Part 1

SOME LONGER ELIZABETHAN POEMS

_AN ENGLISH GARNER_

SOME LONGER ELIZABETHAN POEMS

WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY A. H. BULLEN

WESTMINSTER ARCHIBALD CONSTABLE AND CO., LTD. 1903

PUBLISHERS' NOTE

The texts contained in the present volume are reprinted with very slight alterations from the _English Garner_ issued in eight volumes (1877-1890, London, 8vo) by Professor Arber, whose name is sufficient guarantee for the accurate collation of the texts with the rare originals, the old spelling being in most cases carefully modernised. The contents of the original _Garner_ have been rearranged and now for the first time classified, under the general editorial supervision of Mr. Thomas Seccombe. Certain lacunae have been filled by the interpolation of fresh matter. The Introductions are wholly new and have been written specially for this issue.

Edinburgh: T. and A. CONSTABLE, Printers to His Majesty

CONTENTS

PAGE

Sir John Davies--Orchestra, or A Poem of Dancing, 1596, 1

Sir John Davies--Nosce Teipsum:-- 1. Of Human Knowledge,} 2. Of the Soul of Man,} 1599, 41

Sir John Davies--Hymns of Astræa, in Acrostic Verse, 1599, 107

Six Idillia, that is six small or petty poems or Æglogues of Theocritus translated into English Verse (Anon), Oxford, 1588, 123

*Richard Barnfield--The Affectionate Shepheard. Containing the Complaint of Daphnis for the love of Ganymede, 1594, 147

*Richard Barnfield--Cynthia. With Certaine Sonnets and the Legend of Cassandra, 1595, 187

*Richard Barnfield--The Encomion of Lady Pecunia: or The Praise of Money, 1598, 227

*Richard Barnfield--The Complaint of Poetrie for the Death of Liberalitie, 1598, 241

*Richard Barnfield--The Combat, betweene Conscience and Covetousnesse in the minde of Man, 1598, 253

*Richard Barnfield--Poems: in divers humors, 1598, 261

Astrophel. A Pastoral Elegy upon the death of the most noble and valorous Knight, Sir Philip Sidney. A group of elegies by Spenser and other hands printed as an Appendix to Spenser's Colin Clouts come home again, 1595, 271

J. C.--Alcilia: Philoparthen's Loving Folly, 1595, 319

Antony Scoloker--Daiphantus, or The Passions of Love, by An. Sc. Whereunto is added The Passionate Man's Pilgrimage, 1604, 363

Michael Drayton--_Odes_ [drawn from _Poems Lyrick and Pastorall_, 1606, and the later _Poems_ of 1619], 405

*The items indicated by an asterisk are new additions to _An English Garner_.

INTRODUCTION

As there is no need to adopt a strictly chronological order for the poems included in the present volume, I have begun with the _Orchestra_ and _Nosce Teipsum_ of Sir John Davies (1569-1626), who was undoubtedly one of the most brilliant figures of the Elizabethan Age. Well-born and gently bred, educated at Winchester and at New College, Oxford, Davies was exceptionally fortunate in escaping the pecuniary cares that harassed so many Elizabethan men of letters. From the Middle Temple he was called to the bar in 1595 (at the age of twenty-six). In the previous year _Orchestra_ had been entered in the Stationers' Register, but the poem was first published in 1596. From the dedicatory sonnet to Richard Martin we learn that it was written in fifteen days. There are, however, no signs of haste in the writing, and it may fairly be claimed that this poem in praise of dancing is a graceful monument of ingenious fancy. Lucian composed a valuable and entertaining treatise on dancing, and I suspect that Περὶ ᾽Ορχήσεως gave Davies the idea of writing _Orchestra_.

In the opening stanzas[1] we are presented with a picturesque description of

'The sovereign castle of the rockly isle Wherein Penelope the Princess lay,'

lit with a thousand lamps on a festal night when the suitors had assembled, at the queen's invitation, to hear the minstrel Phoemius sing the praises of the heroes who had fought at Troy. With such beauty shone Penelope that the suitors were abashed at their temerity in having dared to woo her. But one 'fresh and jolly knight,' Antinous, so far from being dismayed,

'boldly gan advance And with fair manners wooed the Queen to dance.'

She blushingly declined, and mildly chided him for trying to persuade her to new-fangled follies. Forthwith he launched into a rapturous disquisition on the antiquity of dancing, which began when Love persuaded the jarring elements--fire, air, earth, and water--to cease from conflict and observe true measure. The sun and moon, the fixed and wandering stars, the girdling sea and running streams, all 'yield perfect forms of dancing.' With exuberant fancy, fetching his illustrations from near and far, he pursues his theme through many richly-coloured stanzas. It may be worth while to remark (as his editors have been silent on the subject) that Davies does not scruple to borrow freely from Lucian. Take, for instance, stanza 80:--

'Wherefore was Proteus said himself to change Into a stream, a lion, and a tree, And many other forms fantastic strange As in his fickle thought he wished to be? But that he danced with such facility, As, like a lion, he could prance with pride, Ply like a plant and like a river glide."

Now hear Lucian:--

δοκεῖ γάρ μοι ὁ παλαιὸς μῆθος καὶ Πρωτέα τὸν Αἰγύπτιον οὐκ ἄλλο τι ἢ ὀρχηστήν τινα γενέσθαι λέγειν, μιμητικὸν ἄνθρωπον καὶ πρὸς πάντα σχηματίζεσθαι καὶ μεταβάλλεσθαι δυνάμενον, ὡς καὶ ὕδατος ὑγρότητα μιμεῖσθαι καὶ πυρὸς ὀξύτητα ἐν τᾖ τῆς κινήσεως σφοδρότητι καὶ λέοντος ἀγριότητα καὶ παρδάλεως θυμὸν καὶ δένδρου δόνημα, καὶ ὅλως ὅ τι καὶ θελήσειεν.[2]

Here is another example (Stanza 17):--

'Dancing, bright Lady, then began to be When the first seeds whereof the world did spring, The Fire, Air, Earth, and Water did agree By Love's persuasion (Nature's mighty King) To leave their first disordered combating, And in a dance such measures to observe As all the world their motion should preserve.'

With this compare Lucian (as Englished by Jasper Mayne): 'First, then, you plainly seem to me not to know that dancing is no new invention or of yesterday's or the other day's growth, or born among our forefathers or their ancestors. But they who most truly derive dancing, say it sprung with the first beginning of the universe, and had a birth equally as ancient as love.' It would be easy to multiply instances. Of course Davies' borrowings from Lucian do not for a moment detract from his poem's merit: indeed they give an added zest.

In the 1596 edition _Orchestra_ ends with a compliment to Queen Elizabeth, and stanzas in praise of Spenser, Daniel, and others. Davies had evidently intended to write a sequel; for, when _Orchestra_ was republished in the collective edition of his poems (1622), it was described on the title-page as 'not finished,' some new stanzas were added, and it ended abruptly in the middle of a simile. The poem is quite long enough as we have it in the 1596 edition, and we need not lament that Davies failed to carry out his intention of continuing it: μηδὲν ἄγαν.

To his youthful days belong the _Epigrams_, which were bound up with Marlowe's translation of Ovid's _Amores_ (with a Middleburgh imprint): occasionally indecorous, they are seldom wanting in wit and pleasantry.

In February 1597-8, Davies was disbarred for a breach of discipline. He quarrelled with Richard Martin (afterwards Recorder of London)--to whom he had dedicated _Orchestra_--and assaulted him at dinner in the Middle Temple Hall, breaking a cudgel over his head. Retiring to Oxford, he engaged in the more peaceful occupation of composing _Nosce Teipsum_, a poem on the immortality of the soul, which was published in 1599. It was an ambitious task that this young disbarred bencher took in hand, but he acquitted himself ably. Some of his modern admirers have exceeded all reasonable bounds in their praise of the poem. Rejecting these extravagant eulogies, we may claim that Davies, while he was leading the life of an inns-of-court man of fashion, had remained a steadfast lover of learning and letters; that he had stored his mind richly; and that his well-turned quatrains have had an inspiring influence on later poets. Young, in _Night Thoughts_, was under special obligation to Davies. Matthew Arnold had no enthusiasm for Elizabethan writers; but, unless I am greatly mistaken, he had glanced at _Nosce Teipsum_. In 'A Southern Night' Arnold wrote--

... 'And see all things from pole to pole,[3] And glance, and nod, and bustle by, And never once possess our soul Before we die,'

--a stanza that bears a very suspicious resemblance to Davies' quatrain--

'We that acquaint ourselves with every zone, And pass both tropics, and behold both poles; When we come home, are to ourselves unknown And unacquainted still with our own souls.'

All the arguments for and against the immortality of the soul were threshed out ages ago, and there is little or nothing new to say on the subject. A poet's skill lies in graciously attiring the old commonplaces; in searching out the right persuasive words and uttering them so melodiously that dull 'approved verities'--sparkling with sudden lustre--are transmuted into something rich and strange. It is idle to talk about Davies' 'deep and original thinking.' Many stanzas can be brushed aside as tiresome and uncouth; but something will be left. In his handling of the ten-syllabled quatrain (with alternate rhymes) Davies showed considerable deftness. The metre has weight and dignity, but is apt to become stiff and monotonous. Davies certainly succeeded in securing more freedom and variety than might have been anticipated. Inspired by his example, Davenant chose this metre for _Gondibert;_ and Davenant was followed by Dryden, who in the preface to _Annus Mirabilis_ says all that can be said in favour of the quatrain (which was seen to best advantage in Gray's _Elegy_).

Though few may be at the pains to read through _Nosce Teipsum_ at a blow, it is a poem that lends itself admirably to quotation. Towards the end there is a cluster of fine stanzas('O ignorant poor man,' etc.) that have found their way into many volumes of selected poetry; and even the arid tracts are dotted with green oases. Tennyson, with somewhat wearisome iteration, pleaded through stanza after stanza of _In Memoriam_ that the longing which most men unquestionably have for immortality must needs be based on a sure foundation:--

'We think we were not made to die, And Thou hast made us, Thou art just.'

Davies sums up pithily in a single line:--

'If Death do quench us quite, we have great wrong.'

A poet greater than Davies, greater than Tennyson, the august Lucretius, in the noble verses that he pondered through the still nights (seeking to do justice to the doctrine of his Master Epicurus), scathingly checks our vaulting aspirations. If we have enjoyed the banquet of life, why should we not rise content and pass to our dreamless sleep? If our life has been wastefully squandered and is become a weariness to us, why should we hesitate to make an end of it? 'Aufer abhinc lacrimas, balatro, et compesce querellas!'

_Astræa_, a series of acrostic verses on Queen Elizabeth, is merely a _tour de force_ of courtly ingenuity. Much more interesting is Davies' group of graceful little poems, _Twelve Wonders of the World_, published in the second edition (1608) of Davison's _Poetical Rhapsody_.

In 1603 Davies was appointed Solicitor-General for Ireland, and in 1606 Attorney-General. His letters to Cecil give a valuable and vivid account of the state of Ireland; and his _Discovery of the True Cause why Ireland was never entirely subdued_, 1612, is a treatise of the first importance. Davies' political writings wait the attention of a competent editor, who would undoubtedly find absorbing interest in his task.

It was the poet's misfortune to marry a crazy rhapsodical woman (Eleanor Touchet, sister of the notorious Baron Audley), who annoyed him by putting herself into mourning and bidding him 'within three years to expect the mortal blow.' Three days before his death she 'gave him pass to take his long sleep.' He resented these admonitions, and testily exclaimed, 'I pray you weep not while I am alive, and I will give you leave to laugh when I am dead.' On 7th December 1626 he dined with Lord Keeper Coventry, and on the following morning was found dead of apoplexy. It was perhaps fortunate that his life had not been prolonged, for his views of kingly prerogative were high. He had supported the king's demand for a forced loan, and (when 'the mortal blow' really came) was about to succeed Lord Chief Justice Crew, who had been removed from office for refusing to affirm the legality of such loans.

Not much need be said about _Six Idillia_, 1588, the anonymous translations (pp. 123-146) from Theocritus. It is a performance worthy of George Turberville or 'that painful furtherer of learning' Barnabe Googe. On the verso of the title page is the Horatian inscription:--

'E.D.

Libenter hic et omnis exantlabitur Labor, in tuæ spem gratiæ.'

Collier, misreading this dedication, claimed the _Idillia_ for Sir Edward Dyer, and his mistake has been followed by some later bibliographers. But in the first place there is nothing to show that 'E.D.' was Sir Edward Dyer; and in the second it is perfectly plain that the translations were dedicated to 'E.D.,' not written by him. The rhymed fourteen-syllable lines are somewhat uncouth and do scant justice to the liquid melody of Theocritus' hexameters; but though these _Idillia_ have no great literary value, the hardy pioneer is entitled to some credit for breaking new ground. Only one copy (preserved in the Bodleian Library) of the original edition is known. Some years ago a small edition, for private circulation, was issued from the press of Rev. H.C. Daniel.

Richard Barnfield(1574-1627) had genuine poetical gifts, but seldom displayed them to advantage. Born in 1574 at Norbury, near Newport, Shropshire, he was educated at Brasenose College, Oxford, and is conjectured to have been a member of Gray's Inn. He seems to have spent most of his time in the country, leading the life of a country gentleman. In 1594 he published _The Affectionate Shepheard_ (with a dedication to Lady Penelope Rich), and in 1595 _Cynthia_. His last work, _The Encomion of Lady Pecunia_, followed in 1598, a second edition (with changes and additions) appearing in 1605. He died in March 1626-7, leaving a son and a grand-daughter. In his will he is described as of 'Dorlestone, in the Countie of Stafford, Esquire.'[4]

_The Affectionate Shepheard_ was inspired by Virgil's Second Eclogue. Though the choice of subject was not happy, it must be allowed that in describing country contentment and the pastimes of silly shepherds Barnfield shows un-laboured fluency and grace, with playful touches of quaint extravagance. The passage beginning 'And when th'art wearie of thy keeping Sheepe'(pp. 159, 160) and ending 'Like Lillyes in a bed of roses shed' is a pleasant piece of poetical embroidery. Barnfield doubtless adopted the six-line stanza in imitation of _Venus and Adonis_, 1593(which had in turn been modelled on Lodge's _Glaucus and Scylla_, 1589). It has been recently pointed out--by Mr. Charles Crawford in _Notes and Queries_--that some passages in _The Affectionate Shepheard_ were closely imitated from Marlowe and Nashe's _Dido_ (published in 1594), and that one line has been taken straight out of Marlowe's _Edward II._ Appended to _The Affectionate Shepheard_ are _The Complainte of Chastitie_, in imitation of Michael Drayton, and _Hellens Rape_--a copy of 'English Hexameters' so atrociously bad that one wonders whether it was written to bring contempt on the metre which Gabriel Harvey and others were vainly striving to popularise.

To _Cynthia_ is prefixed a copy of high-flying commendatory verses, from which very little sense can be extracted, by 'T.T.,' possibly Thomas Thorpe, the publisher of Shakespeare's Sonnets. In the address to 'The Curteous Gentlemen Readers' Barnfield claims indulgence for _Cynthia_ on the ground that it was the first 'imitation of the verse of that excellent Poet, Maister _Spencer_, in his _Fayrie Queene_.' The poem is a compliment to Queen Elizabeth, who is adjudged by Jove to have merited the golden apple wrongly given by Paris to Venus. When Barnfield mentioned that he borrowed the metre of _Cynthia_ from Spenser, he forgot to add that the matter was drawn from Peele's _Arraignment of Paris_. To _Cynthia_ succeed twenty sonnets extolling, after the fashion of the age, the beauty and virtues of an imaginary youth, Ganymede. In the last sonnet Barnfield introduces compliments to Spenser (Colin) and Drayton (Rowland):--

'Ah had great _Colin_, chiefe of sheepheards all, Or gentle _Rowland_, my professed friend, Had they thy beautie, or my pennance pend, Greater had beene thy fame, and lesse my fall: But since that euerie one cannot be wittie, Pardon I craue of them, and of thee pitty.'

The 'Ode' that follows the sonnets runs trippingly away in easy trochaics; but _Cassandra_ is laboured and languid.

_The Encomion of Lady Pecunia_ has an 'Address to the Gentlemen Readers,' in which Barnfield states that he had been at much pains to find an unhackneyed subject for his pen. After long consideration he had determined to write the praises of money, a theme both new (for none had ventured upon it before) and pleasing (for money is always in esteem). It was in pursuit of money that Hawkins and Drake had lost their lives. Barnfield wrote a fine epitaph on Hawkins:--

'The[5] Waters were his Winding sheete, the Sea was made his Toome; Yet for his fame the Ocean Sea was not sufficient roome.'

His lines on Drake are not quite so happy:--

'England[6] his hart; his Corps the Waters have; And that which raysed his fame, became his grave.'

The _Encomion_ is smoothly written, and is not without humour. A country gentleman in easy circumstances, Barnfield could dally playfully with a subject that had for him no terrors. His example probably led 'T. A.' (Thomas Acheley?) to write _The Massacre of Money_, 1602. _The Complaint of Poetrie for the Death of Liberalitie_ seems to be an imitation of Spenser's _Teares of the Muses_. More interesting are the _Poems: in divers humors_ at the end of the booklet, for among them are the sonnet 'If Musique and sweet Poetrie agree,' and the 'Ode' beginning 'As it fell upon a day,' which were long ascribed erroneously to Shakespeare. In the poem entitled 'A Remembrance of some English Poets' Barnfield praises Spenser, Daniel, Drayton, and Shakespeare. For Sir Philip Sidney he had a deep admiration, but his 'Epitaph' was a poor tribute. The verse with which the tract ends,'A Comparison of the Life of Man,' is distinctly impressive:--

'Mans life is well compared to a feast, Furnisht with choice of all Varietie: To it comes Tyme; and as a bidden guest Hee sets him downe, in Pompe and Majestie; The three-folde Age of Man the Waiters bee: Then with an earthen voyder (made of clay) Comes Death, and takes the table clean away.'

We now reach a group of elegies (pp. 271-318) by various hands on Sir Philip Sidney, printed as an Appendix to Spenser's _Colin Clouts Come Home Againe_, 1595, with a dedication to Sidney's widow, who by her second marriage had become Countess of Essex. There was no man more generally beloved than Sidney, and none whose loss was more sincerely deplored. Numberless were the tributes paid in verse and prose to his memory. The present collection embraces 'Astrophel,' by Spenser; the 'Dolefull Lay of Clorinda,' by Sidney's sister, the Countess of Pembroke; 'The Mourning Muse of Thestylis' and 'A Pastorall Æglogue,' both by Lodowick Bryskett; 'An Elegie, or Friends Passion, for his Astrophel,' by Matthew Roydon; 'An Epitaph,' probably by Sir Walter Ralegh; and 'Another of the same' (_i.e._ on the same subject), which Malone was inclined to attribute to Sir Edward Dyer, while Charles Lamb ascribed it on internal evidence to Fulke Greville. Although _Colin Clouts Come Home Againe_ was first published in 1595, the dedicatory epistle to Sir Walter Ralegh is dated from Kilcolman, 27th December 1591. All the elegies were doubtless written soon after Sidney's death. Lodowick Bryskett's two poems had been entered in the Stationers' Register on 22nd August 1587, but are not known to have been separately published. Matthew Roydon's elegy had appeared in the _Phœnix Nest_, 1593, where also are found the 'Epitaph' and 'Another of the Same. Excellently written by a most woorthy gentleman.'

In _The Ruines of Time_ (1591) there are some fine stanzas to Sidney's memory; but if the literary public expected an elaborate elegy from Spenser, 'Astrophel' must have disappointed their hopes. When we recall Moschus' lament over Bion, or Ovid's tribute to Tibullus, or _Lycidas_, or _Adonais_, Spenser's elegy on Sidney seems thin and colourless. Scores of poets who had not a tithe of Spenser's genius have left elegies that far transcend 'Astrophel.' Lady Pembroke's sisterly tribute of affection will be read with respect; but however much we may commend the pious intentions of the naturalised Italian Ludowick Bryskett, it is impossible to find a word of praise for such 'rude rhymes' as

'Come forth, ye Nymphes, come forth, forsake your watry boures! Forsake your mossy caves and help me to lament; Help me to tune my dolefull notes to gurgling sound Of Liffies tumbling streames; come, let salt teares of ours Mix with his waters fresh,' etc.

Matthew Roydon's elegy is too diffuse, but has some most happy and memorable stanzas. As we gaze at Isaac Oliver's beautiful miniature of Sidney, in the Windsor Palace collection, those oft-quoted lines of Roydon inevitably leap to the lips:--

'A sweet attractive kind of grace, A full assurance given by lookes, Continuall comfort in a face, The lineaments of Gospell bookes: I trowe that countenance cannot lie Whose thoughts are legible in the eie.'

The 'Epitaph' beginning, 'To praise thy life, or waile thy worthie death' appears to have been written by Sir Walter Ralegh. Sir John Harington, in the notes appended to the sixteenth book of his translation of _Orlando Furioso_ (1591), refers to 'our English Petrarke, Sir Philip Sidney, or (as Sir Walter Rawleigh in his Epitaph worthily calleth him) the Scipio and the Petrarke of our time' (see the last stanza of the poem). Harington had evidently seen the 'Epitaph' in MS.; and there is not the slightest reason for questioning the accuracy of his ascription, for he was well acquainted with the poets of the time, and curious information may be gathered from his Notes. I find Ralegh's elegy somewhat obscure; pregnant, but harshly worded. Nor can I profess any great admiration for 'Another of the same,' where the vehemence of the writer's grief choked his utterance.