GEORGE WITHERS.
George Withers was one who loved to Fish in troubled Waters, being never more quiet then when in Trouble, of a restless Spirit, and contradicting Disposition; gaining more by Restraint then others could get by their Freedom, which his ungoverned (not to say worse) Pen often brought him unto, so that the Marshalsea and Newgate were no Strangers unto him. He was born in Hantshire (if it be every whit the more honour to the County for his Birth) a prodigious Pourer forth of Rhime, which he spued from his Maw, as Tom Coriat formerly used to spue Greek, and that with a great pretence to a Poetical Zeal, against the Vices of the Times; which he mightily exclaim'd against in his Abuses Stript and Whipt, his Motto, Brittains Remembrancer, &c. with other Satyrical Works of the like nature: He turn'd also into English Verse the Songs of Moses, and other Hymns of the Old Testament; besides these he wrote a Poem called Philaret, the Shepherds Hunting, his Emblems, Campo Musæ, Opo-Balsamum, the Two Pitchers, and others more then a good many, had not his Muse been more Loyal than it was; he was living about the Year 1664. when I saw him, and suppose he lived not long after.
ROBERT HERRIC.
Robert Herric one of the Scholars of Apollo of the middle Form, yet something above George Withers, in a pretty Flowry and Pastoral Gale of Fancy, in a vernal Prospect of some Hill, Cave, Rock, or Fountain; which but for the Interruption of other trivial Passages, might have made up none of the worst Poetick Landskips. Take a view of his Poetry in his Errata to the Reader in these lines.
For these Errata's, Reader thou do'st see,
Blame thou the Printer for them, and not me:
Who gave him forth good Grain, tho he mistook,
And so did sow these Tares throughout my Book.