And simple truth miscall'd simplicity, And captive Good attending captain Ill :-. -Tired with all these, from these would I be gone, Save that, to die, I leave my Love alone. W. SHAKESPEARE. 61. SAINT JOHN BAPTIST. The last and greatest Herald of Heaven's King His food was locusts, and what there doth spring With honey that from virgin hives distill'd; Parch'd body, hollow eyes, some uncouth thing Made him appear, long since from earth exiled. There burst he forth: All ye whose hopes rely Only the echoes, which he made relent, SECOND BOOK, SUMMARY. THIS division, embracing the latter eighty years of the seventeenth century, contains the close of our Early poetical style and the commencement of the Modern. In Dryden we see the first master of the new in Milton, whose genius dominates here as Shakespeare's in the former book,—the crown and consummation of the early period. Their splendid Odes are far in advance of any prior attempts, Spenser's excepted: they exhibit the wider and grander range which years and experience and the struggles of the time conferred on Poetry. Poetry now gave expression to political feeling, to religious thought, to a high philosophic statesmanship in writers such as Marvell, Herbert, and Wotton: whilst in Marvell and Milton, again, we find the first noble attempts at pure description of nature, destined in our own ages to be continued and equalled. Meanwhile the poetry of simple passion, although before 1660 often deformed by verbal fancies and conceits of thought, and afterward by levity and an artificial tone,-produced in Herrick and Waller some charming pieces of more finished art than the Elizabethan: until in the courtly compliments of Sedley it seems to exhaust itself, and lie almost dormant for the hundred years between the days of Wither and Suckling and the days of Burns and Cowper. That the change from our early style to the modern brought with it at first a loss of nature and simplicity is undeniable: yet the far bolder and wider scope which Poetry took between 1620 and 1700, and the successful efforts then made to gain greater clearness in expression, in their results have been nc slight compensation. 62. ODE ON THE MORNING OF CHRIST'S NATIVITY. This is the month, and this the happy morn That He our deadly forfeit should release, That glorious Form, that Light unsufferable, Wherewith He wont at Heaven's high council-table He laid aside; and, here with us to be, And chose with us a darksome house of mortal clay. Say, heavenly Muse, shall not thy sacred vein Afford a present to the Infant God? Hast thou no verse, no hymn, or solemn strain To welcome Him to this His new abode, Now while the heaven, by the sun's team untrod, Hath took no print of the approaching light, And all the spangled host keep watch in squadrons bright? See how from far, upon the eastern road, The star-led wizards haste with odours sweet: O run, prevent them with thy humble ode And lay it lowly at his blessed feet; Have thou the honour first thy Lord to greet, And join thy voice unto the angel quire From out His secret altar touch'd with hallow'd fire. THE HYMN. It was the winter wild While the heaven-born Child All meanly wrapt in the rude manger lies; Had doff'd her gaudy trim, With her great Master so to sympathise : It was no season then for her To wanton with the sun, her lusty paramour. Only with speeches fair She woos the gentle air To hide her guilty front with innocent snow Pollute with sinful blame, The saintly veil of maiden white to throw; Confounded, that her Maker's eyes Should look so near upon her foul deformities. But He, her fears to cease, Sent down the meek-eyed Peace; She, crown'd with olive green, came softly sliding Down through the turning sphere His ready harbinger, With turtle wing the amorous clouds dividing; And waving wide her myrtle wand, She strikes a universal peace through sea and land. No war, or battle's sound Was heard the world around: The idle spear and shield were high up hung; The hooked chariot stood Unstain'd with hostile blood; The trumpet spake not to the arméd throng; As if they surely knew their sovran Lord was by. But peaceful was the night Wherein the Prince of Light His reign of peace upon the earth began: Smoothly the waters kist Whispering new joys to the mild oceán Who now hath quite forgot to rave, While birds of calm sit brooding on the charméd wave. The stars, with deep amaze, Stand fix'd in steadfast gaze, Bending one way their precious influence; And will not take their flight For all the morning light, Or Lucifer that often warn'd them thence; But in their glimmering orbs did glow Until their Lord Himself bespake, and bid them go. And though the shady gloom Had given day her room, The sun himself withheld his wonted speed, And hid his head for shame, As his inferior flame The new-enlighten'd world no more should need: He saw a greater Sun appear Than his bright throne, or burning axletree, could bear. The shepherds on the lawn Or ere the point of dawn Sate simply chatting in a rustic row; Full little thought they then That the mighty Pan Was kindly come to live with them below; Perhaps their loves, or else their sheep Was all that did their silly thoughts so busy keep. |