Part 4

It is true that here the reply wants one of having the same number of syllables as the question—but still the constant return of the same quantity for each speaker is disgusting to all unprejudiced ears. You will tell me that it is in the high gusto of the antique, and that the feet are trochaics—I can only reply, that hard words cannot convince me contrary to reason, and if a proper effect is not produced, it is of very little consequence to me whether the authority is brought from Greece or Siberia. Horace’s often-quoted _Pallida mors_, &c. was perhaps never better translated than at the end of the fourth stanza.

The ninth hieroglyphic will put you in mind of the poems that are squeezed or stretched into the form of axes, altars, and wings——but if you will attend to the matter, and not the form, you will find it excellent——to write this properly requires some care.

_Behold_ How short a span Was long enough of old To measure out the life of man; In those well-temper’d days, his time was then Survey’d, cast up, and found but threescore years and ten!

_Alas!_ And what is that? They come, and slide, and pass, Before my pen can tell thee what. The posts of Time are swift, which having run Their sev’n short stages o’er, their short-liv’d task is done.

_Our days_ Begun, we lend To sleep, to antick plays And toys, until the first stage end: 12 waining moons, twice 5 times told, we give To unrecover’d loss: we rather breathe than live.

_We spend_ A ten years breath Before we apprehend What ’tis to live, or fear a Death: Our childish dreams are fill’d with painted joys Which please our sense awhile, and waking prove but toys!

_How vain_ How wretched is Poor man, that doth remain A slave to such a state as this! His days are short, at longest; few at most; They are but bad at best; yet lavish’d out, or lost.

_They be_ The secret springs That make our minutes flee On wheels more swift than eagle’s wings! Our Life’s a clock, and ev’ry gasp of breath Breathes forth a warning grief, till Time shall strike a Death!

_How soon_ Our new-born light Attains to full-ag’d noon! And this, how soon to grey-hair’d night! We spring, we bud, we blossom and we blast E’er we can count our days, our days they flee so fast!

_They end_ When scarce begun; And e’er we apprehend That we begin to live, our life is done: Man count thy days; and if they fly too fast For thy dull thoughts to count, count ev’ry day the last.

Methinks Quarles’s ghost is at my elbow, which will not be appeased unless I remark that the first lines of each stanza make a verse, being the text on which the poem is a comment.

_Behold, alas! our days we spend; How vain they be, how soon they end!_

This is a kind of false wit once much in request. Jarvis, the translator of Don Quixote, calls it _glossing_—upon what authority I know not. In the first chapter of the second book of the second volume may be found a text and gloss—with this difference from Quarles’s, that the text is introduced at the end of the stanza and not at the beginning.

It is impossible to avoid smiling at the pains he must have taken to preserve the form of the stanza—in the third he is obliged to have the assistance of figures, or his line would have been too long; and after all his trouble there must be some for the reader before he has calculated how much “12 moons, twice 5 times told,” are——in the rest, to say the truth, it is not so apparent. If this pyramidical stanza prevents you from attending to the poetry, it is easily put in another—of the two first lines make one; and the false wit immediately vanishes.—I hope Quarles’s ghost vanished before I proposed the alteration.

I have, like a prudent caterer, reserved the best thing for the last. It is the twelfth emblem of the third book. The subject of the print is a figure trying to escape from the Divine vengeance which is pursuing in thunders: the motto——_O that thou wouldst hide me in the grave, that thou wouldst keep me in secret until thy wrath be past!_ Upon this hint he has produced the following excellent poem.

Ah! whither shall I fly? what path untrod Shall I seek out to ’scape the flaming rod Of my offended, of my angry God?

Where shall I sojourn? what kind sea will hide My head from thunder? where shall I abide, Until his flames be quench’d or laid aside?

What, if my feet should take their hasty flight, And seek protection in the shades of night? Alas! no shades can blind the God of light.

What, if my soul should take the wings of day, And find some desert? if she spring away The wings of vengeance clip as fast as they.

What, if some solid rock should entertain My frighted soul? can solid rocks restrain The stroke of Justice and not cleave in twain?

Nor sea, nor shade, nor shield, nor rock, nor cave, Nor silent deserts, nor the sullen grave, Where flame-ey’d fury means to smite, can save.

Tis vain to flee; ’till gentle mercy shew Her better eye; the farther off we go, The swing of Justice deals the mightier blow.

Th’ ingenuous child, corrected, doth not flie His angry mother’s hand, but clings more nigh, And quenches with his tears her flaming eye.

Great God! there is no safety here below; Thou art my fortress, thou that seem’st my foe, ’Tis thou that strik’st the stroke, must guard the blow.

Six stanzas, which though very good, yet being of less merit than the rest are omitted. It is obvious that he had the 139th psalm in his eye, of which he has made great use. The alarm at the beginning—the searching all nature for shelter—the impossibility of being hid from the author of nature—and the acquiescing at last in what was unavoidable, are grand and natural ideas. The motion of the wings of vengeance—and the recapitulation of the places where protection was fought in vain—are instances of expression rarely met with. But what praise is sufficient for the simile in the eighth stanza? To say only that it is apposite and beautiful, comes very short of my sensations when I read it. Let me confess honestly that I think it one of the noblest instances of the sublime pathetic! As a part of a religious poem it is proper, in a high degree; the scripture frequently considering our connection with the Almighty as that of children with a parent.—As a pictoresque image it is distinct, natural, and affecting.—But to remark all the beauties of this poem would be to comment on every stanza.——You will have more pleasure in finding them out yourself.

Now what think you, is not this rather too good to be lost? Was it from never reading Quarles, or taking his character from common report, that Pope considered his productions as the very bathos of poetry? Poor Quarles! thou hast had many enemies, and art now forgotten. But thou hast at last found a friend—not equal, indeed, to the task of turning a tide that has been flowing for a hundred years against thee—not equal to his wishes for giving thee and every neglected genius his due share of reputation—but barely capable of laying the first stone of thy temple of fame, which he leaves to be compleated by abler and by stronger hands!

Farewel.

P. S. I had forgot to inform you that these emblems were imitated in Latin by one Herman Hugo, a Jesuit. The first edition of them was in 1623, soon after the appearance of Quarles; and the book was reprinted for the ninth time in 1676, which last is the date of the copy in my possession. How many more editions there have been, I know not. He makes no acknowledgement to Quarles, and speaks of his own work as original. As a specimen of his manner, take the following, which is intended as an imitation of “Ah whither shall I fly?”

Quis mihi securis dabit hospita tecta latebris? Tecta, quibus dextræ server ab igne tuæ? Heu! tuus ante oculos quoties furor ille recursat, Nulla mihi toties fida sat antra reor.

Tunc ego secretas, umbracula frondea, sylvas, Lustràque solivagis opto relicta feris. Tunc ego vel mediis timidum caput abdere terris, Aut maris exesâ condere rupe velim, &c.

It reads but poorly after the other, though I have given you the best of it. He afterwards by degrees quits his subject, runs into stuff about Cain and Jonah, and has entirely omitted the simile.

* * * * *

You express an inclination to publish my letters. You should consider that the date of some of them is so far back, that many allusions to passing incidents which might engage attention at the time, now must fail of their effect.——People are spoken of as living, who are dead——and many other objections might be enumerated. However, you are at liberty to do what you please with them. Those which are of a private nature, your prudence will, of course, keep to yourself: and for the others, where some conjectures are hazarded which may be thought different from received opinions; the writer wishes them to be read with the same impartiality they were written——though he is well apprized of the difficulty of dispossessing old opinions.

_=FINIS.=_

Transcriber’s Notes:

- Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_). - Text enclosed by equals is in gespertt (=gespertt=). - Blank pages have been removed. - Silently corrected typographical errors. - Spelling and hyphenation variations made consistent. - Page 87, end of letter XXVII: The symbol appears to be U+1FDE Greek Dasia (rough breathing diacritical mark for an ‘h’ sound before a vowel) and Oxia (acute accent). - Formatting of a dialogue in letter XXX made more consistent.