Early English Poets.
SIR JOHN DAVIES.

PRINTED BY ROBERT ROBERTS,
BOSTON.

Early English Poets.

THE
COMPLETE POEMS
OF
SIR JOHN DAVIES.

EDITED,

WITH

Memorial-Introduction and Notes,

BY THE

REV. ALEXANDER B. GROSART.

IN TWO VOLUMES.—VOL. I.

London:
CHATTO AND WINDUS, PICCADILLY.
1876.

To

THE RIGHT HONOURABLE W. EWART GLADSTONE, M.P., &c., &c.

Sir,

I had the honour to place in your hands the complete Poems of Sir John Davies in the Fuller Worthies' Library. In now publishing these Poems for a wider circle of readers and students, I re-dedicate them to you.

That I should have wished (and wish) to inscribe the Works of a man famous as a prescient and practical Statesman, as a philosophic Thinker, as an Orator, as a Lawyer, and as a Poet, to you, is extremely natural; for in you, Sir,—in common with all Great Britain and Europe, and America,—I recognize his equal, and England's foremost living name, in nearly every department wherein the elder distinguished himself; while transfiguring and ennobling all, is your conscience-ruled and stainless Christian life. That you gave me permission so to do, with appreciative and kindly words, adds to my pleasure. Trusting that my fresh 'labour of love' (for which 'love of labour' has been necessary) on this Worthy may meet your continued approval,

I am, Sir,
With high regard and gratitude,
Yours faithfully and truly,
ALEXANDER B. GROSART.

[Preface.]

My edition of the Complete Poems of Sir John Davies in the Fuller Worthies' Library in 1869; since being followed up with a similarly complete collection of his much more extensive Prose, as Volumes II. and III. of his entire Works—met with so instant a Welcome, that very speedily I had to return the answer of 'out of print' to numerous applicants. Accordingly it was with no common satisfaction I agreed to the request of the Publishers that Sir John Davies' complete Poems should succeed Giles Fletcher's in their Early English Poets.

In the preparation of this new edition I have carefully re-collated the whole of the original and early editions, with the same advantage and for the same reasons, as in Giles Fletcher's. I have likewise been enabled to make some interesting additions, as will appear in the respective places.

I wish very cordially to re-thank various friends for their continued helpfulness. Several I must specify: To Dr. Brinsley Nicholson I am indebted for many suggestions, and spontaneous research towards elucidating the Poems. I would specially thank B. H. Beedham, Esq., Ashfield House, Kimbolton, for not only making a transcript of the holograph copy of the "Twelve Wonders" in Downing College Library, Cambridge, and of the Lines to the King in All Souls' College, Oxford—both Colleges readily allowing this—but for his old-fashioned enthusiasm and carefulness of scrutiny of every available source, far and near. Biographical results will be utilized more fully elsewhere, viz. in the Memorial-Introduction to be prefixed to the Prose in the complete Works; but meantime and here I cannot sufficiently acknowledge Mr. Beedham's kindness or my obligation to him. To Colonel Chester, of Bermondsey, for ready and most useful help in family-Wills, &c., I am as often deeply obliged. His Grace the Duke of Northumberland, was good enough to allow me the leisurely use of his MS. of "Nosce Teipsum" at Alnwick Castle. Dr. David Laing, of Edinburgh, again entrusted me his Davies MSS. (See Note, Vol. II., p. 119.)

The Poetry of Sir John Davies, weighty and imperishable though it be, bears so small a proportion to his entire works and activities in many departments, that it would be out of keeping to give a lengthened Life herein. Still, in the present Memorial-Introduction will be found very much more of accurate detail than hitherto, and corrections of long-transmitted and accepted mistakes.

The discovery of extremely important MSS.—including State-Papers, and official and private Letters—in H.M. Public Record Office, the Bodleian, Oxford, the British Museum, etc., delays my completion of the Prose Works and the full Life; but within this year it is my hope and expectation to issue the whole to my constituents of the Fuller Worthies' Library. En passant—for the sake of others it may be stated that the complete Works (Verse and Prose: 3 vols.) will be readily accessible in all the leading public Libraries of the Kingdom, and of the United States.

I send forth this new edition of a great Poet assured that he has not yet gathered half his destined renown:—

"Ah! weak and foolish men are they Who lightly deem of Poet's lay, That turns e'en winter months to May, And makes the whole year warm: 'Tis this that brings back Paradise, Reveals its bowers by Art's device, Instructs the fool, delights the wise, And gives to Life its charm. (Stephen Jenner.) ALEXANDER B. GROSART.

St. George's Vestry,
Blackburn, Lancashire.

[Contents.]

Those marked with [*] are herein printed for the first time, or published for the first time among Davies' Poems.

[Memorial-Introduction.]

I. BIOGRAPHICAL.

As in other instances, the first thing to be done in any Life of our present Worthy, is to distinguish him from other two contemporary Sir John Davieses—non-attention to which has in many biographical and bibliographical works led to no little confusion. There was

I. Sir John Davis (or Davys or Davies) of Pangbourne, Berkshire, who 'sleeps well' under a chalk-stone monument in the parish church there. He was mixed up with the 'Plots' (alleged and semi-real), of the Elizabethan-Essex period. Many of his Letters—various very long and matterful and pathetic—are preserved at Hatfield among the Cecil-Salisbury MSS. The Blue-Book report of the "Royal Commission on Historical Manuscripts" (3rd, 1872), makes a strange jumble of our Sir John and this Sir John's Letters (see Index, s. n.). He was Master of the Ordnance 31st January, 1598, and was knighted at Dublin 12th July, 1599. His Will is dated 6th April, 1625, and it was proved at London ... May, 1626. Our Sir John was appointed one of his executors. Arms: Sable, a griffin, segt., or. He is supposed to have been of Shropshire descent.

II. Sir John Davies (or Davys or Davis) Knight-Marshal of Connaught and Thomond: temp. Elizabeth. He had large grants of lands in Roscommon. He is now represented by the family of Clonshanville (or Loyle) in Roscommon, who are of Shropshire descent (see Archdall's Peerage of Ireland.) His Will is dated 14th February, 1625. He died 13th April, 1626. His Will was not proved (at Dublin) until 17th November, 1628. Arms: Sable, on a chevron, argent, three trefoils slipped, vert.: crest; a dragon's head erased, vert.

According to Mr. J. Payne Collier, the following entry is found in the register of S. Mary, Aldermanbury: "Buried Sir John Davyes, Knight, May 28, 1624." (Bibliographical Account of Early English Literature, i., 193). If there be no mistake here, we have another contemporary Sir John Davies. Certainly it was not ours, and as certainly neither of the two preceding.[1]

The spelling of the family name, which is now Davies, varies very much. I have found it as Dyve, Dayves, Davyes, Dauis, Davis, and Davies. Usually our Worthy signs 'Dauyes;' but in his books changes, e.g., in 'Nosce Teipsum' of 1599, to the verse-dedication to Elizabeth, it is 'Dauies;' in 1602 'Dauys,' and in 1608 'Davis,' and so diversely in his Prose.

Among the Carte Papers in the Bodleian are rough jottings by the Historian for a Memoir of our Sir John Davies, wherein it is stated that the family came originally from South Wales to Tisbury, Wiltshire. The words are: "His family had continued several generations in y^e place, though descended from a family of that name in South Wales: but planted heere in England Temp. Hen. 7: accompanying at that time y^e Earle of Pembrooke out of Wales.[2]

The 'estate' of the Davieses at Tisbury was named Chicksgrove (sometimes spelled Chisgrove.) Only a small fragment of the Manor-house remains "unto this day." The Tisbury parish registers, however, yield abundant entries of the family-names under the wonted three-fold 'Baptisms,' 'Marriages,' 'Burials;' and the church itself, in tablets and communion plate, and other memorials, possesses various evidences of their influential position for many generations, and in many lines of descent and local intermarriage. It must suffice here briefly to summarize the Pedigree, and to extract the entries immediately bearing on our present Life.

Confirming the Carte statement of a Welsh descent, one John Davys, of ... wyn, in Shropshire, temp. Henry VIII., recorded by Carney (1606) in the Visitation of Dublin in Ulster Office, and according to Chalmers settled at Tisbury, temp. Edward VI., came from Wales with the Earl of Pembroke, and was living in 1517 and 1541.[3] This John Davys married Matilda, daughter of ... Bridemore, who was buried as "Maud, Master Davys widow, 18 May, 1570." There was a numerous family of sons and daughters from this union.[4] We have only now to do with their eighth, and youngest son, John, who was living in 1517 and 1541.[5] He was of 'New Inn,' London; and thus, like his more famous son, was brought up to the study of the Law. This will appear authoritatively onward; but at this point it is needful to correct and explain a long-continued error, originated by Anthony à-Wood "Athenæ," by Dr. Bliss, Vol. ii., p. 400) apparently, viz. that the father was "a wealthy tanner," and so Sir John, of "low extraction," etc., etc. I do not know that there should have been reason for shame had the paternal Davies been a 'tanner,' wealthy or otherwise, if otherwise he was that Christian gentleman which all reports represent. But the matter-of-fact is that through the premature deaths of his elder brothers, John Davyes, of Chisgrove, seems to have inherited the family possessions and wealth, and to have been in the front rank of the country gentry. The explanation of the mistake as to his having been a 'tanner,' is unexpectedly found in the Will of Thomas Bennett, brother (as we shall see) of Sir John Davies' mother. Among other things he leaves "a certain mess, or tent, in West Hatch now (1591) in the use of Edward Scannell, and all lands thereto belonging, [to] be held by John Bennett my son, Thomas Rose and Nicholas Graye as trustees to my own use for life, and after my decease to the use and behoof" of various relatives, of whom one is described as "Edward Davys of Tyssebury, tanner." This Edward Davys, tanner, was no doubt of the Chisgrove family; and hence the confusion. In all probability he was one of the younger sons, and so brother of our Sir John. When he came to make his Will (now before me), though engaged in trade, he asserts his gentility by styling himself 'gentleman.' So much in correction of a second important biographical mistake.

John Davyes, of Chisgrove, was married to Mary, daughter of John Bennett (alias Pitt) of Pitt House, Wilts., (Visitation of Wilts., 1563) by Agnes his wife, daughter of ........ Toppe, of Fenny Sutton, in Wilts. Hoare[6] and others, give ample proof of the almost lordly position of the Bennetts. Woolrych observes (1869) "The Bennetts of Pyt, have been well known in our own time. The struggles of Bennet and Astley for the representation of the county are remembered as severe and costly."[7] Thus if Davyes of Chisgrove was of good blood in the county, he certainly advanced himself when he wooed and won a daughter of the house of Bennett (or Benett). They had at least three sons. The first was Matthew, who became D.D., Vicar of Writtle, Essex. Hoare (as before) calls him second son, and states that he died unmarried. Both are inaccuracies. The Tisbury Register shews that he was the eldest not the second son; and the Will of our Sir John remembers his family.[8] The second son was (probably) the Edward who became a "tanner." He was baptized at Tisbury 6th December, 1566. He too is named in our Sir John's Will. The third was the subject of our Memorial-Introduction. The following is his baptismal entry from (a) the paper or scroll-copy, (b) the parchment or extended register of Tisbury—literatim:

(a) Paper MS.: 1569 Aprill xvj. John the sonne of John Dauy was crysten'd.

(b) Parchment MS.: Anno dni 1569 Aprill 16 John the sonne of John Davis bapt.[9]

There were two sisters, Edith and Maria. Master John was in his 11th year only when he lost his father, who died in 1580. The Carte MS. "Notes" (as before) tell us: "his father dyed when hee was very young and left him with his 2 brothers to his mother to bee educated. She therefore brought them vpp all to learning." The same "Notes" state "y^t Iohn off whom we now write, being designed for a lawyer, neglected his learning, butt being first a scholar in Winchester Colledge, was afterwards removed to New Colledge in Oxford." According to Chalmers (History of Oxford: I. p. 105) he became in Michaelmas term 1585, a Commoner of Queen's College, Oxford. From thence he removed in 1587 (not 1588 as usually stated e.g. by Wood to George Chalmers and Woolrych). The Admission Register of the Middle Temple contains his entry, and it is interesting additionally as establishing that his father was of the New Inn, London, and so of the legal profession:

f. 193 D.
Teio Die februarij A^o 1587:

Mr Iohes Davius filius tertius Johis Davis de Tisburie in Com Wiltes gen de nov hospitio gen admissus est in societate medij Templi et obligat^r vna m ' m^r is Lewes et Raynolde et dat p fine—xx^s.[10]

This 'entry' renders null all speculations as to whether by 'New Inn' were not intended 'New Hall' Oxford, &c. &c.; and it is a third correction of important biographical errors hitherto.

It is to be regretted that other Records of New Inn commence only with the year 1674. So that we are without light on the residence in the Middle Temple.

In 1590 the saddest of all human losses came on the young law-student by the death of his mother, who was buried at Tisbury "XXVth of Marche, 1590." In this year he is again at the University of Oxford; for in the "Fasti" (by Bliss, Vol. ii., p. 250) he is entered under 1590 as taking the degree of Bachelor of Arts. I fear that with the death of his lady-mother there ensued a full plunge into the frivolities and gaities of the University and Inns of Court society. It was a 'fast' period; and while his after-books prove conclusively that he must have studied Law widely and laboriously, there can be little doubt that there were outbursts of youthful extravagance and self-indulgence. None the less is it equally certain—rather is in harmony therewith—that very early he mingled with the poets and wits of the day. There is not a tittle of evidence warranting the ascription of "Sir Martin Mar People his Coller of Esses Workmanly wrought by Maister Simon Soothsaier, Goldsmith of London, and offered to sale upon great necessity by John Davies. Imprinted at London by Richard Ihones. 1590 (4^to),"[11] to him; nor can any one really study "O Vtinam 1 For Queene Elizabeths securitie, 2 For hir Subiects prosperitie, 3 For a general conformitie, 4 And for Englands tranquilitie. Printed at London, by R. Yardley and P. Short, for Iohn Pennie, dwelling in Pater noster row, at the Grey hound. 1591 (16mo),"[12] and for a moment concede his hastily alleged authorship. But in 1593 his poem of "Orchestra, or a Poeme of Dauncing," was "licensed to Iohn Harison" the elder. No earlier edition than that of 1596 has been proved; but the "license" assures us that Harrison had negotiated for its publication in 1593. The title-page of the 1596 edition is followed by a dedicatory sonnet "To his very friend, Ma. Rich. Martin." The Reader may turn to it "an' it please" him (Vol. I. p. 159): and "thereby hangs a tale." The dedicatory sonnet, it will be seen, while characterizing "Orchestra" as "this dauncing Poem," this "suddaine, rash, half-capreol of my wit," informs us that his "very friend" Martin was the "first mouer and sole cause of it, and that he was the Poet's "owne selues better halfe," and "deerest friend." We have the time employed on it too:—

"You know the modest Sunne full fifteene times
Blushing did rise, and blushing did descend,
While I in making of these ill made rimes,
My golden howers unthriftily did spend:
Yet, if in friendship you these numbers prayse,
I will mispend another fifteene dayes."

All this receives tragi-comical illumination from the fact that this same "very friend" and "better halfe," and he who so sang of him, had soon a deadly quarrel and estrangement. Richard Martin became Recorder of London, and one memorial of him is a Speech to the King which, if it partakes of the oddities of Euphues, must also be allowed to contain weighty and bravely-outspoken counsel: and thus he has come down to posterity as a grave and potent seignior. Moreover, he became Reader of his Society, and M.P. for first Barnstaple, and later for Cirencester. He appears, too, as the associate of Ben Jonson, John Selden, and others of the foremost.[13]

But as a youthful law-student he was 'wild.' He fell under the lash of the Benchers, having been expelled from the Middle Temple in February, 1591, for the part he took in a riot at the prohibited festival of the Lord of Misrule. He was fast of tongue and ribald of wit, with a dash of provocative sarcasm. Evidently he was one of those men who would rather (as the saying puts it) lose his friend than his joke (however poor the joke and rich the friend). A consideration of the whole facts seems to show that again restored to the Middle Temple he had let loose his probably wine-charged sarcasms at his friend Davies. Whether it was so or not, he was ignobly punished. For against all "good manners" not to speak of the "law" and discipline of the Court, Master Davies came into the Hall with his hat on, armed with a dagger, and attended by two persons with swords. Master Martin was seated at dinner at the Barristers' Table. Davies pulling a bastinado or cudgel from under his gown, went up to his insulter and struck him repeatedly over the head. The chastisement must have been given with a will; for the bastinado was shivered to pieces—arguing either its softness or the head's asinine thickness. Having "avenged" himself, Davies returned to the bottom of the Hall, drew one of the swords belonging to his attendants, and flourished it repeatedly over his head, turning his face towards Martin, and then hurrying down the water-steps of the Temple, threw himself into a boat.[14] This extraordinary occurrence happened at the close of 1597 or January of 1598. In 1595 he had been called to the bar; but in February 1598 Davies was expelled by a unanimous sentence; "disbarred" and deprived for ever of all authority to speak or consult in law.[15] These "outbreaks" and expulsions were familiar incidents; and make us exclaim with Othello: "O thou invisible spirit of wine, if thou hast no name to be known by, let us call thee devil"—"O God, that men should put an enemy in their mouths to steal away their brains! that we should with joy, pleasure, revel and applause, transform ourselves into beasts" (ii. 3). This is the all-too-plain solution of these "high jinks." It was a disaster of the most ominous kind. Nevertheless the dark cloud that thus fell across the noon of the full-and-hot-blooded young Barrister folded in it a "bright light:" or—if we may fetch an illustration from Holy Scripture, as Moses the great Lawgiver of ancient Israel through the slaying of the Egyptian was compelled to be a fugitive in the wilderness and therein to master his native impulsiveness and passion, so was the "offender" in the Hall of the Middle Temple through the disgrace and penalties incurred forced into retirement and introspection. It was a costly price to pay. But it is to be doubted whether if the enforced return to Oxford and the self-scrutiny and penitence that calm reflection wrought there had not arrested him, he ever would have given our literature "Nosce Teipsum." His great poem bears witness to very poignant self-accusation and humiliation. Towards the close you seem to catch the echo of sobs and the glistening of tears; nor is it "preaching" to recognize a diviner element still—his unrest and burden alike laid on Him Who alone can sustain and help a "wounded spirit" in its trouble. Besides the hazardous as disastrous incident with Martin, his "Epigrams" by their abandon and general allusiveness reveal that he was the associate of the "young gallants" of the city and lived "fast"; and so give significance and interpretation to his later passionate regrets, self-accusations and self-rebuke. How abased and yet in touches how noble is this!

"O ignorant poor man! what dost thou beare
Lockt vp within the casket of thy brest?
What iewels and what riches hast thou there!
What heauenly treasure in so weake a chest!

Looke in thy soule, and thou shalt beauties find,
Like those which drownd Narcissus in the flood:
Honour and Pleasure both are in thy mind,
And all that in the world is counted good.

Thinke of her worth, and think that God did meane,
This worthy mind should worthy things imbrace;
Blast not her beauties with thy thoughts vnclean,
Nor her dishonour with thy passions base:

Kill not her quickning powers with surfettings,
Mar not her sense with sensualitie;
Cast not her serious wit on idle things:
Make not her free-will, slaue to vanitie.

And when thou think'st of her eternitie,
Thinke not that death against her nature is,
Thinke it a birth; and when thou goest to die,
Sing like a swan, as if thou went'st to blisse.

Take heed of over-weening, and compare
Thy peacock's feet with thy gay peacock's traine;
Study the best and highest things that are,
But of thyselfe an humble thought retaine."[16]

"Expelled" and "disbarred," he retired to Oxford and there "followed his studies, although he wore a cloak." (Wood's Athenæ, as before, ii. 401). To lighten severer studies he now leisurely composed that "Nosce Teipsum" from which has just been quoted the remarkable close. His vein must have been a "flowing" one; for it was published within a year of his disgrace, viz. in 1599.[17] It was dedicated to the "great Queen;" without the all-too-common contemporary hyperbole of laudation, yet showing the strange magnetism of her influence to win allegiance from the greatest, even in her old age:—

"Loadstone to hearts and loadstone to all eyes."

The Carte "Notes" (as before) thus tell the whole story and ratify Anthony-a-Wood:—"Vpon a quarrell between him and Mr. Martin before y^e Judges, where he strooke Mr. Martin hee was confined and made a prisoner: after w^ch in discontentment he retired to y^e countrye, and writt y^t excellent poeme of his Nosce Teipsum, w^ch was so well aprooved of by the Lord Mountioy after Lord Deputy of Ireland and Earle of Devonshire, that by his aduise he publisht it and dedicated it to Queen Elizabeth, to whom hee presented it, being introduced by y^e aforesaide Lord his pattron, and y^e first essay of his pen was so well relisht y^t y^e Queen encouraged him in his studdys, promising him preferment, and had him sworn her servant in ordinary." "Nosce Teipsum" was not his "first essay" so that perchance the meaning is that its verse-dedication was his "first essay" in addressing the Queen—his second being the Hymns to Astræa. The "Hymns to Astræa" appeared in quick succession to "Nosce Teipsum" in the same year 1599. They are dainty trifles; but from all we know of Elizabeth would be received as "sweet incense." If they seem to us to-day flattering not to say adulatory, it must be remembered that such was the mode. Much later, Epistles-dedicatory from Bacon and others of the mighties, and not to Elizabeth but to James—are infinitely fulsome compared with the ideal praises of an ideal Elizabeth—that Elizabeth who had stirred the nation's pulses through her great patriotic words when "The Armada" threatened—in the most superlative of these "Hymnes." Their workmanship is as of diamond-facets. The "bright light" of olden promise was now "lining" the dark cloud. The discipline of his retirement to Oxford did him life-long good. Speedily outward events dove-tailed with the deepened ethical experience and resultant character.

For despair and disgrace there came hope and help. For a career that seemed arrested, a higher, and wider, and nobler opened out in inspiriting perspective. In 1599-1600 he was in all men's mouths as a Poet. The "Poetical Rhapsody" of Davison of these years would have been rendered incomplete without contributions from "I. D.;" and so there went to it those Minor Poems, that are read still with pleasure. So early as 1595 George Chapman had printed his "Ovid's Banquet of Sence," with lines from "I. D." More important still, "Secretary Cecil" became his friend and patron. "By desire" he prepared certain dialogues and scenes for entertainments to the Queen. Three of these remain. The first is "A Dialogue between a Gentleman Usher and a Poet."[18] The second is "A Contention betwixt a Wife, a Widdow, and a Maide."[19] The third is "A Lottery: presented (as the heading states) before the late Queene's Maiesty at the Lord Chancelor's House, 1601."[20] These indicate that the recluse of Oxford was once more restored to society, and that the supremest. The favour of the aged Queen was capricious; but the "Lottery" that formed part of the entertainment at the Lord Chancellor's marked the turning of the tide, in flood not ebb. Through Ellesmere steps were taken to cancel the "expulsion" and "disbarring." He addressed a respectful and manly Petition to "his Society." It was considered at a "Parliament of the Society, held on the 30th October 1601." He had "presented" it in Trinity Term; but it was adjourned until now. In the interval he had attended "the Commons" and in November after making the admission and satisfaction required by four Benches, it was unanimously agreed that he should be "restored to his position at the bar and his seniority." He publicly pronounced his "repentance" in due form on the feast of All Saints. This was done in the Hall in the presence of Chief Iustice Popham, Chief Baron Periam, Judge Fenner, Baron Savil, Sergeant Harris, Sergeant Williams, and the Masters of the Bench." The legal or ceremonial part being completed, and the Apology read in English, Davies turned to "Mr. Martin," then present, and as he could offer no sufficient satisfaction to him, entreated his forgiveness, promising sincere love and affection in all good offices towards him for the future." "Mr. Martin" accepted the tender thus made, and the re-instatement was completed.[21] That the reconciliation between Davies and Martin was formal rather than real has been too hastily assumed. True, that when in 1622 Davies collected his Poems, the Sonnet to Martin was withdrawn and a hiatus left towards the close of "Orchestra." But both these things are otherwise explainable. Both Elizabeth and Martin were now dead—the latter in 1618. Besides, it was only natural that the living friend should be willing to remove all memory of the quarrel. The name should only have revived it. This, and not a many-yeared carrying of an unclosed wound is my judgment in charity. The restored 'Barrister' never forgot his indebtedness to the Lord Chancellor. His dedication of his great "Reports" of Irish Law Cases and their correspondence remain to attest this—remain too to attest the reciprocal admiration, if a tenderer word were not fitter, of Ellesmere.[22] His words in the 'Reports' dedication are more than respectful.

It would appear from the MS. dedication of a corrected MS. of "Nosce Teipsum" to "the right noble, valorous, and learned Prince Henry, Earle of Northumberland" that he must have joined in the intercession for restoration, e.g.

"Then to what spirit shall I these noates commend,
But unto that which doth them best expresse;

Who will to them more kind protection lend,
Than Hee which did protect me in distresse."[23]

Contemporaneous with his full Restoration to his privileges at the Bar, the student-lawyer—through influence that has not come down to us—found his way into Parliament as M.P. for Corfe Castle. The House 'sat' for "barely two months"—October 27th to December 29th" (1601). It was the last Parliament of Elizabeth. The records of it are meagre and unsatisfying, but sufficient is preserved to inform us that untried and inexperienced in Parliament as he was, the member for Corfe Castle at once came to the front. A long-continued warfare on the part of the Commons against monopolies found in him a vehement defender of the privileges of the House. The wary Queen, who always knew when to give way, withdrew certain "patents" that had been granted and led to grievous abuses; and Davies was appointed one of the "Grand Committee" to thank her Majesty[24]. He had spoken stoutly for procedure by "bill" and not by "petition." Richard Martin supported the monopolies.

In 1602 a second edition "newly corrected and amended" of "Nosce Teipsum" appeared. Still prefixed to it—and to his honour continued in the third edition of 1608 when she was gone—was the verse-dedication to the Queen. But it was now "the beginning of the end" with her. Somewhat cloudily and thundrously was the great orb westering. She died on 24th March 1603. It argues that Davies had advanced in various ways that he accompanied Lord Hunsdon to Scotland when that nobleman went with the formal announcement of James' accession to the throne. A pleasant anecdote has survived that when "in the presence" Lord Hunsdon announced John Davies, the King—who if a fool was a learned one and capable of discerning genius—straightway asked "whether he were 'Nosce Teipsum'" and on finding he was its author, "embraced him and conceived a considerable liking for him."[25] That his position was regarded as a potential one with the new King is incidentally confirmed by letters to him from no less than Bacon, who addressing him in Scotland sought his good influences in his behalf, using in one a sphinx-like expression of "concealed poets" that it is a marvel Delia Bacon did not lay hold of to buttress her egregious argument on the Baconian authorship of Shakespeare's Plays.

Accompanying the King southward, Davies held his own at the English court. The royal 'liking' grew: and the royal brain—small no doubt yet alert and in a sense animated with patriotic feeling—was in earnest study of what has till to-day proved England's difficulty—Ireland. Mountjoy (later Earl of Devonshire and husband of Sidney's "Stella"[26]) was sent as Lord-Deputy, and Davies accompanied him as Solicitor-General for Ireland, for which office the "patent" is dated 25th November, 1603. Immediately almost on his arrival at Dublin, viz. on 18th December, 1603, he was knighted. The date hitherto given has been "at Theobald's 11th February 1607," but the records of the Ulster King of Arms make it certain that the knighthood was conferred on 18th December, 1603. On the same occasion his "crest" is described as "On a mount vert, a Pegasus, or, winged, gules."[27]

I know no more noble story than the Work of Sir John Davies in and for Ireland. Our collection of his Prose Works, wherein his State Papers and Correspondence will appear in extenso—from H. M. Public Record Office and other sources—will make it clear as day that beyond all comparison he was the foremost man in the Government. With the sheer hard toil of humblest attorney slaving for his daily bread, there was a breadth of view, a self-denying resoluteness of purpose to benefit his adopted country, a prescience of outlook into the future combined with fearless and magnanimous dealing with contemporary problems, a high-hearted resistance in the face of manifold temptations to slacken effort, and a fecundity of resource and fulness of knowledge and vigilance of observation, that ought to be written on a white page of our national history. It is scarcely possible to exaggerate the consuming labours and the actual and solid results of Davies' almost ubiquitory activities in Ireland. In my full Life of him I hope to make good to the uttermost this high praise. Here and now a few outward facts alone can be stated. In 1606, by patents dated successively 29th May, 1606, and 29th May, 1609,[28] he was promoted to be Attorney-General for Ireland, and was also created Sergeant-at-Arms.[29] He went as "Judge of Assize." His Reports and State Papers, and "Pleadings" and Letters, from 1603 onward, demonstrate how firm was his grasp of circumstance, and how statesmanly he marked out his plans, while his forensic appearances astonish with the omniverousness of his legal reading and knowledge of precedents. Throughout he was 'backed' and cheered by his superiors in Ireland and by the King and his ministers. So early as 9th September, 1604, the Lord Chancellor thus wrote to Davies:—

Y^r lett^r written at Cavan the |13 of Julij Last I receyude the 28 of August. I am gladde to heare of yo^r [illegible] & wysh yo^r seruice & successe therein may be aunswerable to yo^r owne expectations & best hopes. You maye haue comfort that you serue so gracious a soueraigne, so religious & replete w^th all Royall virtues, and so redy & wyllinge to acknowledge & remunerate the services & dueties of his meanest servantes farre beyonde their desertes. I doubt not but yo^r diligence & care will be such as wyll be very acceptable to his Ma^tie. In the Discourse w^ch you haue sent me, I fynde not only a very lovinge respcte w^ch you have towardes me (for w^ch I owe you heartie thankes). But also a very wyse & judicious obseruacon of the state of this wasted kingdome & the condicon of the people. God staye his hande from further afflictinge them. They haue alreadye fealte the scourge of Warre & oppresion & now are vnder the grevous scourge of famine & pestilence. God gyue them his grace and make them imprest as true Christians ought. To become truly Religious towarde God, Loyall and faythfull to their Soueraigne, constantly obedient to his lawes & to the effecting thereof. I euer wysh & praye that they may haue religious virtuous & godly magistrates sette ouer them. To yo^r selfe I wish all happines, and wherein you shall haue occasion to vse mee, you shall alwayes finde me redy & wyllinge to stande you in the best stede I can. And so w^th my very swete comendacons I comitt you to the Almightye. And rest yo^r very assured Loving frende

T. Ellesmere, Canc.

At[torn]feile
9 Septembris 1604.

To the right wo^r my very Loving frende, Sr. John Davis Knight, his Ma^ties Solict. generall in his Realme of Ireland.[30]

A few years later—1608—one Letter in full—like all our MSS., now for the first time printed,—from the Lord Deputy—the noble Chichester—must suffice as a specimen of many kindred.

Noble Mr. Attornie,

Since your departure hence I haue received two ioynt letters from you, and Sr. James Ley, and one from your selfe alone, for w^ch I am not your debter vnlesse it be in the matter, w^ch I confesse bringes more life w^th it comming freshe out of the stoorehouse of neewes and noveltie, for I have written as manie and more vnto you both.

Albeyt I expect you w^th the first passage (for so the lordes haue promised by their letters) yet can I not leaue you vnremembred, assuringe you thoe you have greater friendes, none respects you better then my selfe, nor can be more readie to make demonstration therof accordinge to the meanes I haue. I praye bringe w^th you the lordes directions for Sr. Neale Odonnell, and the rest of the prisoners. Sr. Neale and Ocatiance [O'Sullivan?] had contriued their escape and woulde haue as desperately attempted it, had I not preuented it within these sixe nightes by a discoverie made vnto me, albeyt I keep 20 men euerie neight for the guarde of the Castle ouer and aboue the warde of the same, whereof two or three lye in each of their chambers. Their horses were come to the towne, and all thinges else in readines. Sure these men doe goe beyond all nations in the worlde for desperate escapes, Shane Granie Ocarratan [O'Sullivan?] after he was acquited of three indictments, and as most men conceiued free from all danger of the lawe, did on fridaye the 27th of Januarie cast himselfe out of a wyndow in the topp of the Castle by the heelpe of a peece of rotten match, and his mantell w^ch brake before he was halfe waye downe, and thoe he were presently discovered yet he escaped about supper tyme.

When I had written thus far worde was brought me that a passadge [sic] was come from Hollyheade w^ch made me to pause for a tyme hopinge you or some other w^th letters, or other directions, was arriued, but beinge advertised that the Recorder of this Cyttie only w^th a fewe other passengers had in this fayre weather wrought out a passage by longe lyeinge att sea, although the wyndes were contrarie, and that they came from London before Christmas and had no written letters or message but in theise particulars, I fell to you againe.

And do now praye you to geue your best assystance and furtherance to such matters tuchinge my perticulare as John Strowd or Annesley shall acquaint you w^th all, for w^ch you shall finde me verie thankfull vnto you.

I haue written to the lordes in the behalfe of the howse servitors here, that they maye be remembered vpon the deuysion and plantation of the scheated lands in Ulster. I am discreadited amonge them if they should be forgotten, and sure the plantation woulde be weake w^th out them, for they must be the pyllers to support it. Those that shall come from thence wyll not affect it in that kynde as these do, to make it a settlement for them and theirs; and in respect of their wourthier deserts and paynfull labors, and that I haue vpon my promise to speake effectually for them preuayled so farre as to staye them from resortinge thither, w^ch they woulde doe in great multitudes if I woulde haue given way to their desire. I wysh that an honorable consideration maye be had of them before the diuision be concluded. I knowe that worke is of great moment and on it dependes much of the prosperitie, and good estate of the whole kingdome. I haue sayd enough to one that vnderstandes so well: And so beinge called vpon sooner then I expected I must end w^th the page, but wyll euer be found

Your trewe affected friend

Arthur Chichester.

Att Dublyn Castle the 7th of
februarie 1608.

I send here w^th the proceedinge of the Court of Kinges bench in the cause of the Carrolans w^ch was violently prosecuted by the l. of Howth. I send them by reason it is thought by the Judges that the Baron will exclaime of their proceedinges here.

To my verie wourthie friend Sr John Davis Knight his

Ma^ties Attornie in the Realme of Irelande.[31]

Two short letters from Bacon—not before printed, having escaped even Mr. Spedding's Argus-eyes—in the same Carte MSS.—show Davies's pleasant relations with his great contemporary. They are as follow:—

(I. Carte MS. Vol. 62, ff. 317-18.)

Good Sr Jh. Davies yo^r mistaking shall not be imputed to you (for the difference is not much). Yo^r gratulacons for my marrige I take kyndly. And as I was all waies delighted w^th the fruites of yo^r [illegible] so I would be gladde of yo^r [illegible] so as you plant not yo^r self to[o] farre of[f]. For I had rather you should be a laborer than a plant in that State. You giue me no occasion to wryte longer in that you impart not by yo^r l^rs any occurrence of y^rs. And so w^th my very lov^g considⁿ towards you

I remayne
Yo^r assured friend
Fr. Bacon.

from Graies Inn,
this 26th of Dec. 1606.

To my very good Frend Sr Jh. Davis Knt Attorny g'rall to his M. in Ireland.

(II. Ibid ff, 328-9.)

Mr. Atturny,

I thanke you for yo^r l^re and the discourse you sent of this mere accident, as thinges then appeared. I see manifestly the begynnyng of better or woorse. But me thinketh it is first a tender of the better, and woorse foloweth but vpon refusall or default. I would haue been gladd to see you hear, but I hope occasion restreineth o^r meeting for a vacation when we may haue more fruite of conference. To requite yo^r proclamacon (w^ch in my judgment is wysely and seriously penned) I send you [illegible] w^h [illegible] w^ch happened to be in my hands when y^os came.

I would be gladde to hear oft from you and to be advertized how [illegible] passe whereby to haue some occasion to thinke some good thoughts though I can doe lyttell. At least it wilbe a contynuance in exercise of o^r frendshippe w^ch on my part remayneth increased by that I hear of yo^r service and the good respects I find towards my self. And so in extreme hast I remayne

Yo^r very [illegible] frend
Fr. Bacon.

from Graies Inn this
23th of Oct. 1607.

To the R. W. his verie Lovinge frende Sr Iohn Dauys
Knight, his Ma^ties Atturnye in Irelande.

During one of his 'circuits' in Ireland, he met Eleanor, daughter of Lord Audley (afterwards Earl of Castlehaven) and was married to her—though the date has not been traced. Her later years were darkened with insanity of a strangely voluble type. It is to be feared she was an ill "help-meet" for her husband. There is pathos, if also inevitable comedy, in her career—not here to be entered on.[32]

While intensely occupied with his official duties, Sir John Davies did not neglect his literary gift. He was making history every year—so fundamental and permanent was the part he filled in Ireland—but the Past was gone back on that he might fetch from it monition for the Present, and hope for the Future. His imperishable book: "A Discourse of the true reasons why Ireland has neuer been entirely subdued till the beginning of His Majesty's reign," (4to)[33] will reward the most prolonged study to-day. It was published in 1612. In the same year he was made King's Sergeant and also elected M.P. for Fermanagh, being the first representative for that county in the Irish House of Parliament. He was likewise chosen to be Speaker of the House; but not without a characteristically violent struggle between the Catholics and Protestants.[34] He delivered a notable speech "to the House" on its opening in 1613.[35] In 1614 he appears in the House of Commons in England as M.P. for Newcastle-under-Lyne:[36] and his attendance in England was preparatory to final retirement from Ireland. "Grants of lands" there from the "forfeitures,"—which, if ever any righteously acquired, he did[37]—gave him a special interest in Ireland as a proprietor; but after all, for such a man, at such a time, to be limited to Ireland, was but a splendid exile. It is not, therefore, to be wondered at that having practically achieved all, and more than all, he had been given to do, or himself originated, he sought to return. It is usually stated (e.g. Chalmers, Woolrych, &c., &c.) that he so returned in 1616; but it was not until 1619 that he did so finally and absolutely; for in a letter under date "21 June, 1619," to Buckingham, he is found still only pleading for retirement and for the transference of his office to a relative.[38] It is one of the treasures of the Fortescue MSS, in the Bodleian,[39] and is as follows:

My most honored Lord,

I præsent my most humble Thanks to y^r L^p for præsenting mee to his Ma^ty the last Day, at Wansted; & for y^r noble favour in furthering the suit I then made, as well for mine owne stay in England, as for my recommending a fitt man to my place of service in Ireland.

The Gentleman to whom I wish this place now, is much obliged to y^r L^p already, & well worthy of y^r L^ps favours, & besides his owne worthines (hee being a Reader & Judge of a circuit, of w^ch degree & quality never any before was sent out of England to supply that place), hee is of neere alliance vnto mee. So as, where there is concurrence of meritt & kinred, y^r L^p may conjecture that I deale w^th him like a gentleman & a friend, & not like a marchent. Albeit I wi^ll leave a good place there, w^thout any præsent præferment heer (whereof none of my profession have failed at their return out of Ireland) I might, perhaps w^th some reason expect some Retribution, to recompence the charge of Transporting my famely from thence, & of setling it heer in this Kingdome, where I am become almost an Alien by reason of my long absence.

For this particular favour of transferring my place to so well deserving a successor, I doo wholly depend vppon y^r L^p as I shall euer doo vpon all other occasions, while I live, as one that have separated my self from all other dependancies, beeing entirely devoted to doo y^r L^p all humble & faythful service

Jo: Dauys.

21 Junij 1619.

if my long service may induce favour, y^r L^p may bee pleased to looke vppon the noate enclosed.

To the right honorable my very good lord
my lord the Marques of Buckingham, &c.

It is to be regretted that the "noate" of the postscript has not been preserved. It probably enumerated his public services.

Sir William Ryves succeeded as Attorney-General for Ireland by Patent dated 30th October, 1619.[40] From 1619 onward, Sir John Davies is found in the House of Commons (still for Newcastle-under-Lyne) and "on circuit" as a Judge. His "Charges"—to be given in his Prose Works—as "one of the Justices of Assize for the Northerne Circute"—are very characteristic, being full of legal 'precedents,' and noticeable in their tracing up the verdict sought to abiding principles. He took part in the memorable "case" of Frances, Countess of Somerset, for the poison-murder of Sir Thomas Overbury. In the House of Commons he spoke seldom; but when anything that concerned Irish interests came up he never failed to contend in behalf of Ireland.[41]

Lightening his legal employments were a large correspondence and 'fellowship' with his most eminent contemporaries, and the collection of his Poetical Works, in so far as he wished them to go down to posterity. Of the former I select one undated letter to the illustrious Sir Robert Cotton, with whom he had been early acquainted, and associated in 1614, in re-establishing the Society of Antiquaries, originally founded in 1590. One of these is a sprightly and pleasant letter, and all the more welcome that most of his correspondence that remains is official and grave. The lighter letter is as follows, from MSS. Cotton: Julius C. III., p. 14: now paged 133, British Museum:

Sweet Robin, for a few sweet words, a client of mine hath presented me w^th sweet meates, to what end I know not except it be, as Chaucer speakes,

To make mine English sweet uppon my tongue, that I may pleade the better for him to morrow at the Seale.

Not w^th standing, the best vse that I can make of it, is to preesent you w^th it, especially at this time when you ar in Physick, that you may sweeten your tast after the Rhewbarb. I have been a little distracted w^th vnexpected busines these two or three last dayes, that I cold not performe my officious promise to visit you in this voluntary sicknes of yours; but [erased] now I am faine to make my hands to excuse my feet from travayling vnto you, because being the servant of the multitude I am not mine owne man. Make much of your self, & make y^r self speedily well, that I may have your company towards Cambridge, from whence I will go w^th you to see the ancient Seat of Robt. le Bruis; so wishing you a prosperous operation of your Phisick, at least that you may Imagine so, for it is the Imagination that doth good, & not the Physick, w^ch I ever thought a meere imposture; I cease to troble you least the intention of to much Reading hinder the working of those vertuous drugs.

Y^rs all & ever
J. Dauis.

(Endorsed) To my worthy friend
Rob: Cotton esquier.

A second letter runs thus, from MSS. Cotton: Julius C. III., p. 32:—

Noble S^r Robert: the ordinary subject of letters is, newes, whereof this kingdome since the warres, hath been very barren; therefore I must write vnto you that w^ch is no newes, that is, that I love you, & hold a kind & dear memory of you.

according to my promise to y^r self & Mr. Solliciter of England who is now, I hear, a Judge, I have caused this bearer to draw some Mapps of o^r principal Cittyes of Ireland; & he having occasion to go for England, I have thought fitt to direct him vnto you. he is an honest ingenuous yong mā & of y^r owne Name. I hear not yet of y^e Antiquities out of Cumberland; if they be brought hither I will take care to transmitt thā to London, & so in speciall hast, being ready to go my circuit ov^r all Munster I leave you to y^e divine p'servation.

Y^s to do you Service,
Io: Dauys.

Dublin 4 Martij 1607.
I desire to be affectionately remembred to Mr.
Justice Doddridge & Mr. Clarencieux.

His Poems, as finally collected by him, appeared in a thin octavo in 1622. His Prose Works he never collected, but allowed them to be re-published separately. His "True Cause" passed through several editions during his own life-time. One of his most important prose-books after the "True Cause" brings us to the closing event of his busy and various-coloured life. It is entitled in the first issue, which was posthumous[42]—"The Question concerning Impositions, Tonnage, Poundage, Prizage, Customs, &c. Fully stated and argued, from Reason, Law, and Policy. Dedicated to King James in the latter end of his Reign." (1656.)

This historically-memorable treatise has already been reproduced in the Prose Works.[43] Elsewhere I examine it critically.[44] It must suffice here to state that later the King (Charles I.), having an impoverished exchequer, had recourse to forced loans of various amounts. Hating the control of Parliament, he persisted in substituting his will for law, his "proclamation" for statute. Feeling the treacherousness of his standing-ground of prerogative, the Judges were applied to, and with loyalty to the monarch rather than to their country, they somewhat favoured the King's 'demands.' Charles deemed their "opinion" to have a somewhat "uncertain sound," and presented to the Judges a paper for their signature, recognising the legality of the collection. This was refused. One of the victims of the sovereign's wrath was Chief-Justice Crew, who was "discharged" on the 9th of November, 1626 (Foss's Judges, vi., p. 291). Sir John Davies was appointed as his successor; and one cannot help recognising that the opinions revealed in his "Jus Imponendi" contributed to the succession. For one, I should rather have found Sir John Davies on the other side, spite of his great array of "precedents" and ingenious applications to the then circumstances and exigencies, and necessarily ignorant of the lengths Charles as distinguished from James, was to proceed. Technically, there had been "precedents" no doubt; but long "use and wont" had rendered so-called regal rights obsolete, and it was insanity to revive them, as Charles I.,—who inherited James's high notions of regal authority,—found out when too late. But, passing to Davies, the "lean fellow" called Death was nearer the Knight than was the Chief-Justiceship. Purple and ermine robes were actually bought, but they were not to be donned. He had told a Mr. Mead that he was at supper with the Lord Keeper on the 7th of December,[45] and that he fully expected the great promotion. The air was thick with "reports" to the same effect. He was found dead in his bed on the morning of the 8th December, cut down, it has been supposed, by apoplexy. Three days after, he was interred in S. Martin's Church, London. Later a double inscription for himself and his widow (who was re-married to Sir Archibald Douglas,) long hung on the third pillar, near the grave. The original Latin, with our translation, are as follow:[46]—

D. O. M. S.

Johannes Davys Equestris ordinis quondam Attornati
Regii Generalis amplissima prudentiâ in regno
Hyberniæ functus, inde in patriam revocatus
inter servientes Domini Regis ad Legem primum
Locum obtinuit; post varia in utrone munere præ
clare gesta ad ampliora jam designatus, repente
spem suorum destituit suam implevit ab humanis
honoribus ad cœlestem gloriam evocatus
Ætatis anno 57.o
Vir ingenio compto, rarâ facundiâ
Oratione cum solutâ tum numeris restrictâ
Felicissimus.
Juridicam severitatem morum elegantiâ et ameniore eruditione temperavit.
Iudex incorruptus; Patronus fidus
Ingenuæ pietatis amore et anxiæ superstitionis contemptu
Iuxta insignis.
Plebeiarum animarum in religionis negotio
Pervicacem μἱκροψυχιαν ex edito despiciebet
Fastidium leniente miseratione.
Ipse magnanimè probus, religiosus, liber, et cœlo admotus
Uxorem habuit Dominam Eleanoram Honoratissimi
Comitis de Castlehaven Baronis Audley filiam
Unicam ex eâ prolem superstitem hæredem reliquit
Luciam illustrissimo Ferdinando Baroni
Hastings Huntingdoniæ Comiti nuptam.
Diem Supremam obiit 8o idus Decembris
Anno Domini 1626.
Apud nos exemplum relinquens, hic resurrectionem justorum expectat.
Accubat dignissimo marito incomparabilis uxor
Quæ illustre genus
Et generi pares animos
Christianâ mansuetudine temperavit
Erudita super sexum
Mitis infra sortem
Plurimis Major
Quia humilior
In eximiâ formâ sublime ingenium
In venustâ comitate singularem modestiam
In femineo corpore viriles animos
In rebus adversissimis serenam mentem
In impio sæculo pietatem et rectitudinem inconcussam
Possedit.
Non illi robustam animam aut res lauta laxavit, aut
Angusta contraxit, sed utramque sortem pari vultu
Animoque non excepit modo sed rexit
Quippe Dei plena cui plenitudini
Mundus nec benignus addere
Nec malignus detrahere potuisset
Satis Deum jamdudum spirans et sursum aspirans sui
Ante et Reip. fati præsaga, salutisque æternæ certissima
Ingente latoque ardore in Servatoris dilectissimi sinum
Ipsius sanguine lotam animam efflavit
Rebus humanis exempta immortalitatem induit
III. Non. Quintilis Anno Salutis 1652.
Ps. 16. 9.
Etiam caro mea habitat securè quà non es
Derelicturus animam meam in sepulchro.

D(eo) O(ptimo) M(aximo) S(acrum)

To God the Best and Greatest: Sacred.
John Davys of knightly rank, having formerly
discharged with prudence the highest duties of
King's Attorney General in the realm of Ireland:
thence having been recalled to his own country,
secured the first place among the servants
of his lord the King, at the Law. After various
services nobly rendered in each office, being now
nominated to more distinguished (appointments)
he suddenly frustrated the hope of his friends
but fulfilled his own—being called away
from human honours to celestial glory,
in the year of his age 57.
A man for accomplished genius, for uncommon
eloquence, for language whether free or bound
in verse,
Most happy.
Judicial sternness with elegance of manners
and more pleasant learning
he tempered.
An uncorrupt Judge, a faithful Patron
For love of free-born piety and contempt of fretting superstition
alike remarkable.
He looked down from on high on the obstinate narrowness
of plebeian souls in the matter of religion,
pity softening his disdain.
Himself magnanimously just, religious, free, and moved by heaven,
Had for wife the Lady Eleanor of the Right Honble.
Earl of Castlehaven, Baron Audley, daughter:
His only surviving offspring by her he left as heiress,
Lucy, to the most illustrious Ferdinand Baron
Hastings, Earl of Huntingdon, married.
He spent his last day the 8th December
In the year of our Lord 1626.
With us leaving an example: here for the resurrection
of the Just, he waits.

Near to her most worthy husband lies his incomparable Wife:
Who her illustrious birth
And spirit equal to her race
With Christian mildness tempered.
Learned above her sex,
Meek below her rank,
Than most people greater
Because more humble,
In eminent beauty She possessed a lofty mind,
In pleasing affability, singular modesty:
In a woman's body a man's spirit,
In most adverse circumstances a serene mind,
In a wicked age unshaken piety and uprightness.
Not for her did Luxury relax her strong soul, or
Poverty narrow it: but each lot with equal countenance
And mind, she not only took but ruled.
Nay she was full of God, to which fulness
Neither a smiling world could have added,
Nor from it a frowning world have taken away.
Now for a long time sufficiently breathing of God
and aspiring above, of her own
And the Commonwealth's fate divining beforehand,
And most sure of Eternal Salvation
With a mighty and huge ardour into her Beloved Saviour's
breast, She breathed forth her soul washed in His own blood.
Taken away from things human she put on immortality
on the fifth of July, in the year of Salvation, 1652.
Ps. 16. 9.
My flesh also dwells securely because Thou wilt not
leave my soul in the sepulchre.

One is willing to accept the "golden lies" of these Epitaphs in either case.

Sir John Davies had several children. One, who was semi-idiotic, was drowned in Ireland. Others alleged to have been born, have not been traced. His daughter Lucy, of the Inscriptions, and by whom, no doubt, they were procured, became famous in her generation as Countess of Huntingdon. We have to deplore that while we have a fine portrait of her, none, as yet, has been found of her Father. His Will and Charities, and their singular after-history, will be given in my fuller Life (as before). Pass we now to

[II. CRITICAL.]

I shall limit myself in this second half of the Memorial-Introduction to a brief statement and examination of certain characteristics of the Poetry of Sir John Davies—the limitation being imposed by the contents of the present volumes.[47] There are Poets whose truest and most certain fame rests on so-called minor poems; and yet commonly their bulkier productions have over-shadowed these. From Milton to Wordsworth it is to be lamented that to the many they should be represented by "Paradise Lost" and "The Excursion"; or to descend, that Thomas Campbell and Samuel Rogers should have so hidden behind their "Pleasures of Hope" and "Pleasures of Memory" their rare and real faculty as Poets—for while in the larger poems of Milton and Wordsworth there is of the imperishable stuff that only genius of a lofty type weaves, it is rather (meo judicio) in "purple patches" than in the web as a whole. In Milton and Wordsworth you do not read them at their highest in their Epics but in their shorter poems; while Campbell and Rogers should long since have died out of men's hearts had they left nothing behind them save the smooth and prize-poem-like common-places of their "Pleasures." In Milton the remark requires modification, for only in "Paradise Lost" has he put forth to uttermost daring his Imagination—than which no writer of all time has approached him for grandeur of vision and splendour of utterance. But substantially I think that those capable of discernment will agree with me that if Time may shut and leave unread except by an elect few, many pages of the 'great' and volume-filling poems, the lesser will assuredly draw more and more homage, and abide the regalia of our Literature.

It is different with Sir John Davies. His "Orchestra" and "Hymnes to Astræa" and Minor Poems, preceded considerably his "Nosce Teipsum," but it was his "Nosce Teipsum" that made King James I. prick up his ears on hearing his name, and it is "Nosce Teipsum" that is the poem that will secure immortality to Sir John Davies. His other poetry has special remarkablenesses—as will appear—but in "Nosce Teipsum" alone have we the inspiration and spontaneity, the insight and speculation, the subtlety and yet definiteness, the "burden" (in the prophetic sense) and the melody of the Poet as distinguished from the versifier or verse-Rhetorician.

I value "Nosce Teipsum" as a first thing for its deep and original thinking, i.e. for its intellectual strength—all the more remarkable that as the former part of the Memorial-Introduction shows, he was only in his 28th-29th year when he composed it. Of its art I shall have somewhat to say anon: but regarding it as a "philosophical poem" and as a contribution to metaphysic, I place foremost the THOUGHT in it, as at once a characteristic and a merit (if merit be not too poor a word). Davies (along with Fulke Greville, Lord Brooke and Donne) simply as Thinker on the profoundest problems of nature and human nature, seems to me to stand out pre-eminently, and in saying this, I regard it as sheer nonsense to exalt the workmanship at the expense of the material—to ask me to recognize in a bit of tin ingeniously and painstakingly etched into a kind of miracle of execution something co-equal with a solid bar of gold as it gleams i' the face of the sun in its purged and massive simpleness; or to put it unmetaphorically, I must pronounce judgment on the rank of a Poet qua a Poet fundamentally on the kind and quality of the thought on higher and deeper things that he puts into his verse and that he strikes out in others. Your mere artist-Poet is surely third-rate and must even go beneath the music-composer of to-day.

"Nosce Teipsum" as it was practically the earliest so it remains the most remarkable example of deep reflective-meditative thinking in verse in our language or in any language. The student of this great poem will very soon discover that within sometimes homeliest metaphors there is folded a long process of uncommon thought on the every-day facts of our mysterious existence. I call the thinking deep, because "Nosce Teipsum" reveals more than eyes that looked on the surface—reveals penetrative and bold descent to the roots of our being and reachings upward to the Highest. Your mere realistic word-painter of what he sees, is shallow beside a Poet who passes beneath the surface and circumstance and fetches up from sunless depths or down from radiant altitudes fact and facts—each contributory to that ultimate philosophy which while it shall accept every proved fact, will not rush off hysterically shouting "eureka," with ribald accusations of all that generations have held to be venerable and sustaining. I call the thinking original, for there is evidence everywhere in "Nosce Teipsum" that the penitent recluse of Oxford made his own self his study—as really if not as avowedly as Wordsworth.

I am aware in claiming originality for Davies that in that huge waste-basket of our Literature—Nichols' Literary Illustrations (Vol. IV. pp. 549-50) there is a letter from an Alexander Dalrymple, Esq., who is designated "the great hydrographer" to "Mr. Herbert" (the Bibliographer I opine) wherein he takes different ground. We must traverse his charge. He thus writes:—"Dear Sir, I have lately purchased the following old books" (he enumerates several).... "I have also got 'Wither's translation of Nemesius de Naturâ hominis' by which I find Sir John Davies's poem on the Immortality of the Soul is chiefly taken from Nemesius" ... "I have picked up a tract in 4to. by Thomas Jenner, with some very good plates, the marginal notes of which seem to be what the heads of Tate's edition of Sir John Davies's are taken from."

Were this true it would utterly take from "Nosce Teipsum" the first characteristic and merit I claim for it—deep and original thought. But it is absolutely untrue, an utter delusion, as any one will find who takes the pains that I have done to read, either the original Nemesius, or what this sapient book-buyer mentions, Wither's translation. With my mind and memory full of "Nosce Teipsum" and the poem itself beside me, I have read and re-read every page, sentence and word of Nemesius and Wither (and there is a good deal of Wither in his translation: 1636) and I have not come upon a single metaphor or (as the old margin-notes called them) "similies," or even observation in "Nosce Teipsum" drawn from Nemesius or Wither. The only element in common is that necessarily Nemesius adduces and discusses the opinions of the Heathen Philosophers on the many matters handled by him, and Sir John Davies does the same with equal inevitableness. But to base a charge of plagiarism against "Nosce Teipsum" on this, is to reason on the connection between Tenterden Steeple and Goodwin Sands (if the well-worn folly be a permissible reference). The following is the title-page of the quaint old tome and as it is by no means scarce, any reader can cross-question our witness: "The Nature of Man. A learned and useful Tract written in Greek by Nemesius, surnamed the Philosopher; sometime Bishop of a City in Phœnecia, and one of the most ancient Fathers of the Church. Englyshed, and divided into Sections, with briefs of their principle contents by Geo. Wither. London: Printed by M. F. for Henry Taunton in St. Duncan's Churchyard in Fleetstreet. 1636." (12^o 21 leaves and pp. 661.) Chronologically—Wither's translation was not published until 1636, while "Nosce Teipsum" was published in 1599; but Nemesius' own book no more than Wither's warrants any such preposterous statements as this Alexander Dalrymple makes. Even in the treatment of the "opinions" of the Heathen Philosophers which come up in Nemesius, and in "Nosce Teipsum," the latter while 'intermedling' with the same returns wholly distinct answers in refutation. The "opinions" themselves as being derived of necessity from the same sources are identical; but neither their statement nor refutation. Nemesius is ingenious and well-learned, but heavy and prosaic. Sir John Davies is light of touch and a light of poetic glory lies on the lamest "opinion." The "Father of the Church" goes forth to war with encumbering armour: the Poet naked and unarmed beyond the spear wherewith he 'pierces' everything, viz. human consciousness. Jenner's forgotten book had perhaps been read by Tate, but that concerns Tate not Sir John Davies. I pronounce it a hallucination to write "Sir John Davies' poem on the immortality of the Soul is chiefly taken from Nemesius." Not one line was taken from Nemesius.

Before passing on it may be well to illustrate here from the "contents" of two chapters (representative of the whole) in Wither's Nemesius, the merely superficial agreement between them and "Nosce Teipsum." In the Poem under "The Soule of Man and the Immortalitie thereof" various opinions of its 'nature' are thus summarized:

"One thinks the Soule is aire; another fire;
Another blood, diffus'd about the heart;
Another saith, the elements conspire,
And to her essence each doth giue a part.

Musicians thinke our Soules are harmonies,
Phisicians hold that they complexions bee;
Epicures make them swarmes of atomies,
Which doe by chance into our bodies flee." (p. 26.)

In Nemesius, c. 2. § I, the 'headings' are: "I. The severall and different Opinions of the Ancients concerning the Sovl, as whether it be a Substance; whether corporeall, or incoporeall, whether mortal or immortal P. II. The confutation of those who affirme in general that the Sovl is a corporeall-substance. III. Confutations of their particular Arguments, who affirme that the Sovl is Blood, Water, or Aire." These are all common-places of ancient 'opinion' and of the subject; and anything less poetical than Nemesius' treatment of them is scarcely imaginable. Here if anywhere Davies' indebtedness must have been revealed; but not one scintilla of obligation suggests itself to the Reader. Again in the Poem, after a subtle and very remarkable 'confutation' of the notion that the Soul is a thing of 'Sense' only, there comes proof "That the Soule is more than the Temperature of the humours of the Body;" and nowhere does Davies show a more cunning hand than in his statement of the 'false opinion.' Turning once more to Nemesius c. II. § 3, these are its 'headings:'—"I. It is here declared, that the Soul is not (as Galen implicitly affirmeth) a Temperature in general. II. It is here proved also, that the Soul is no particular temperature or quality. III. And it is likewise demonstrated that the Soul is rather governesse of the temperatures of the Body, both ordering them, and subduing the vices which arise from the bodily tempers." Here again we would have expected some resemblances or suggestions; but again there is not a jot or tittle of either. Thus is it throughout. One might as well turn up the words used in "Nosce Teipsum" in a quotation-illustrated Dictionary of the English Language (such as Richardson's) and argue 'plagiarism' because of necessarily agreeing definitions, as from a few scattered places in "Nosce Teipsum" discussing the same topics, allege appropriation of Nemesius. Your mere readers of title-pages and contents, or glancers over indices are constantly blundering after this fashion. Dalrymple was one of these.

The headings of the successive sections—removed in our text from the margins to their several places—suffice to inform us of the original lines of thought and research and illustration pursued in "Nosce Teipsum" and thither I refer the Reader. The merest glance will show that in "Nosce Teipsum" you have the whole breadth of the field traversed—and that for the first time in Verse. I can only very imperfectly illustrate either the depth or the originality of the poem. Almost as at the opening of the book, take these uniting both:—

"And yet alas, when all our lamps are burnd,
Our bodyes wasted, and our spirits spent;
When we haue all the learnèd Volumes turn'd,
Which yeeld mens wits both help and ornament:

What can we know? or what can we discerne?
When Error chokes the windowes of the minde,
The diuers formes of things, how can we learne,
That haue been euer from our birth-day blind?

When Reasone's lampe, which (like the sunne in skie)
Throughout Man's little world her beames did spread;
Is now become a sparkle, which doth lie
Vnder the ashes, halfe extinct, and dead:

How can we hope, that through the eye and eare,
This dying sparkle, in this cloudy place,
Can recollect these beames of knowledge cleere,
Which were infus'd in the first minds by grace?

So might the heire whose father hath in play
Wasted a thousand pound of ancient rent;
By painefull earning of a groate a day,
Hope to restore the patrimony spent.

The wits that diu'd most deepe and soar'd most hie
Seeking Man's pow'rs, haue found his weaknesse such:
"Skill comes so slow, and life so fast doth flie,
"We learne so little and forget so much.

For this the wisest of all morall men
Said, 'He knew nought, but that he nought did know';
And the great mocking-Master mockt not then,
When he said, 'Truth was buried deepe below.'

For how may we to others' things attaine,
When none of vs his owne soule vnderstands?
For which the Diuell mockes our curious braine,
When, 'Know thy selfe' his oracle commands.

For why should wee the busie Soule beleeue,
When boldly she concludes of that and this;
When of her selfe she can no iudgement giue,
Nor how, nor whence, nor where, nor what she is?

All things without, which round about we see,
We seeke to knowe, and how therewith to doe;
But that whereby we reason, liue and be,
Within our selues, we strangers are thereto.

We seeke to know the mouing of each spheare,
And the strange cause of th' ebs and flouds of Nile;
But of that clock, within our breasts we beare,
The subtill motions we forget the while.

We that acquaint our selues with euery Zoane
And passe both Tropikes and behold the Poles,
When we come home, are to our selues vnknown,
And vnacquainted still with our owne Soules.

We study Speech but others we perswade;
We leech-craft learne, but others cure with it;
We interpret lawes, which other men haue made,
But reade not those which in our hearts are writ." (pp. 18-20.)

Again:—

In what manner the Soule is united to the Body.

But how shall we this union well expresse?
Nought ties the soule; her subtiltie is such
She moues the bodie, which she doth possesse,
Yet no part toucheth, but by Vertue's touch.

Then dwels shee not therein as in a tent,
Nor as a pilot in his ship doth sit;
Nor as the spider in his web is pent;
Nor as the waxe retaines the print in it;

Nor as a vessell water doth containe;
Nor as one liquor in another shed;
Nor as the heat doth in the fire remaine;
Nor as a voice throughout the ayre is spread:

But as the faire and cheerfull Morning light,
Doth here and there her siluer beames impart,
And in an instant doth herselfe vnite
To the transparent ayre, in all, and part:

Still resting whole, when blowes th' ayre diuide:
Abiding pure, when th' ayre is most corrupted;
Throughout the ayre, her beams dispersing wide,
And when the ayre is tost, not interrupted:

So doth the piercing Soule the body fill,
Being all in all, and all in part diffus'd;
Indiuisible, incorruptible still,
Not forc't, encountred, troubled or confus'd.

And as the sunne aboue, the light doth bring,
Though we behold it in the ayre below;
So from th' Eternall Light the Soule doth spring,
Though in the body she her powers doe show. (pp. 61-2.)

Further, "An Acclamation":—

An Acclamation.

O! what is Man (great Maker of mankind!)
That Thou to him so great respect dost beare!
That Thou adornst him with so bright a mind,
Mak'st him a king, and euen an angel's peere!

O! what a liuely life, what heauenly power,
What spreading vertue, what a sparkling fire!
How great, how plentifull, how rich a dower
Dost Thou within this dying flesh inspire!

Thou leau'st Thy print in other works of Thine,
But Thy whole image Thou in Man hast writ;
There cannot be a creature more diuine,
Except (like Thee) it should be infinit.

But it exceeds man's thought, to thinke how hie
God hath raisd Man, since God a man became;
The angels doe admire this Misterie,
And are astonisht when they view the same. (pp. 81-2.)

Again:—

That the Soule is Immortal, and cannot Die.

Nor hath he giuen these blessings for a day,
Nor made them on the bodie's life depend;
The Soule though made in time, suruives for aye,
And though it hath beginning, sees no end.

Her onely end, is neuer-ending blisse;
Which is, th' eternall face of God to see;
Who Last of Ends, and First of Causes, is:
And to doe this, she must eternall bee.

How senselesse then, and dead a soule hath hee,
Which thinks his soule doth with his body die!
Or thinkes not so, but so would haue it bee,
That he might sinne with more securitie.

For though these light and vicious persons say,
Our Soule is but a smoake, or ayrie blast;
Which, during life, doth in our nostrils play,
And when we die, doth turne to wind at last:

Although they say, 'Come let us eat and drinke';
Our life is but a sparke, which quickly dies;
Though thus they say, they know not what to think,
But in their minds ten thousand doubts arise.

Therefore no heretikes desire to spread
Their light opinions, like these Epicures:
For so the staggering thoughts are comfortèd,
And other men's assent their doubt assures.

Yet though these men against their conscience striue,
There are some sparkles in their flintie breasts
Which cannot be extinct, but still reuiue;
That though they would, they cannot quite bee beasts;

But who so makes a mirror of his mind,
And doth with patience view himselfe therein,
His Soule's eternitie shall clearely find,
Though th' other beauties be defac't with sin. (pp. 82-3.)

Further, "An Acclamation":—

An Acclamation.

O ignorant poor man! what dost thou beare
Lockt vp within the casket of thy brest?
What iewels, and what riches hast thou there!
What heauenly treasure in so weak a chest!

Looke in thy soule, and thou shalt beauties find,
Like those which drownd Narcissus in the flood:
Honour and Pleasure both are in thy mind,
And all that in the world is counted Good.

Thinke of her worth, and thinke that God did meane.
This worthy mind should worthy things imbrace;
Blot not her beauties with thy thoughts vnclean,
Nor her dishonour with thy passions base;

Kill not her quickning power with surfettings,
Mar not her Sense with sensualitie;
Cast not her serious wit on idle things:
Make not her free-will, slaue to vanitie.

And when thou think'st of her eternitie,
Thinke not that Death against her nature is;
Thinke it a birth; and when thou goest to die,
Sing like a swan, as if thou went'st to blisse.

And if thou, like a child, didst feare before,
Being in the darke, where thou didst nothing see:
Now I haue broght thee torch-light, feare no more;
Now when thou diest, thou canst not hud-winkt be.

And thou, my Soule, which turn'st thy curious eye,
To view the beames of thine owne forme diuine;
Know, that thou canst know nothing perfectly,
While thou art clouded with this flesh of mine.

Take heed of ouer-weening, and compare
Thy peacock's feet with thy gay peacock's traine;
Study the best, and highest things, that are,
But of thy selfe, an humble thought retaine.

Cast down thy selfe, and onely striue to raise
The glory of thy Maker's sacred Name;
Vse all thy powers, that Blessed Power to praise,
Which giues the power to bee, and use the same. (pp. 114-16.)

Finally, here is a simile well-wrought in itself and accidentally to be for ever associated with a celebrated criticism:—

The Motion of the Soule.

.... how can shee but immortall bee?
When with the motions of both Will and Wit,
She still aspireth to eternitie,
And neuer rests, till she attaine to it?

Water in conduit pipes, can rise no higher
Then the wel-head, from whence it first doth spring:
Then sith to eternall God shee doth aspire,
Shee cannot be but an eternall thing. (p. 85.)

The second stanza contains a metaphor that was stolen and murdered as well, by Robert Montgomery. Concerning his use of it Macaulay thus wrote in his merciless review:—"We would not be understood, however, to say that Mr. Robert Montgomery cannot make similitudes for himself. A very few lines further on we find one which has every mark of originality and on which we will be bound, none of the poets whom he has plundered will ever think of making reprisal:—

'The soul aspiring, pants its source to mount,
As streams meander level with their fount.'

"We take this to be on the whole the worst similitude in the world. In the first place, no stream meanders, or can possibly meander level with its fount. In the next place, if streams did meander level with their fount, no two motions can be less like each other than that of meandering level and that of mounting upwards." True; but none the less is the original 'spoiled' and despoiled metaphor, accurate and vivid.

If the Reader will surrender himself to the task, he will be rewarded for studying and re-studying the entire poem of "Nosce Teipsum;" and, unless I very much mistake, will then regard Hallam's judgment on it as inadequate rather than exaggerate, as (with intercalated remarks), thus: "A more remarkable poem [than Drayton's and Daniel's] is that of Sir John Davies, afterwards Chief Justice of Ireland so great a length, of more condensation of thought, or in which fewer languid verses will be found. Yet, according to some definitions [of poetry] the 'Nosce Teipsum' is wholly unpoetical, inasmuch as it shows no passion [48] The alleged "no passion" is contradicted by the various pathetic autobiographic introspections and confessions brought out in this Memorial-Introduction, and not less so by the outbursts of adoration and praise that thunder up like the hosannahs before the great White Throne. The similarly alleged "little fancy" is one of manifold proofs that the critic was the most superficial of all imaginable readers with so much pretention. "Nosce Teipsum" is radiant as the dew-bedabbled grass with delicacies of fancy, not a few of the "fancies" being as exquisitely touched as divine work.

Campbell in his "Essay on English Poetry" (prefixed to his "Specimens") may be read with interest after Hallam. Accepting from Johnson as Johnson from Dryden the name of "metaphysical poets," he observes:—"The term of metaphysical poetry would apply with much more justice to the quatrains of Sir John Davies and those of Sir Fulke Greville, writers who, at a later period, found imitators in Sir Thomas Overbury and Sir William Davenant. Davies's poem on the Immortality of the Soul, entitled "Nosce teipsum," will convey a much more favourable idea of metaphysical poetry than the wittiest effusions of Donne and his followers. Davies carried abstract reasoning into verse with an acuteness and felicity which have seldom been equalled. He reasons undoubtedly with too much labour, formality, and subtlety, to afford uniform poetical pleasure. The generality of his stanzas exhibit hard arguments interwoven with the pliant materials of fancy so closely, that we may compare them to a texture of cloth and metallic threads, which is cold and stiff, while it is splendidly curious. There is this difference, however, between Davies and the commonly-styled metaphysical poets, that he argues like a hard thinker, and they, for the most part, like madmen. If we conquer the drier parts of Davies' poem, and bestow a little attention on thoughts which were meant, not to gratify the indolence, but to challenge the activity of the mind, we shall find in the entire essay fresh beauties at every perusal: for in the happier parts we come to logical truths so well illustrated by ingenious similes, that we know not whether to call the thoughts more poetically or philosophically just. The judgment and fancy are reconciled, and the imagery of the poems seems to start more vividly from the surrounding shades of abstraction."

The 'coldness' of 'cloth and metallic threads' which the critic applies to the 'hard arguments' of Nosce Teipsum is a mere imagination. But besides, the 'metallic threads' are not for warmth but for splendour. The lining of the 'splendidly curious' garment is to be looked for for warmth. Similarly the 'hard arguments' would have been unpoetical as unphilosophical had they been 'warm' with the warmth of the 'clothing' in similes and fancies. The 'hardness' is where it ought to be—in the thinking: but it is a hardness like the bough that is green with leafage and radiant with bloom and odorous with 'sweet scent' and pliant to every lightest touch of the breeze. The leaf and bloom start from the 'hard' bough rightly, fittingly 'hard' to its utmost twig. The alleged 'too much labour' is singularly uncharacteristic. As for the 'madness' I can but exclaim—Oh for more of such 'fine lunacy' as in Donne is condemned! His and compeers' 'madness' is worth cart-loads of most men's sanity.

In our own day Dr. George Macdonald has spoken more wisely if still somewhat superficially of "Nosce Teipsum" in his charming "England's Antiphon." Having explained that by "Immortality of the Soul" is intended "the spiritual nature of the soul, resulting in continuity of existence," he proceeds:—"It [Nosce Teipsum] is a wonderful instance of what can be done for metaphysics in verse, and by means of imaginative or poetic embodiment generally. Argumentation cannot of course naturally belong to the region of poetry, however well it may comport itself when there naturalized; and consequently, although there are most poetic no less than profound passages in the treatise, a light scruple arises whether its constituent matter can properly be called poetry. At all events, however, certain of the more prosaic measures and stanzas lend themselves readily, and with much favour, to some of the more complex of logical necessities. And it must be remembered that in human speech, as in the human mind, there are no absolute divisions: power shades off into feeling; and the driest logic may find the heroic couplet render it good service." (pp. 105-6). The 'scruple' must be 'light' indeed that has to decide whether the 'reasoning' of "Nosce Teipsum" be or be not 'poetry.' It is astounding that at this time o' day any should attempt to exclude the highest region of the intellect and its noblest occupation from poetry. Poetry I must hold absolutely is poetry, whatever be its matter and form if the thinking be glorified by imagination or tremulous with emotion. It is sheer folly to refuse to the Poet any material within the compass of the universe. Especially deplorable is it to have to argue for possibilities of poetry in the greatest of all thinking, viz., metaphysics, in the face of such actualities of achievement as in Davies and Lord Brooke and Donne.

A second characteristic of "Nosce Teipsum" that calls for notice is its perfection of workmanship shown in the mastery of an extremely difficult stanza, as well as its solidity of material. Here unquestionably Sir John Davies far excels Lord Brooke and Donne, and later, Sir William Davenant in "Gondibert." The two former are occasionally (it must be granted) semi-inarticulate, and the last is very often monotonous and trying. "Nosce Teipsum" is throughout articulate and unmistakeable, and never flags. You have a fear o' times that a metaphor will prove grotesque or mean: or a vein of thought pinch and go out from ore to bare limestone. But invariably an imaginative touch, or a colour-like epithet, or a thrill of emotion, lifts up the mean into a transfiguring atmosphere as of sun-set purples and crysolites, and gives to grotesquest gargoyles (as of cathedrals) a strange fitness. Then when a thought or illustration seems about to end, debasedly, another forward-carrying and ennobling, swiftly succeeds.

There is more than dexterity, there is consummate art—the art of a conscious master—in the inter-weaving of the lines and stanzas of "Nosce Teipsum." Professor Craik recognised the difficulty and the triumph, but fails by ultra-ingenuity in accounting for either the selection of the measure or the miracle of its continuous success. His criticism is worth recalling, thus:—"A remarkable poem of this age ... is the 'Nosce Teipsum' of Sir John Davies ... a philosophical poem, the earliest of the kind in the language. It is written in rhyme, in the common heroic ten-syllable verse, but disposed in quatrains, like the early play of Misogonus, already mentioned, and other poetry of the same era, or like Sir Thomas Overbury's poem of 'The Wife,' the 'Gondibert' of Sir William Davenant, and the 'Annus Mirabilis' of Dryden, at a later period. No one of these writers has managed this difficult stanza so successfully as Davies: it has the disadvantage of requiring the sense to be in general closed at certain regularly and quickly-recurring turns, which yet are very ill adapted for an effective pause; and even all the skill of Dryden has been unable to free it from a certain air of monotony and languor,—a circumstance of which that poet may be supposed to have been himself sensible, since he wholly abandoned it after one or two early attempts. Davies, however, has conquered its difficulty; and, as has been observed, 'perhaps no language can produce a poem, extending to so great a length, of more condensation of thought, or in which fewer languid verses will be found.' (Hallam, as before.) In fact, it is by this condensation and sententious brevity, so carefully filed and elaborated, however, as to involve no sacrifice of perspicuity or fulness of expression, that he has attained his end. Every quatrain is a pointed expression of a separate thought, like one of Rochefoucault's maxims; each thought being, by great skill and painstaking in the packing, made exactly to fit and to fill the same case. It may be doubted, however, whether Davies would not have produced a still better poem if he had chosen a measure which would have allowed him greater freedom and real variety; unless, indeed, his poetical talent was of a sort that required the suggestive aid and guidance of such artificial restraints as he had to cope with in this; and what would have been a bondage to a more fiery and teeming imagination, was rather a support to his."[49]

Most of this must be read cum grano salis. Davies elected his measure and stanza with evidently entire spontaneity; and it is an odd reversal of the simple matter of fact to ascribe the 'artificial restraints' chosen, to an absence 'of a fiery and teeming imagination,' when, as all observation demonstrates, the more fiery and fecund the imagination of a Poet, the more exquisitely obedient is he to the subtlest and most intricate movements of his measure—just as the bluest-blooded race-horse is a law to itself whereas your stolid dray-cart or plough-drawer needs the "artificial restraints" of all kinds of gear, and the constraint of whip and blow and vociferation. I can well suppose that but for the "Fairy Queen" Sir John Davies might have chosen its stanza, but just as to-day "In Memoriam" has taken to itself its form and music to the exclusion of every other—though a very ancient English measure—so Spenser's immortal poem precluded "Nosce Teipsum" following in the same. I cannot admit "artificial restraints" in the sense of needed restraints or aid. There was the stanza, and the genius of Sir John Davies appropriated it—since Spenser's, in all worship, could not be taken—and, like a great Vine, clad its natural slenderness and poorness of build with wealth of bright green leafage and clustered fruitage. The nicety and daintiness of workmanship, the involute and nevertheless firmly-completed and manifested imagery of "Nosce Teipsum" wherewith this nicety and daintiness are wrought, place Sir John Davies artistically among the finest of our Poets. Southey wrote decisively on this:—"Sir John Davies and Sir William Davenant, avoiding equally the opposite faults of too artificial and too careless a style, wrote in numbers which, for precision and clearness, and felicity and strength, have never been surpassed." For 'felicity' I should have said 'flexibility.'[50]

Again our examples of the mastery and perfection of workmanship must be brief; but take these:—

"Nor can her wide imbracements fillèd bee;
For they that most, and greatest things embrace,
Inlarge thereby their minds' capacitie,
As streames inlarg'd, inlarge the channel's space.

All things receiu'd, doe such proportion take,
As those things haue, wherein they are receiu'd:
So little glasses little faces make,
And narrow webs on narrow frames be weau'd;

Then what vast body must we make the mind
Wherin are men, beasts, trees, towns, seas, and lands;
And yet each thing a proper place doth find,
And each thing in the true proportion stands?

Doubtlesse this could not bee, but that she turnes
Bodies to spirits, by sublimation strange;
As fire conuerts to fire the things it burnes
As we our meats into our nature change.

From their grosse matter she abstracts the formes,
And draws a kind of quintessence from things;
Which to her proper nature she transformes,
To bear them light on her celestiall wings:

This doth she, when, from things particular,
She doth abstract the universall kinds;
Which bodilesse and immateriall are,
And can be lodg'd but onely in our minds:

And thus from diuers accidents and acts,
Which doe within her obseruation fall,
She goddesses, and powers diuine, abstracts:
As Nature, Fortune, and the Vertues all." (pp. 42-44.)

Again:—

Are they not sencelesse then, that thinke the Soule
Nought but a fine perfection of the Sense;
Or of the formes which fancie doth enroule,
A quicke resulting, and a consequence?

What is it then that doth the Sense accuse,
Both of false judgements, and fond appetites?
What makes vs do what Sense doth most refuse?
Which oft in torment of the Sense delights?

Sense thinkes the planets, spheares not much asunder;
What tels vs then their distance is so farre?
Sense thinks the lightning borne before the thunder;
What tels vs then they both together are?

When men seem crows far off vpon a towre,
Sense saith, th'are crows; what makes vs think them men?
When we in agues, thinke all sweete things sowre,
What makes vs know our tongue's false iudgement then?

What power was that, whereby Medea saw,
And well approu'd, and prais'd the better course,
When her rebellious Sense did so withdraw
Her feeble powers, as she pursu'd the worse?

Did Sense perswade Vlisses not to heare
The mermaid's songs, which so his men did please;
As they were all perswaded, through the eare
To quit the ship, and leape into the seas?

Could any power of Sense the Romane moue,
To burn his own right hand with courage stout?
Could Sense make Marius sit vnbound, and proue
The cruell lancing of the knotty gout?

Doubtlesse in Man there is a nature found,
Beside the Senses, and aboue them farre;
'Though most men being in sensuall pleasures drownd,
'It seems their Soules but in their Senses are.'

If we had nought but Sense, then onely they
Should haue sound minds, which haue their Senses sound;
But Wisdome growes, when Senses doe decay,
And Folly most in quickest Sense is found.

If we had nought but Sense, each liuing wight,
Which we call brute, would be more sharp then we;
As hauing Sense's apprehensiue might,
In a more cleere, and excellent degree.

But they doe want that quicke discoursing power,
Which doth in vs the erring Sense correct;
Therefore the bee did sucke the painted flower,
And birds, of grapes, the cunning shadow, peckt.

Sense outsides knows; the Soule throgh al things sees;
Sense, circumstance; she, doth the substance view;
Sense sees the barke, but she, the life of trees;
Sense heares the sounds, but she, the concords true. (pp. 35-38.)

Once more:—

I know my bodie's of so fraile a kind,
As force without, feauers within can kill;
I know the heauenly nature of my minde,
But 'tis corrupted both in wit and will:

I know my Soule hath power to know all things,
Yet is she blinde and ignorant in all;
I know I am one of Nature's little kings,
Yet to the least and vilest things am thrall.

I know my life's a paine and but a span,
I know my Sense is mockt with euery thing:
And to conclude, I know my selfe a MAN,
Which is a proud, and yet a wretched thing. (p. 24.)

If the pathos and grandeur of Pascal be anticipated in
these lines, Pope has certainly appropriated Davies'
favourite metaphor of the 'spider.' Witness the Sense
of Feeling illustrated:—

Much like a subtill spider, which doth sit
In middle of her web, which spreadeth wide;
If ought doe touch the vtmost thred of it,
Shee feeles it instantly on euery side. (p. 70).

So in the Essay of Man:—

"The spider's touch, how exquisitely fine,
Feels at each thread, and lives along the line."

Another now familiar 'metaphor' also occurs in "Nosce Teipsum":—

"Heere Sense's apprehension, end doth take;
As when a stone is into water cast,
One circle doth another circle make,
Till the last circle touch the banke at last." (p. 72.)

These two characteristics, viz., (1) deep and original thinking, (2) perfection of workmanship, or mastery of an extremely difficult stanza—embrace that in "Nosce Teipsum," regarded broadly, which I am anxious to have the Reader recognize and 'prove' for himself. Subsidiary to them is one other thing—not shared with many of our Poets and therefore demanding specific statement—viz. its condensation throughout. Hallam and Craik have called attention to this; and the student cannot fail to be struck with it. It is not simply that the stanzas are as so many rings of gold each complete in itself—much as Proverbs are—but that whether it be idea or opinion or metaphor there is no beating of it out, as though yards of gold-leaf or tin-foil were more valuable than the relatively small solid ore that has been so manipulated: or the common mistake of imagining that a pound of feathers is heavier than a pound of lead. From Dean Donne until now "comparisons are odious." Nevertheless when one recalls the attenuated thought and the blatant verbiage of not a few of our Poets, this resolute sifting out of everything extraneous is not less noticeable than commendable. It assures us that the Poet was conscious of his resources—of his unused wealth of thought and imagination and fancies. He who compacts his carbon into a Koh-i-noor has infinite supplies of it. Similarly a Poet who could and did so lavishly add great thought to great thought and vivid metaphor to vivid metaphor, and still go on adding in smallest possible compass, declares his intellect to be of the highest. I take two stanzas as illustrative equally of condensed thought and condensed metaphor concerning our First Parents:—

When their reasons eye was sharpe and cleare,
And (as an eagle can behold the sunne)
Could haue approcht th' Eternall Light as neare,
As the intellectuall angels could haue done:

Euen then to them the Spirit of Lyes suggests
That they were blind, because they saw not ill;
And breathes into their incorrupted brests
A curious wish, which did corrupt their will.

Your Rhetorician-poet would have expatiated on his 'Eagle' through a hundred lines. Your mere Metaphysician would have entangled himself with distinctions between 'wish' and 'will' endlessly. Similarly how succinctly memorable is this of man's un-willinghood to know himself—every stanza a perfect circle but all the circles interlinked:—

We study Speech but others we perswade;
We leech-craft learne, but others cure with it;
We interpret lawes, which other men haue made,
But reade not those which in our hearts are writ.

Is it because the minde is like the eye,
Through which it gathers knowledge by degrees—
Whose rayes reflect not, but spread outwardly:
Not seeing it selfe when other things it sees?

No, doubtlesse; for the mind can backward cast
Vpon her selfe, her vnderstanding light;
But she is so corrupt, and so defac't,
As her owne image doth her selfe affright.

As in the fable of the Lady faire,
Which for her lust was turnd into a cow;
When thirstie to a streame she did repaire,
And saw her selfe transform'd she wist not how:

At first she startles, then she stands amaz'd,
At last with terror she from thence doth flye;
And loathes the watry glasse wherein she gaz'd,
And shunnes it still, though she for thirst doe die:

Euen so Man's Soule which did God's image beare,
And was at first faire, good, and spotlesse pure;
Since with her sinnes her beauties blotted were,
Doth of all sights her owne sight least endure:

For euen at first reflection she espies,
Such strange chimeraes, and such monsters there;
Such toyes, such antikes, and such vanities,
As she retires, and shrinkes for shame and feare.

And as the man loues least at home to bee,
That hath a sluttish house haunted with spirits;
So she impatient her owne faults to see,
Turnes from her selfe and in strange things delites.

For this few know themselues: for merchants broke
View their estate with discontent and paine;
And seas are troubled, when they doe reuoke
Their flowing waues into themselues againe. (pp. 20-22.)

How daintily-put and how divinely ennobled by the sacred reference is this of the soul's yearning after that higher ideal that is ever receding horizon-like to our vision:—

Then as a bee which among weeds doth fall,
Which seeme sweet flowers, with lustre fresh and gay;
She lights on that, and this, and tasteth all,
But pleasd with none, doth rise, and soare away;

So, when the Soule finds here no true content,
And, like Noah's doue, can no sure footing take;
She doth returne from whence she first was sent,
And flies to Him that first her wings did make. (p. 87)

For condensed and close-packed thought and imagery the 'Reasons' for the 'Immortalitie of the Soule' (pp. 83-99) are not to be equalled anywhere.

We may not linger over "Nosce Teipsum." Passing to the "Hymnes to Astræa" and "Orchestra, or a Poeme of Dauncing" while they have the same characteristics with "Nosce Teipsum," they yet suggest another characteristic in Davies as a Poet—unexpectedness of brilliant and great things. You count on the Lark's up-springing and the Lark's idyllic song, if you are traversing its bladed or daisied possession; but you are startled if it rise from the mired or dusty street or the inodorous slum. You look for the eagle when you have climbed Shehallion and other Highland mountain fastnesses; but suppose it were to flap out upon you as you paced into your semi-suburban villa. So in "Nosce Teipsum," as seen, deep thought perfectly worked is what knowing the Poet you look for therein; but even in "Hymnes to Astræa" and "Orchestra" you very soon discover that it is still the Poet of "Nosce Teipsum" who sings. The moods of thought are airier and more vivacious substantively, but the thinking and shaping and colouring of imagination is the same; and 'unexpected' is really the word that seems to me to express the out-flashing of the higher faculty. Turning to the "Hymnes to Astræa," how exquisite are the fancy and the flattery of Hymne V., "To the Larke," as she is wooed by the Poet-Courtier to be his minstrel to 'sing' of Elizabeth. You do not for a moment feel the 'artificial restraint' of the margin-letters that go to form Elizabetha Regina:—

Earley, cheerfull, mounting Larke,
Light's gentle vsher, Morning's clark,
In merry notes delighting;
Stint awhile thy song, and harke,
And learn my new inditing.

Beare vp this hymne, to heau'n it beare,
Euen vp to heau'n, and sing it there,
To heau'n each morning beare it;
Haue it set to some sweet sphere,
And let the Angels heare it.
Renownd Astræa, that great name,
Exceeding great in worth and fame,
Great worth hath so renownd it;
It is Astræa's name I praise,
Now then, sweet Larke, do thou it raise,
And in high Heauen resound it. (p. 133.)

Meet companion to this is Hymne VII., "To the Rose:"—

Eye of the Garden, Queene of flowres,
Love's cup wherein he nectar powres,
Ingendered first of nectar;
Sweet nurse-child of the Spring's young howres,
And Beautie's faire character.

Best iewell that the Earth doth weare,
Euen when the braue young sunne draws neare,
To her hot Loue pretending;
Himselfe likewise like forme doth beare,
At rising and descending.

Rose of the Queene of Loue belou'd;
England's great Kings diuinely mou'd,
Gave Roses in their banner;
It shewed that Beautie's Rose indeed,
Now in this age should them succeed,
And raigne in more sweet manner. (p. 135.)

That the large and intense homage of Davies (among his illustrious contemporaries), in these "Hymnes" was genuine not simulated, spontaneous not mercenary, the apostrophe to Envy protests. With an echo of the old 'exegi monumentum' or reminiscence of Shakespeare's then not long published Sonnets, he thus writes:—

Enuy, goe weepe; my Muse and I
Laugh thee to scorne; thy feeble eye
Is dazeled with the glory
Shining in this gay poesie,
And little golden story.

Behold how my proud quill doth shed
Eternall nectar on her head;
The pompe of coronation
Hath not such power her fame to spread,
As this my admiration.

Respect my pen as free and franke
Expecting not reward nor thanke,
Great wonder onely moues it;
I never made it mercenary,
Nor should my Muse this burthen carrie
As hyr'd, but that she loues it. (p. 154.)

Then in "Orchestra" you are again and again reminded that, mere sport of wit though it be, "suddaine, rash, half-capreol of my wit," as he himself calls it to Martin (p. 159), it is a man of rare genius who sports. So much so that ever and anon you perceive, as Cleopatra of her Anthony:

———"his delights
Were dolphin-like; they show'd his tack above
The element they lived in." (v. 2.)

That is, even among the trivialities about 'Dauncing' and the frivolities of laudation, you are re-called to grander things—as in the Summer one sees breaks of blue in the over-arching sky above some miserable Pick-nick party desecrating some glorious forest-dell. I cull two out of manifold examples of the unexpectedness that I now wish to point out—as thus of the antiquity yet vitality of 'Dauncing':—

"Thus doth it equall age with age inioy,
And yet in lustie youth for euer flowers;
Like loue his sire, whom Paynters make a boy,
Yet is the eldest of the heau'nly powers;
Or like his brother Time, whose wingèd howers
Going and comming will not let him dye,
But still preserve him in his infancie." (p. 169.)

That is 'brilliant' but this is 'great,' indeed magnificent, of the Sea:—

"Loe the Sea that fleets about the Land,
And like a girdle clips her solide waist,
Musicke and measure both doth vnderstand;
For his great chrystall eye is always cast
Vp to the Moone, and on her fixèd fast;
And as she daunceth in her pallid spheere,
So daunceth he about her Center heere." (p. 179.)

I know not where, outside of Milton, to match that personification of the Sea, with its "great chrystall eye"; and 'palid' is as tenderly delicate as the other is grand. Coleridge must have carried it in his omniverous memory, for surely one of the most memorable of the stanzas in his "Ancient Mariner" drew its inspiration thence, as thus:—

"Still as a slave before his lord,
The ocean hath no blast;
His great bright eye most silently
Up to the Moon is cast—
If he may know which way to go;
For she guides him smooth or grim.
See, brother, see! how graciously
She looketh down on him." (Pt. VI.)

At this point it may interest some to read Sir John Harington's welcome to the Poet on the publication of 'Orchestra', thus:—

Of Master John Dauies Booke of Dancing. To Himselfe.

While you the Planets all doe set to dancing,
Beware such hap, as to the Fryer was chancing:
Who preaching in a Pulpit old and rotten,
Among some notes, most fit to be forgotten:
Vnto his Auditory thus he vaunts,
To make all Saints after his pype to dance:
It speaking, which as he himselfe aduances,
To act his speech with gestures, lo, it chances,
Downe fals the Pulpit, sore the man is brusèd,
Neuer was Fryer and Pulpit more abusèd.
Then beare with me, though yet to you a stranger,
To warne you of the like, nay greater danger.
For though none feare the falling of those sparkes,
(And when they fall, t'will be good catching Larkes)
Yet this may fall, that while you dance and skip,
With female Planets, sore your foote may trip,
That in your lofty Caprioll and turne
Their motion may make your dimension burne." (Epigrams, Book II. 67.)

I am tempted to further critical examination of this very remarkable Poetry; but feel constrained by already transgressed limits to withhold them for the present. But I must say something on the Epigrams and Minor Poems. I have 'compunctious visitings' in re-publishing them, even though they have been included by Dyce and by Colonel Cunningham in their successive editions of Marlowe. In my Note (Vol. II., pp. 3-6), I give bibliographical and other details concerning these Epigrams; and I correct a mis-assignation of certain by Dyce to Davies that belong to Henry Hutton. It must be conceded that the Epigrams have dashes of the roughness, even coarseness, of the age. They self-drevealingly belong to the wild-oats sowing of the Poet's youthful period. Nevertheless, I have ventured their reproduction in integrity for four reasons:—

(a) These Epigrams, from their subjects and style, are valuable, as expressing the tone of society at the time.

(b) It would be suppressio veri to withhold them, toward an accurate estimate of their Author. They furnish elements of judgment.