Or taste a part of that full joy he meant

To have exprest,

In this bright asterism;

Where it were friendship's schism

(Were not his Lucius long with us to tarry)

To separate these twi

Lights, the Dioscori;

And keep the one half from his Harry.

But fate doth so alternate the design,

While that in Heaven, this light on earth doth shine."

This seems as if because he cannot without difficulty write smoothly, he becomes rough and crabbed in a spirit of defiance, like those persons who cannot behave well in company, and affect rudeness to show their contempt for the opinions of others.

6

His Epistles' are particularly good, equally full of strong sense and sound feeling. They show that he was not without friends, whom he esteemed, and by whom he was deservedly esteemed in return. The controversy started about his character is an idle one, carried on in the mere spirit of contradiction, as if he were either made up entirely of gall, or dipped in "the milk of human kindness." There is no necessity or ground to suppose either. He was no doubt a sturdy, plain-spoken, honest, well-disposed man, inclining more to the severe than the amiable side of things; but his good qualities, learning, talents, and convivial habits preponderated over his defects of temper or manners; and in a course of friendship some difference of character, even a little roughness or acidity, may relish to the palate; and olives may be served up with effect as well as sweetmeats. Ben Jonson, even by his quarrels and jealousies, does not seem to have been curst with the last and damning disqualification for friendship,-heartless indifference. He was also what is understood by a good fellow, fond of good cheer and good company: and the first step for others to enjoy your society, is for you to enjoy theirs. If any one can do without the world, it is certain that the world can do quite as well without him. His 'Verses Inviting a Friend to Supper' give us as familiar an idea of his private habits and character, as his 'Epistle to Michael Drayton,' that to Selden, &c.; his Lines to the Memory of Shakspeare,'

and his noble prose Eulogy on Lord Bacon,' in his disgrace, do a favourable one.

Among the best of these (perhaps the very best) is the 'Address to Sir Robert Wroth,' which, besides its manly moral sentiments, conveys a strikingly picturesque description of rural sports and manners at this interesting period :

"How blest art thou, canst love the country, Wroth,
Whether by choice, or fate, or both!

And though so near the city and the court,
Art ta'en with neither's vice nor sport:
That at great times, art no ambitious guest
Of sheriff's dinner, or of mayor's feast;
Nor com'st to view the better cloth of state,
The richer hangings, or the crown-plate;
Nor throng'st (when masquing is) to have a sight
Of the short bravery of the night;

To view the jewels, stuffs, the pains, the wit
There wasted, some not paid for yet!

But canst at home, in thy securer rest,
Live with unbought provision blest;

Free from proud porches or their gilded roofs,
'Mongst lowing heards and solid hoofs:
Along the curled woods and painted meads,
Through which a serpent river leads

To some cool courteous shade, which he calls his,
And makes sleep softer than it is!

Or if thou list the night in watch to break,
A-bed canst hear the loud stag speak,
In spring oft roused for their master's sport,
Who for it makes thy house his court;

Or with thy friends, the heart of all the year,
Divid'st upon the lesser deer;

In autumn, at the partrich mak'st a flight,
And giv'st thy gladder guests the sight;
And in the winter hunt'st the flying hare,
More for thy exercise than fare;

While all that follows, their glad ears apply
To the full greatness of the cry:

Or hawking at the river or the bush,

Or shooting at the greedy thrush,

Thou dost with some delight the day out-wear,
Although the coldest of the year!

The whilst the several seasons thou hast seen
Of flow'ry fields, of copses green,

The mowed meadows, with the fleeced sheep,
And feasts that either shearers keep;
The ripened ears yet humble in their height,
And furrows laden with their weight;
The apple-harvest that doth longer last;
The hogs return'd home fat from mast;

The trees cut out in log; and those boughs made
A fire now, that lent a shade!

Thus Pan and Sylvan having had their rites,
Comus puts in for new delights;

And fills thy open hall with mirth and cheer,
As if in Saturn's reign it were;

Apollo's harp and Hermes' lyre resound,
Nor are the Muses strangers found:

The rout of rural folk come thronging in

(Their rudeness then is thought no sin),

Thy noblest spouse affords them welcome grace:
And the great heroes of her race

Sit mixt with loss of state or reverence.
Freedom doth with degree dispense.

The jolly wassall walks the often round,

And in their cups their cares are drown'd:

They think not then which side the cause shall leese,

Nor how to get the lawyer fees.

Such, and no other, was that age of old,

Which boasts t' have had the head of gold.

And such since thou canst make thine own content,

Strive, Wroth, to live long innocent.

Let others watch in guilty arms, and stand

The fury of a rash command,

Go enter breaches, meet the cannon's rage,

That they may sleep with scars in age,

And show their feathers shot and colours torn,
And brag that they were therefore born.
Let this man sweat, and wrangle at the bar

For every price in every jar,

And change possessions oftener with his breath,
Than either money, war, or death:

Let him, than hardest sires, more disinherit,

And each where boast it as his merit,

To blow up orphans, widows, and their states;
And think his power doth equal Fate's.
Let that go heap a mass of wretched wealth,
Purchas'd by rapine, worse than stealth;
And brooding o'er it sit, with broadest eyes,
Not doing good, scarce when he dies.

Let thousands more go flatter vice, and win,
By being organs to great sin;

Get place and honour, and be glad to keep
The secrets that shall break their sleep :
And, so they ride in purple, eat in plate,
Though poison, think it a great fate.

But thou, my Wroth, if I can truth apply,
Shalt neither that nor this envy:

Thy peace is made; and, when man's state is well,

'Tis better, if he there can dwell.

God wisheth none should wrack on a strange shelf;
To him man's dearer than t' himself.

And howsoever, we may think things sweet,
He always gives what he knows meet;
Which who can use is happy: such be thou.
Thy morning's and thy evening's vow
Be thanks to him, and earnest prayer, to find
A body sound, with sounder mind;
To do thy country service, thyself right;
That neither want do thee affright,

Nor death; but when thy latest sand is spent,

Thou mayst think life a thing but lent."

Of all the poetical Epistles of this period, however, that of Daniel to the Countess of Cumberland, for weight of thought and depth of feeling, bears the palm. The reader will not peruse this effusion with less interest or pleasure, from knowing that it is a favourite with Mr. Wordsworth:

"He that of such a height hath built his mind,
And rear'd the dwelling of his thoughts so strong,
As neither fear nor hope can shake the frame
Of his resolved powers; nor all the wind
Of vanity or malice pierce to wrong
His settled peace, or to disturb the same:
What a fair seat hath he, from whence he may
The boundless wastes and wilds of man survey!
And with how free an eye doth he look down
Upon these lower regions of turmoil,
Where all the storms of passions mainly beat
On flesh and blood: where honour, pow'r, renown,

Are only gay afflictions, golden toil;

Where greatness stands upon as feeble feet
As frailty doth; and only great doth seem

To little minds, who do it so esteem.

He looks upon the mightiest monarch's wars
But only as on stately robberies;

Where evermore the fortune that prevails
Must be the right: the ill-succeeding mars
The fairest and the best fac'd enterprize.
Great pirate Pompey lesser pirates quails:
Justice, he sees (as if seduced) still

Conspires with pow'r, whose cause must not be ill.
He sees the face of right t' appear as manifold
As are the passions of uncertain man;

Who puts it in all colours, all attires,

To serve his ends, and make his courses hold.
He sees, that let deceit work what it can,
Plot and contrive base ways to high desires;
That the all-guiding Providence doth yet
All disappoint, and mocks this smoke of wit.

Nor is he mov'd with all the thunder-cracks
Of tyrants' threats, or with the surly brow
Of pow'r, that proudly sits on others' crimes,
Charg'd with more crying sins than those he checks.
The storms of sad confusion, that may grow
Up in the present for the coming times,
Appal not him; that hath no side at all,
But of himself, and knows the worst can fall.
Although his heart (so near allied to earth)
Cannot but pity the perplexed state
Of troublous and distress'd mortality,
That thus make way unto the ugly hirth
Of their own sorrows, and do still beget
Affliction upon imbecility:

Yet seeing thus the course of things must run,
He looks thereon not strange, but as fore-done.
And whilst distraught ambition compasses,
And is encompass'd; whilst as craft deceives,
And is deceiv'd; whilst man doth ransack man,
And builds on blood, and rises by distress;
And th' inheritance of desolation leaves
To great expecting hopes; he looks thereon,
As from the shore of peace, with unwet eye,
And bears no venture in impiety."

Michael Drayton's Poly-Olbion' is a work of great length and of unabated freshness and vigour in itself, though the monotony of the subject tires the reader. He describes each place with the accuracy of a topographer, and the enthusiasm of a