As we account those Books best written which mix Profit with Delight,
so, in my opinion, none more profitable nor delightful than those of
Lives, especially them of Poets, who have laid out themselves for the
publick Good; and under the Notion of Fables, delivered unto us the
highest Mysteries of Learning. These are the Men who in their Heroick
Poems have made mens Fames live to eternity; therefore it were pity
(faith _Plutarch_) that those who write to Eternity, should not live so
too. Now above all Remembrances by which men have endeavoured even in
despight of Death, to give unto their Fames eternity, for Worthiness
and Continuance, Books, and Writings, have ever had the Preheminence;
which made _Ovid_ to give an endless Date to himself, and to his
_Metamorphosis_, in these Words;
_Famque Opus exegi, &c._
Thus Englished by the incomparable Mr. _Sandys_.
_And now the Work is ended, which_ Jove's _Rage,_
_Nor Fire, nor Sword, shall raze, nor eating Age,_
_Come when it will, my Death's uncertain hour_
_Which only of my Body hath a power;_
_Yet shall my better Part transcend the Sky,_
_And my immortal Name shall never dy:_
_For wherefoe're the_ Roman _Eagles spread_
_Their conquering Wings, I shall of all be read._
_And if we Prophets truly can divine,_
_I in my living Fame shall ever shine_.
With the same Confidence of Immortality, the Renowned Poet _Horace_
thus concludes the Third Book of his _Lyrick_ Poesie.
_Exegi Monumentum ære perennius._
_Regalique situ, &c_.
_A Monument than Brass more lasting, I,
Than Princely Pyramids in site more high
Have finished, which neither fretting Showrs,
Nor blustring Winds, nor flight of Years, and Hours,
Though numberless, can raze; I shall not die
Wholly; nor shall my best part buried lie
Within my Grave_.
And _Martial_, Lib. 10. Ep. 2. thus speaks of his Writings;
----_My Books are read in every place,
And when_ Licinius, _and_ Messala's _high
Rich Marble Towers in ruin'd Dust shall lie,
I shall be read, and Strangers every where,
Shall to their farthest Homes my Verses bear_.
Also _Lucan_, Lib. 9. of his own Verse, and _Cæsar's_ Victory at
_Pharsalia_, writeth thus;
_O great and sacred Work of Poesie!
Thou freest from Fate, and giv'st Eternity
To mortal Wights; but_ Cæsar _envy not
Their living Names; if_ Roman _Muses ought
May promise thee, whilst_ Homer's _honoured,
By future Times shalt Thou and I be read;
No Age shall us with dark Oblivion stain,
But our_ Pharsalia _ever shall remain._
But this Ambition, or (give it a more moderate Title), Desire of Fame,
is naturally addicted to most men; The Triumph of _Miltiades_ would not
let _Themistocles_ sleep; For what was it that _Alexander_ made such a
Bustle in the world, but only to purchase an immortal Fame? To what
purpose were erected those stupendious Structures, entituled _The
Wonders of the World, viz._ The walls of _Babylon_, the _Rhodian
Colossus_, the Pyramids of _Egypt_, the Tomb of _Mausolus, Diana's_
Temple at _Ephesus_, the _Pharoes_ Watch-Tower, and the Statue of
_Jupiter_ in Achaya, were they not all to purchase an immortal Fame
thereby? Nay, how soon was this Ambition bred in the heart of man? for
we read in _Genesis_ the 11th. how that presently after the Flood, the
People journeying from the _East_, they said among themselves, _Go to,
let us build us a City, and a tower, whose Top may reach unto Heaven;
and let us make us a Name_. Here you see the intent of their Building
was to make them a Name, though God made it a Confusion; as all such
other lofty Buildings built in Blood and Tyranny, of which nothing now
remains but the Name; which is excellently exprest by _Ovid_ in the
Fifteenth Book of his _Metamorphosis_.
Troy _rich and powerful, which so proudly stood,
That could for ten years spend such streams of Blood,
For Buildings, only her old Ruines shows,
For Riches, Tombs, which slaughter'd Sires enclose_,
Sparta, Mycenæ, _were of_ Greece _the Flowers;
So_ Cecrops _City, and_ Amphion's _Towers:
Now glorious_ Sparta _lies upon the ground.
Lofty_ Mycenæ _hardly to be found.
Of_ Oedipus _his_ Thebes _what now remains?
Or_ of Pandion's Athens, _but their Names?_
So also _Sylvester_ in his _Du Bartus_.
Thebes, Babel, Rome, _those proud Heaven-daring Wonders,
Lo under ground in Dust and Ashes lie,
For earthly Kingdoms even as men do die._
By this you may see that frail Paper is more durable than Brass or
Marble; and the Works of the Brain more lasting than that of the Hand;
so true is that old Verse,
Marmora _Mæonij_ vincunt Monumenta Libelli:
Vivitur ingenio, cætera mortis erunt.
_The Muses Works Stone-Monuments outlast.
'Tis Wit keeps Life, all else Death will down cast._
Now though it is the desire of all Writers to purchase to themselves
immortal Fame, yet is their Fate far different; some deserve Fame, and
have it; others neither have it, nor deserve it; some have it not
deserving, and others, though deserving, yet totally miss it, or have
it not equall to their Deserts: Thus have I known a well writ Poem,
after a double expence of Brain to bring it forth, and of Purse to
publish it to the World, condemned to the Drudgery of the _Chandler_ or
_Oyl-man_, or, which is worse, to light _Tobacco_. I have read in Dr.
_Fuller's Englands Worthies_, that Mr. _Nathanael Carpenter_, that
great Scholar for _Logick_, the _Mathematicks, Geography_, and
_Divinity_, setting forth a Book of _Opticks_, he found, to his great
grief, the Preface thereof in his Printers House, _Casing
Christmas-Pies_, and could never after from his scattered Notes recover
an Original thereof; thus (saith he) _Pearls_ are no _Pearls_, when
_Cocks_ or _Coxcombs_ find them.
There are two things which very much discourage Wit; ignorant Readers,
and want of _Mecænasses_ to encourage their Endeavours. For the first,
I have read of an eminent Poet, who passing by a company of Bricklayers
at work, who were repeating some of his Verses, but in such a manner as
quite marred the Sence and Meaning of them; he snatching up a Hammer,
fell to breaking their Bricks; and being demanded the reason thereof,
he told them, that _they spoiled his Work, and he spoiled theirs_. And
for the second; what greater encouragement to Ingenuity than
Liberality? Hear what the Poet _Martial_ saith, _Lib. 10. Epig. 11._
_What deathless numbers from my Pen would flow,
What Wars would my_ Pierian _Trumpet blow,
If, as_ Augustus _now again did live,
So_ Rome _to me would a_ Mecænas _give._
The ingenious Mr. _Oldham_, the glory of our late Age, in one of his
Satyrs, makes the renowned _Spenser_'s Ghost thus speak to him,
disswading him from the Study of Poetry.
_Chuse some old_ English _Hero for thy Theme,
Bold_ Arthur, _or great_ Edward_'s greater Son,
Or our fifth_ Henry, _matchless to renown;
Make_ Agin-Court, _and_ Crescy_-fields out-vie
The fam'd_ Laucinan_-shores, and walls of_ Troy;
_What_ Scipio, _what_ Mæcenas _wouldst thou find;
What_ Sidney _now to thy great project kind?_
Bless me! how great a _Genius_! how each Line
Is big with Sense! how glorious a design
Does through the whole, and each proportion shine!
How lofty all his Thoughts, and how inspir'd!
Pity, such wondrous Parts are not preferr'd:
_Cry a gay wealthy Sot, who would not bail,
For bare Five Pounds the Author out of Jail,
Should he starve there and rot; who, if a Brief
Came out the needy Poets to relieve,
To the whole Tribe would scarce a Tester give._
But some will say, it is not so much the _Patrons_ as the _Poets_
fault, whose wide Mouths speak nothing but Bladders and Bumbast,
treating only of trifles, the Muses Haberdashers of small wares.
_Whose Wit is but a Tavern-Tympany,
The Shavings and the Chips of Poetry._
Indeed such Pedlars to the Muses, whose Verse runs like the Tap, and
whose invention ebbs and flows as the Barrel, deserve not the name of
Poets, and are justly rejected as the common Scriblers of the times:
but for such who fill'd with _Phebean_-fire, deserve to be crowned with
a wreath of Stars; for such brave Souls, the darlings of the _Delian_
Deity, for these to be scorn'd, contemn'd, and disregarded, must needs
be the fault of the times; I shall only give you one instance of a
renowned Poet, out of the same Author.
_On_ Butler_, who can think without just rage,
The glory and the scandal of the age,
Fair stood his hopes, when first he came to Town,
Met every where with welcoms of renown,
Courted, and lov'd by all, with wonder read,
And promises of Princely favour fed:
But what reward for all had he at last,
After a life in dull expectance pass'd?
The wretch at summing up his mispent days,
Found nothing left, but poverty, and praise:
Of all his gains by Verse he could not save
Enough to purchase Flannel, an
Thus you see though we have had some comparable to _Homer_ for Heroick
Poesie, and to _Euripides_ for Tragedy, yet have they died disregarded,
and nothing left of them, but that only once there were such Men and
Writings in being.
I shall, in the next place, speak something of my Undertakings, in
writing the Lives of these Renowned Poets. Two things, I suppose, may
be laid to my charge; the one is the omission of some that ought with
good reason to have been mentioned; and the other, the mentioning of
those which without any injury might have been omitted. For the first,
as I have begg'd pardon at the latter end of my Book for their
omission, so have I promised, (if God spare me life so long) upon the
first opportunity, or second Edition of this Book, to do them right. In
the mean time I should think my self much beholding to those persons
who would give me any intelligence herein, it being beyond the reading
and acquaintance of any one single person to do it of himself.
And yet, let me tell ye, that by the Name of Poet, many more of former
times might have been brought in than what I have named, as well as
those which I have omitted that are now living, namely, Sir _Walter
Rawleigh_, Mr. _John Weever_, Dr. _Heylin_, Dr. _Fuller,_ &c. but the
Volume growing as big as the Bookseller at present was willing to have
it, we shall reserve them to another time, they having already
eternized their Names by the never dying Histories which they have
wrote.
Then for the second thing which may be objected against me, That I have
incerted some of the meanest rank; I answer, That comparatively, it is
a less fault to incert two, than to omit one, most of which in their
times were of good esteem, though now grown out of date, even as some
learned Works have been at first not at all respected, which afterwards
have been had in high estimation; as it is reported of Sir _Walter
Rawleigh_, who being Prisoner in the Tower, expecting every hour to be
sacrificed to the _Spanish_ cruelty, some few days before he suffered,
he sent for Mr. _Walter Burre_, who had formerly printed his first
Volume of _the History of the World_, whom, taking by the hand,
after some other discourse, he ask'd him, How that Work of his had
sold? Mr. _Burre_ returned this answer, That it sold so slowly, that it
had undone him. At which words of his, Sir _Walter Rawleigh_ stepping
to his Desk, reaches the other part of his History, to Mr. _Burre_,
which he had brought down to the times he lived in; clapping his hand
on his breast, he took the other unprinted part of his Works into his
hand with a sigh, saying, _Ah my Friend, hath the first Part undone
thee? The second Volume shall undo no more; this ungrateful World is
unworthy of it_; When immediately going to the fire-side he threw it
in, and set his foot on it till it was consumed. As great a Loss to
Learning as Christendom could have, or owned; for his first Volume
after his death sold Thousands.
It may likewise be objected, That some of these Poets here mentioned,
have been more famous in other kind of Studies than in Poetry, and
therefore do not shine here as in their proper sphere of fame; but what
then, shall their general knowledge debar them from a particular notice
of their Abilities in this most excellent Art? Nor have we scarce any
Poet excellent in all its Species thereof; some addicting themselves
most to the _Epick_, some to the _Dramatick_, some to the _Lyrick_,
other to the _Elegiack_, the _Epænitick_, the _Bucolick_, or the
_Epigram_; under one of which all the whole circuit of _Poetick Design_
is one way or other included.
Besides, should we have mentioned none but those who upon a strict
scrutiny the Name of Poet doth belong unto, I fear me our number would
fall much short of those which we have written; for as one writes,
_There are many that have a Fame deservedly for what they have writ,
even in Poetry itself, who, if they come to the test, I question how
well they would endure to open their Eagle-eyes against the Sun._ But I
shall wade no further in this Discourse, desiring you to accept of what
is here written.