[Sidenote: Anaphora, or the Figure of Report.]
Repetition in the first degree we call the figure of Report according to
the Greeke originall, and is when we make one word begin, and as they are
wont to say, lead the daunce to many verses in sute, as thus.
To thinke on death it is a miserie
To thinke on life it is a vanitie:
To thinke on the world verily it is,
To thinke that heare man hath no perfit blisse.
And this written by Sir Walter Raleigh of his greatest mistresse iin
most excellent verses.
In vayne mine eyes in vaine you wast your teares,
In vayne my sighs the smokes of my despaires:
In vayne you search th'earth and heauens aboue,
In vayne ye seeke, for fortune keeps my loue.
Or as the buffon in our enterlude called Lustie London said very
knauishly and like himselfe.
Many a faire lasse in London towne,
Many a bawdie basket borne up and downe:
Many a broker in a thridbare gowne.
Many a bankrowte scarce worth a crowne.
In London.
[Sidenote: Antistrophe, or the Counter turne.]
Ye haue another sort of repetition quite contrary to the former when ye
make one word finish many verses in sute, and that which is harder, to
finish many clauses in the middest of your verses or dittie (for to make
them finish the verse in our vulgar it should hinder the rime) and because
I do finde few of our English makers vse this figure, I haue set you down
two litle ditties which our selues in our yonger yeares played vpon the
Antistrophe, for so is the figures name in Greeke: one vpon the mutable
loue of a Lady, another vpon the meritorious loue of Christ our Sauiour,
thus.
Her lowly lookes, that gaue life to my loue,
With spitefull speach, curstnesse and crueltie:
She kild my loue, let her rigour remoue,
Her cherefull lights and speaches of pitie
Reuiue my loue: anone with great disdaine,
She shunnes my loue, and after by a traine
She seekes my loue, and faith she loues me most,
But seing her loue, so lightly wonne and lost:
I longd not for her loue, for well I thought,
Firme is the loue, if it be as it ought.
The second vpon the merites of Christes passion toward mankind, thus,
Our Christ the sonne of God, chief authour of all good,
Was he by his allmight, that first created man:
And with the costly price, of his most precious bloud,
He that redeemed man: and by his instance wan
Grace in the sight of God, his onely father deare,
And reconciled man: and to make man his peere
Made himselfe very man: brief to conclude the case,
This Christ both God and man, he all and onely is:
The man brings man to God and to all heauens blisse.
The Greekes call this figure Antistrophe, the Latines, conuersio, I following the originall call him the counterturne, because he turnes counter in the middest of euery meetre.
[Sidenote: Symploche, or the figure of replie.]
Take me the two former figures and put them into one, and it is that which
the Greekes call symploche, the Latines complexio, or conduplicatio,
and is a maner of repetion, when one and the selfe word doth begin and end
many verses in sute & so wrappes vp both the former figures in one, as he
that sportingly complained of his vntrustie mistresse, thus.
_Who made me shent for her loues sake?
Myne owne mistresse.
Who would not seeme my part to take,
Myne owne mistresse.
What made me first so well content
Her curtesie.
What makes me now so sore repent
Her crueltie._
The Greekes name this figure Symploche, the Latins Complexio, perchaunce for that he seemes to hold in and to wrap vp the verses by reduplication, so as nothing can fall out. I had rather call him the figure of replie.
[Sidenote: Anadiplosis, or the Redouble.]
Ye haue another sort of repetition when with the worde by which you finish
your verse, ye beginne the next verse with the same, as thus:
Comforte it is for man to haue a wife,
Wife chast, and wise, and lowly all her life.