Hope. Parent's lawes must beare no weight, When they happinesse prevent; But it roome hath for content. Feare. Thousand hearts as victims stand And will partiall she command, Hope. Thousand victims must returne; In a short address" to The Thames," p. 32, he speaks of Faire Seymors, on the banks of Marlow." P. 43, is a poem "to Seymors, the house in which Castara resided." In p. 39, a poem to Mr. George Talbot begins with the following noble lines: "Thrice hath the pale-fac'd empresse of the night Lent in her chaste increase her borrowed light To guide the vowing marriner: since mute, Talbot, th' ast beene, too slothfull to salute Thy exil'd servant. Labour not t'excuse This dull neglect: love never wants a muse. When thunder summons from eternall sleepe Th' imprison'd ghosts, and spreads o' th' frighted deepe 8 Ep. 2^, 21. A veile of darknesse, penitent to be I may forget; yet still remember thee, Next to my faire, under whose eye-lids move, In p. 50, are some lines to Lady Eleanor Powis, Castara's mother, in which he appeals to the superiority of her judgment over the glitter of wealth and station; and demands, if rich with a little, they may not be lifted by mutual love, to a greatness above what riches can confer. He dares not, he says, when he surveys the beauty of Castara's hand, ascribe the brightness of its veins to the blood of Charlemaigne, which flows in them through her, or the united streams of Marmion, Rosse, Parr, Fitzhugh, and St. Quintin, which add their lustre to the Pembroke family. Would that Castara were the daughter of some mountain-cottager, who could leave her no other dower than what she derived from the bounty of nature! He would then lead her to the temple, rich in her own wealth. That fortune, them t'enrich, made others want, P. 52, is a poem, "To the honourable Mr. Wm. E." reprinted in Headley's 2d vol. pp. 19, 20. In another poem, "To Castara, on the Vanity of Avarice," p. 56, he says, "I'de rather like the violet grow Than on the hill those terrors know There is more pompe above, more sweete below." The verses, p. 38, are to his "honoured friend and kinsman, R. St. Esquire." It does not give me pain, says he, if what I write is held no wit at court. Let those who teach their muse the art of winning on easy greatness, or the spruce young lawyer, who is all impudence and tongue,' endeavour to divulge their fames, by which the one may get employ, and the other fees, I embrace silence, and that fate which placed my birth so happily, that I am neither depressed by want, nor flattered by riches into pride. Why are some poets always railing, and steeping their rhymes in gall; as if there was no crime that called so loudly for the vengeance of heaven as the poverty of a few writers? It is true, that Chapman's reverend ashes have been mingled with the vulgar dust for want of a tomb; yet we need not despair, that some devout lover of poetry may yet build him a monu ment. 1 "Since Spencer hath a stone; and Drayton's browes Stand petrefied: th' wall, with laurell bowes Yet girt about: and nigh wise Henrie's hearse, "If some please their patrons with hyperboles, or mysterious nonsense, and then complain, if they are not noticed, that the state neglects men of parts; and seem to think all other kinds of excellence unworthy of reputation, let us set so just a value on knowledge, that the world may trust the sentence of a poet. "I write to you, Sir, on this theame, because Yours onely the example to my muše. And till my browner haire be mixt with grey, But age doth dote without philosophie." The 1st part closes at pp. 65-67, with a poem so simple, so chaste, so elegant, harmonious, and happy, as to exceed my powers of praise. "The Description of Castara. "Like the violet, which alone For shee's to herselfe untrue, Who delights i' th' publicke view. Such her beauty, as no arts Have enricht with borrowed grace, Folly boasts a glorious blood; Cautious, she knew never yet, Of herselfe survey she takes, But 'tweene men no difference makes, She obeyes with speedy will Her grave parents' wise commands; And so innocent, that ill, She nor acts, nor understands. Women's feet runne still astray, |