Physic himself must fade; Lord have mercy on us! Beauty is but a flower, Which wrinkles will devour: I am sick, I must die. Lord have mercy on us! Strength stoops unto the grave: Lord have mercy on us! Wit with his wantonness, Hath no ears for to hear Lord have mercy on us! Haste therefore each degree Lord have mercy on us! [SAMUEL DANIEL, the son of a music master, was born near Taunton, in Somersetshire, in 1562, and educated at Magdalen College, Oxford. Leaving the University at the end of three years without taking a degree, he continued to prosecute his studies under the patronage of the Countess of Pembroke, sister of the accomplished Sidney, whose friendship procured for him the appointment of tutor to the Lady Anne Clifford, daughter of the Earl of Cumberland. His diligent application to literary pursuits enabled him to improve these favourable circumstances, and the reputation he acquired by the publication of some of his early poems, especially the Complaint of Rosamond (in which Mr. Malone imagines he has discovered the inspiration of Shakespeare's Venus and Adonis) recommended him to the favour of royalty. Thus encouraged, he became one of the volunteer laureates of Queen Elizabeth, and under King James obtained a place at court as gentleman extraordinary, and subsequently as one of the grooms of the privy chamber to the Queen Consort, who is said to have entertained a high opinion of his conversation and his writings. Few poets have been more fortunate in their associations. Daniel enjoyed the friendship and respect of his most distinguished contemporaries, and amongst those with whom he maintained an intimate intercourse were Camden, Drayton, Shakespeare, Jonson, Fulke Greville, Harrington and Spelman; even Gabriel Harvey paid tribute to his merits, and Spenser transmitted his character to after times in his Colin Clout's come home again. While he held his office at court (which imposed merely nominal duties upon him) he lived in a handsome garden-house in Old-street, St. Luke's; but towards the latter part of his life, feeling that a race of greater poets had extinguished his early popularity, or, as he expresses it himself, that he had outlived the date Of former grace, acceptance, and delight, he retired to a farm in Somersetshire, where he died in 1619. In addition to his poems and plays, Daniel wrote a History of England, which he carried down to the end of the reign of Edward III. His reputation as a poet rests chiefly on the ponderous cantos of the Civil Wars, a poem now little read, although it occupies a place of some mark in our literature. At the close of his career, when he was relinquishing a Muse that no longer smiled upon his labours, he appears to have formed a very accurate estimate of the qualities to which he was indebted for his success :— And I, although among the latter train, And least of those that sung unto this land, To aggravate the worst man's infamy; To virtue and the time.-Dedication of Philotas. unable to He always The great defect of his poetry is want of imagination, which his naturally languid constitution was remedy by vigour or boldness of treatment. writes with good sense; and his diction, which seldom rises above the level of prose, is generally pure and appropriate. But his narrative is lifeless and tedious, and fails to sustain the attention. He is more successful in his smaller pieces, where neatness and delicacy of expression make a distinct impression, and atone for the absence of higher qualities. It has been said by some of his critics that he anticipated the improvements of a more refined age, because he wrote with a perspicuity and directness not common amongst his contemporaries. But these merits are not in themselves sufficient to project a poet beyond his own time; a truth strikingly illustrated in his case. He lived in an age that produced the noblest examples of English poetry, and he has not survived it either in the closet or on the stage. His plays are planned strictly on the classical model, which he lacked the power to fill up. Deficient in the essential of action, and didactic rather than dramatic, they are for the most part very flat and dreary. The tragedy of Cleopatra, his first play, from which the following piece is taken, may, perhaps, be considered the best of them.] THE INFLUENCE OF OPINION. OPINION, how dost thou molest The affected mind of restless man? To draw him still from thought to thought: O malcontent seducing guest, Or what thou in conceit designest; Which shows their state thou ill definest : For what thou hast, thou still dost lack: If we unto ambition tend, Then dost thou draw our weakness on, With vain imagination Of that which never had an end. Or if that lust we apprehend, How dost that pleasant plague infest? He can say by proof of toil, That feeds upon the heart of pride, |