Fain would BAPTISTA DE VIVAR[152] you praise,
Sisters, with unpremeditated lyre;
Such grace, discretion, prudence, he displays,
That, muses though ye be, ye can admire;
He will not hymn Narcissus in his lays
Nor the disdains that lonely Echo tire,
But he will sing his cares which had their birth
'Twixt sad forgetfulness and hope of mirth.
Now terror new, now new alarm and fear
Cometh upon me and o'erpowereth me,
Only because I would, yet cannot bear
Unto the loftiest heights of dignity
Grave BALTASAR, who doth as surname wear
TOLEDO,[153] though my fancy whispereth me
That of his learned quill the lofty flight
Must bear him soon to the empyrean height.
There is a mind wherein experience shows
That knowledge findeth fitting dwelling-place,
Not only in ripe age amidst the snows,
But in green years, in early youthful days;
With no man shall I argue, or oppose
A truth so plain, the more because my praise,
If it perchance unto his ears be brought,
Thine honour hath, LOPE DE VEGA,[154] sought.
Now holy Betis to my fancy's eye
Presents himself with peaceful olive crowned,
Making his plaint that I have passed him by,—
His angry words now in my ears resound—
He asks that in this narrative, where I
Speak of rare intellects, place should be found
For those that dwell upon his banks, and so
With voice sonorous I his will shall do.
But what am I to do? For when I seek
To start, a thousand wonders I divine.
Many a Pindus' or Parnassus' peak,
And choirs of lovelier sisters than the nine,
Whereat my lofty spirits faint and weak
Become, and more when by some strange design
I hear a sound repeated as in echo,
Whene'er the name is namèd of PACHECO.[155]
PACHECO 'tis whom Phoebus calls his friend,
On whom he and my sisters so discreet
Did from his feeble tender years attend
With new affection and new converse sweet;
I too his genius and his writings send
By strange paths never trod by mortal feet,
And ever have sent, till they rise on high
Unto the loftiest place of dignity.
Unto this pass I come, that, though I sing
With all my powers divine HERRERA'S[156] praise,
My wearied toil but little fruit will bring,
Although to the fifth sphere my words him raise;
But, should friendship's suspicions to me cling,
Upon his works and his true glory gaze,
HERNANDO doth by learning all enthral
From Ganges unto Nile, from pole to pole.
FERNANDO would I name to you again
DE CANGAS[157] surnamed, whom the world admires.
Through whom the learning lives and doth sustain
Itself that to the hallowed bays aspires;
If there be any intellect that fain
Would lift its gaze to the celestial fires,
Let it but gaze on him, and it will find
The loftiest and the most ingenious mind.