Fitter perhaps to thunder martial stour,
Whenso thee list thy lofty Muse to raise :
Yet, till that thou thy poem wilt make known,
Let thy fair Cynthia's praises be thus rudely shown.

Sidney

ROYDON.

From An Elegy.

You knew, who knew not Astrophill?
(That I should live to say I knew,
And have not in possession still!)
Things known permit me to renew ;

Of him you know his merit such,
I cannot say, you hear, too much.

Within these woods of Arcadie
He chief delight and pleasure took,
And on the mountain Parthenie,
Upon the crystal liquid brook,

The Muses met him every day,

[1598

That taught him sing, to write, and say.

When he descended down the mount,
His personage seemed most divine,
A thousand graces one might count
Upon his lovely cheerful eyne;

To hear him speak and sweetly smile,
You were in Paradise the while.

A sweet attractive kind of grace,
A full assurance given by looks,

Continual comfort in a face,
The lineaments of Gospel books;

I trow that countenance cannot lie,
Whose thoughts are legible in the eye.

Was never eye did see that face,
Was never ear did hear that tongue,
Was never mind did mind his grace,
That ever thought the travail long;

But eyes and ears and every thought,
Were with his sweet perfections caught.

O God, that such a worthy man,
In whom so rare deserts did reign,
Desirèd thus, must leave us than,
And we to wish for him in vain !

O could the stars, that bred that wit,
In force no longer fixed sit !

Then being fill'd with learned dew,
The Muses willed him to love;
That instrument can aptly shew
How finely our conceits will move;

As Bacchus opes dissembled hearts,
So Love sets out our better parts.

Stella, a nymph within this wood,
Most rare and rich of heavenly bliss,
The highest in his fancy stood,
And she could well demerit this;

'Tis likely they acquainted soon;
He was a sun, and she a moon.

Our Astrophill did Stella love;
O Stella, vaunt of Astrophill,

Albeit thy graces gods may move,
Where wilt thou find an Astrophill !

The rose and lily have their prime,
And so hath beauty but a time.

Although thy beauty do exceed
In common sight of every eye,
Yet in his poesies when we read,
It is apparent more thereby,

He that hath love and judgment too,
Sees more than any other do.

Then Astrophill hath honour'd thee;
For when thy body is extinct,
Thy graces shall eternal be,
And live by virtue of his ink;

For by his verses he doth give
To short-lived beauty aye to live.

Above all others this is he,
Which erst approved in his song
That love and honour might agree,
And that pure love will do no wrong.
Sweet saints! it is no sin or blame,
To love a man of virtuous name.

Did never love so sweetly breathe
In any mortal breast before,
Did never Muse inspire beneath
A Poet's brain with finer store;

He wrote of love with high conceit,
And beauty rear'd above her height.

RALEIGH.

A Vision upon this Conceipt of the

Fairy Queen.

[1590

METHOUGHT I saw the grave where Laura lay,
Within that temple, where the vestal flame
Was wont to burn; and passing by that way
To see that buried dust of living fame,
Whose tomb fair Love and fairer Virtue kept,
All suddenly I saw the Fairy Queen:

At whose approach the soul of Petrarch wept,
And from thenceforth those Graces were not seen;
(For they this Queen attended); in whose stead
Oblivion laid him down on Laura's hearse :
Hereat the hardest stones were seen to bleed,
And groans of buried ghosts the heavens did pierce :
Where Homer's sprite did tremble all for grief,
And curst the access of that celestial thief,

From Another of the same. [1590

Of me no lines are loved, nor letters are of price,
(Of all which speak our English tongue), but those
of thy device.

Spenser.

Spenser.

PEELE.

Ad Mæcenatem Prologus. [1593
PLAIN is my coat, and humble is my gait ;
Thrice-noble earl, behold with gentle eyes

Sidney.

Spenser.
Harington.

Daniel.

Campion.
Fraunce.

Chaucer.
Gower.

Phaer.

Watson.

My wit's poor worth, even for your noblesse,
Renowned Lord, Northumberland's fair flower,
The Muses' love, patron, and favourite.

And you the Muses, and the Graces three,
You I invoke from heaven and Helicon,
For other patrons have poor poets none,
But Muses and the Graces to implore.
Augustus long ago hath left the world,
And liberal Sidney, famous for the love
He bare to learning and to chivalry,
And virtuous Walsingham are fled to heaven.
Why thither speed not Hobbin and his feres,
Great Hobbinol on whom our shepherds gaze,
And Harington, well-letter'd and discreet,
That hath so purely naturálizèd

Strange words and made them all free denizens ?
Why thither speeds not Rosamond's trumpeter,
Sweet as the nightingale? Why go'st not thou,
That richly cloth'st conceit with well-made words,
Campion, accompanied with our English Fraunce,
A peerless, sweet translator of our time?
Why follow not a thousand that I know,
Fellows to these, Apollo's favourites,
And leave behind our ordinary grooms,
With trivial humours to pastime the world,
That favours Pan and Phoebus both alike?
Why thither post not all good wits from hence,
To Chaucer, Gower, and to the fairest Phaer
That ever ventured on great Virgil's works?
To Watson, worthy many epitaphs

For his sweet poesy, for Amyntas' tears
And joys so well set down? And after thee