and with the neglect which it has occasioned.
-thy riddles all men do neglect,
Thy rugged lines of all do lie forlorn ;—
Unwelcome rhymes that rudely do detect
The readers ignorance. Men holden scorn
To be so often nonplus'd, or to spell,
And on one stanza a whole age to dwell.
Besides this harsh and hard obscurity
Of the hid sense, thy words are barbarous
And strangely new, and yet too frequently
Return, as usual, plain and obvious,
So that the shew of the new thick-set patch
Marrs all the old with which it ill doth match.
This the Poet resolutely answers in his own person.
What thou dost pedantickly object
Concerning my rude, rugged, uncouth style,
As childish toy I manfully neglect...
How ill alas! with wisdom it accords
To sell my living sense for liveless words
My thought's the fittest measure of my tongue,
Wherefore I'll use what's most significant;
And rather than my inward meaning wrong,
Or my full-shining notion trimly skant,
I'll conjure up old words out of their grave,
Or call fresh foreign force in, if need crave;
And these attending on my moving mind,
Shall duly usher in the fitting sense.
And then looking on to the warm season which is to succeed the winter of the world, and at the same time anticipating Baron Munchausen's idea, he says,
My words into this frozen air I throw,
Will then grow vocal at that general thaw.
The following extract is the best specimen that can be given of the strain of feeling, which Henry More could express in no better language than an inharmonious imitation of Spenser's, barbarized by the extremes of carelessness the most licentious, and erudition "the most pedantic.
In silent night when mortalls be at rest,
And bathe their molten limbs in slothful sleep,
My troubled ghost strange cares did straight molest,
And plunged my heavie soul in sorrow deep: >
Large floods of tears my moistned cheeks did steep,
My heart was wounded with compassionate love
Of all the creatures: sadly out I creep
From men's close mansions, the more to improve My mournfull plight; so softly on I forward move.
Aye me! said I, within my wearied breast,
And sighed sad,.. wherefore did God erect
This stage of misery? thrice, foure times blest
Whom churlish Nature never did eject
From her dark womb, and cruelly object
By sense nnd life unto such balefull smart ;
Every slight entrance into joy is checkt
By that soure step-dames threats, and visage tart: Our pleasure of our pain is not the thousandth part.
Thus vex'd I was 'cause of mortality,
Her curst remembrance cast me in this plight,
That I grew sick of the world's vanity,
Ne ought recomfort could my sunken spright;
What so I hate may do me no delight,
Few things (alas!) I hate, the more my wo.
The things I love by mine own sad foresight,
Make me the greater torments undergo,
Because I know at last they're gone like idle show.
Each goodly sight my sense doth captivate,
When vernal flowers their silken leaves display,
And ope their fragrant bosomes, I that state
Would not have changed, but indure for aye;
Nor care to mind that that fatall decay
Is still secured by faithfull succession.
But why should aught that's good thus fade away? Should steddy spring exclude summer's accession? Or summer spoil the spring with furious hot oppression!
You chearfull chaunters of the flowring woods,
That feed your carelesse souls with pleasant layes,
O silly birds! cease from your merry moods:
Ill suits such mirth when dreary death's assayes
So closely presse your sory carkases:
To mournfull note turn your light verilayes,
: Death be your song, and winter's hoary sprayes,.
Spend your vain sprights in sighing elegies:
I'll help you to lament your wofull miseries.
When we lay cover'd in the shady night
Of senselesse matter, we were well content
With that estate, nought pierced our anxious spright,
No harm we suffered, no harm we ment;
Our rest not with light dream of ill was blent:
But when rough Nature, with her iron hond,
Puli'd us from our soft ease, and hither hent,
Disturbing fear and pinching pain we found,
Full many a bitter blast, full many a dreadful stound
VOL. II.
In silent night when mortalls be at rest,
And bathe their molten limbs in slothful sleep,
My troubled ghost strange cares did straight molest,
And plunged my heavie soul in sorrow deep:
Large floods of tears my moistned cheeks did steep,
My heart was wounded with compassionate love
Of all the creatures: sadly out I creep
From men's close mansions, the more to improve
My mournfull plight; so softly on I forward move.
Aye me! said I, within my wearied breast,
And sighed sad,.. wherefore did God erect
This stage of misery? thrice, foure times blest
Whom churlish Nature never did eject
From her dark womb, and cruelly object
By sense nnd life unto such balefull smart ;
Every slight entrance into joy is checkt
By that soure step-dames threats, and visage tart:
Our pleasure of our pain is not the thousandth part.
Thus vex'd I was 'cause of mortality,
Her curst remembrance cast me in this plight,
That I grew sick of the world's vanity,
Ne ought recomfort could my sunken sprights
What so I hate may do me no delight,
Few things (alas!) I hate, the more my wo.
The things I love by mine own sad foresight,
Make me the greater torments undergo,
Because I know at last they're gone like idle show.
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