Chapter XVII (11)

715. _No pack like poverty._ Burton, _Anat. Mel._ iii. 3: Οὐδὲν πενίας βαρύτερόν ἐστι φόρτιον. "No burden, saith Menander, is so intolerable as poverty."

718. _As many laws_, etc. Tacit. _Ann._ iii. 27: Corruptissima in republica plurimæ leges.

723. _Lay down some silver pence._ Cp. Bishop Corbet's _The Faeryes Farewell_:--

"And though they sweep their hearths no less
Than maids were wont to do,
Yet who of late for cleanliness
Finds sixpence in her shoe?"

725. _Times that are ill ... Clouds will not ever_, etc., two reminiscences of Horace, II. _Od._ x. 17, and ix.

727. _Up tails all._ This tune will be found in Chappell's _Popular Music of the Olden Time_, vol. i. p. 196. He notes that it was a favourite with Herrick, who wrote four other poems in the metre, viz.: _The Hag is Astride_, _The Maypole is up_, _The Peter-penny_, and _Twelfth Night: or, King and Queen_. The tune is found in Queen Elizabeth's Virginal Book, and in the _Dancing Master_ (1650-1690). It is alluded to by Ben Jonson, and was a favourite with the Cavaliers.

730. _Charon and Philomel._ This dialogue is found with some slight variations of text in Rawlinson's MS. poet. 65. fol. 32. The following variants may be noted: l. 5, _voice_ for _sound_; l. 7, _shade_ for _bird_; l. 11, _warbling_ for _watching_; l. 12, _hoist up_ for _thus hoist_; l. 13, _be gone_ for _return_; l. 18, _praise_ for _pray_; l. 19, _sighs_ for _vows_; l. 24, omit _slothful_. The dialogue is succeeded in the MS. by an old catch (probably written before Herrick was born):--

"A boat! a boat! haste to the ferry!
For we go over to be merry,
To laugh and quaff, and drink old sherry".

After the catch comes the following dialogue, written (it would seem) in imitation of Herrick's _Charon and Philomel_: the speakers' names are not marked:--

"Charon! O Charon! the wafter of all souls to bliss or bane!
Who calls the ferryman of Hell?
Come near and say who lives in bliss and who in pain.
Those that die well eternal bliss shall follow.
Those that die ill their own black deeds shall swallow.
Shall thy black barge those guilty spirits row
That kill themselves for love? Oh, no! oh, no!
My cordage cracks when such foul sins draw near,
No wind blows fair, nor I my boat can steer.
What spirits pass and in Elysium reign?
Those harmless souls that love and are beloved again.
That soul that lives in love and fain would die to win,
Shall he go free? Oh, no! it is too foul a sin.
He must not come aboard, I dare not row,
Storms of despair my boat will overblow.
But when thy mistress (?) shall close up thine eyes then come aboard,
Then come aboard and pass; till then be wise and sing."

"Then come aboard" from the penultimate line and "and sing" from the last should clearly be struck out.

739. _O Jupiter_, etc. Eubulus in Athenaeus, xiii. 559: Ὠ Ζεῦ πολυτίμητ', εἶτ' ἐγὼ κακῶς ποτε | ἐρῶ γυναῖκας; νὴ Δί' ἀπολοίμην ἄρα· | πάντων ἄριστον κτημάτων. Comp. 885.

743. _Another upon her Weeping._ Printed in Witts _Recreations_, 1650, under the title: _On Julia's Weeping_.

745. _To Sir John Berkeley, Governour of Exeter._ Youngest son of Sir Maurice Berkeley, of Bruton, in Somersetshire; knighted in Berwick in 1638; commander-in-chief of all the Royalist forces in Devonshire, 1643; captured Exeter Sept. 4 of that year, and held it till April 13, 1646. Created Baron Berkeley of Stratton, in Cornwall, 1658; died 1678.

749. _Consultation._ As noted in the text, this is from Sallust, _Cat._ i.

751. _None sees the fardell of his faults behind._ Cp. Catullus, xxii. 20, 21:--

Suus cuique attributus est error,
Sed non videmus manticae quod in tergo est,

or, perhaps more probably from Seneca, _de Irá_, ii. 28: Aliena vitia in oculis habemus; à tergo nostra sunt.

755. _The Eye._ Æschyl. _Fragm._ in Plutarch, _Amat._ 21: Νέας γυναικὸς οὔ με μὴ λάθῃ φλέγων Ὀφθαλμὸς, ἥτις ἀνδρὸς ᾖ γεγευμένη.

756. _To Prince Charles upon his coming to Exeter._ In August, 1645.

761. _The Wake._ Printed in _Witts Recreations_, 1650, under the title: _Alvar and Anthea_.

763. _To Doctor Alabaster._ William Alabaster, or Alablaster, born at Hadleigh, Suffolk (1567); educated at Westminster and Trinity College, Cambridge; a friend of Spencer; was converted to Roman Catholicism while chaplain to the Earl of Essex in Spain, 1596. In 1607 he began his series of apocalyptic writings by an _Apparatus in Revelationem Jesu Christi_. On visiting Rome he was imprisoned by the Inquisition, escaped, and returned to Protestantism. Besides his theological works, he published (in 1637) a Lexicon Pentaglotton. Died April, 1640.

766. _Time is the bound of things_, etc. From Seneca, _Consol. ad Marc._ xix.: Excessit filius tuus terminos intra quos servitur ... mors omnium dolorum solutio est et finis.

771. _As I have read must be the first man up_, etc. Hor. I. _Ep._ vi. 48: Hoc primus repetas opus, hoc postremus omittas.

_Rich compost._ Cp. the same thought in 662.

772. _A Hymn to Bacchus._ Printed, with the misprint _Bacchus for Iacchus_ in l. 1, in _Witts Recreations_, 1650.

_Brutus ... Cato._ Cp. Note to 4 and 8.

774. _If wars go well_, etc. Tacitus, _Ann._ iii. 53: cùm rectè factorum sibi quisque gratiam trahant, unius [Principis scil.] invidiâ ab omnibus peccatur.

775. _Niggards of the meanest blood._ Seneca, _de Clem._ i. 1: Summa parsimonia etiam vilissimi sanguinis.

776. _Wrongs, if neglected_, etc. Tacit. _Ann._ iv. 34: [Probra] spreta exolescunt, si irascare agnita videntur.

780. _Kings ought to shear_, etc. A saying of Tiberius quoted by Suetonius: Boni pastoris est tondere oves, non deglubere. Herrick probably took it from Ben Jonson's _Discoveries_.

784-7. _Ceremonies for Christmas._ More will be found about the Yule-log in _Ceremonies for Candlemas Day_ (893); cp. also _The Wassail_ (476).

788. _Power and Peace._ From Tacitus, _Ann._ iv. 4: Quanquam arduum sit eodem loci potentiam et concordiam esse.

789. _Mistress Margaret Falconbridge._ A daughter, probably, of the Thomas Falconbridge of number 483.

797. _Kisses._ Printed in _Witts Recreations_, 1650, with omission of me in l. 1.

804. _John Crofts, Cup-bearer to the King._ Third son of Sir John Crofts, of Saxham, Suffolk. We hear of him in the king's service as early as 1628, and two years later Lord Conway, in thanking Wm. Weld for some verses sent him, hopes "the lines are strong enough to bind Robert Maule and Jack Crofts from ever more using the phrase". So Jack was probably a bit of a poet himself. He may be the Mr. Crofts for assaulting whom George, Lord Digby, was imprisoned a month and more, in 1634.

807. _Man may want land to live in._ Tacitus, _Ann._ xiii. 56: Addidit [Boiocalus] Deësse nobis terra in quâ vivamus, in quâ moriamur non potest, quoted by Montaigne, II. 3.

809. _Who after his transgression doth repent._ Seneca, _Agam._ 243: Quem poenitet peccasse paene est innocens.

810. _Grief, if't be great 'tis short._ Seneca, quoted by Burton (II. iii. 1, § 1): "Si longa est, levis est; si gravis est, brevis est. If it be long, 'tis light; if grievous, it cannot last."

817. _The Amber Bead._ Cp. Martial's epigram quoted in Note to 497. The comparison to Cleopatra is from Mart. IV. xxxii.

818. _To my dearest sister, M. Mercy Herrick._ Not quite five years his senior. She married John Wingfield, of Brantham, Suffolk, to whom also Herrick addresses a poem.

820. _Suffer that thou canst not shift._ From Seneca; the title from _Ep._ cvii.: Optimum est pati quod emendare non possis, the epigram from _De Provid._ 4, as translated by Thomas Lodge, 1614, "Vertuous instructions are never delicate. Doth fortune beat and rend us? Let us suffer it"--whence Herrick reproduces the printer's error, _Vertuous_ for Vertues (Virtue's).

821. _For a stone has Heaven his tomb._ Cp. Sir T. Browne, _Relig. Med._ § 40: "Nor doe I altogether follow that rodomontado of Lucan (_Phars._ vii. 819): Coelo tegitur qui non habet urnam,

He that unburied lies wants not his hearse,
For unto him a tomb's the universe".

823. _To the King upon his taking of Leicester._ May 31, 1645, a brief success before Naseby.

825. _'Twas Cæsar's saying._ Tiberius ap. Tacit. _Ann._ ii. 26: Se novies a divo Augusto in Germaniam missum plura consilio quam vi perfecisse.

830. _His Loss._ A reference to his ejection from Dean Prior.

837. _Mistress Amy Potter._ Daughter of Barnabas Potter, Bishop of Carlisle, Herrick's predecessor at Dean Prior.

839. _Love is a circle ... from good to good._ So Burton, III. i. 1, § 2: Circulus a bono in bonum.

844. TO HIS BOOK. _Make haste away._ Martial, III. ii. Ad Librum suum--Festina tibi vindicem parare, Ne nigram cito raptus in culinam Cordyllas madidâ tegas papyro, Vel thuris piperisque sis cucullus. _To make loose gowns for mackerel._ From Catullus, xcv. 1:--

At Volusi annales Paduam morientur ad ipsam,
Et laxas scombris saepe dabunt tunicas.

846. _And what we blush to speak_, etc. Ovid, _Phaedra to Hipp._ 10: Dicere quae puduit scribere jussit amor.

849. _'Tis sweet to think_, etc. Seneca, _Herc. Fur._ 657-58: Quae fuit durum pati Meminisse dulce est.

851. _To Mr. Henry Lawes, the excellent composer of his lyrics._ Henry Lawes (1595-1662), the friend of Milton, admitted a Gentleman of the Chapel Royal, 1625. In the _Noble Numbers_ he is mentioned as the composer of Herrick's _Christmas Carol_ and the first of his two _New-Year's Gifts_. Lawes also set to music Herrick's _Not to Love_, _To Mrs. Eliz. Wheeler_ (Among the Myrtles as I walked), _The Kiss_, _The Primrose_, _To a Gentlewoman objecting to him his Grey Hairs_, and doubtless others.

852. _Maidens tell me I am old._ From Anacreon:

Λέγουσιν αἱ γυναῖκες
Ἀνακρέων γέρων εἶ κ.τ.λ.

With a significant variation--"Ill it fits"--for μᾶλλον πρέπει.

859. _Master J. Jincks._ Not identified.

861. _Kings seek their subjects' good, tyrants their own._ Aristot. _Politics_, iii. 7: καλεῖν εἰώθαμεν τῶν μὲν μοναρχιῶν τὴν πρὸς τὸ κοινὸν ἀποβλέπουσαν συμφέρον βασιλείαν ... ἡ τυραννίς ἐστι μοναρχία πρὸς τὸ συμφέρον τὸ τοῦ μοναρχοῦντος.

869. _Sir Thomas Heale._ Probably a son of the Sir Thomas Hele, of Fleet, Co. Devon, who died in 1624. This Sir Thomas was created a baronet in 1627, and according to Dr. Grosart was one of the Royalist commanders at the siege of Plymouth. He died 1670.

872. _Love is a kind of war._ Ovid, _Ars Am._ II. 233, 34:--

Militiae species amor est: discedite segnes!
Non sunt haec timidis signa tuenda viris.

873. _A spark neglected_, etc. Ovid, _Rem. Am._ 732-34:--

E minimo maximus ignis erit.
Sic nisi vitaris quicquid renovabit amorem,
Flamma redardescet quae modo nulla fuit.

874. _An Hymn to Cupid._ From Anacreon:--

Ὠναξ, ᾧ δαμάλης Ἔρως
καὶ Νύμφαι κυανώπιδες
πορφυρέη τ' Ἀφροδίτη
συμπαίζουσιν ... γουνοῦμαί σε, κ.τ.λ.

885. _Naught are all women._ Burton, III. ii. 5. § 5.

907. _Upon Mr. William Lawes, the rare musician._ Elder brother of the more famous Henry Lawes; appointed a Gentleman of the Chapel Royal, 1602, and also one of Charles I.'s musicians-in-ordinary. When the Civil War broke out he joined the king's army and was killed by a stray shot during the siege of Chester, 1645. He set Herrick's _Gather ye rosebuds_ to music.

914. _Numbers ne'er tickle_, etc. Martial, I. xxxvi.:--

Lex haec carminibus data est jocosis,
Ne possint, nisi pruriant, juvare.

918. _M. Kellam._ As yet unidentified. Dr. Grosart suggests that he may have been one of Herrick's parishioners, and the name sounds as of the west country.

920. _Cunctation in correction._ Is Herrick translating? According to a relief at Rome the lictors' rods were bound together not only by a red thong twisted from top to bottom, but by six straps as well.

922. _Continual reaping makes a land wax old._ Ovid, _Ars Am._ iii. 82: Continua messe senescit ager.

923. _Revenge._ Tacitus, _Hist._ iv. 3: Tanto proclivius est injuriae quàm beneficio vicem exsolvere; quia gratia oneri, ultio in quaestu habetur.

927. _Praise they that will times past._ Ovid, _Ars Am._ iii. 121:--

Prisca juvent alios: ego me nunc denique natum
Gratulor; haec aetas moribus apta meis.

928. _Clothes are conspirators._ I can suggest no better explanation of this oracular epigram than that the tailor's bill is an enemy of a slender purse.

929. _Cruelty_. Seneca _de Clem._ i. 24: Ferina ista rabies est, sanguine gaudere et vulneribus; (i. 8), Quemadmodum praecisae arbores plurimis ramis repullulant [H. uses repullulate, -tion, 336, 794], et multa satorum genera, ut densiora surgant, reciduntur; ita regia crudelitas auget inimicorum numerum tollendo. Ben Jonson, _Discoveries_ (_Clementia_): "The lopping of trees makes the boughs shoot out quicker; and the taking away of some kind of enemies increaseth the number".

931. _A fierce desire of hot and dry._ Cp. note on 683.

932. _To hear the worst_, etc. Antisthenes ap. _Diog. Laert._ VI. i. 4, § 3: Ἀκούσας ποτὲ ὅτι Πλάτων αὐτὸν κακῶς λέγει Βασιλικὸν ἔφη καλῶς ποιοῦντα κακῶς ἀκούειν, quoted by Burton, II. iii. 7.

934. _The Bondman._ Cp. Exodus xxi. 5, 6: "And if the servant shall plainly say: I love my master, my wife, and my children: I will not go out free: Then his master shall bring him unto the judges; he shall also bring him to the door, or unto the doorpost; and his master shall bore his ear through with an awl, and he shall serve him for ever".

936. _My kiss outwent the bonds of shamefastness._ Cp. Sidney's _Astrophel and Stella_, sonnet 82. For _not Jove himself_, etc., cp. 10, and note.

938. _His wish._ From Martial, II. xc. 7-10:--

Sit mihi verna satur: sit non doctissima conjux:
Sit nox cum somno, sit sine lite dies, etc.

939. _Upon Julia washing herself in the river._ Imitated from Martial, IV. xxii.:--

Primos passa toros et adhuc placanda marito
Merserat in nitidos se Cleopatra lacus,
Dum fugit amplexus: sed prodidit unda latentem,
Lucebat, totis cum tegeretur aquis.
Condita sic puro numerantur lilia vitro,
Sic prohibet tenuis gemma latere rosas,
Insilui mersusque vadis luctantia carpsi
Basia: perspicuae plus vetuistis aquae.

940. _Though frankincense_, etc. Ovid, _de Medic. Fac._ 83, 84:--

Quamvis thura deos irataque numina placent,
Non tamen accensis omnia danda focis.

947. _To his honoured and most ingenious friend, Mr. Charles Cotton._ Dr. Grosart annotates: "The translator of Montaigne, and associate of Izaak Walton"; but as the younger Cotton was only eighteen when _Hesperides_ was printed, it is perhaps more probable that the father is meant, though we may note that Herrick and the younger Cotton were joint-contributors in 1649 to the _Lacrymæ Musarum_, published in memory of Lord Hastings. For a tribute to the brilliant abilities of the elder Cotton, see Clarendon's _Life_ (i. 36; ed. 1827).

948. _Women Useless._ A variation on a theme as old as Euripides. Cp. _Medea_, 573-5:--

χρῆν γὰρ ἀλλοθέν ποθεν βροτοὺς
παῖδας τεκνοῦσθαι, θῆλυ δ' οὐκ εἶναι γένος·
χοὒτως ἂν οὐκ ἦν οὐδὲν ἀνθρώποις κακόν.

952. _Weep for the dead, for they have lost the light_, cp. Ecclus. xxii. 11.

955. _To M. Leonard Willan, his peculiar friend._ A wretched poet; author of "The Phrygian Fabulist; or the Fables of Æsop" (1650), "Astraea; or True Love's Mirror" (1651), etc.

956. _Mr. John Hall, Student of Gray's Inn._ Hall remained at Cambridge till 1647, and this poem, which addresses him as a "Student of Gray's Inn," must therefore have been written almost while _Hesperides_ was passing through the press. Hall's _Horæ Vacivæ, or Essays_, published in 1646, had at once given him high rank among the wits.

958. _To the most comely and proper M. Elizabeth Finch._ No certain identification has been proposed.

961. _To the King, upon his welcome to Hampton Court, set and sung._ The allusion can only be to the king's stay at Hampton Court in 1647. Good hope was then entertained of a peaceful settlement, and Herrick's ode, enthusiastic as it is, expresses little more than this.

_For an ascendent_, etc.: This and the next seven lines are taken from phrases on pp. 29-33 of the _Notes and Observations on some passages of Scripture_, by John Gregory (see note on N. N. 178). According to Gregory, "The Ascendent of a City is that sign which riseth in the Heavens at the laying of the first stone".

962. _Henry, Marquis of Dorchester._ Henry Pierrepoint, second Earl of Kingston, succeeded his father (Herrick's Newark) July 30, 1643, and was created Marquis of Dorchester, March, 1645. "He was a very studious nobleman and very learned, particularly in law and physics." (See Burke's _Extinct Peerages_, iii. 435.)

_When Cato, the severe, entered the circumspacious theatre._ The allusion is to the visit of Cato to the games of Flora, given by Messius. When his presence in the theatre was known, the dancing-women were not allowed to perform in their accustomed lack of costume, whereupon the moralist obligingly retired, amidst applause.

966. _M. Jo. Harmar, physician to the College of Westminster._ John Harmar, born at Churchdown, near Gloucester, about 1594, was educated at Winchester and Magdalen College, Oxford; was a master at Magdalen School, the Free School at St. Albans, and at Westminster, and Professor of Greek at Oxford under the Commonwealth. He died 1670. Wood characterises him as a butt for the wits and a flatterer of great men, and notes that he was always called by the name of Doctor Harmar, though he took no higher degree than M.A. But in 1632 he supplicated for the degree of M.B., and Dr. Grosart's note--"Herrick, no doubt, playfully transmuted 'Doctor' into 'Physician'"--is misleading. He may have cared for the minds and bodies of the Westminster boys at one and the same time.

_The Roman language.... If Jove would speak_, etc. Cp. Ben Jonson's _Discoveries_: "that testimony given by L. Aelius Stilo upon Plautus who affirmed, "Musas si latine loqui voluissent Plautino sermone fuisse loquuturas". And Cicero [in Plutarch, § 24] "said of the Dialogues of Plato, that Jupiter, if it were his nature to use language, would speak like him".

967. _Upon his spaniel, Tracy._ Cp. _supra_, 724.

971. _Strength_, etc. Tacitus, _Ann._ xiii. 19: Nihil rerum mortalium tam instabile ac fluxum est, quàm fama potentiae, non suâ vi nixa.

975. _Case is a lawyer_, etc. Martial, I. xcviii. Ad Naevolum Causidicum. Cùm clamant omnes, loqueris tu, Naevole, tantùm.... Ecce, tacent omnes; Naevole, dic aliquid.

977. _To his sister-in-law, M. Susanna Herrick._ Cp. _supra_, 522. The subject is again the making up of the book of the poet's elect.

978. _Upon the Lady Crew._ Cp. Herrick's Epithalamium for her marriage with Sir Clipsby Crew, 283. She died 1639, and was buried in Westminster Abbey.

979. _On Tomasin Parsons._ Daughter of the organist of Westminster Abbey: cp. 500 and Note.

983. _To his kinsman, M. Thomas Herrick, who desired to be in his book._ Cp. 106 and Note.

989. _Care keeps the conquest._ Perhaps jotted down with reference to the Governorship of Exeter by Sir John Berkeley: see Note to 745.

992. _To the handsome Mistress Grace Potter._ Probably sister to the Mistress Amy Potter celebrated in 837, where see Note.

995. _We've more to bear our charge than way to go._ Seneca, Ep. 77: quantulumcunque haberem, tamen plus superesset viatici quam viae, quoted by Montaigne, II. xxviii.

1000. _The Gods, pillars, and men._ Horace's Mediocribus esse poetis Non homines, non di, non concessere columnae (_Ars Poet._ 373). Latin poets hung up their epigrams in public places.

1002. _To the Lord Hopton on his fight in Cornwall._ Sir Ralph Hopton won two brilliant victories for the Royalists, at Bradock Down and Stratton, January and May, 1643, and was created Baron Hopton in the following September. Originally a Parliamentarian, he was one of the king's ablest and most loyal servants.

1008. _Nothing's so hard but search will find it out._ Terence, _Haut._ IV. ii. 8: Nihil tam difficile est quin quaerendo investigari posset.

1009. _Labour is held up by the hope of rest._ Ps. Sallust, _Epist. ad C. Caes._: Sapientes laborem spe otii sustentant.

1022. _Posting to Printing._ Mart. V. x. 11, 12:--

Vos, tamen, o nostri, ne festinate, libelli:
Si post fata venit gloria, non propero.

1023. _No kingdoms got by rapine long endure._ Seneca, _Troad._ 264: Violenta nemo imperia continuit dies.

1026. _Saint Distaff's Day._ "Saint Distaff is perhaps only a coinage of our poet's to designate the day when, the Christmas vacation being over, good housewives, with others, resumed their usual employment." (Nott.) The phrase is explained in dictionaries and handbooks, but no other use of it is quoted than this. Herrick's poem was pilfered by Henry Bold (a notorious plagiarist) in _Wit a-sporting in a pleasant Grove of New Fancies_, 1657.

1028. _My beloved Westminster._ As mentioned in the brief "Life" of Herrick prefixed to vol. i., all the references in this poem seem to refer to Herrick's courtier-days, between leaving Cambridge and going to Devonshire. He then, doubtless, resided in Westminster for the sake of proximity to Whitehall. It has been suggested, however, that the reference is to Westminster School, but we have no evidence that Herrick was educated there.

_Golden Cheapside._ My friend, Mr. Herbert Horne, in his admirably-chosen selection from the _Hesperides_, suggests that the allusion here is to the great gilt cross at the end of Wood Street. The suggestion is ingenious; but as Cheapside was the goldsmiths' quarter this would amply justify the epithet, which may indeed only refer to Cheapside as a money-winning street, as we might say Golden Lombard Street.

1032. _Things are uncertain._ Tiberius, in Tacitus, _Annal._ i. 72: Cuncta mortalium incerta; quantoque plus adeptus foret, tanto se magis in lubrico.

1034. _Good wits get more fame by their punishment._ Cp. Tacit. _Ann._ iv. 35, sub fin.: Punitis ingeniis gliscit auctoritas, etc., quoted by Bacon and Milton.

1035. _Twelfth Night: or King and Queen._ Herrick alludes to these "Twelfth-Tide Kings and Queens" in writing to Endymion Porter (662), and earlier still, in the "New-Year's Gift to Sir Simeon Steward" (319) he speaks--

"Of Twelfth-Tide cakes, of Peas and Beans,
Wherewith ye make those merry scenes,
Whenas ye choose your King and Queen".

Brand (i. 27) illustrates well from "Speeches to the Queen at Sudley" in Nichols' _Progresses of Queen Elizabeth_.

"_Melibœus._ Cut the cake: who hath the bean shall be king, and where the pea is, she shall be queen.

_Nisa._ I have the pea and must be queen.

_Mel._ I the bean, and king. I must command."

1045. _Comfort in Calamity._ An allusion to the ejection from their benefices which befel most of the loyal clergy at the same time as Herrick. It is perhaps worth noting that in the second volume of this edition, and in the last hundred poems printed in the first, wherever a date can be fixed it is always in the forties. Equally late poems occur, though much less frequently, among the first five hundred, but there the dated poems belong, for the most part, to the years 1623-1640. Now, in April 29, 1640, as stated in the brief "Life" prefixed to vol. i., there was entered at Stationers' Hall, "The severall poems written by Master Robert Herrick," a book which, as far as is known, never saw the light. It was probably, however, to this book that Herrick addressed the poem (405) beginning:--

"Have I not blest thee? Then go forth, nor fear
Or spice, or fish, or fire, or close-stools here";

and we may fairly regard the first five hundred poems of _Hesperides_ as representing the intended collection of 1640, with a few additions, and the last six hundred as for the most part later, and I must add, inferior work. This is borne out by the absence of any manuscript versions of poems in the second half of the book. Herrick's verses would only be passed from hand to hand when he was living among the wits in London.

1046. _Twilight._ Ovid, _Amores_, I. v. 5, 6: Crepuscula ... ubi nox abiit, nec tamen orta dies.

1048. _Consent makes the cure._ Seneca, _Hippol._ 250: Pars sanitatis velle sanari fuit.

1050. _Causeless whipping._ Ovid, _Heroid._ v. 7, 8: Leniter ex merito quicquid patiare, ferendum est; Quae venit indignae poena, dolenda venit. Quoted by Montaigne, III. xiii.

1052. _His comfort._ Terence, _Adelph._ I. i. 18: Ego ... quod fortunatum isti putant, Uxorem nunquam habui.

1053. _Sincerity._ From Hor. _Ep._ I. ii. 54: Sincerum est nisi vas, quodcunque infundis acescit. Quoted by Montaigne, III. xiii.

1056. _To his peculiar friend, M. Jo. Wicks._ See 336 and Note. Written after Herrick's ejection. We know that the poet's uncle, Sir William Herrick, suffered greatly in estate during the Civil War, and it may have been the same with other friends and relatives. But there can be little doubt that the poet found abundant hospitality on his return to London.

1059. _A good Death._ August. _de Disciplin. Christ._ 13: Non potest malè mori, qui benè vixerit.

1061. _On Fortune._ Seneca, _Medea_, 176: Fortuna opes auferre non animum potest.

1062. _To Sir George Parry, Doctor of the Civil Law._ According to Dr. Grosart, Parry "was admitted to the College of Advocates, London, 3rd Nov., 1628; but almost nothing has been transmitted concerning him save that he married the daughter and heir of Sir Giles Sweet, Dean of Arches". I can hardly doubt that he must be identified with the Dr. George Parry, Chancellor to the Bishop of Exeter, who in 1630 was accused of excommunicating persons for the sake of fees, but was highly praised in 1635 and soon after appointed a Judge Marshal. If so, his wife was a widow when she came to him, as she is spoken of in 1638 as "Lady Dorothy Smith, wife of Sir Nicholas Smith, deceased". She brought him a rich dower, and her death greatly confused his affairs.

1067. _Gentleness._ Seneca, _Phoen._ 659: Qui vult amari, languidâ regnet manu. And Ben Jonson, _Panegyre_ (1603): "He knew that those who would with love command, Must with a tender yet a steadfast hand, Sustain the reins".

1068. _Mrs. Eliza Wheeler._ See 130 and Note.

1071. _To the Honoured Master Endymion Porter._ For Porter's patronage of poetry see 117 and Note.

1080. _The Mistress of all singular Manners, Mistress Portman._ Dr. Grosart notes that a Mrs. Mary Portman was buried at Putney Parish Church, June 27, 1671, and this was perhaps Herrick's schoolmistress, the "pearl of Putney".

1087. _Where pleasures rule a kingdom._ Cicero, _De Senect._ xii. 41: Neque omnino in voluptatis regno virtutem posse consistere. _He lives who lives to virtue._ Comp. Sallust, _Catil._ 2, s. fin.

1088. _Twice five-and-twenty (bate me but one year)._ As Herrick was born in 1591, this poem must have been written in 1640.

1089. _To M. Laurence Swetnaham._ Unless the various entries in the parish registers of St. Margaret's, Westminster, refer to different men, this Lawrence Swetnaham was the third son of Thomas Swettenham of Swettenham in Cheshire, married in 1602 to Mary Birtles. Lawrence himself had children as early as 1629, and ten years later was church-warden. He was buried in the Abbey, 1673.

1091. _My lamp to you I give._ Allusion to the Λαμπαδηφορία which Plato (_Legg._ 776B) uses to illustrate the succession of generations. So Lucretius (ii. 77): Et quasi cursores vitaï lampada tradunt.

1092. _Michael Oulsworth._ Michael Oulsworth, Oldsworth or Oldisworth, graduated M.A. from Magdalen College, Oxford, in 1614. According to Wood, "he was afterwards Fellow of his College, Secretary to Earl of Pembroke, elected a burgess to serve in several Parliaments for Sarum and Old Sarum, and though in the Grand Rebellion he was no Colonel, yet he was Governor of Old Pembroke, and Montgomery led him by the nose as he pleased, to serve both their turns". The partnership, however, was not eternal, for between 1648 and 1650 Oldisworth published at least eight virulent satires against his former master.

1094. _Truth--her own simplicity._ Seneca, _Ep._ 49: (Ut ille tragicus), Veritatis simplex oratio est.

1097. _Kings must be dauntless._ Seneca, _Thyest._ 388: Rex est qui metuit nihil.

1100. _To his brother, Nicholas Herrick._ Baptized April 22, 1589; a merchant trading to the Levant. He married Susanna Salter, to whom Herrick addresses two poems (522, 977).

1103. _A King and no King._ Seneca, _Thyest._ 214: Ubicunque tantùm honestè dominanti licet, Precario regnatur.

1118. _Necessity makes dastards valiant men._ Sallust, _Catil._ 58: Necessitudo ... timidos fortes facit.

1119. _Sauce for Sorrows._ Printed in _Witts Recreations_, 1650. _An equal mind._ Plautus, _Rudens_, II. iii. 71: Animus aequus optimum est aerumnae condimentum.

1126. _The End of his Work._ Printed in _Witts Recreations_, 1650, under the title: _Of this Book._ From Ovid, _Ars Am._ i. 773, 774:--

Pars superest caepti, pars est exhausta laboris:
Hic teneat nostras anchora jacta rates.

1127. _My wearied bark_, etc. Ovid, _Rem. Am._ 811, 812:--

fessae date serta carinæ:
Contigimus portum, quo mihi cursus erat.

1128. _The work is done._ Ovid, _Ars Am._ ii. 733, 734:--

Finis adest operi: palmam date, grata juventus,
Sertaque odoratae myrtea ferte comae.

1130. _His Muse._ Cp. Note on 624.

NOBLE NUMBERS.

3. _Weigh me the Fire._ _2 Esdras_, iv. 5, 7; v. 9, 36: "Weigh me ... the fire, or measure me ... the wind," etc.

4. _God ... is the best known, not...._ _August. de Ord._ ii. 16: [Deus] scitur melius nesciendo.

5. _Supraentity_, τὸ ὑπερόντως ὄν, Plotinus.

7. _His wrath is free from perturbation._ August. _de Civ. Dei_, ix. 5: Ipse Deus secundum Scripturas irascitur, nec tamen ullâ passione turbatur. _Enchir. ad Laurent._ 33: Cum irasci dicitur Deus, non significatur perturbatio, qualis est in animo irascentis hominis.

9. _Those Spotless two Lambs._ "This is the offering made by fire which ye shall offer unto the Lord: two lambs of the first year without spot, day by day, for a continual burnt-offering." (Numb. xxviii. 3.)

17. _An Anthem sung in the Chapel of Whitehall._ This may be added to Nos. 96-98, and 102, the poems on which Mr. Hazlitt bases his conjecture that Herrick may have held some subordinate post in the Chapel Royal.

37. _When once the sin has fully acted been._ Tacitus, _Ann._ xiv. 10: Perfecto demum scelere, magnitudo ejus intellecta est.

38. _Upon Time._ Were this poem anonymous it would probably be attributed rather to George Herbert than to Herrick.

41. _His Litany to the Holy Spirit._ We may quote again from Barron Field's account in the _Quarterly Review_ (1810) of his cross-examination of the Dean Prior villagers for Reminiscences of Herrick: "The person, however, who knows more of Herrick than all the rest of the neighbourhood we found to be a poor woman in the 99th year of her age, named Dorothy King. She repeated to us, with great exactness, five of his _Noble Numbers_, among which was his beautiful 'Litany'. These she had learnt from her mother, who was apprenticed to Herrick's successor at the vicarage. She called them her prayers, which she said she was in the habit of putting up in bed, whenever she could not sleep; and she therefore began the 'Litany' at the second stanza:--

'When I lie within my bed,' etc."

Another of her midnight orisons was the poem beginning:--

"Every night Thou dost me fright,
And keep mine eyes from sleeping," etc.

The last couplet, it should be noted, is misquoted from No. 56.

54. _Spew out all neutralities._ From the message to the Church of the Laodiceans, Rev. iii. 16.

59. _A Present by a Child._ Cp. "A pastoral upon the Birth of Prince Charles" (_Hesperides_ 213), and Note.

63. _God's mirth: man's mourning._ Perhaps founded on Prov. i. 26: "I also will laugh at your calamity; I will mock when your fear cometh".

65. _My Alma._ The name is probably suggested by its meaning "soul". Cp. Prior's _Alma_.

72. _I'll cast a mist and cloud._ Cp. Hor. I. _Ep._ xvi. 62: Noctem peccatis et fraudibus objice nubem.

75. _That house is bare._ Horace, _Ep._ I. vi. 45: Exilis domus est, ubi non et multa supersunt.

77. _Lighten my candle_, etc. The phraseology of the next five lines is almost entirely from the Psalms and the Song of Solomon.

86. _Sin leads the way._ Hor. _Odes_, III. ii. 32: Raro antecedentem scelestum Deseruit pede Poena claudo.

88. _By Faith we ... walk ..., not by the Spirit._ 2 Cor. v. 7: "We walk by faith, not by sight". 'By the Spirit' perhaps means, 'in spiritual bodies'.

96. _Sung to the King._ See Note on 17.

_Composed by M. Henry Lawes._ See _Hesperides_ 851, and Note.

102. _The Star-Song._ This may have been composed partly with reference to the noonday star during the Thanksgiving for Charles II.'s birth. See _Hesperides_ 213, and Note.

_We'll choose him King._ A reference to the Twelfth Night games. See _Hesperides_ 1035, and Note.

108. _Good men afflicted most._ Taken almost entirely from Seneca, _de Provid._ 3, 4: Ignem experitur [Fortuna] in Mucio, paupertatem in Fabricio, ... tormenta in Regulo, venenum in Socrate, mortem in Catone. The allusions may be briefly explained for the unclassical. At the siege of Dyrrachium, Marcus Cassius Scæva caught 120 darts on his shield; Horatius Cocles is the hero of the bridge (see Macaulay's _Lays_); C. Mucius Scævola held his hand in the fire to illustrate to Porsenna Roman fearlessness; Cato is Cato Uticensis, the philosophic suicide; "high Atilius" will be more easily recognised as the M. Atilius Regulus who defied the Carthaginians; Fabricius Luscinus refused not only the presents of Pyrrhus, but all reward of the State, and lived in poverty on his own farm.

109. _A wood of darts._ Cp. Virg. _Æn._ x. 886: Ter secum Troius heros Immanem aerato circumfert tegmine silvam.

112. _The Recompense._ Herrick is said to have assumed the lay habit on his return to London after his ejection, perhaps as a protection against further persecution. This quatrain may be taken as evidence that he did not throw off his religion with his cassock. Compare also 124.

_All I have lost that could be rapt from me._ From Ovid, III. _Trist._ vii. 414: Raptaque sint adimi quae potuere mihi.

123. _Thy light that ne'er went out._ Prov. xxxi. 18 (of 'the Excellent Woman'): "Her candle goeth not out by night". _All set about with lilies._ Cp. _Cant. Canticorum_, vii. 2: Venter tuus sicut acervus tritici, vallatus liliis.

_Will show these garments._ So Acts ix. 39.

134. _God had but one son free from sin._ Augustin. _Confess._ vi.: Deus unicum habet filium sine peccato, nullum sine flagello, quoted in Burton, II. iii. 1.

136. _Science in God._ Bp. Davenant, _on Colossians_, 166, _ed._ 1639; speaking of Omniscience: Proprietates Divinitatis non sunt accidentia, sed ipsa Dei essentia.

145. _Tears._ Augustin. _Enarr. Ps._ cxxvii.: Dulciores sunt lacrymae orantium quàm gaudia theatorum.

146. _Manna._ Wisdom xvi. 20, 21: "Angels' food ... agreeing to every taste".

147. _As Cassiodore doth prove._ Reverentia est enim Domini timor cum amore permixtus. Cassiodor. _Expos. in Psalt._ xxxiv. 30; quoted by Dr. Grosart. My clerical predecessor has also hunted down with much industry the possible sources of most of the other patristic references in _Noble Numbers_, though I have been able to add a few. We may note that Herrick quotes Cassiodorus (twice), John of Damascus, Boethius, Thomas Aquinas, St. Bernard, St. Augustine (thrice), St. Basil, and St. Ambrose--a goodly list of Fathers, if we had any reason to suppose that the quotations were made at first hand.

148. _Mercy ... a Deity._ Pausanias, _Attic._ I. xvii. 1.

153. _Mora Sponsi, the stay of the bridegroom._ Maldonatus, _Comm. in Matth._ xxv.: Hieronymus et Hilarius moram sponsi pœnitentiae tempus esse dicunt.

157. _Montes Scripturarum._ See August. _Enarr. in Ps._ xxxix., and passim.

167. _A dereliction._ The word is from Ps. xxii. 1: Quare me dereliquisti? "Why hast Thou forsaken me?" Herrick took it from Gregory's _Notes and Observations_ (see infra), p. 5: 'Our Saviour ... in that great case of dereliction'.

174. _Martha, Martha._ See Luke x. 41, and August. _Serm._ cii. 3: Repetitio nominis indicium est dilectionis.

177. _Paradise._ Gregory, p. 75, on "the reverend Say of Zoroaster, Seek Paradise," quotes from the Scholiast Psellus: "The Chaldæan Paradise (saith he) is a Quire of divine powers incircling the Father".

178. _The Jews when they built houses._ Herrick's rabbinical lore (cp. 180, 181, 193, 207, 224), like his patristic, was probably derived at second hand through some biblical commentary. Much of it certainly comes from the _Notes and Observations upon some Passages of Scripture_ (Oxford, 1646) of John Gregory, chaplain of Christ Church, a prodigy of oriental learning, who died in his 39th year, March 13, 1646. Thus in his Address to the Reader (3rd page from end) Gregory remarks: "The Jews, when they build a house, are bound to leave some part of it unfinished in memory of the destruction of Jerusalem," giving a reference to Leo of Modena, _Degli Riti Hebraici_, Part I.

180. _Observation. The Virgin Mother_, etc. Gregory, pp. 24-27, shows that Sitting, the usual posture of mourners, was forbidden by both Roman and Jewish Law "in capital causes". "This was the reason why ... she stood up still in a resolute and almost impossible compliance with the Law.... They sat ... after leave obtained ... to bury the body."

181. _Tapers._ Cp. Gregory's _Notes_, p. 111: "The funeral tapers (however thought of by some) are of the same harmless import. Their meaning is to show that the departed souls are not quite put out, but having walked here as the children of the Light are now gone to walk before God in the light of the living."

185. _God in the holy tongue._ J. G., p. 135: "God is called in the Holy Tongue ... the Place; or that Fulness which filleth All in All".

186, 187, 188, 189, 197. _God's Presence, Dwelling_, etc. J. G., pp. 135-9: "Shecinah, or God's Dwelling Presence". "God is said to be nearer to this man than to that, more in one place than in another. Thus he is said to depart from some and come to others, to leave this place and to abide in that, not by essential application of Himself, much less by local motion, but by impression of effect." "With just men (saith St. Bernard) God is present, _in veritate_, in deed, but with the wicked, dissemblingly." "He is called in the Holy Tongue, Jehovah, He that is, or Essence." "He is said to dwell there (saith Maimon) where He putteth the marks ... of His Majesty; and He doth this by His Grace and Holy Spirit."

190. _The Virgin Mary._ J. G., p. 86: "St. Ephrem upon those words of Jacob, This is the House of God, and this is the Gate of Heaven. This saying (saith he) is to be meant of the Virgin Mary ... truly to be called the House of God, as wherein the Son of God ... inhabited, and as truly the Gate of Heaven, for the Lord of heaven and earth entered thereat; and it shall not be set open the second time, according to that of Ezekiel (xliv. 2): I saw (saith he) a gate in the East; the glorious Lord entered thereat; thenceforth that gate was shut, and is not any more to be opened (_Catena Arab._ c. 58)."

192. _Upon Woman and Mary._ The reference is to Christ's appearance to St. Mary Magdalene in the Garden after the Resurrection, John xx. 15, 16.

193. _North and South._ Comp. _Hesper._ 429. _Observation_. J. G., pp. 92, 93: "Whosoever (say the Doctors in Berachoth) shall set his bed N. and S., shall beget male children. Therefore the Jews hold this rite of collocation ... to this day.... They are bound to place their ... house of office in the very same situation ... that the uncomely necessities ... might not fall into the Walk and Ways of God, whose Shecinah or dwelling presence lieth W. and E."

195. _Noah the first was_, etc. Cp. Gregory, _Notes_, p. 28.

201. _Temporal goods._ August., quoted by Burton, II. iii. 3: Dantur quidem bonis, saith Austin, ne quis mala aestimet, malis autem ne quis nimis bona.

203. _Speak, did the blood of Abel cry_, etc. Cp. Gregory's _Notes_, pp. 118: "But did the blood of Abel speak? saith Theophylact. Yes, it cried unto God for vengeance, as that of sprinkling for propitiation and mercy."

204. _A thing of such a reverend reckoning._ Cp. Gregory, 118-9: "The blood of Abel was so holy and reverend a thing, in the sense and reputation of the old world, that the men of that time used to swear by it".

205. _A Position in the Hebrew Divinity._ From Gregory's _Notes_, pp. 134, 5: "That old position in the Hebrew Divinity ... that a repenting man is of more esteem in the sight of God than one that never fell away".

206. _The Doctors in the Talmud._ From Gregory's _Notes_, _l.c._: "The Doctors in the Talmud say, that one day spent here in true Repentance is more worth than eternity itself, or all the days of heaven in the other world".

207. _God's Presence._ Again from Gregory's Notes, pp. 136 sq.

208. _The Resurrection._ Gregory's _Notes_, pp. 128-29, translating from a Greek MS. of Mathæus Blastares in the Bodleian: "The wonder of this is far above that of the resurrection of our bodies; for then the earth giveth up her dead but one for one, but in the case of the corn she giveth up many living ones for one dead one".

243. _Confession twofold is._ August, in Ps. xxix. _Enarr._ ii. 19: Confessio gemina est, aut peccati, aut laudis.

254. _Gold and frankincense._ St. Matt. ii. 11. St. Ambrose. Aurum Regi, thus Deo.

256. _The Chewing the Cud._ Cp. Lev. xi. 6.

258. _As my little pot doth boil_, etc. This far-fetched little poem is an instance of Herrick's habit of jotting down his thoughts in verse. In cooking some food for a charitable purpose he seems to have noticed that the boiling pot tossed the meat to and fro, or "waved" it (the priest's work), and that he himself was giving away the meat he lifted off the fire, the "heave-offering," which was the priest's perquisite. This is the confusion or "level-coil" to which he alludes.

NOTES TO ADDITIONAL POEMS.

_The Description of a Woman_. Printed in _Witts Recreations_, 1645, and contained also in Ashmole MS. 38, where it is signed: "Finis. Robert Herrick." Our version is taken from _Witts Recreations_, with the exception of the readings _show_ and _grow_ (for _shown_ and _grown_, in ll. 15 and 16). The Ashmole MS. contains in all thirty additional lines, which may or may not be by Herrick, but which, as not improving the poem, have been omitted in our text in accordance with the precedent set by the editor of _Witts Recreations_.

_Mr. Herrick: his Daughter's Dowry._ From Ashmole MS. 38, where it is signed: "Finis. Robt. Hericke."

_Mr. Robert Herrick: his Farewell unto Poetry._ Printed by Dr. Grosart and Mr. Hazlitt from Ashmole MS. 38. I add a few readings from Brit. Mus. Add. MS. 22, 603, where it is entitled: _Herrick's Farewell to Poetry_. The importance of the poem for Herrick's biography is alluded to in the brief "Life" prefixed to vol. i.

For _some sleepy keys_ the Museum MS. reads, _the sleeping keys_; for _yet forc't they are to go_ it has _and yet are forc't to go_; _drinking to the odd Number of Nine_ for _Number of Wine_, as to which see below; _turned her home_ for _twirled her home_; _dear soul_ for _rare soul_. All these are possible, but _beloved Africa_, and the omission of the two half lines, "'tis not need The scarecrow unto mankind," are pure blunders.

_Drinking to the odd Number of Nine_. I introduce this into the text from the Museum manuscript as agreeing with the

"Well, I can quaff, I see,
To th' number five
Or nine"

of _A Bacchanalian Verse_ (_Hesperides_ 653), on which see Note. Dr. Grosart explains the Ashmole reading _Wine_ by the Note "_οἶνος_ and _vinum_ both give five, the number of perfection"; but this seems too far-fetched for Herrick.

_Kiss, so depart._ By a strange freak Ashmole MS. writes _Guesse_, and the Museum MS. _Ghesse_; but the emendation _Kiss_ (adopted both by Dr. Grosart and Mr. Hazlitt) cannot be doubted.

_Well doing's the fruit of doing well._ Seneca, _de Clem._ i. 1: Rectè factorum verus fructus [est] fecisse. Also _Ep._ 81: Recte facti fecisse merces est. The latter, and Cicero, _de Finib._ II. xxii. 72, are quoted by Montaigne, _Ess._ II. xvi.

_A Carol presented to Dr. Williams._ From Ashmole MS. 36, 298. For Dr. Williams, see Note to _Hesperides_ 146. This poem was apparently written in 1640, after the removal of the bishop's suspension.

_His Mistress to him at his Farewell._ From Add. MS. 11, 811, at the British Museum, where it is signed "Ro. Herrick".

_Upon Parting._ From Harleian MS. 6917, at the British Museum.

_Upon Master Fletcher's Incomparable Plays._ Printed in Beaumont and Fletcher's Works, 1647, and Beaumont's Poems, 1653.

_The Golden Pomp is come._ Ovid, "Aurea Pompa venit" (as in _Hesperides_ 201).

_To be with juice of cedar washed all over._ Horace's "linenda cedro," as in _Hesperides_.

_Evadne._ See Note to _Hesperides_ 575.

_The New Charon._ First printed in "Lachrymae Musarum. The tears of the Muses: exprest in Elegies written by divers persons of Nobility and Worth, upon the death of the most hopefull Henry, Lord Hastings.... Collected and set forth by R[ichard] B[rome]. _London_, 1649." This is the only poem which we know of Herrick's, written after 1648, and even in this Herrick uses materials already employed in "Charon and the Nightingale" in _Hesperides_.

_Epitaph on the Tomb of Sir Edward Giles._ First printed by Dr. Grosart from the monument in Dean Prior Church. Sir Edward Giles was the occupant of Dean Court and the magnate of the parish.