Chapter 16

THANKS FOR A SUMMER'S DAY.

1 O perfect light which shade[1] away The darkness from the light, And set a ruler o'er the day, Another o'er the night.

2 Thy glory, when the day forth flies, More vively does appear, Nor[2] at mid-day unto our eyes The shining sun is clear.

3 The shadow of the earth anon Removes and drawis by, Syne[3] in the east, when it is gone, Appears a clearer sky.

4 Which soon perceive the little larks, The lapwing, and the snipe, And tune their song like Nature's clerks, O'er meadow, muir, and stripe.

5 But every bold nocturnal beast No longer may abide, They hie away both maist and least,[4] Themselves in house to hide.

* * * * *

6 The golden globe incontinent Sets up his shining head, And o'er the earth and firmament Displays his beams abroad.[5]

7 For joy the birds with boulden[6] throats, Against his visage sheen,[7] Take up their kindly music notes In woods and gardens green.

8 Upbraids[8] the careful husbandman, His corn and vines to see, And every timeous[9] artisan In booths works busily.

9 The pastor quits the slothful sleep, And passes forth with speed, His little camow-nosed[10] sheep, And rowting kye[11] to feed.

10 The passenger, from perils sure, Goes gladly forth the way, Brief, every living creaeture Takes comfort of the day.

* * * * *

11 The misty reek,[12] the clouds of rain From tops of mountain skails,[13] Clear are the highest hills and plain, The vapours take the vales.

12 Begaired[14] is the sapphire pend[15] With spraings[16] of scarlet hue; And preciously from end to end, Damasked white and blue.

13 The ample heaven, of fabric sure, In clearness does surpass The crystal and the silver, pure As clearest polish'd glass.

14 The time so tranquil is and clear, That nowhere shall ye find, Save on a high and barren hill, The air of passing wind.

15 All trees and simples, great and small, That balmy leaf do bear, Than they were painted on a wall, No more they move or steir.[17]

16 The rivers fresh, the caller[18] streams, O'er rocks can swiftly rin,[19] The water clear like crystal beams, And makes a pleasant din.

* * * * *

17 Calm is the deep and purple sea, Yea, smoother than the sand; The waves, that woltering[20] wont to be, Are stable like the land.

18 So silent is the cessile air, That every cry and call, The hills and dales, and forest fair, Again repeats them all.

19 The clogged busy humming bees, That never think to drown,[21] On flowers and flourishes of trees, Collect their liquor brown.

20 The sun most like a speedy post With ardent course ascends; The beauty of our heavenly host Up to our zenith tends.

* * * * *

21 The breathless flocks draw to the shade And freshure[22] of their fauld;[23] The startling nolt, as they were mad, Run to the rivers cauld.

22 The herds beneath some leafy trees, Amidst the flowers they lie; The stable ships upon the seas Tend up their sails to dry.

23 The hart, the hind, the fallow-deer, Are tapish'd[24] at their rest; The fowls and birds that made thee beare,[25] Prepare their pretty nest.

24 The rayons dure[26] descending down, All kindle in a gleid;[27] In city, nor in burrough town, May none set forth their head.

25 Back from the blue pavemented whun,[28] And from ilk plaster wall, The hot reflexing of the sun Inflames the air and all.

26 The labourers that timely rose, All weary, faint, and weak, For heat down to their houses goes, Noon-meat and sleep to take.

27 The caller[29] wine in cave is sought, Men's brothing[30] breasts to cool; The water cold and clear is brought, And sallads steeped in ule.[31]

28 With gilded eyes and open wings, The cock his courage shows; With claps of joy his breast he dings,[32] And twenty times he crows.

29 The dove with whistling wings so blue, The winds can fast collect, Her purple pens turn many a hue Against the sun direct.

30 Now noon is gone--gone is mid-day, The heat does slake at last, The sun descends down west away, For three o'clock is past.

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31 The rayons of the sun we see Diminish in their strength, The shade of every tower and tree Extended is in length.

32 Great is the calm, for everywhere The wind is setting down, The reek[33] throws up right in the air, From every tower and town.

33 The mavis and the philomeen,[34] The starling whistles loud, The cushats[35] on the branches green, Full quietly they crood.[36]

34 The gloamin[37] comes, the clay is spent, The sun goes out of sight, And painted is the occident With purple sanguine bright.

* * * * *

35 The scarlet nor the golden thread, Who would their beauty try, Are nothing like the colour red And beauty of the sky.

* * * * *

36 What pleasure then to walk and see, Endlong[38] a river clear, The perfect form of every tree Within the deep appear.

37 The salmon out of cruives[39] and creels[40] Uphauled into scouts;[41] The bells and circles on the weills,[42] Through leaping of the trouts.

38 O sure it were a seemly thing, While all is still and calm, The praise of God to play and sing With trumpet and with shalm.

39 Through all the land great is the gild[43] Of rustic folks that cry; Of bleating sheep, from they be fill'd, Of calves and rowting kye.

40 All labourers draw home at even, And can to others say, Thanks to the gracious God of heaven, Who sent this summer day.

[1] 'Shade:' for shaded. [2] 'Nor:' than. [3] 'Syne:' then. [4] 'Maist and least:' largest and smallest. [5] 'Abread:' abroad. [6] 'Boulden:' emboldened. [7] 'Sheen:' shining. [8] 'Upbraids:' uprises. [9] 'Timeous:' early. [10]'Camow-nosed:' flat-nosed. [11]'Rowting kye:' lowing kine. [12]'Reek:' fog. [13]'Skails:' dissipates. [14]'Begaired:' dressed out. [15]'Pend:' arch. [16]'Spraings:' streaks. [17] 'Steir:' stir. [18] 'Caller:' cool. [19] 'Rin:' run. [20] 'Woltering:' tumbling. [21] 'Drown:' drone, be idle. [22] 'Freshure:' freshness. [23] 'Fauld:' fold. [24] 'Tapish'd:' stretched as on a carpet. [25] 'Beare:' sound, music. [26] 'Rayons dure:' hard or keen rays. [27] 'Gleid:' fire. [28] 'Whun:' whinstone. [29] 'Caller:' cool. [30] 'Brothing:' burning. [31] 'Ule:' oil. [32] 'Dings:' beats. [33] 'Reek:' smoke. [34] 'The mavis and the philomeen:' thrush and nightingale. [35] 'Cushats:' wood-pigeons. [36] 'Crood:' coo. [37] 'Gloamin:' evening. [38] 'Endlong:' along. [39] 'Cruives:' cages for catching fish. [40] 'Creels:' baskets. [41] 'Scouts:' small boats or yawls. [42] 'Weills:' eddies. [43] 'Gild:' throng.

* * * * *

OTHER SCOTTISH POETS.

About the same time with Hume flourished two or three poets in Scotland of considerable merit, such as Alexander Scott, author of satires and amatory poems, and called sometimes the 'Scottish Anacreon;' Sir Richard Maitland of Lethington, father of the famous Secretary Lethington, who, in his advanced years, composed and dictated to his daughter a few moral and conversational pieces, and who collected, besides, into a MS. which bears his name, the productions of some of his contemporaries; and Alexander Montgomery, author of an allegorical poem, entitled 'The Cherry and the Slae.'

The allegory is not well managed, but some of the natural descriptions are sweet and striking. Take the two following stanzas as a specimen:--

'The cushat croods, the corbie cries, The cuckoo conks, the prattling pies To geck there they begin; The jargon of the jangling jays, The cracking craws and keckling kays, They deav'd me with their din; The painted pawn, with Argus eyes, Can on his May-cock call, The turtle wails, on wither'd trees, And Echo answers all. Repeating, with greeting, How fair Narcissus fell, By lying, and spying His shadow in the well.

'The air was sober, saft, and sweet, Nae misty vapours, wind, nor weet, But quiet, calm, and clear; To foster Flora's fragrant flowers, Whereon Apollo's paramours Had trinkled mony a tear; The which, like silver shakers, shined, Embroidering Beauty's bed, Wherewith their heavy heads declined, In Maye's colours clad; Some knopping, some dropping Of balmy liquor sweet, Excelling and smelling Through Phoebus' wholesome heat.'

The 'Cherry and the Slae' was familiar to Burns, who often, our readers will observe, copied its form of verse.

SAMUEL DANIEL.

This ingenious person was born in 1562, near Taunton, in Somersetshire. His father was a music-master. He was patronised by the noble family of Pembroke, who probably also maintained him at college. He went to Magdalene Hall, Oxford, in 1579; and after studying there, chiefly history and poetry, for seven years, he left without a degree. When twenty-three years of age, he translated Paulus Jovius' 'Discourse of Rare Inventions.' He became tutor to Lady Anne Clifford, the elegant and accomplished daughter of the Earl of Cumberland. She, at his death, raised a monument to his memory, and recorded on it, with pride, that she had been his pupil. After Spenser died, Daniel became a 'voluntary laureat' to the Court, producing masques and pageants, but was soon supplanted by 'rare Ben Jonson.' In 1603 he was appointed Master of the Queen's Revels and Inspector of the Plays to be enacted by juvenile performers. He was also promoted to be Gentleman Extraordinary and Groom of the Chambers to the Queen. He was a varied and voluminous writer, composing plays, miscellaneous poems, and prose compositions, including a 'Defence of Rhyme' and a 'History of England,'--an honest, but somewhat dry and dull production. While composing his works he resided in Old Street, St Luke's, which was then thought a suburban residence; but he was often in town, and mingled on intimate terms with Selden and Shakspeare. When approaching sixty, he took a farm at Beckington, in Somersetshire--his native shire--and died there in 1619.

Daniel's Plays and History are now, as wholes, forgotten, although the former contained some vigorous passages, such as Richard II.'s soliloquy on the morning of his murder in Pomfret Castle. His smaller pieces and his Sonnets shew no ordinary poetic powers.

RICHARD II., THE MORNING BEFORE HIS MURDER IN POMFRET CASTLE.

Whether the soul receives intelligence, By her near genius, of the body's end, And so imparts a sadness to the sense, Foregoing ruin, whereto it doth tend; Or whether nature else hath conference With profound sleep, and so doth warning send, By prophetising dreams, what hurt is near, And gives the heavv careful heart to fear:--

However, so it is, the now sad king, Toss'd here and there his quiet to confound, Feels a strange weight of sorrows gathering Upon his trembling heart, and sees no ground; Feels sudden terror bring cold shivering; Lists not to eat, still muses, sleeps unsound; His senses droop, his steady eyes unquick, And much he ails, and yet he is not sick.

The morning of that day which was his last, After a weary rest, rising to pain, Out at a little grate his eyes he cast Upon those bordering hills and open plain, Where others' liberty makes him complain The more his own, and grieves his soul the more, Conferring captive crowns with freedom poor.

'O happy man,' saith he, 'that lo I see, Grazing his cattle in those pleasant fields, If he but knew his good. How blessed he That feels not what affliction greatness yields! Other than what he is he would not be, Nor change his state with him that sceptre wields. Thine, thine is that true life: that is to live, To rest secure, and not rise up to grieve.

'Thou sitt'st at home safe by thy quiet fire, And hear'st of others' harms, but fearest none: And there thou tell'st of kings, and who aspire, Who fall, who rise, who triumph, who do moan. Perhaps thou talk'st of me, and dost inquire Of my restraint, why here I live alone, And pitiest this my miserable fall; For pity must have part--envy not all.

'Thrice happy you that look as from the shore, And have no venture in the wreck you see; No interest, no occasion to deplore Other men's travails, while yourselves sit free. How much doth your sweet rest make us the more To see our misery and what we be: Whose blinded greatness, ever in turmoil, Still seeking happy life, makes life a toil.'

EARLY LOVE.

Ah, I remember well (and how can I But evermore remember well?) when first Our flame began, when scarce we knew what was The flame we felt; when as we sat and sigh'd And look'd upon each other, and conceived Not what we ail'd, yet something we did ail, And yet were well, and yet we were not well, And what was our disease we could not tell. Then would we kiss, then sigh, then look: and thus In that first garden of our simpleness We spent our childhood. But when years began To reap the fruit of knowledge; ah, how then Would she with sterner looks, with graver brow, Check my presumption and my forwardness! Yet still would give me flowers, still would show What she would have me, yet not have me know.

SELECTIONS FROM SONNETS.

I must not grieve, my love, whose eyes would read Lines of delight, whereon her youth might smile; Flowers have time before they come to seed, And she is young, and now must sport the while. And sport, sweet maid, in season of these years, And learn to gather flowers before they wither; And where the sweetest blossom first appears, Let love and youth conduct thy pleasures thither, Lighten forth smiles to clear the clouded air, And calm the tempest which my sighs do raise: Pity and smiles do best become the fair; Pity and smiles must only yield thee praise. Make me to say, when all my griefs are gone, Happy the heart that sigh'd for such a one.

Fair is my love, and cruel as she's fair; Her brow shades frown, although her eyes are sunny; Her smiles are lightning, though her pride despair; And her disdains are gall, her favours honey. A modest maid, deck'd with a blush of honour, Whose feet do tread green paths of youth and love; The wonder of all eyes that look upon her: Sacred on earth; design'd a saint above; Chastity and Beauty, which are deadly foes, Live reconciled friends within her brow; And had she Pity to conjoin with those, Then who had heard the plaints I utter now? For had she not been fair, and thus unkind, My muse had slept, and none had known my mind.

Care-charmer Sleep, son of the sable Night, Brother to Death, in silent darkness born, Relieve my anguish, and restore the light, With dark forgetting of my care, return. And let the day be time enough to mourn The shipwreck of my ill-advised youth; Let waking eyes suffice to wail their scorn, Without the torments of the night's untruth. Cease, dreams, the images of day-desires, To model forth the passions of to-morrow; Never let the rising sun prove you liars, To add more grief, to aggravate my sorrow. Still let me sleep, embracing clouds in vain, And never wake to feel the day's disdain.

SIR JOHN DAVIES.

This knight, says Campbell, 'wrote, at twenty-five years of age, a poem on the "Immortality of the Soul," and at fifty-two, when he was a judge and a statesman, another on the "_Art of Dancing_." Well might the teacher of that noble accomplishment, in Moliere's comedy, exclaim, "_La philosophie est quelque chose--mais la danse!_" This, however, is more pointed than correct, since the first of these poems was written in 1592, when the author was only twenty-two years of age, and the latter appeared in 1599, when he was only twenty-nine.

Tisbury, in Wiltshire, was the birthplace of this poet, and 1570 the date of his birth. His father was a practising lawyer. John was expelled from the Temple for beating one Richard Martyn, afterwards Recorder, but was restored, and subsequently elected for Parliament. In 1592, as aforesaid, appeared his poem, 'Nosce Teipsum; or, The Immortality of the Soul.' Its fame soon travelled to Scotland; and when Davies, along with Lord Hunsdon, visited that country, James received him most graciously as the author of 'Nosce Teipsum.' His history became, for some time, a list of promotions. He was appointed, in 1603, first Solicitor and then Attorney-General in Ireland, was next made Sergeant, was then knighted, then appointed King's Sergeant, next elected representative of the county of Fermanagh, and, in fine, after a violent contest between the Roman Catholic and Protestant parties, was chosen Speaker of the House of Commons in the Protestant interest. While in Ireland he married Eleanor, a daughter of Lord Audley, who turned out a raving prophetess, and was sent, in 1649, to the Tower, and then to Bethlehem Hospital, by the Revolutionary Government. In 1616, Sir John returned to England, continued to practise as a barrister, sat in Parliament for Newcastle- under-Lyne, and received a promise of being made Chief-Justice of England; but was suddenly cut off by apoplexy in 1626.

His poem on dancing, which was written in fifteen days, and left a fragment, is a piece of beautiful, though somewhat extravagant fancy. His 'Nosce Teipsum,' if it casts little new light, and rears no demonstrative argument on the grand and difficult problem of immortality, is full of ingenuity, and has many apt and memorable similes. Feeling he happily likens to the

'subtle spider, which doth sit In middle of her web, which spreadeth wide; If aught do touch the utmost thread of it, She feels it instantly on every side.'

In answering an objection, 'Why, if souls continue to exist, do they not return and bring us news of that strange world?' he replies--

'But as Noah's pigeon, which return'd no more, Did show she footing found, for all the flood, So when good souls, departed through death's door, Come not again, it shows their dwelling good.'

The poem is interesting from the musical use he makes of the quatrain, a form of verse in which Dryden afterwards wrote his 'Annus Mirabilis,' and as one of the earliest philosophical poems in the language. It is proverbially difficult to reason in verse, but Davies reasons, if not always with conclusive result, always with energy and skill.

INTRODUCTION TO THE POEM ON THE SOUL OF MAN.

1 The lights of heaven, which are the world's fair eyes, Look down into the world, the world to see; And as they turn or wander in the skies, Survey all things that on this centre be.

2 And yet the lights which in my tower do shine, Mine eyes, which view all objects nigh and far, Look not into this little world of mine, Nor see my face, wherein they fixed are.

3 Since Nature fails us in no needful thing, Why want I means my inward self to see? Which sight the knowledge of myself might bring, Which to true wisdom is the first degree.

4 That Power, which gave me eyes the world to view, To view myself, infused an inward light, Whereby my soul, as by a mirror true, Of her own form may take a perfect sight.

5 But as the sharpest eye discerneth nought, Except the sunbeams in the air do shine; So the best soul, with her reflecting thought, Sees not herself without some light divine.

6 O light, which mak'st the light which makes the day! Which sett'st the eye without, and mind within, Lighten my spirit with one clear heavenly ray, Which now to view itself doth first begin.

7 For her true form how can my spark discern, Which, dim by nature, art did never clear, When the great wits, of whom all skill we learn, Are ignorant both what she is, and where?

8 One thinks the soul is air; another fire; Another blood, diffused about the heart; Another saith, the elements conspire, And to her essence each doth give a part.

9 Musicians think our souls are harmonies; Physicians hold that they complexions be; Epicures make them swarms of atomies, Which do by chance into our bodies flee.

10 Some think one general soul fills every brain, As the bright sun sheds light in every star; And others think the name of soul is vain, And that we only well-mix'd bodies are.

11 In judgment of her substance thus they vary; And thus they vary in judgment of her seat; For some her chair up to the brain do carry, Some thrust it down into the stomach's heat.

12 Some place it in the root of life, the heart; Some in the liver, fountain of the veins; Some say, she's all in all, and all in every part; Some say, she's not contain'd, but all contains.

13 Thus these great clerks their little wisdom show, While with their doctrines they at hazard play; Tossing their light opinions to and fro, To mock the lewd, as learn'd in this as they.

14 For no crazed brain could ever yet propound, Touching the soul, so vain and fond a thought; But some among these masters have been found, Which in their schools the selfsame thing have taught.

15 God only wise, to punish pride of wit, Among men's wits hath this confusion wrought, As the proud tower whose points the clouds did hit, By tongues' confusion was to ruin brought.

16 But thou which didst man's soul of nothing make, And when to nothing it was fallen again, 'To make it new, the form of man didst take; And, God with God, becam'st a man with men.'

17 Thou that hast fashion'd twice this soul of ours, So that she is by double title thine, Thou only know'st her nature and her powers, Her subtle form thou only canst define.

18 To judge herself, she must herself transcend, As greater circles comprehend the less; But she wants power her own powers to extend, As fetter'd men cannot their strength express.

19 But thou bright morning Star, thou rising Sun, Which in these later times hast brought to light Those mysteries that, since the world begun, Lay hid in darkness and eternal night:

20 Thou, like the sun, dost with an equal ray Into the palace and the cottage shine, And show'st the soul, both to the clerk and lay, By the clear lamp of oracle divine.

21 This lamp, through all the regions of my brain, Where my soul sits, doth spread such beams of grace, As now, methinks, I do distinguish plain Each subtle line of her immortal face.

22 The soul a substance and a spirit is, Which God himself doth in the body make, Which makes the man; for every man from this The nature of a man and name doth take.

23 And though this spirit be to the body knit, As an apt means her powers to exercise, Which are life, motion, sense, and will, and wit, Yet she survives, although the body dies.

THE SELF-SUBSISTENCE OF THE SOUL.

1 She is a substance, and a real thing, Which hath itself an actual working might, Which neither from the senses' power doth spring, Nor from the body's humours temper'd right.

2 She is a vine, which doth no propping need, To make her spread herself, or spring upright; She is a star, whose beams do not proceed From any sun, but from a native light.

3 For when she sorts things present with things past, And thereby things to come doth oft foresee; When she doth doubt at first, and choose at last, These acts her own,[1] without her body be.