these aspirings of his mind to the high pro

terrores istos ostentare, ac si salutes tuas sexcentas velles, subducta minutim ratiuncula, ad unum omnes a me reposcere, si forte ego, quod ne siverit unquam Deus, amicitiæ desertor fierem; atque amove terribile illud itayisus quod cervicibus nostris videris imposuisse, ut sine tua bona venia ne liceat ægrotare. Ego enim ne nimis minitere, tui similes impossibile est quin amem, nam de cætero quidem quid de me statuerit Deus nescio, illud certe; δεινόν μοι ἔρωτα, εἰπέρ τω αλλω, το xaλs évéσrage. Nec tanto Ceres labore, ut in fabulis est, Liberam fertur quæsivisse filiam, quanto ego hanc ra xxλe ideav, veluti pulcherrimam quandam imaginem, per omnes rerum formas et facies: (πολλαί γὰρ μορφαὶ τών Δαιμονίων) dies noctesque indagare soleo, et quasi certis quibusdam vestigiis ducentem sector. Unde fit, ut qui, spretis quæ vulgus prava rerum æstimatione opinatur, id sentire et loqui et esse audet; quod summa per omne ævum sapientia optimum esse docuit, illi me protinus, sicubi reperiam, necessitate quadam adjungam. Quod si ego sive natura, sive meo fato ita sum comparatus, ut nulla contentione, et laboribus meis ad tale decus et fastigium laudis ipse valeam emergere; tamen quo minus qui eam gloriam assecuti sunt, aut eo feliciter aspirant, illos semper colam, et suspiciam, nec dii puto, nec homines prohibuerint. Cæterum jam curiositati tuæ vis esse satisfactum scio. solicite quæris, etiam quid cogitem. Audi, Theodote, verum in aurem ut ne rubeam, et sinito paulisper apud te grandia loquar; quid cogitem quæris? ita me bonus Deus, immortalitatem. Quid agam vero? lépoque, et volare meditor: sed tenellis admodum adhuc pennis evehit se noster Pegasus, humile sapiamus. Dicam jam nunc serio quid cogitem, in hospitium juridicorum aliquod immigrare, sicubi amena et umbrosa ambulatio est, quod et inter aliquot sodales, commodior illic habitatio, si domi manere, et ὁρμητήριον ευπρεπέστερον quocunque libitum erit excurrere; ubi nunc sum, ut nosti, obscure, et anguste sum; de studiis etiam nostris fies certior. Græcorum res continuata lectione deduximus usquequo illi Græci esse sunt desiti: Italorum in obscura re diu versati sumus sub Longobar

Multa

spect of poetic immortality, till the baleful

dis, et Francis, et Germanis, ad illud tempus quo illis ab Rodolpho Germaniæ rege concessa libertas est; exinde quid quæque civitas suo marte gesserit, separatim legere præstabit. Tu vero quid? quousque rebus domesticis filius familias imminebis urbanarum sodalitatum oblitus? quod, nisi bellum hoc novercale, vel Dacico, vel Sarmatico infestius sit, debebis profecto maturare, ut ad nos saltem in hyberna concedas. Interim, quod sine tua molestia fiat, Justinianum mihi Venetorum historicum rogo mittas; ego mea fide aut in adventum tuum probe asservatum curabo; aut, si mavis, haud ita multo post ad te remissum. Vale."

Londino, September 23, 1637.

TO CHARLES DEODATI.

"Other friends in their letters generally reckon it sufficient to wish only a single health to their correspondents; I can assign a reason, however, why you so often repeat the salutation. For in addition to your old wishes, which are all that others are still able to offer, you would have me now consider our whole art and energy of medicine as engaged: since you bid me hail indefinitely, to the height of my desires, of my powers-nay, beyond. You must surely have become of late the very housesteward of health, you so lavishly dispense her whole stores; or health herself is without doubt your obsequious attendant, you so imperiously like a king enjoiu her obedience. Accept therefore my congratulations, and allow me to return you my double thanks, on account both of your friendship and your profound skill. I had long indeed, in consequence of your arrangement, been expecting a letter from you, but, trust me, so far was I from feeling the slightest diminution of kindness towards you on account of its non-arrival, that I had even anticipated the very excuse for its delay, which you yourself allege in the beginning of it. And this too justly, and without any derogation from our intimacy. For true friendship should not depend upon the

fury of politics diverted his fancy from where

she

Roll'd o'er Elysian flowers her amber stream,

into a channel polluted with weeds, and horrid with precipices.

balancings of letters and salutations, which may be all hypocritical; but should cling and sustain itself by the deep roots of the soul, and, originating in pure and hallowed principles, should through the whole of life, even without the intervention of reciprocal civilities, avoid both suspicion and offence, cherished not so much by letters, as by the lively remembrance of mutual virtues. Nor, should you happen to omit writing, would you be without a substitute in that office. Your integrity writes to me in your stead, and inscribes its deep characters upon my inmost senses. Your simplicity, your honour, and your genius (genius of no common stamp) are my correspondents, and give me a still stronger impression in your favour. Do not then from your lordly eminence of medicine, hold out to me the threat of reclaiming, with rigid minuteness of calculation, your indefinitely-multiplied salutations, in the event (which God avert!) of my proving treacherous to friendship; but take off that dread injunction, which you seem to have laid upon me, of not daring to be sick without your leave. For, without your denunciations, I cannot help loving such as resemble you; since, whatever God may have determined concerning me in other respects, he has certainly implanted in me, if in any one, a vehement love of the ro naov: nor is Ceres herself represented in fable to have sought her daughter Proserpine with so much zeal, as I daily and nightly pursue and trace the steps of this fair idea, this enchanting image through every form and face of things" for various are the shapes which people heaven." Hence he, who, in contempt of the depraved estimates of popular opinion, dares to think and speak, and be what genuine wisdom has universally pronounced best, by a kind of necessity becomes instantly, wherever I find him, an object of my ardent

L'Allegro and II Penseroso made their

attachment. I myself may from nature or through destiny be so circumstanced, as to be incapable by any struggles or exertions of my own of attaining such an honourable elevation: but neither gods, I trust, nor men, will forbid my looking up to such as have attained, or are successfully labouring to attain it, with reverence and veneration.

"Your curiosity will now, I know, expect some satisfaction. Amongst other subjects of anxious inquiry, you ask me, upon what I am thinking. Hear me, my heaven-bestowed friend, but in a whisper, to spare my blushes; and permit me for a moment to utter great things. Do you ask me," Upon what I am thinking?" So help me heaven, upon immortality. But what am I doing? I am fledging myself, and meditate a flight. My Pegasus however as yet soars only on slender pinions: let me moderate my thoughts. I will now tell you, what is my serious project:-to remove into some inn of court, where I may find pleasant and shady walks; because it is both more convenient to reside among a few companions, if I choose to stay at home; and I shall have a better point of setting off, whenever I wish to go abroad. My present abode, you know, is both gloomy and confined. You shall also be informed of my studies. I have read straightforward the history of the Greeks, till they lost their title to the name: and have lingered in the dark ages of Italy among the Lombards, the Franks, and the Germans, down to the period in which they obtained liberty from the Emperor Rodolph. From that epoch it will be better to read separately the exertions of each distinct state.

"And what are you doing? How long will you allow your domestic engagements, as a son, to interfere with your cityfriendships? Surely if this stepmother's warfare be not more bitter than that of Dacia or Sarmatia, you will dispatch it speedily, and join us in winter-quarters. In the mean while I shall be obliged to you, if you can without inconvenience lend me Giustiniani's History of Venice; and I will engage either to take the utmost care of it till your arrival, or (if you choose) in a very short time to return it to you. Farewell,"

London, Sept. 23, 1637.

author's poems,

first public appearance in the edition of our poems, which was published by himself in 1645; and we have no positive testimony to determine the precise time of their production. There is reason, however, to suppose that they were written in the interval between the composition of Comus, and that of Lycidas. The opening lines of the latter poem seem to refer to some work of a more recent date than the Mask, since the representation of which three years had now elapsed; and we cannot, with the least pretence of probability, assign their origin to any other portion of their author's life than to that which was passed at Horton. The evidence of their ripened excellence would not allow us to ascribe them to his more youthful years, even if the accurate and circumstantial account, which has been transmitted to us, of the produce of those years had left us any doubt upon the subject. With his compositions also during his residence in Italy we are so particularly acquainted as not to be permitted to hesitate when we exclude from their number the objects of our reference. The character also of these pieces establishes them to be English. Their lineaments and their tints are so specific, and so peculiarly genuine as to