GAVIN DOUGLASS. 1474–1522. Dame Nature's minstrals, on that other part, Welcome master and ruler of the year, Welcome be thy bright beamis gladdand all. WILLIAM CAXTON. In 1471 he printed the first book in the English language. In a note to this publication, Caxton says: "For as much as age creepeth on me daily and feebleth all the bodie, and also because I have promised divers gentlemen, and to my friends, to address to them, as hastily as I might, this said book; therefore I have practised and learned, at my great charge and dispence, to ordain this said book in print, after the manner and form as ye may here see, and is not written with pen and ink, as other books ben, to the end that all men may have them at once; for all the books of this story, named The Recule of the Historeys of Troyes, thus emprinted, as ye here see, were begun in one day and also finished in one day." EARL OF SURREY. 1516-47. Martial, the things that do attain The happy life, be these I find, The riches left, not got with gain, The fruitful ground, the quiet mind. The equal friend; no grudge, no strife, The household of continuance. The mean diet, no delicate fare, True wisdom joined with simpleness; The night discharged of all care, Where wine the wit may not oppress. Mistress Alice, in my most hearty wise I recommend me to you. And whereas I am informed by my son Heron of the loss of our barns and our neighbors' also, with all the corn that was therein; albeit (saving God's pleasure) it were great pity of so much good corn lost; yet since it has liked him to send us such a good chance, we must, and are bounden not only to be content, but are also glad of his visitation. He sent us all that we have lost; and since he hath by such a chance taken it away again, his pleasure be fulfilled! Let us never grudge thereat, but take it in good worth, and thank him heartily as well for adversity as for prosperity. And peradventure we have more cause to thank him for our loss than for our winning, for his wisdom better seeth what is good for us than we do ourselves. Therefore I pray you, be of good cheer, and take all the household with you to church, and there thank God, both for that he has given us, and for that which he has taken from us, and for that he hath left us; which, if it please him, he can increase when he will, and if it please him to leave us yet less, at his pleasure be it. He, making speedy way through spersed ayre, And low, where dawning day doth never peepe, His dwelling is, there Tethys his wet bed Doth ever wash, and Cynthia still doth steepe In silver deaw his ever drouping hed, Whiles sad Night over him her mantle black doth spred. Whose double gates he findeth locked fast, The one fayre fram'd of burnished yvory, The other all with silver overcast ; And wakeful dogges before them farre doe lye, Watching to banish care their enimy, By them the sprite doth pass in quietly, And unto Morpheus comes, whom drouned deepe, $82. SPECIMENS OF MODERN ENGLISH. SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. 1554-86. Description of Arcadia. There were hills which garnished their proud heights with stately trees; humble valleys, whose base estate seemed comforted with the refreshing of silver rivers; meadows, enamelled with all sorts of eye-pleasing flowers; thickets, which being lined with the most pleasant shade, were witnessed so to by the cheerful disposition of many well-tuned birds; each pasture stored with sheep, feeding with sober security, while the pretty lambs, with bleating oratory, craved the dam's comfort; here a shepherd's piping, as though he should never be old; there a young shepherdess knitting, and withal singing; and it seemed that her voice comforted her hands to work, and her hands kept time to her voice music. GEORGE HERBERT. 1593-1632. RELIGION. All may of thee partake; Nothing can be so mean, Which with this tincture, for thy sake, This is the famous stone That turneth all to gold, For that which God doth touch and own Can not for less be told. SIR WALTER RALEIGH. 1552-1618. The Strength of Kings. They say the goodliest cedars which grow on the high mountains of Libanus thrust their roots between the clefts of hard rocks, the better to bear themselves against the strong storms that blow there. As reason has instructed those kings of trees, so has reason taught the kings of men to root themselves in the hardy hearts of their faithful subjects; and as those kings of trees have large tops, so have the kings of men large crowns, whereof, as the first would soon be broken from their bodies were they not underborne by many branches, so would the other easily totter were they not fastened on their heads by the strong chains of civil justice and martial discipline. ROBERT HERRICK. Born 1591. TO FIND GOD. Weigh me the fire; or canst thou find And taste thou them as saltless there BEN JONSON. 1574-1637. Language most shows a man: speak, that I may see thee. It inmost parts of us, and is the No glass renders a man's form springs out of the most retired and image of the parent of it, the mind. or likeness so true as his speech. Nay, it is likened to a man; and as we consider feature and composition in a man, so words in language, in the greatness, openness, sound, structure, and harmony of it. Some men are tall and big, so some language is high and great. Then the words are chosen, their sound ample, the composition fair, the absolution plenteous, and poured out, all grave, sinewy, and strong. Some are little and dwarfs; so of speech, it is humble and low, the words poor and flat, the members and periods thin and weak, without knitting or number. The middle are of a just stature. There the language is plain and pleasing; even without stopping, round without swelling; all well turned, composed, elegant, and accurate. The vicious language is vast and gaping, swelling and irregular; when it contends to be high, full of rocks and mountains, and pointedness; as it affects to lie low, it is abject, and creeps full of bogs and holes. Light, that makes things seen, makes some things invisible. Were it not for darkness and the shadow of the earth, the noblest part of creation had remained unseen, and the stars in heaven as invisible as on the fourth day, when they were created above the horizon with the sun, and there was not an eye to behold them. The greatest mystery of religion is expressed by adumbration, and in the noblest part of Jewish types we find the cherubim shadowing the mercy-seat. Life itself is but the shadow of death, and souls departed but the shadows of the living. All things fall under this name. The sun itself is but the dark simulacrum, and light but the shadow of God. JEREMY TAYLOR. 1613-1667. The Age of Reason and Discretion. We must not think that the life of a man begins when he can feed himself or walk alone, when he can fight or beget his like, for so is he contemporary with a camel or a cow; but he is first a man when he comes to a certain steady use of his reason, according to his proportion; and when that is, all the world of men can not tell precisely. Some are called at age at fourteen, some at one-andtwenty, some never; but all men late enough; for the life of a man comes upon him slowly and insensibly. But, as when the sun approaching toward the gates of the morning, he first opens a little. eye of heaven, and sends away the spirits of darkness, and gives light to a cock, and calls up the lark to matins, and by-and-by gilds the fringes of a cloud, and peeps over the eastern hills, thrusting out his golden horns like those which decked the brows of Moses when he was forced to wear a veil because himself had seen the face of God; and still, while a man tells the story, the sun gets up higher, till he shows a fair face and a full light, and then he shines one whole day, under a cloud sometimes, and often weeping great and little showers, and sets quickly; so is a man's reason and his life. He first begins to perceive himself, to see or taste, making little reflections upon his actions of sense, and can discourse of flies and dogs, shells and play, horses and liberty; but when he is strong enough to enter into arts and little institutions, he is at first entertained with trifles and impertinent things, not because he needs them, but because his understanding is no bigger; and little images of things are laid before him, like a cock-boat to a whale, only to play withal but before a man comes to be wise, he is half dead with gouts and consumption, with catarrhs and aches, with sore eyes and worn-out body. So that, if we must not reckon the life of a man but by the accounts of his reason, he is long before his soul can |