"His conversation, wit, and parts,
His knowledge in the noblest useful arts,
Were such, dead authors could not give;
But habitudes of those who live;
Who, lighting him, did greater lights receive:
He drain'd from all, and all they knew;
His apprehension quick, his judgment true:
That the most learn'd with shame confess
His knowledge more, his reading only less."
JOHN DRYDEN: Ode to the Memory of Charles II; Poems, p. 84.
20. Reign of Charles II, 1685 to 1660.—Example from a Letter to the Earl of Sunderland, dated, "Philadelphia, 28th 5th mo. July, 1683."
"And I will venture to say, that by the help of God, and such noble Friends, I will show a Province in seven years, equal to her neighbours of forty years planting. I have lay'd out the Province into Countys. Six are begun to be seated; they lye on the great river, and are planted about six miles back. The town platt is a mile long, and two deep,—has a navigable river on each side, the least as broad as the Thames at Woolwych, from three to eight fathom water. There is built about eighty houses, and I have settled at least three hundred farmes contiguous to it."—WILLIAM PENN. The Friend, Vol. vii, p. 179.
21. From an Address or Dedication to Charles II.—Written in 1675.
"There is no [other] king in the world, who can so experimentally testify of God's providence and goodness; neither is there any [other], who rules so many free people, so many true Christians: which thing renders thy government more honourable, thyself more considerable, than the accession of many nations filled with slavish and superstitious souls."—ROBERT BARCLAY: Apology, p. viii.
22. The following example, from the commencement of Paradise Lost, first published in 1667, has been cited by several authors, to show how large a proportion of our language is of Saxon origin. The thirteen words in Italics are the only ones in this passage, which seem to have been derived from any other source.
"Of man's first disobedience, and the fruit
Of that forbidden tree, whose mortal taste
Brought death into the world, and all our woe,
With loss of Eden; till one greater Man
Restore us, and regain the blissful seat,
Sing, heav'nly Muse, that on the secret top
Of Oreb, or of Sinai, didst inspire
That shepherd, who first taught the chosen seed,
In the beginning, how the Heav'ns and Earth
Rose out of Chaos."—MILTON: Paradise Lost, Book I.
23. Examples written during Cromwell's Protectorate, 1660 to 1650.
"The Queene was pleased to shew me the letter, the seale beinge a Roman eagle, havinge characters about it almost like the Greeke. This day, in the afternoone, the vice-chauncellor came to me and stayed about four hours with me; in which tyme we conversed upon the longe debates."—WHITELOCKE. Bucke's Class. Gram., p. 149.
"I am yet heere, and have the States of Holland ingaged in a more than ordnary maner, to procure me audience of the States Generall. Whatever happen, the effects must needes be good."—STRICKLAND: Bucke's Classical Gram., p. 149.