Nec tu, (pace tuâ,) nostri Cato maxime sêcli, Nec serò Dominam venientem in vota, nec aurum, Linque, viris miseris miseranda sophismata, quondam Nec sectare nimis; res utraq; crimine plena. Hoc bene qui callet (si quis tamen hoc bene callet) Scribe vel invito sapientem hunc Socrate solum. Dij mihi dulce diu dederant, verùm utile nunquam; Frugibus & vacuas speratis cernere spicas. Ibimus ergò statim; (quis eunti fausta precetur?) Et pede clivosas fesso calcabimus Alpes. Quis dabit intereà conditas rore Britanno, Quis tibi Litterulas, quis carmen amore petulcum! Ipse suos; & sæpe animo verbisq; benignis Fausta precaretur, Deus illum aliquando reducat! &c. Plura vellem per Charites, sed non licet per Musas. Vale, Vale plurimùm, Mi amabilissime Harvele, meo cordi, meorum omnium longè charissime. I was minded also to have sent you some English verses, or rymes, for a farewell; but, by my troth, I have no spare time in the world, to thinke on such toyes, that you knowe will demaund a freer head than mine is presently. I beseeche you by all your curtesies and graces, let me be answered, ere I goe: which will be, (I hope, I feare, I thinke) the next weeke, if I can be dispatched of my Lorde. I goe thither, as sent by him, and maintained most-what of him : and there am to employ my time, my body, my minde, to his honours service. Thus, with many superhartie commendations and recommendations to your selfe, and all my friendes with you, I ende my last farewell, not thinking any more to write to you before I goe: and with all committing to your faithfull credence the eternall memorie of our everlasting friendship; the inviolable memorie of our unspotted friendshippe; the sacred memorie of our vowed friendship; which I beseech you continue with usuall writings, as you may; and of all things let me heare some newes from you. As gentle M. Sidney, I thanke his good worship, hath required of me, and so promised to doe againe. Qui monet, ut facias, quod jam facis; you knowe the rest. b See the quotation, however, presently cited from Harvey's answer to this Letter. You may alwayes send them most safely to me by Mistresse Kerke, and by none other. So once againe, and yet once more, farewell most hartily, mine owne good Master H. and love me, as I love you, and thinke upon poore Immerito, as he thinketh uppon you. Leycester House, this 16 of October, 1579 <. Per mare, per terras, Vivus mortuusq; Tuus IMMERITO." In Harvey's answer to this Letter, dated "Trinitie Hall, 23. Octob. 1579," he desires Spenser to give him "leave to playe the counsaylour a while;" and he conjures him, "by the contents of the Verses and Rymes enclosed," (viz.Certaine Latin Verses, of the frailtie and mutabilitie of all things, saving onely certue; written by M. Doctor Norton, paraphrastically varied by M. Doctor Gouldingham, translated by olde Maister Wythepol, and paraphrastically varied in English by Harvey himself;) "and by al the good and bad Spirites that attende upon the Authors themselves, immediately upon the contemplation thereof, to abandon all other fooleries, and honour Vertue, the onely immortall and surviving Accident amongst so manye mortall and ever-perishing Substances." After this judicious advice, he presently notices the English poem which Spenser had sent him : "Your Englishe Trimetra I lyke better than perhappes you will easily believo; and am to requite them wyth better or worse, at more convenient leysure. Marry, you must pardon me, I finde not your warrant so sufficiently good and substantiall in lawe, that it can persuade me they are all so precisely for the feete, as your selfe over-partially weene and overconfidently avouche;" and he accordingly specifies some errors committed by Spenser in this example of English verse composed according to Latin rules; an attempt, which, however once the favourite employment of our poets in the age of Elizabeth, will be always too repulsive to gain many admirers or imitators; requiring, as it generally requires, a pronunciation most dismal, most unmusical, or most ridiculous; an attempt indeed, which has not escaped the lash of a just and indignant satire. From the unprofitable criticism of Harvey I therefore turn to a more important remark in his Letter, in which he appears to have been justified: “As for your speedy and hasty travell, methinks I dare stil wager al the books and writings in my study, which you know I esteeme of greater value than al the golde and silver in my purse or chest, that you wil not, that you shall not, I saye, bee gone over sea, for al your saying, neither the next nor the nexte weeke." And indeed it may justly be doubted whether Spenser was ever employed on this intended com He says in a former part of this letter that it was the sixteenth day of month. See p. xv. The date 5 at this con clusion, in the original publication, is therefore a mistake. d See bishop Hall's Satires, B. i. Sat. iv. where he rightly calls effusions of this kind,“ rhymeless numbers ;" and adds, "Unbid iambics flow from careless head!" And in Sat. vi. having ridiculed those who scorne "the homespun thread of rhymes," he proceeds: "Whoever saw a colt, wanton and wild, See also a judicious observation of Nash, in his Foure Letters confuted, 1592. Sign. G. 3. "The hexamiter verse I graunt to be a gentleman of an auncient house, (so is many an english beggar,) yet this clyme of ours hee cannot thrive in; our speech is too craggy for him to set his plough in; hee goes twitching and hopping in our language like a man running vpon quagmiers vp the hill in one syllable, and down the dale in another; retaining no part of that stately smooth gate, which he vaunts himselfe with amongst the Greeks and Latins." Dr. Percy, the present bishop of Dromore, possesses, as I have been informed by Mr. Cooper Walker, some books which belonged to Harvey; in which are manuscript notes by this friend of Spenser. I have seen the following pieces, which were also part of Harvey's library, and are now (bound in one volume) in the possession of James Bindley, Esq., in which are several observations written likewise by Harvey, applicable to the subjects of the several pieces; incidentally commending Gascoigne, bishop Watson, Cheke, and Ascham; and shewing a great attachment to Italian literature, the taste indeed of that period. 1. Medea, Tragedia di M. Lodovico Dolce, Venet. 1566. 2. Thieste, Tragedia di M. L. Dolce, Venet. 1566. 3. Hecuba, et Iphigenia in Aulide, Erasmo Roterodamo interprete, &c. 1507. 4. An Italian Grammar, written in Latin by Scipio Lentulo, a Neapolitan, and turned into English by H. G. 1575. mission; which, some of his biographers have asserted, constituted him Agent for the Earl of Leicester in France and other foreign countries. For, by the date of Spenser's next Letter to Harvey, we find him still in London; and an interval of less than six months onely had elapsed, since his mention of an appointment; a period hardly sufficient to have allowed him the exercise of such an appointment, even in a small degree; in regard to which we have also no further memorial. Before I present the reader with Spenser's next Letter to Harvey, it is necessary to observe that his first Letter, already given, affects the credibility of his pretended introduction to Philip Sidney, on account of his presentation to him of the ninth Canto of the first Book of the Faerie Queene; for it shews that he was known to Sidney previously to the publication of the Shepheards Calender in 1579. This incontrovertible fact refutes the opinion also of a very elegant writer, and of others less known to fame that "the Dedication of the Shepheards Calender seems to have procured Spenser his first introduction to Sir Philp Sidney." In Spenser's second Letter to Harvey, some interesting remarks concerning his works occur. "To my long approoved and singular good frende, Master G. H. Good Master H. I doubt not but you have some great important matter in hande, which al this while restraineth youre penne, and wonted readinesse in provoking me unto that, wherein your selfe now faulte. If there bee any such thing in hatching, I pray you hartily, lette us knowe, before al the worlde see it. But if happly you dwell altogither in Justinians courte, and give your selfe to be devoured of secreate studies, as of likelyhood you doe: yet at least imparte some your olde, or newe, Latine, or Englishe, eloquent and gallant poesies to us, from whose eyes, you saye, you keepe in a manner nothing hidden. "Little newes is here stirred; but that olde greate matter still depending. Hish Honoure never better. I thinke the Earthquake was also there wyth you, (which I would gladly learne,) as it was here with us; overthrowing divers old buildings, and peeces of churches. Sure very straunge to be hearde of in these countries, and yet I heare some saye, (I know not howe truely) that they have knowne the like before in their dayes. Sed quid vobis videtur magnis Philosophis? "I like your late Englishe Hexameters so exceedingly well, that I also enure my penne sometime in that kinde: whyche I fynd indeede, as I have heard you often defende in worde, neither so harde nor so harshe, that it will easily and fairely yeelde it selfe to oure moother tongue. For the onely, or chiefest hardnesse, whyche seemeth, is in the accente; whyche sometime gapeth, and as it were yawneth ilfavouredly; comming shorte of that it should, and sometime exceeding the measure of the number, as in Carpenter, the middle sillable being used shorte in speache, when it shall be read long in verse, seemeth like a lame gosling, that draweth one legge after hir: and Heaven, beeing used shorte as one sillable when it is in verse, stretched out with a diastole, is like a lame dogge that holdes up one legge. But it is to be wonne with custome, and rough words must be subdued with use. For, why a God's name may not we, as I else the Greekes, have the kingdome of our owne language, and measure our accentes by the sounde, reserving the quantitie to the verse ?-Loe here I let you see my olde use of toying in rymes, turned into your artificial straightnesse of verse by this Tetrasticon. I beseech you tell me your fancie, without parcialitie. See yee the blindefoulded pretie god, that feathered archer, I should have omitted the preceding paragraph, for the same reason as I have omitted Harvey's criticism, if I had thought it justifiable to withold from the reader any poetical fragment of Spenser; for to the name of poetry these English hexameters and pentameters, by Life of Spenser, prefixed to the folio edition of his Works in 1679; and Hughes's Life of Spenser, prefixed to both his editions of the Works. Ellis's Specimens of the early English Poets, Art. Spenser. h The Earl of Leicester. i Else is perhaps a misprint for als or also. the expression of the author, evidently pretend; as does the wretched couplet immediately following: "That which I eate, did I ioy, and that which I greedily gorged; "As for those many goodly matters leaft I for others." Spenser afterwards requests Harvey to send him the Rules and Precepts of Art which he observes in quantities; or else to follow those which Drant had devised, Sidney improved, and himself augmented; lest their discrepancy in this important point should destroy each other's system! Spenser proceeds: "Truste me, you will hardly beleeve what greate good liking and estimation Maister Dyer had of youre satyricall verses, and I, since the viewe thereof, having before of my selfe had special liking of Englishe versifying, am even nowe aboute to give you some token what, and howe well therein, I am able to doe : for, to tell you trueth, I mynde shortly, at convenient leysure, to sette forthe a booke in this kinde, whyche I entitle, Epithalamion Thamesis; whyche booke I dare undertake wil be very profitable for the knowledge, and rare for the invention, and manner of handling. For, in setting forth the marriage of the Thames, I shewe his first beginning and offspring, and all the countrey that he passeth thorough, and also describe all the rivers throughout Englande, whyche came to this wedding, and their righte names, and right passage, &c. a worke, beleeve me, of much labour, wherein, notwithstanding, Master Holinshed hath muche furthered and advantaged me, who therein hath bestowed singular paines, in searching oute their course, til they fall into the sea. O Tite, siquid, ego, But of that more hereafter. Nowe, my Dreames, and Dying Pellicane, being fully finished, (as I partelye signified in my laste letters) and presentlye to bee imprinted, I wil in hande forthwith with my k Faerie Queene, whyche I praye you hartily send me with al expedition; and your friendly letters, and long expected judgement withal, whyche let not be shorte, but in all pointes such as you ordinarilye use, and I extraordinarily desire. Multum cale. Westminster. Quarto non. Aprilis [Apr. 10,] 1580. Sed, amato te, Meum Corculum tibi se ex animo commendat plurimùm: jamdiu mirata, te nihil ad literas suas responsi dedisse. Vide quæso, ne id tibi Capitale sit: mihi certè quidem erit, neque tibi hercle impune, ut opinor. Iterum vale, et quàm voles sæpè. Yours alwayes to commaunde, Postcripte. IMMERITO. I take best my Dreames shoulde come forth alone, being growen by means of the Glosse, (running continually in manner of a paraphrase,) full as great as my Calendar. Therin be some things excellently, and many things wittily, discoursed of E. K., and the pictures so singularly set forth and purtrayed, as, if Michael Angelo were there, he could (I think) nor amende the best, nor reprehend the worst. I know you would lyke them passing wel. Of my 'Stemmata Dudleiana, and especially of the sundry apostrophes therein, addressed you knowe to whom, muste more advisement be had, than so lightly to sende them abroade: howbeit, trust me (though I doe never very well) yet, in my owne fancie, I never dyd better: Veruntamen te sequor solùm; nunquam verò assequar." While this Letter was on its way to Harvey, Harvey had dispatched a long epistle to Spenser, dated the 7th of April, the day after the earthquake had happened; to which event j Spenser, it seems, had prefixed to these satyrical verses a Sonnet. See Harvey's Foure Letters, and certaine Sonnets, 1592. Sign F. 3. b. where Harvey, having given a dozen of his own hexameters, adds; "the verse is not vnknowen; and runneth in one of those vnsatyricall Satyres, which M. Spencer long since embraced with an overlooving Sonnet: a token of his affection, not a testimony of hys iudgement." The Sonnet is lost; as is another poem also, of which E. K. has given us a line in his notes on the sixth Eclogue of the Shepheards Calender. k This is a direct proof that Spenser had begun his great poem; he desires the opinion of his friend upon it; which, as we shall presently see, was not calculated to encourage the ardour of the poet. 1 This work appears, by a subsequent extract from Harvey's Letter to Spenser, to have been written in Latin. It was, no doubt, a curious and valuable description of the Earl of Leicester's genealogy: and " the sundry apostrophes therein" we may reasonably suppose to have been addressed to Sir Philip Sidney. Spenser has "adverted. The fluency of Harvey's abuse respecting the state of learning and discipline at that time in the University, exclusive of his "short but sharpe and learned judgement of Earthquakes”, forms the greater part of this epistle; from which I have "already extracted what relates to Spenser's apparent disappointment at Cambridge; and of which species of illiberal remark no other specimen, I conceive, is necessary. What he says of Spenser's finished and intended poetry, is too important to be omitted: "Commende mee to thine owne good selfe, and tell thy Dying Pellicane, and thy Dreames, from me, I wil now leave dreaming any longer of them, til with these eyes I see them forth indeede: And then againe, I imagine your Magnificenza will holde us in suspense as long for your P nine English Comœdies, and your Latine Stemmata Dudleiana; whiche two shal go for my mony, when all is done; especiallye if you woulde but bestow one sevennights pollishing and trimming uppon eyther: Whiche, I pray thee, doe for my pleasure, if not for their sake, nor thine owne profite." There is also an allusion in it (worthy of quotation) to the puritanical controversies which had existed at Cambridge; in regard to one of which Spenser had already expressed a strong opinion: "No more adoe about cappes and surplesses: Maister 'Cartwright nighe forgotten: The man you wot of, conformable, with his square cappe on his rounde heade, and non resident at pleasure, &c." After the Letter, from which the preceding extracts have been made, there follows, in the same publication, another without date, entitled "A gallant familiar Letter, containing an answere to that of M. Immerito, with sundry proper examples, and some precepts, of our Englishe reformed Versifying." Of examples which supply occasion principally for animadversion, and of precepts which administer no service to English literature, extensive notice, as I have before hinted, is hardly requisite. Prefixed, however, to the author's Encomium Lauri, (one of his examples,) is a curious remark addressed to Spenser: "Thinke uppon Petrarches Arbor vittoriosa, triomfale, and perhappes it will advaunce the wynges of your Imagination a degree higher; at the least if any thing can be added to the loftinesse of his conceite, whom gentle Mistresse Rosalinde once reported to have all the Intelligences at commaundement, and an other time christened him Segnior Pegaso." This alludes to the pleasant days of love that were gone and past. And it is rather strange that Harvey should introduce a subject, of which the remembrance could not be very pleasing to a deserted lover. The Encomium Lauri thus commences; which I cite, in order to introduce Nash's happy burlesque of it : "What might I call this Tree? A Laurell? O bonny Laurell: "Needes to thy bowes will I bow this knee, and vayle my bonetto." And accordingly Nash, in the Foure Letters confuted, describes Harvey walking under the "ewe-tree at Trinitie Hall," and addressing it in the very same terms; and as making "verses See p. xix. The date is ascertained by a copy of verses on the event in Yates's "Castell of courtesie, whereunto is adioyned the holde of humilitie, &c." 4to. 1582. Nash is equally severe in regard to Harvey's judgement, and to his brother Richard Harvey's Astrological discourse: he calls Gabriel "a roguish commenter upon earthquakes," and Richard's discourse "a lewd piece of prophecie-John Doleta's prophesie of flying dragons, commets, earthquakes, and inundations; of which every miller made a comment, and not an oyster-wife but mockt it." See the Foure Letters confuted, 1592; and Have with you to Saffron-Walden, 1596. n See p. ix., &c. • An allusion to the Faerie Queene. See Spenser's Letter to Sir Walter Raleigh: "In the person of Prince Arthure I sette forth Magnificence in particular, &c." P See further remarks on these nine Comedies in a subsequent page. q The opposition to the " apparell and garments" prescribed by the Church of England, had indeed risen to such a height, as to occasion "A Declaration in the name and defence of certaine Ministers in London, refusyng to weare the apparell prescribed by the lawes and orders of the realme:" which gave rise to "A briefe examination of the same, in which the judgements of Peter Martyr and Bucer, on the point, are introduced, 4to. bl. 1. Impr. by R. Jugge. Spenser's affection to the non-conformists in this circumstance, is visible in the seventh Eclogue of his Shepheards Calender. r Cartwright was a noted non-conformist as well as a scholar, and is said to have been encouraged by the Earl of Leicester (Spenser's friend) in the well-known opposition to Whitgift. See Isaac Walton's Life of Hooker. Cartwright had been fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge; and was Lady Margaret's Professor of Divinity, in the year when Spenser became a member of the University. |