The following is a portion of his version of the twenty-third Psalm : « Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil." It is highly spirited and beautiful. Come now all ye terrors, sally, Where triumphant darkness hovers PHINEAS FLETCHER. 1584-1650. PHINEAS FLETCHER was the brother of Giles Fletcher, and born about the year 1584. He took his degree at Cambridge, and after completing his studies for the ministry, was presented with the living of Hilgay, in Norfolk, in 1621, which he held for twenty-nine years; and it is supposed that he died there in 1650. His chief poem is entitled "The Purple Island," which title, on being first heard, would suggest ideas totally different from what is its real subject. The truth is, it is a sort of anatomical poem, the "Purple Island" being nothing less than the human body, the veins and arteries of which are filled with the purple fluid coursing up and down; so that the first part of the poem, which is anatomically descriptive, is not a little dry and uninteresting. But after describing the body, he proceeds to personify the passions and intellectual faculties. "Here," says Headley, "fatigued attention is not merely relieved, but fascinated and enraptured; there is a boldness of outline, a majesty of manner, a brilliancy of coloring, and an air of life, that we look for in vain in modern productions, and that rival, if not surpass, what we meet with of the kind even in Spenser, from whom our author caught his inspiration." This is rather extravagant, and yet a few passages can be selected from Phineas Fletcher, that, for beauty, are scarcely exceeded by any poetry in the language. THE SHEPHERD'S LIFE.1 Thrice, oh thrice happy, shepherd's life and state, His cottage low, and safely humble gate Shuts out proud Fortune, with her scorns and fawns: No Serian worms he knows, that with their thread No empty hopes, no courtly fears him fright; Instead of music and base flattering tongues, 1 These beautiful lines seem to have suggested the plan of that most exquisite little piece called The Hamlet by Thomas Warton, which contains a selection of beautiful rural images, such as perhaps no other poem of equal length in our language presents us with. See it in the selections from Warton. FLETCHER. His certain life, that never can deceive him, Is full of thousand sweets and rich content: [INTERREGNUM, The smooth-leaved beeches in the field receive him Of troublous world, nor lost in slothful ease: His bed of wool yields safe and quiet sleeps, The lively picture of his father's face: Never his humble house or state torment him; Less he could like, if less his God had sent him; And when he dies, green turfs with grassy tomb content him ENVY.1 Envy the next, Envy with squinted eyes; Sick of a strange disease, his neighbor's health; Is never poor, but in another's wealth: On best men's harms and griefs he feeds his fill; Ill must the temper be, where diet is so ill. Each eye through divers optics slyly leers, And molehill faults to mountains multiply. When needs he must, yet faintly, then he praises; DECAY OF HUMAN GREATNESS. Fond man, that looks on earth for happiness, Why shouldst thou here look for perpetual good, Do but behold where glorious cities stood, With gilded tops and silver turrets shining; And loving pelican in safety breeds: There screeching satyrs fill the people's empty steads. Where is th' Assyrian lion's golden hide, That all the East once grasp'd in lordly paw? I "In his description of Envy, Fletcher is superior to Spenser."--Retrospective Reviere ii, 343. 2 Places. Where that great Persian bear, whose swelling pride Or he which, 'twixt a lion and a pard, Through all the world with nimble pinions fared, And to his greedy whelps his conquer'd kingdoms shared. Hardly the place of such antiquity, Or note of these great monarchies we find: Only a fading verbal memory, And empty name in writ is left behind: But when this second life and glory fades, And sinks at length in time's obscurer shades, A second fall succeeds, and double death invades. That monstrous beast, which, nursed in Tiber's fen, And trod down all the rest to dust and clay: Back'd, bridled by a monk, with seven heads yoked stands. And that black vulture, which, with deathful wing, Already stoops, and flags with weary flight: Where each new day proclaims chance, change, and death, WILLIAM HABINGTON. 1605-1654. WILLIAM HABINGTON was born at the country seat of his ancestors in Worcestershire, called Hindlip, in 1605, the year of the famed gunpowder plot, the discovery of which is said to have come from his mother. They were a wealthy family, and were Papists. William was educated in the Jesuits' College in St. Omers, and afterwards at Paris, in the hope that he might enter into that society. But he preferred a wiser and happier course of life, and returning to his own country, married Lucy, daughter of William Herbert. In 1635 he published a volume of poems entitled "Castara," under which name he celebrates his wife, a kind of title fashionable in that day. He died when he had just completed his fiftieth year, and was buried in the family vault at Hindlip. But little is known of Habington's history. He appears to have been dis tinguished for connubial felicity, for a love of retirement and study, and for the dignity and moral beauty of his sentiments. "His poems possess much. elegance, much poetical fancy, and are almost everywhere tinged with a deep moral cast, which ought to have made their fame more permanent."2 1 The Mohammedan Empire. 2 See "Censura Literaria," vili. 227 and 387; and "Retrospective Review," gil. 274; also, "Hal lam's Literature," &c., ii. 182. TO CASTARA, In praise of Content, and the calm Happiness of the Country at Hindlip. Do not their profane orgies hear Who but to wealth no altars rear: Castara, rather seek to dwell Yet Hindlip doth not want extent No north wind shall the corn infest, Our scent with perfumed banquets feast. A Satyr here and there shall trip, The Nymphs with quivers shall adorn Waken'd with which, and viewing thee, So they whose wisdom did discuss THE VANITY OF AVARICE. Hark! how the traitor wind doth court To make their avarice his sport: A tempest checks the fond disdain; We'll sit, my love, upon the shore, And charm the sea to th' calm it had before. |