He then enters upon a defence of poetry, experience proving, he remarks, "by examples of many, both dead and living, that divers delighted and excelling herein, being princes or statesmen, have gouerned and counselled as wisely; being souldiers, have commanded armies as fortunately; being lawyers, have pleaded as judicially and eloquently; being divines, have written and taught as profoundly; and being of any other profession, have discharged it as sufficiently, as any other men whatsoever;" and concludes by alleging, as an excuse "for these poems in particular, that those under the name of
Anonymos were written (as appeareth by divers things to Sir Philip Sidney living, and of him dead) almost twenty years since, when poetry was farre from that perfection to which it hath now attained: that my brother is by profession a souldier, and was not eighteen years old when he writ these toys: that mine owne were made most of them sixe or seven yeares since, at idle times as I journeyed up and downe during my travails."
The division of the "Rapsodie" more peculiarly occupied by these kindred bards, is that including "Sonnets, Odes, Elegies, Madrigals, and Epigrams, by Francis and Walter Davison, brethren;" and they were assisted in that, and the residue of the work, by Spenser, Sidney, Sir John Davis, Mary Countess of Pembroke, Thomas Campion, Thomas Watson, Charles Best, Thomas Spelman, and by others, whose initials are supposed to indicate Henry Constable, Walter Raleigh, Henry Wotton, Robert Greene, Andrew Willet, and Joshua Sylvester.[730:A]
The "Poetical Rapsodie" is dedicated by Davison in a sonnet, "To the most noble, honorable, and worthy Lord William Earl of Pembroke, Lord Herbert of Cardiffe, Marmion, and St. Quintine," and was successively republished with augmentations in 1608, 1611, and 1621. It may be said to present us, not only with a felicitous choice of topics, but it claims the merit of having preserved several valuable poems not elsewhere to be discovered, and which, owing to the rarity of the book, although four times subjected to the press, have not, until lately, attracted the notice that is due to them.
Independent of the ten miscellanies which we have now enumerated, an immense multitude of Airs, Madrigals, and Songs, set to music, and printed in Parts, were published during the latter part of the reign of Elizabeth, and during the reign of James the First. These Collections contain a variety of lyric poems not elsewhere to be met with, and which were either written expressly for the
Composers, or selected by the latter from manuscripts, or rare and insulated printed copies. Foremost among these Professors of Music, who thus indirectly contributed to enrich the stores of English Poetry, stands William Byrd. This celebrated composer's first printed work in English was licensed in 1587, and has the following title:—"Tenor. Psalmes, Sonets, and Songs of sadnes and pietie, made into musicke of five parts: whereof, some of them going a broad among divers, in untrue coppies, are heere truely corrected, and the other being Songs very rare and newly composed, are heere published, for the recreation of all such as delight in Musicke. By William Byrd, one of the Gent. of the Queene's Maiesties Royall Chappell." 4to.
The volume is dedicated to Sir Christopher Hatton; and he tells his reader, in an epistle subscribed the most assured friend to all that love or learne musicke, William Byrd,—"heere is offered unto thy courteous acceptation, musicke of sundrie sorts, and to content divers humors. If thou bee disposed to pray, heere are psalmes. If to bee merrie, heere are sonets. If to lament for thy sins, heere are songs of sadnesse and pietie. If thou delight in musicke of great cõpasse, heere are divers songs, which beeing originally made for instruments to expresse the harmony, and one voyce to pronounce the dittie, are now framed in all parts for voyces to sing the same. If thou desire songs of smal compasse and fit for the reach of most voyces, heere are most in number of that sort."
Next to Byrd, whose publications of this kind are numerous, we may mention Thomas Morley, no less remarkable for his skill in music, and for his fertility in the production of madrigals, ballets, and canzonets. How fashionable and universal had become the practice of singing these compositions at every party of amusement, may be drawn from one of the elementary works of this writer:—"Being at a banquet," he relates, "supper being ended, and music books brought to table, the mistress of the house, according to custom, presented me with a part, earnestly intreating me to sing; when, after many excuses, I protested unfeignedly that I could not, every
one began to wonder, yea, some whispered to others demanding how I was brought up."[732:A]
Of the various collections of lyric poetry adapted to music and published by Morley, who died about the period of the accession of James the First, we shall notice two; one as indicatory of the manners of the age, and the other of the estimation in which the science was held by our composer, who seems, on this occasion, to have partaken the enthusiasm of Shakspeare; for in a dedication, "To the Worshipfull Sir Gervis Clifton, Knight," prefixed to "Madrigals to five voyces. Selected out of the best approved Italian Authors. By Thomas Morley, Gentleman of hir Maiesties Royall Chappell, 1598," he tells his worthy patron, "I ever held this sentence of the poet, as a canon of my creede; That whom God loveth not, they love not Musique. For as the Art of Musique is one of the most Heavenly gifts, so the very love of Musique (without art) is one of the best engrafted testimonies of Heavens love towards us."