lay in Thetis lap, at the East side of the Stage, canopy'd with an Azure Curtain. Our Author," continues Langbaine, "seems to be much of the Humour of Ben Johnson, whose greatest Weakness was, that he could not bear Censure, and has so great a Value for Ben's Writings, that his Scene between Loveall, Mungrel, and Hammeshin Act 3. Scene 7, is copied from Ben Johnson's Silent Woman, between True-wit, Daw, and La-fool, Act 4. Scene 5."

2. Ten Sermons preached upon several Sundays, and Saints Days, London 1636, 4to. To which is added an Assize Sermon.

3. Ad Populum, a Lecture to the People, with a Satire against Sedition, Oxon, 1644, in three Sheets in 4to.

This is a Poem, and the Title of it was given by King Charles I. who seeing it in Manuscript, with the Title of a Sermon to the People, he altered it, and caused it to be called a Lecture, being much delighted with it.

This Author also translated into English, Hymnus, Tobaci, &c. Lond. 1651, 8vo.

* * * * *

WILLIAM DRUMMOND of HAWTHORNDEN Esq;

This gentleman was a native of Scotland, and a poet of no inconsiderable rank. We had at first some doubt whether he fell within our design, as being no Englishman, but upon observing that Mr. Langbaine has given a place to the earl of Stirling, a man of much inferior note; and that our author, though a Scotchman, wrote extremely pure and elegant English, and his life, that is fruitful of a great many incidents, without further apology, it is here presented to the reader.

He was born the 13th of November, 1585; his father was Sir John Drummond of Hawthornden, who was Gentleman Usher to King James VI. but did not enjoy that place long, being in three months after he was raised to his new dignity, taken away by death[1]. The family of Drummond in the article of antiquity is inferior to none in Scotland, where that kind of distinction is very much regarded.

The first years of our author's youth were spent at the high school at Edinburgh, where the early promises of that extraordinary genius, which afterwards appeared in him, became very conspicuous. He was in due time sent to the university of Edinburgh, where after the ordinary stay, he was made Master of Arts. When his course at the university was finished, he did not, like the greatest part of giddy students, give over reading, and vainly imagine they have a sufficient stock of learning: he had too much sense thus to deceive himself; he knew that an education at the university is but the ground-work of knowledge, and that unless a man digests what he has there learned, and endeavours to produce it into life with advantage, so many years attendance were but entirely thrown away. Being convinced of this truth, he continued to read the best authors of antiquity, whom he not only retained in his memory, but so digested, that he became quite master of them, and able to make such observations on their genius and writings, as fully shewed that his judgment had been sufficiently exercised in reading them.

In the year 1606 his father sent him into France, he being then only twenty-one years old. He studied at Bourges the civil law, with great diligence and applause, and was master not only of the dictates of the professors, but made also his own observations on them, which occasioned the learned president Lockhart to observe, that if Mr. Drummond had followed the practice, he might have made the best figure of any lawyer in his time; but like all other men of wit, he saw more charms in Euripides, Sophocles, Seneca, and other the illustrious ancients, than in the dry wranglings of the law; as there have been often instances of poets, and men of genius being educated to the law, so here it may not be amiss to observe, that we remember not to have met with one amongst them who continued in that profession, a circumstance not much in its favour, and is a kind of proof, that the professors of it are generally composed of men who are capable of application, but without genius. Mr. Drummond having, as we have already observed, a sovereign contempt for the law, applied himself to the sublimer studies of poetry and history, in both which he became very eminent. Having relinquished all thoughts of the bar, or appearing in public, he retired to his pleasant seat at Hawthornden, and there, by reading the Greek and Latin authors, enriched the world with the product of his solitary hours. After he had recovered a very dangerous fit of sickness, he wrote his Cypress Grove, a piece of excellent prose, both for the fineness of the stile, and the sublimity and piety of the sentiments: In which he represents the vanity and instability of human affairs; teaches a due contempt of the world; proposes consolations against the fear of death, and gives us a view of eternal happiness. Much about this time he wrote the Flowers of Sion in verse. Though the numbers in which these poems are wrote are not now very fashionable, yet the harmony is excellent, and during the reign of King James and Charles I. we have met with no poet who seems to have had a better ear, or felt more intimately the passion he describes. The writer of his life already mentioned, observes, that notwithstanding his close retirement, love stole upon him, and entirely subdued his heart. He needed not to have assigned retirement as a reason why it should seem strange that love grew upon him, for retirement in its own nature is the very parent of love. When a man converses with but few ladies, he is apt to fall in love with her who charms him most; whereas were his attention dissipated, and his affections bewildered by variety, he would be preserved from love by not being able to fix them; which is one reason why we always find people in the country have more enthusiastic notions of love, than those who move in the hurry of life. This beautiful young lady, with whom Mr. Drummond was enamoured, was daughter of Mr. Cunningham of Barnes, of an ancient and honourable family. He made his addresses to her in the true spirit of gallantry, and as he was a gentleman who had seen the world, and consequently was accomplished in the elegancies of life, he was not long in exciting proper returns of passion; he gained her affections, and when the day of the marriage was appointed, and all things ready for its solemnization, she was seized with a fever, and snatched from him, when his imagination had figured those scenes of rapture which naturally fill the mind of a bridegroom. As our author was a poet, he no doubt was capable of forming still a greater ideal fealt, than a man of ordinary genius, and as his mistress was, as Rowe expresses it, 'more than painting can express,' or 'youthful poets fancy when they love,' those who have felt that delicate passion, may be able in some measure to judge of the severity of distress into which our poetical bridegroom was now plunged: After the fervours of sorrow had in some measure subsided, he expressed his grief for her in several letters and poems, and with more passion and sincerity celebrated his dead mistress, than others praise their living ones. This extraordinary shock occasioned by the young lady's death, on whom he doated with such excessive fondness, so affected his spirits, that in order as much as possible to endeavour to forget her, he quitted his retirement, and resided eight years at Paris and Rome; he travelled through Germany, France and Italy, where he visited all the famous universities, conversed with the learned men, and made an excellent collection of the best ancient Greek, and of the modern Spanish, French, and Italian books. Mr. Drummond, though a scholar and a man of genius, did not think it beneath him to improve himself in those gay accomplishments which are so peculiar to the French, and which never fail to set off wit and parts to the best advantage. He studied music, and is reported to have possessed the genteel accomplishment of dancing, to no inconsiderable degree.

After a long stay of eight years abroad, he returned again to his native country, where a civil war was ready to break out. He then found that as he could be of no service by his action, he might at least by his retirement, and during the confusion, he went to the feat of his Brother-in-law, Sir John Scott, of Scotts Tarvat, a man of learning and good sense. In this interval it is supposed he wrote his History of the Five James's, successively Kings of Scotland, which is so excellent a work, whether we consider the exact conduct of the story, the judicious reflections, and the fine language, that no Historian either of the English or Scotch nation (the lord Clarendon excepted) has shewn a happier talent for that species of writing, which tho' it does not demand the highest genius, yet is as difficult to attain, as any other kind of literary excellence. This work was received in England with as much applause, as if it had been written by a countryman of their own, and about English affairs. It was first published six or seven years after the author's death, with a preface, or introduction by Mr. Hall of Grays-Inn, who, tho' not much disposed to think favourably of the Scotch nation, has yet thus done justice to Mr. Drummond; for his manner of writing, says he, "though he treats of things that are rather many than great, and rather troublesome than glorious; yet he has brought so much of the main together, as it may be modestly said, none of that nation has done before him, and for his way of handling it, he has sufficiently made it appear, how conversant he was with the writings of venerable antiquity, and how generously he has emulated them by a happy imitation, for the purity of that language is much above the dialect he wrote in; his descriptions lively and full, his narrations clear and pertinent, his orations eloquent, and fit for the persons who speak, and his reflections solid and mature, so that it cannot be expected that these leaves can be turned over without as much pleasure as profit, especially meeting with so many glories, and trophies of our ancestors." In this history Mr. Drummond has chiefly followed bishop Elphiston, and has given a different turn to things from Buchanan, whom a party of the Scotch accuse of being a pensioner of Queen Elizabeth's, and as he joined interest with the earl of Murray, who wanted to disturb the reign of his much injured sister Mary Queen of Scots, he is strongly suspected of being a party writer, and of having misrepresented the Scotch transactions of old, in order to serve some scheme of policy.

In the short notes which Mr. Drummond has left behind him in his own life, he says, that he was the first in the island that ever celebrated a dead mistress; his poems consist chiefly of Love-Verses, Madrigals, Epigrams, Epitaphs, &c. they were highly esteemed by his contemporaries both for the wit and learning that shone in them. Edward Philips, Milton's nephew, writes a preface to them, and observes, 'that his poems are the effects of genius, the most polite and verdant that ever the Scots nation produced, and says, that if he should affirm, that neither Tasso, Guarini, or any of the most neat and refined spirits of Italy, nor even the choicest of our English poets can challenge any advantage above him, it could not be judged any attribute superior to what he deserves; and for his history he says, had there been nothing else extant of his writings, consider but the language how florid and ornate it is; consider the order and prudent conduct of the story, and you will rank him in the number of the best writers, and compare him even with Thuanus himself: Neither is he less happy in his verse than prose, for here are all those graces met together, that conduce any thing towards the making up a compleat and perfect poet, a decent and becoming majesty, a brave and admirable heighth, and a wit flowing.' Thus far the testimony of Mr. Philips.

In order to divert himself and his friends, he wrote a small poem which he called Polemio-Middinia; 'tis a sort of Macronic poetry, in which the Scots words are put in Latin terminations. In Queen Anne's time it was reprinted at Oxford, with a preface concerning Macronic poetry. It has been often reprinted in Scotland, where it is thought a very humorous performance.

Our author, who we have already seen, suffered so much by the immature fate of his first mistress, thought no more of love for many years after her decease, but seeing by accident one Elizabeth Logan, grandchild to Sir Robert Logan, who by the great resemblance she bore to his first favourite, rekindled again the flame of love; she was beautiful in his eyes because she recalled to his mind the dear image of her he mourned, and by this lucky similarity she captivated him. Though he was near 45 years of age, he married this lady; she bore to him several children; William, who was knighted in Charles II's time; Robert, and Elizabeth, who was married to one Dr. Henderson, a physician, at Edinburgh.

In the time of the public troubles, Mr. Drummond, besides composing his history, wrote several tracts against the measures of the covenanters, and those engaged in the opposition of Charles I. In a piece of his called Irene, he harangues the King, nobility, gentry, clergy and commons, about their mutual mistakes, jealousies and fears; he lays before them the dismal consequences of a civil war, from indisputable arguments, and the histories of past times. The great marquis of Montrose writ a letter to him, desiring him to print this Irene, as the best means to quiet the minds of the distracted people; he likewise sent him a protection, dated August, 1645, immediately after the battle of Kylsyth, with another letter, in which he highly commends Mr. Drummond's learning and loyalty. Besides this work of Irene, he wrote the Load Star, and an Address to the Noblemen, Barons, Gentlemen, &c. who leagued themselves for the defence of the liberties and religion of Scotland, the whole purport of which is, to calm the disturbed minds of the populace, to reason the better sort into loyalty, and to check the growing evils which he saw would be the consequence of their behaviour. Those of his own countrymen, for whom he had the greatest esteem, were Sir William Alexander, afterwards earl of Stirling, Sir Robert Carr, afterwards earl of Ancram, from whom the present marquis of Lothian is descended, Dr. Arthur Johnston, physician to King Charles I. and author of a Latin Paraphrase of the Psalms, and Mr. John Adamson, principal of the college of Edinburgh. He had great intimacy and correspondence with the two famous English poets, Michael Drayton, and Ben Johnson, the latter of whom travelled from London on foot, to see him at his seat at Hawthornden. During the time Ben remained with Mr. Drummond, they often held conversation about poetry and poets, and Mr. Drummond has preserved the heads of what passed between them; and as part of it is very curious, and serves to illustrate the character of Johnson, we have inserted it in his life: though it perhaps was not altogether fair in Mr. Drummond, to commit to writing things that passed over a bottle, and which perhaps were heedlesly advanced. It is certain some of the particulars which Mr. Drummond has preferred, are not much in Ben's favour, and as few people are so wise as not to speak imprudently sometimes, so it is not the part of a man, who invites another to his table, to expose-what may there drop inadvertently; but as Mr. Drummond had only made memorandums, perhaps with no resolution to publish them, he may stand acquitted of part of this charge. It is reported of our author that he was very smart, and witty in his repartees, and had a most excellent talent at extempore versifying, above any poet of his time. In the year 1645, when the plague was raging in Scotland, our author came accidentally to Forfar, but was not allowed to enter any house, or to get lodging in the town, though it was very late; he went two miles further to Kirrimuir, where he was well received, and kindly entertained. Being informed that the towns of Forfar and Kirrimuir had a contest about a piece of ground called the Muirmoss, he wrote a letter to the Provost of Forfar, to be communicated to the town-council in haste: It was imagined this letter came from the Estates, who were then sitting at St. Andrew's; so the Common-Council was called with all expedition, and, the minister sent for to pray for direction and assistance in answering the letter, which was opened in a solemn manner. It contained the following lines,

The Kirrimorians and Forforians met at Muirmoss,
The Kirrimorians beat the Forforians back to the cross,
[2]Sutors ye are, and sutors ye'll be
T——y upon Forfar, Kirrimuir bears the gree.

By this innocent piece of mirth he revenged himself on the town of Forfar. As our author was a great cavalier, and addicted to the King's party, he was forced by the reformers to send men to the army which fought against the King, and his estate lying in three different counties; he had not occasion to send one entire man, but halves, and quarters, and such like fractions, that is, the money levied upon him as his share, did not amount to the maintaining one man, but perhaps half as much, and so on through the several counties, where his estates lay; upon this he wrote the following verses to the King.

Of all these forces, rais'd against the King,
'Tis my strange hap not one whole man to bring,
From diverse parishes, yet diverse men,
But all in halves, and quarters: great king then,
In halves, and quarters, if they come, 'gainst
thee,
In halves and quarters send them back to me.

Being reputed a malignant, he was extremely harrassed by the prevailing party, and for his verses and discourses frequently summoned before their circular tables. In the short account of his life written by himself, he says, 'that he never endeavoured to advance his fortune, or increase such things as were left him by his parents, as he foresaw the uncertainty and shortness of life, and thought this world's advantages not worth struggling for.' The year 1649, remarkable for the beheading of Charles I. put likewise a period to the life of our author: Upon hearing the dismal news that his Sovereign's blood was shed on a scaffold, he was so overwhelmed with grief, and being worn down with study, he could not overcome the shock, and though we find not that he ever was in arms for the King, yet he may be said, in some sense, to have fallen a sacrifice to his loyalty. He was a man of fine natural endowments, which were cultivated by reading and travelling; he spoke the Italian, Spanish, and French languages as well as his mother tongue; he was a judicious and great historian, a delicate poet, a master of polite erudition, a loyal subject, a friend to his country, and to sum up all, a pious christian.

Before his works are prefixed several copies of verses in his praise, with which we shall not trouble the reader, but conclude the life of this great man, with the following sonnet from his works, as a specimen of the delicacy of his muse.

I know, that all beneath the moon decays,
And what by mortals in this world is brought,
In times great period shall return to nought;
That fairest states have fatal nights and days;
I know that all the Muses heavenly lays,
With toil of spirit, which are so dearly bought.
As idle sounds, of few or none are sought,
That there is nothing lighter than vain praise.
I know frail beauty like the purple flower,
To which one morn, oft birth, and death affords,
That love a jarring is, of minds accords,
Where sense, and will, bring under reason's
power:
Know what I lift, all this cannot me move,
But, that alas, I both must write and love.

[Footnote 1: The reader will please to observe, that I have taken the most material part, of this account of Mr. Drummond, from a life of him prefixed to a 4to Edition printed at Edinburgh, 1711.]

[Footnote 2: Shoemakers.]

* * * * *

WILLIAM ALEXANDER, Earl of STIRLING.

It is agreed by the antiquaries of Scotland, where this nobleman was born, that his family was originally a branch of the Macdonalds. Alexander Macdonald, their ancestor, obtained from the family of Argyle a grant of the lands of Menstry, in Clackmananshire, where they fixed their residence, and took their sirnames from the Christian name of their predecessor[1]. Our author was born in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, and during the minority of James VI. of Scotland, but on what year cannot be ascertained; he gave early discoveries of a rising genius, and much improved the fine parts he had from nature, by a very polite and extensive education. He first travelled abroad as tutor to the earl of Argyle, and was a considerable time with that nobleman, while they visited foreign countries. After his return, being happy in so great a patron as the earl of Argyle, and finished in all the courtly accomplishments, he was caressed by persons of the first fashion, while he yet moved in the sphere of a private gentleman.

Mr. Alexander having a strong propensity to poetry, he declined entering upon any public employment for some years, and dedicated all his time to the reading of the ancient poets, upon which he formed his taste, and whose various graces he seems to have understood. King James of Scotland, who with but few regal qualities, yet certainly had a propension to literature, and was an encourager of learned men, took Mr. Alexander early into his favour. He accepted the poems our author presented him, with the most condescending marks of esteem, and was so warm in his interest, that in the year 1614, he created him a knight, and by a kind of compulsion, obliged him to accept the place of Master of the Requests[2]; but the King's bounty did not stop here: Our author having settled a colony in Nova Scotia in America, at his own expence, James made him a grant of it, by his Royal Deed, on the 21st of September, 1621, and intended to have erected the order of Baronet, for encouraging and advancing so good a work; but the three last years of that prince's reign being rendered troublesome to him, by reason of the jealousies and commotions which then subsisted in England, he thought fit to suspend the further prosecution of that affair, 'till a more favourable crisis, which he lived not to see.

As soon as King Charles I. ascended the throne, who inherited from his father the warmest affection for his native country, he endeavoured to promote that design, which was likely to produce so great a benefit to the nation, and therefore created Sir William Alexander Lord Lieutenant of New Scotland, and instituted the order of Knight Baronet, for the encouraging, and advancing that colony, and gave him the power of coining small copper money, a privilege which some discontented British subjects complained of with great bitterness; but his Majesty, who had the highest opinion of the integrity and abilities of Sir William, did not on that account withdraw his favour from him, but rather encreased it; for in the year 1626 he made him Secretary of State for Scotch affairs, in place of the earl of Haddington, and a Peer, by the title of Viscount Stirling, and soon after raised him to the dignity of an Earl, by Letters Patent, dated June 14, 1633, upon the solemnity of his Majesty's Coronation at the Palace of Holy-rood-house in Edinburgh. His lordship enjoyed the place of secretary with the most unblemished reputation, for the space of fifteen years, even to his death, which happened on the 12th of February, 1640.

Our author married the daughter of Sir William Erskine, Baronet, cousin german to the earl of Marr, then Regent of Scotland; by her he had one son, who died his Majesty's Resident in Nova Scotia in the life time of his father, and left behind him a son who succeeded his grandfather in the title of earl of Stirling.

His lordship is author of four plays, which he stiles Monarchic Tragedies, viz. The Alexandræan Tragedy, Cræsus, Darius, and Julius Cæsar, all which in the opinion of the ingenious Mr. Coxeter (whose indefatigable industry in collecting materials for this work, which he lived not to publish, has furnished the present Biographers with many circumstances they could not otherwise have known) were written in his lordship's youth, and before he undertook any state employment.

These plays are written upon the model of the ancients, as appears by his introducing the Chorus between the Acts; they are grave and sententious throughout, like the Tragedies of Seneca, and yet the softer and tender passions are sometimes very delicately touched. The author has been very unhappy in the choice of his verse, which is alternate, like the quatrains of the French poet Pibrach, or Sir William Davenant's heroic poem called Gondibert, which kind of verse is certainly unnatural for Tragedy, as it is so much removed from prose, and cannot have that beautiful simplicity, that tender pathos, which is indispensable to the language of tragedy; Mr. Rymer has criticised with great judgment on this error of our author, and shewn the extreme absurdity of writing plays in rhime, notwithstanding the great authority of Dryden can be urged in its defence.

Writing plays upon the model of the ancients, by introducing choruses, can be defended with as little force. It is the nature of a tragedy to warm the heart, rouze the passions, and fire the imagination, which can never be done, while the story goes languidly on. The soul cannot be agitated unless the business of the play rises gradually, the scene be kept busy, and leading characters active: we cannot better illustrate this observation, than by an example.

One of the best poets of the present age, the ingenious Mr. Mason of Cambridge, has not long ago published a Tragedy upon the model of the ancients, called Elfrida; the merit of this piece, as a poem has been confessed by the general reading it has obtained; it is full of beauties; the language is perfectly poetical, the sentiments chaste, and the moral excellent; there is nothing in our tongue can much exceed it in the flowry enchantments of poetry, or the delicate flow of numbers, but while we admire the poet, we pay no regard to the character; no passion is excited, the heart is never moved, nor is the reader's curiosity ever raised to know the event. Want of passion and regard to character, is the error of our present dramatic poets, and it is a true observation made by a gentleman in an occasional prologue, speaking of the wits from Charles II. to our own times, he says,

From bard, to bard, the frigid caution crept,
And declamation roared while passion slept.

But to return to our author's plays;

The Alexandræan Tragedy is built upon the differences about the succession, that rose between Alexander's captains after his decease; he has borrowed many thoughts, and translated whole speeches from Seneca, Virgil, &c. In this play his lordship seems to mistake the very essence of the drama, which consists in action, for there is scarce one action performed in view of the audience, but several persons are introduced upon the stage, who relate atchievements done by themselves and others: the two first acts are entirely foreign to the business of the play. Upon the whole it must be allowed that his lordship was a very good historian, for the reader may learn from it a great deal of the affairs of Greece and Rome; for the plot see Quintus Curtius, the thirteenth Book of Justin, Diodorus Siculus, Jofephus, Raleigh's History, &c. The Scene is in Babylon.

Cræsus, a Tragedy; the Scene of this Play is laid in Sardis, and is reckoned the most moving of the four; it is chiefly borrowed from Herodotus, Clio, Justin, Plutarch's Life of Solon, Salian, Torniel. In the fifth Act there is an Episode of Abradates and Panthæa, which the author has taken from Xenophon's Cyropædeia, or The Life and Education of Cyrus, lib. vii. The ingenious Scudery has likewise built upon this foundation, in his diverting Romance called the Grand Cyrus.

Darius, a Tragedy; this was his lordship's first dramatic performance; it was printed at Edinburgh in 4to. in the year 1603; it was first composed of a mixture of English and Scotch dialect, and even then was commended by several copies of verses. The Scene of this Play is laid in Babylon. The author afterwards not only polished his native language, but altered the Play itself; as to the plot consult Q. Curtius, Diodorus Siculus, Justin, Plutarch's Life of Alexander, &c. Julius Cæsar, a Tragedy. In the fifth Act of this Play, my lord brings Brutus, Cassius, Cicero, Anthony, &c. together, after the death of Cæsar, almost in the same circumstances Shakespear has done in his Play of this name; but the difference between the Anthony and Brutus of Shakespear, and these characters drawn by the earl of Stirling, is as great, as the genius of the former transcended the latter. This is the most regular of his lordship's plays in the unity of action. The story of this Play is to be found in all the Roman Histories written since the death of that Emperor.

His lordship has acknowledged the stile of his dramatic works not to be pure, for which in excuse he has pleaded his country, the Scotch dialect then being in a very imperfect state. Having mentioned the Scotch dialect, it will not be improper to observe, that it is at this time much in the same degree of perfection, that the English language was, in the reigns of Henry VIII. and Queen Elizabeth; there are idioms peculiar to the Scotch, which some of their best writers have not been able entirely to forget, and unless they reside in England for some time, they seldom overcome them, and their language is greatly obscured by these means; but the reputation which some Scotch writers at present enjoy, make it sufficiently clear, that they are not much wanting in perspicuity or elegance, of which Mr. Hume, the ingenious author of Essays Moral and Political, is an instance. In the particular quality of fire, which is indispensible in a good writer, the Scotch authors have rather too much of it, and are more apt to be extravagantly animated, than correctly dull.

Besides these Plays, our author wrote several other Poems of a different kind, viz. Doomsday, or the Great Day of the Lord's Judgment, first printed 1614, and a Poem divided into 12 Book, which the author calls Hours; In this Poem is the following emphatic line, when speaking of the divine vengeance falling upon the wicked; he calls it

A weight of wrath, more than ten worlds could bear.

A very ingenious gentleman of Oxford, in a conversation with the author of this Life, took occasion to mention the above line as the best he had ever read consisting of monysyllables, and is indeed one of the most affecting lines to be met with in any poet. This Poem, says Mr. Coxeter, 'in his MS. notes, was reprinted in 1720, by A. Johnston, who in his preface says, that he had the honour of transmitting the author's works to the great Mr. Addison, for the perusal of them, and he was pleased to signify his approbation in these candid terms. That he had read them with the greatest satisfaction, and was pleased to give it as his judgment, that the beauties of our ancient English poets are too slightly passed over by the modern writers, who, out of a peculiar singularity, had rather take pains to find fault, than endeavour to excel.'

A Parænæsis to Prince Henry, who dying before it was published, it was afterwards dedicated to King Charles I.[3]

Jonathan; intended to be an Heroic Poem, but the first Book of it is only extant. He wrote all these Poems in the Ottavo Rima of Tasso, or a Stanza of eight lines, six interwoven, and a Couplet in Base. His Plays and Poems were all printed together in folio, under the title of Recreations with the Muses, 1637, and dedicated to the King.

The earl of Stirling lived in friendship with the most eminent wits of his time, except Ben Johnson, who complained that he was neglected by him; but there are no particulars preserved concerning any quarrel between them.

My lord seems to have often a peculiar inclination to punning, but this was the characteristic vice of the times. That he could sometimes write in a very elegant strain will appear by the following lines, in which he describes love.

Love is a joy, which upon pain depends;
A drop of sweet, drowned in a sea of sours:
What folly does begin, that fury ends;
They hate for ever, who have lov'd for hours.

[Footnote 1: Crawford's Peerage of Scotland.]

[Footnote 2: Crawford, ubi supra.]

[Footnote 3: Langbaire.]

* * * * *

JOSEPH HALL, Bishop of NORWICH.

This prelate was born, according to his own account, July 11, 1574, in Bristow-Park, within the parish of Ashby de la Zouch, a town in Leicestershire.[1] His father was an officer under Henry Earl of Huntingdon, president of the North, who from his infancy had devoted him to the service of the church; and his mother, whom he has celebrated for her exemplary and distinguished piety, was extremely sollicitous that her favourite son would be of a profession, she herself held so much in veneration. Our author, who seems to have been very credulous in his disposition, rather religious than wise, or possessing any attainments equal to the dignity to which he rose, has preserved in his Specialities, some visions of his mother's, which he relates with an air of seriousness, sufficient to evidence his own conviction of their reality; but as they appear to have been the offspring of a disordered imagination, they have no right to a place here.

In order to train him up to the ministry, his father at first resolved to place him under the care of one Mr. Pelset, lately come from Cambridge to be the public preacher at Leicester, who undertook to give him an education equally finished with that of the university, and by these means save much expence to his father: This resolution, however, was not executed, some other friends advising his father to send him to Cambridge, and persuaded him that no private tuition could possibly be equal to that of the academical. When our author had remained six years at Cambridge, he had a right to preferment, and to stand for a fellowship, had not his tutor Mr. Gilby been born in the same county with him, and the statutes not permitting two of the same shire to enjoy fellowships, and as Mr. Gilby was senior to our author, and already in possession, Mr. Hall could not be promoted. In consequence of this, he proposed to remove, when the Earl of Huntingdon, being made acquainted with this circumstance, and hearing very favourable accounts of our author, interested himself to prevent his removal. He made application to Mr. Gilby, promised to make him his chaplain, and promote him in the church, provided he would relinquish his place in the college, in favour of Mr. Hall. These promises being made with seeming sincerity, and as the Earl of Huntingdon was a man of reputation for probity, he complied with his lordship's request, and relinquished his place in the college. When he was about to enter upon his office of chaplain, to his great mortification, the nobleman on whose promises he confided, and on whom he immediately depended, suddenly died, by which accident he was thrown unprovided upon the world. This not a little affected Mr. Hall, who was shocked to think that Mr. Gilby should be thus distressed, by the generosity of his temper, which excited him to quit a certainty in order to make way for his promotion. He addressed Dr. Chadderton, then the master of the college, that the succeeding election might be stopped, and that Mr. Gilby should again possess his place; but in this request he was unsuccessful: for the Doctor told him, that Mr. Gilby was divested of all possibilty of remedy, and that they must proceed in the election the day following; when Mr. Hall was unanimously chosen into that society. Two years after this, he was chosen Rhetorician to the public schools, where, as he himself expresses it, "he was encouraged with a sufficient frequence of auditors;" but this place he soon resigned to Dr. Dod, and entered upon studies necessary to qualify him for taking orders.

Some time after this, the mastership of a famous school erected at Tiverton in Devon, became vacant; this school was endowed by the founder Mr. Blundel, with a very large pension, and the care of it was principally cast upon the then Lord Chief Justice Popham. His lordship being intimately acquainted with Dr. Chadderton, requested him to recommend some learned and prudent man for the government of that school. The Dr. recommended Mr. Hall, assuring him that great advantage would arise from it, without much trouble to himself: Our author thinking proper to accept this, the Doctor carried him to London, and introduced him to Lord Chief Justice Popham, who seemed well pleased and thanked Dr. Chadderton for recommending a man so well qualified for the charge. When Dr. Chadderton and Mr. Hall had taken leave of his lordship and were returning to their lodgings, a messenger presented a letter to Mr. Hall, from lady Drury of Suffolk, earnestly requesting him to accept the rectory of Halsted, a place in her gift. This flow of good fortune not a little surprized him, and as he was governed by the maxims of prudence, he made no long hesitation in accepting the latter, which was both a better benefice, and a higher preferment. Being settled at Halsted, he found there a dangerous antagonist to his ministry, whom he calls in his Specialities, a witty, and a bold Atheist: "This was one Mr. Lilly, who by reason of his travels, (says he) and abilities of discourse and behaviour, had so deeply insinuated himself into my patron, that there were small hopes for me to work any good upon that noble patron of mine; who by the suggestion of this wicked detractor, was set off from me before he knew me. Hereupon, I confess, finding the obduredness, and hopeless condition of that man, I bent my prayers against him, beseeching God daily, that he would be pleased to remove by some means or other, that apparent hindrance of my faithful labours; who gave me an answer accordingly. For this malicious man going hastily up to London, to exasperate my patron against me, was then and there swept away by the pestilence, and never returned to do any further mischief." This account given by Mr. Hall of his antagonist, reflects no great honour upon himself: it is conceived in a spirit of bitterness, and there is more of spite against Lilly's person in it, than any tenderness or pity for his errors. He calls him a witty Atheist, when in all probability, what he terms atheism, was no more than a freedom of thinking, and facetious conversation, which to the pious churchman, had the appearance of denying the existence of God; besides, had Hall dealt candidly, he should have given his readers some more particulars of a man whom he was bold enough to denominate an Atheist, a character so very singular, that it should never be imputed to any man, without the strongest grounds. Hall in his usual spirit of enthusiasm, in order to remove this antagonist of his, has recourse to a miracle: He tells us, he went up to London and died of the Plague, which he would have us to understand was by the immediate interpolition of God, as if it were not ridiculous to suppose our author of so great importance, as that the Supreme Being should work a miracle in his favour; but as it is with natural so is it with spiritual pride, those who are possessed by either, never fail to over-rate their own significance, and justly expose themselves to the contempt of the sober part of mankind.

Our author has also given us some account of his marriage, with the daughter of Mr. George Winniff, of Bretenham; he says of her, that much modesty, piety, and good disposition were lodged in her seemly presence. She was recommended to him, by the Rev. Mr. Grandig his friend, and he says, he listened to the recommendation, as from the Lord, whom he frequently consulted by prayer, before he entered into the matrimonial state. She lived with him 49 years.

Not long after Mr. Hall's settlement at Halsted, he was sollicited by Sir Edmund Bacon to accompany him in a journey to the Spa in Ardenna, at the time when the Earl of Hertford went ambassador to the archduke Albert of Brussels. This request Mr. Hall complied with, as it furnished him with an opportunity of feeing more of the world, and gratified a desire he had of conversing with the Romish Jesuits. The particulars of his journey, which he has preserved in his Specialities, are too trifling to be here inserted: When he came to Brussels, he was introduced by an English gentleman, who practiced physic there, to the acquaintance of father Costrus; who held some conversation with him concerning the miracles said to be lately done, by one Lipsieus Apricollis, a woman who lived at Zichem. From particular miracles, the father turned the discourse to the difference between divine and diabolical miracles; and he told Mr. Hall, that if he could ascertain that one miracle ever was wrought in the church of England, he would embrace that persuasion: To which our author replied, that he was fully convinced, that many devils had been ejected out of persons in that church by fasting and prayer. They both believed the possibility and frequency of miracles; they only differed as to the church in which miracles were performed. Hall has censured father Costrus, as a barren man, and of superficial conversation; and it is to be feared, that whoever reads Hall's religious works will conclude much in the same manner of him. They departed from Brussels soon after this interview between father Costrus and our author, and met with nothing in their journey to and return from the Spa, worth relation, only Mr. Hall had by his zeal in defending his own church, exposed himself to the resentment of one Signior Ascanio Negro, who began notwithstanding Mr. Hall's lay-habit, to suspect him to be a clergyman, and use some indecent freedoms with him in consequence of this suspicion. Our author to avoid any impertinence which the captain was likely to be guilty of towards him, told him, Sir Edmund Bacon, the person with whom he travelled, was the grandchild of the great lord Verulam, High Chancelor of England, whose fame was extended to every country where science and philosophy prevailed, and that they were protected by the earl of Hertford, the English embassador at Brussels. Upon the Italian's being made acquainted with the quality of Sir Edmund, and the high connections of the two travellers, he thought proper to desist from any acts of impertinence, to which bigotry and ignorance would have excited him. Hall returned to England after being absent eighteen months, and was received but coldly by Sir Robert Drury his patron; there having never been much friendship between them. In consequence of this, Mr. Hall came to London, in search of a more comfortable provision; he was soon recommended by one Mr. Gurrey, tutor to the Earl of Essex, to preach before Prince Henry at Richmond. Before this accident Mr. Hall had been author of some Meditations, whom Mr. Gurrey told him, had been well received at Henry's court, and much read by that promising young Prince. He preached with success, for the Prince desired to hear him a second time, and was so well pleased with him, that he signified an inclination of having him attend about his court. Mr. Hall's reputation growing, he was taken notice of by persons of fashion, and soon obtained the living of Waltham, presented him by the Earl of Norwich.

While he exercised his function at Waltham, the archdeacon of Norwich engaged him to interest himself in favour of the church of Wolverhampton, from which a patrimony was detained by a sacrilegious conveyance. In the course of this prosecution, our author observes, "that a marvellous light opened itself unexpectedly, by revealing a counterfeit seal, in the manifestation of razures, and interpolations, and misdates of unjustifiable evidences, that after many years suit, Lord Chancellor Ellesmere, upon a full hearing, gave a decree in favour of the church."

During Mr. Hall's residence at Waltham, he was thrice employed by his Majesty in public service. His first public employment was to attend the Earl of Carlisle, who went on an embassy to France, and during his absence his Majesty conferred upon him the deanery of Worcester. Upon his return, he attended the King in a journey to Scotland, where he exerted himself in support of episcopacy, in opposition to the established ministry there, who were Presbyterians. Having acquired some name in polemical divinity, and being long accustomed to disputations, the King made choice of him to go to the Netherlands, and assist at the synod of Dort, in settling the controverted points of faith, for which that reverend body were there convened. Hall has been very lavish in his own praise, while he acted at the synod of Dort; he has given many hints of the supernatural assistance he was blessed with: he has informed us, that he was then in a languishing state of health; that his rest was broken, and his nights sleepless; but on the night preceding the occasion of his preaching a Latin sermon to the synod, he was favoured with, refreshing sleep, which he ascribes to the immediate care of providence. The states of Holland, he says, "sent Daniel Heinsius the poet to visit him, and were so much delighted with his comportment, that they presented him with a rich medal of gold, as a monument of their respect for his poor endeavours." Upon our author's returning home, he found the church torn to pieces, by the fierce contentions which then subsisted concerning the doctrines of Arminius: he saw this with concern, and was sensible true religion, piety, and virtue, could never be promoted by such altercation; and therefore with the little power of which he was master, he endeavoured to effect a reconciliation between the contending parties: he wrote what he calls a project of pacification, which was presented to his Majesty, and would have had a very happy influence, had not the enemies of Mr. Hall misrepresented the book, and so far influenced the King, that a royal edict for a general inhibition, buried it in silence. Hall after this contended with the Roman Catholics, who upon the prospect of the Spanish match, on the success of which they built their hopes, began to betray a great degree of insolence, and proudly boast the pedigree of their church, from the apostles themselves. They insisted, that as their church was the first, so it was the best, and that no ordination was valid which was not derived from it. Hall in answer to their assertions, made a concession, which some of his Protestant brethren thought he had no right to do; he acknowledged the priority of the Roman Church, but denied its infallibility, and consequently that it was possible another church might be more pure, and approach more to the apostolic practice than the Romish. This controversy he managed so successfully, that he was promoted to the see of Exeter; and as King James I. seldom knew any bounds to his generosity, when he happened to take a person into his favour, he soon after that removed him from Exeter, and gave him the higher bishoprick of Norwich; which he enjoyed not without some allay to his happiness, for the civil wars soon breaking out, he underwent the same severities which were exercised against other prelates, of which he has given an account in a piece prefixed to his works, called, Hall's hard Measure; and from this we shall extract the most material circumstances.

The insolence of some churchmen, and the superiority they assumed in the civil government, during the distractions of Charles I. provoked the House of Commons to take some measures to prevent their growing power, which that pious monarch was too much disposed to favour. In consequence of this, the leading members of the opposition petitioned the King to remove the bishops from their seats in Parliament, and degrade them to the station at Commons, which was warmly opposed by the high church lords, and the bishops themselves, who protested against whatever steps were taken during their restraint from Parliament, as illegal, upon this principle, that as they were part of the legislature, no law could pass during their absence, at least if that absence was produced by violence, which Clarendon has fully represented.

The prejudice against the episcopal government gaining ground, petitions to remove the bishops were poured in from all parts of the kingdom, and as the earl of Strafford was then so obnoxious to the popular resentment, his cause and that of the bishops was reckoned by the vulgar, synonimous, and both felt the resentment of an enraged populace. To such a fury were the common people wrought up, that they came in bodies, to the two Houses of Parliament, to crave justice, both against the earl of Strafford, and the archbishop of Canterbury, and, in short, the whole bench of spiritual Peers; the mob besieged the two Houses, and threatened vengeance upon the bishops, whenever they came out. This fury excited some motion to be made in the House of Peers, to prevent such tumults for the future, which were sent down to the House of Commons. The bishops, for their safety, were obliged to continue in the Parliament House the greatest part of the night, and at last made their escape by bye-ways and stratagems. They were then convinced that it was no longer safe for them to attend the Parliament, 'till some measures were taken to repress the insolence of the mob, and in consequence of this, they met at the house of the archbishop of York, and drew up a protest, against whatever steps should be taken during their absence, occasioned by violence. This protest, the bishops intended should first be given to the Secretary of State, and by him to the King, and that his Majesty should cause it to be read in the House of Peers; but in place of this, the bishops were accused of high treason, brought before the bar of the House of Peers, and sent to the Tower. During their confinement, their enemies in the House of Commons, took occasion to bring in a bill for taking away the votes of bishops in the House of Peers: in this bill lord Falkland concurred, and it was supported by Mr. Hambden and Mr. Pym, the oracles of the House of Commons, but met with great opposition from Edward Hyde, afterwards earl of Clarendon, who was a friend to the church, and could not bear to see their liberties infringed.

The bishops petitioned to have council assigned them, in which they were indulged, in order to answer to the charge of high treason. A day was appointed, the bishops were brought to the bar, but nothing was effected; the House of Commons at last finding that there could be no proof of high treason, dropt that charge, and were content to libel them for a misdemeanor, in which they likewise but ill succeeded, for the bishops were admitted to bail, and no prosecution was carried on against them, even for a misdemeanor.

Being now at liberty, the greatest part of them retired to their dioceses, 'till the storm which had threatened them should subside. Bishop Hall repaired to Norwich, where he met, from the disaffected party, a very cold reception; he continued preaching however in his cathedral at Norwich, 'till the order of sequestration came down, when he was desired to remove from his palace, while the sequestrators seized upon all his estate, both real and personal, and appraized all the goods which were in the palace. The bishop relates the following instance of oppression which was inflicted on him; 'One morning (says his lordship) before my servants were up, there came to my gates one Wright, a London trooper, attended with others requiring entrance, threatening if they were not admitted, to break open the gates, whom, I found at first sight, struggling with one of my servants for a pistol which he had in his hand; I demanded his business at that unseasonable time; he told me he came to search for arms and ammunition, of which I must be disarmed; I told him I had only two muskets in the house, and no other military provision; he not resting upon my word, searched round about the house, looked into the chests and trunks, examined the vessels in the cellar; finding no other warlike furniture, he asked me what horses I had, for his commission was to take them also; I told him how poorly I was stored, and that my age would not allow me to travel on foot; in conclusion, he took one horse away.'

The committee of sequestration soon after proceeded to strip him of all the revenue belonging to his see, and as he refused to take the covenant, the magistrates of the city of Norwich, who were no friends to episcopal jurisdiction, cited him before them, for giving ordination unwarrantably, as they termed it: to this extraordinary summons the bishop answered, that he would not betray the dignity of his station by his personal appearance, to answer any complaints before the Lord Mayor, for as he was a Peer of the realm, no magistrate whatever had a right to take cognizance of his conduct, and that he was only accountable to the House of Lords, of which he was one. The bishop proceeds to enumerate the various insults he received from the enraged populace; sometimes they searched his house for malignants, at other times they threatened violence to his person; nor did their resentment terminate here; they exercised their fury in the cathedral, tore down the altar, broke the organ in pieces, and committed a kind of sacrilegious devastation in the church; they burnt the service books in the market-place, filled the cathedral with musketeers, who behaved in it with as much indecency, as if it had been an alehouse; they forced the bishop out of his palace, and employed that in the same manner. These are the most material hardships which, according to the bishop's own account, happened to him, which he seems to have born with patience and fortitude, and may serve to shew the violence of party rage, and that religion is often made a pretence for committing the most outrageous insolence, and horrid cruelty. It has been already observed, that Hall seems to have been of an enthusiastic turn of mind, which seldom consists with any brilliance of genius; and in this case it holds true, for in his sermons extant, there is an imbecility, which can flow from no other cause than want of parts. In poetry however he seems to have greater power, which will appear when we consider him in that light.

It cannot positively be determined on what year bishop Hall died; he published that work of his called Hard Measure, in the year 1647, at which time he was seventy-three years of age, and in all probability did not long survive it.

His ecclesiastical works are,

A Sermon, preached before King James at Hampton-Court, 1624.

Christian Liberty, set forth in a Sermon at Whitehall, 1628.

Divine Light and Reflections, in a Sermon at Whitehall, 1640.

A Sermon, preached at the Cathedral of Exeter, upon the Pacification between the two Kingdoms, 1641.

The Mischief of Faction, and the Remedy of it, a Sermon, at Whitehall on the second Sunday in Lent, 1641.

A Sermon, preached at the Tower, 1641.

A Sermon, preached on Whitsunday in Norwich, printed 1644.

A Sermon, preached on Whitsunday at Higham, printed 1652.

A Sermon, preached on Easter day at Higham, 1648.

The Mourner in Sion.

A Sermon, preached at Higham, printed 1655.

The Women's Veil, or a Discourse concerning the Necessity or
Expedience of the close Covering the Heads of Women.

Holy Decency in the Worship of God.

Good Security, a Discourse of the Christian's Assurance.

A Plain and Familiar Explication of Christ's Presence, in the
Sacrament of his Body and Blood.

A Letter for the Observation of the Feast of Christ's Nativity.

A Letter to Mr. William Struthers, one of the Preachers at Edinburgh.

Epistola D. Baltasari Willio. S.T.D.

Epistola D. Lud. Crocio. S.T.D.

Reverendissimo Marco Antonio de L'om. Archiep. Spalatensi.

Epistola decessus sui ad Romam dissuasiva.

A Modest Offer.

Certain Irrefragable Propositions, worthy of serious Consideration.

The Way of Peace in the Five Busy Articles, commonly known by the name of Arminius.

A Letter concerning the Fall Away from Grace.

A Letter concerning Religion.

A Letter concerning the frequent Injection of Temptations.

A Consolatory Letter to one under Censure.

A Short Answer to the Nine Arguments which are brought against the
Bishops sitting in Parliament.

For Episcopacy and Liturgy.

A Speech in Parliament.

A Speech in Parliament, in Defence of the Canons made in Convocation.

A Speech in Parliament, concerning the Power of Bishops in secular things.

The Anthems for the Cathedral of Exeter.

All these are printed in 4to, and were published 1660. There are also other Works of this author. An Edition of the whole has been printed in three Vols. folio.

Besides these works, Bishop Hall is author of Satires in Six Books, lately reprinted under the title of Virgidemiarum, of which we cannot give a better account than in the words of the ingenious authors of the Monthly Review, by which Bishop Hall's genius for that kind of poetical writing will fully appear.

He published these Satires in the twenty third year of his age, and was, as he himself asserts in the Prologue, the first satirist in the English language.

I first adventure, follow me who list,
And be the second English satyrist.

And, if we consider the difficulty of introducing so nice a poem as satire into a nation, we must allow it required the assistance of no common and ordinary genius. The Italians had their Ariosto, and the French their Regnier, who might have served him as models for imitation; but he copies after the ancients, and chiefly Juvenal and Persius; though he wants not many strokes of elegance and delicacy, which shew him perfectly acquainted with the manner of Horace. Among the several discouragements which attended his attempt in that kind, he mentions one peculiar to the language and nature of the English versification, which would appear in the translation of one of Persius's Satires: The difficulty and dissonance whereof, says he, shall make good my assertion; besides the plain experience thereof in the Satires of Ariosto; save which, and one base French satire, I could never attain the view of any for my direction. Yet we may pay him almost the same compliment which was given of old to Homer and Archilochus: for the improvements which have been made by succeeding poets bear no manner of proportion to the distance of time between him and them. The verses of bishop Hall are in general extremely musical and flowing, and are greatly preferable to Dr. Donne's, as being of a much smoother cadence; neither shall we find him deficient, if compared with his successor, in point of thought and wit; but he exceeds him with respect to his characters, which are more numerous, and wrought up with greater art and strength of colouring. Many of his lines would do honour to the most ingenious of our modern poets; and some of them have thought it worth their labour to imitate him, especially Mr. Oldham. Bishop Hall was not only our first satyrist, but was the first who brought epistolary writing to the view of the public; which was common in that age to other parts of Europe, but not practised in England, till he published his own epistles. It may be proper to take notice, that the Virgidemiarum are not printed with his other writings, and that an account of them is omitted by him, through his extreme modesty, in the Specialities of his Life, prefixed to the third volume of his works in folio.

The author's postscript to his satires is prefixed by the editor in the room of a preface, and without any apparent impropriety. It is not without some signatures of the bishop's good sense and taste; and, making a just allowance for the use of a few obsolete terms, and the puerile custom of that age in making affected repetitions and reiterations of the same word within the compass of a period, it would read like no bad prose at present. He had undoubtedly an excellent ear, and we must conclude he must have succeeded considerably in erotic or pastoral poetry, from the following stanza's, in his Defiance to Envy, which may be considered as an exordium to his poetical writings.

Witnesse, ye muses, how I wilful sung
These heady rhimes, withouten second care;
And wish'd them worse my guilty thoughts among;
The ruder satire should go ragg'd and bare,
And shew his rougher and his hairy hide,
Tho' mine be smooth, and deck'd in carelesse pride.

Would we but breathe within a wax-bound quill,
Pan's seven-fold pipe, some plaintive pastoral;
To teach each hollow grove, and shrubby hill,
Each murmuring brook, each solitary vale
To found our love, and to our song accord,
Wearying Echo with one changelesse word.

Or lift us make two striving shepherds sing,
With costly wagers for the victory,
Under Menalcas judge; while one doth bring
A carven bowl well wrought of beechen tree,
Praising it by the story; or the frame,
Or want of use, or skilful maker's name.

Another layeth a well-marked lamb,
Or spotted kid, or some more forward steere,
And from the paile doth praise their fertile dam;
So do they strive in doubt, in hope, in feare,
Awaiting for their trusty empire's doome,
Faulted as false by him that's overcome.
Whether so me lift my lovely thought to sing,
Come dance ye nimble Dryads by my side,
Ye gentle wood-nymphs come; and with you bring
The willing fawns that mought their music guide.
Come nymphs and fawns, that haunts those shady groves,
While I report my fortunes or my loves.

The first three books of satires are termed by the author Toothless satires, and the three last Biting satires. He has an animated idea of good poetry, and a just contempt of poetasters in the different species of it. He says of himself, in the first satire.

Nor can I crouch, and writhe my fawning tayle,
To some great Patron for my best avayle.
Such hunger-starven trencher-poetrie,
Or let it never live, or timely die.

He frequently avows his admiration of Spenser, whose cotemporary he was. His first book, consisting of nine satires, appears in a manner entirely levelled at low and abject poetasters. Several satires of the second book reprehend the contempt of the rich, for men of science and genius. We shall transcribe the sixth, being short, and void of all obscurity.

A gentle squire would gladly entertaine
Into his house some trencher-chaplaine;
Some willing man that might instruct his sons,
And that would stand to good conditions.
First, that he lie upon the truckle-bed,
While his young maister lieth o'er his head.
Second, that he do on no default,
Ever presume to sit above the salt.
Third, that he never change his trencher twise.
Fourth, that he use all common courtesies;
Sit bare at meales, and one halfe raise and wait.
Last, that he never his young maister beat,
But he must ask his mother to define,
How manie jerkes she would his breech should line.
All these observed, he could contented bee,
To give five markes and winter liverie.

The seventh and last of this book is a very just and humorous satire against judicial astrology, which was probably in as high credit then, as witchcraft was in the succeeding reign.

The first satire of the third book is a strong contrast of the temperance and simplicity of former ages, with the luxury and effeminacy of his own tines, which a reflecting reader would be apt to think no better than the present. We find the good bishop supposes our ancestors as poorly fed as Virgil's and Horace's rustics. He says, with sufficient energy,

Thy grandsire's words favour'd of thrifty leekes,
Or manly garlicke; but thy furnace reekes
Hot steams of wine; and can a-loose descrie
The drunken draughts of sweet autumnitie.

The second is a short satire on erecting stately monuments to worthless men. The following advice is nobly moral, the subsequent sarcasm just and well expressed.

Thy monument make thou thy living deeds;
No other tomb than that true virtue needs.
What! had he nought whereby he might be knowne
But costly pilements of some curious stone?
The matter nature's, and the workman's frame;
His purse's cost: where then is Osmond's name?
Deserv'dst thou ill? well were thy name and thee,
Wert thou inditched in great secrecie.

The third gives an account of a citizen's feast, to which he was invited, as he says,

With hollow words, and [2] overly request.

and whom he disappointed by accepting his invitation at once, and not Maydening it; no insignificant term as he applies it: for, as he says,

Who looks for double biddings to a feast,
May dine at home for an importune guest.

After a sumptuous bill of fare, our author compares the great plenty of it to our present notion of a miser's feast—saying,

Come there no more; for so meant all that cost;
Never hence take me for thy second host.

The fourth is levelled at Ostentation in devotion, or in dress. The fifth represents the sad plight of a courtier, whose Perewinke, as he terms it, the wind had blown off by unbonnetting in a salute, and exposed his waxen crown or scalp. 'Tis probable this might be about the time of their introduction into dress here. The sixth, which is a fragment, contains a hyperbolical relation of a thirsty foul, called Gullion, who drunk Acheron dry in his passage over it, and grounded Charon's boat, but floated it again, by as liberal a stream of urine. It concludes with the following sarcastical, yet wholesome irony.

Drinke on drie foule, and pledge Sir Gullion:
Drinke to all healths, but drink not to thyne owne.

The seventh and last is a humorous description of a famished beau, who had dined only with duke Humfrey, and who was strangely adorned with exotic dress.

To these three satires he adds the following conclusion.

Thus have I writ, in smoother cedar tree,
So gentle Satires, penn'd so easily.
Henceforth I write in crabbed oak-tree rynde,
Search they that mean the secret meaning find.
Hold out ye guilty and ye galled hides,
And meet my far-fetched stripes with waiting sides.

In his biting satires he breathes still more of the spirit and stile of Juvenal, his third of this book being an imitation of that satirist's eighth, on Family-madness and Pride of Descent; the beginning of which is not translated amiss by our author. The principal object of his fourth satire, Gallio, would correspond with a modern Fribble, but that he supposes him capable of hunting and hawking, which are exercises rather too coarse and indelicate for ours: this may intimate perhaps, that the reign of the great Elizabeth had no character quite so unmanly as our age. In advising him to wed, however, we have no bad portrait of the Petit Maitre.

Hye thee, and give the world yet one dwarfe more,
Such as it got when thou thy selfe was bore.

His fifth satire contrasts the extremes of Prodigality and Avarice; and by a few initials, which are skabbarded, it looks as if he had some individuals in view; though he has disclaimed such an intention in his postscript (now the preface) p. 6. lin. 25, &c. His sixth sets out very much like the first satire of Horace's first book, on the Dissatisfaction and Caprice of mankind—Qui fit Mecænas; and, after a just and lively-description of our different pursuits in life, he concludes with the following preference of a college one, which, we find in the Specialities of his life, he was greatly devoted to in his youth. The lines, which are far from inelegant, seem indeed to come from his heart, and make him appear as an exception to that too general human discontent, which was the subject of this satire.

'Mongst all these stirs of discontented strife,
Oh let me lead an academick life;
To know much, and to think we nothing know;
Nothing to have, yet think we have enowe;
In skill to want, and wanting seek for more;
In weele nor want, nor wish for greater store.
Envy, ye monarchs, with your proad excesse,
At our low sayle, and our high happinesse.

The last satire of this book is a severe one on the clergy of the church of Rome. He terms it POMH-PYMH, by which we suppose he intended to brand Roma, as the Sink of Superstition. He observes, if Juvenal, whom he calls Aquine's carping spright, were now alive, among other surprising alterations at Rome,

—that he most would gaze and wonder at,
Is th' horned mitre, and the bloody hat,
The crooked staffe, their coule's strange form and store,
Save that he saw the fame in hell before.

The first satire of the fifth book is levelled at Racking Landlords. The following lines are a strong example of the taste of those times for the Punn and Paronomasia.

While freezing Matho, that for one lean fee
Won't term each term the term of Hillary,
May now, instead of those his simple fees,
Get the fee-simples of faire manneries.

The second satire lashes the incongruity of stately buildings and want of hospitality, and naturally reminds us of a pleasant epigram of Martial's on the same occasion, where after describing the magnificence of a villa, he concludes however, there is no room either to sup or lodge in it. It ends with a transition on the contumely with which the parasites are treated at the tables of the great; being a pretty close imitation of Juvenal on the same subject. This satire has also a few skabbarded initials.

In his third, titled, [Greek: KOINA PHIAON], where he reprehends Plato's notion of a political community of all things, are the following lines:

Plato is dead, and dead is his device,
Which some thought witty, none thought ever wise:
Yet certes Macha is a Platonist
To all, they say, save whoso do not list;
Because her husband, a far traffick' man,
Is a profess'd Peripatician.

His last book and satire, for it consists but of one, is a humorous ironical recantation of his former satires; as the author pretends there can be no just one in such perfect times as his own. The latter part of it alludes to different passages in Juvenal; and he particularly reflects on some poetaster he calls Labeo, whom he had repeatedly lash'd before; and who was not improbably some cotemporary scribler.

Upon the whole, these satires sufficiently evince both the learning and ingenuity of their author. The sense has generally such a sufficient pause, and will admit of such a punctuation at the close of the second line, and the verse is very often as harmonious too, as if it was calculated for a modern ear: tho' the great number of obsolete words retained would incline us to think the editors had not procured any very extraordinary alteration of the original edition, which we have never seen. The present one is nearly printed; and, if it should occasion another, we cannot think but a short glossary at the end of it, or explanations at the bottom of the pages, where the most uncouth and antiquated terms occur, would justly increase the value of it, by adding considerably to the perspicuity of this writer; who, in other respects, seems to have been a learned divine, a conscientious christian, a lover of peace, and well endued with patience; for the exercise of which virtue, the confusions at the latter end of his life, about the time of the death of Charles I. furnished him with frequent opportunities, the account of his own hard measures being dated in May 1647. We have met with no other poetical writings of the bishop's, except three anthems, composed for the use of his cathedral-church; and indeed, it seems as if his continual occupation after his youth, and his troubles in age, were sufficient to suppress any future propensity to satirical poetry: which we may infer from the conclusion of the first satire of his fourth book.

While now my rhimes relish of the ferule still,
Some nose-wise pedant saith; whose deep-seen skill
Hath three times construed either Flaccus o'er,
And thrice rehears'd them in his trivial flore.
So let them tax me for my hot blood's rage,
Rather than say I doated in my age.

[Footnote 1: Specialities of this bishop's life prefixed to his works.]

[Footnote 2: Slight.]

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