PEOPLE MENTIONED IN A WEEK - Kouroo

PEOPLE MENTIONED IN A WEEK

PEOPLE MENTIONED IN A WEEK:

MICHAEL DRAYTON

“NARRATIVE HISTORY” AMOUNTS TO FABULATION, THE REAL STUFF BEING MERE CHRONOLOGY

DRAYTON’S WORKS

“Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project Michael Drayton

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/ActiveIndex.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmers_Drayton.pdf

mailto:[email protected]?subject=Contribution to Kouroo Contexture

mailto:[email protected] subject=Contribution to Kouroo Contexture

MICHAEL DRAYTON MICHAEL DRAYTON

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A WEEK: The world is a strange place for a playhouse to standwithin it. Old Drayton thought that a man that lived here, andwould be a poet, for instance, should have in him certain “brave,translunary things,” and a “fine madness” should possess hisbrain. Certainly it were as well, that he might be up to theoccasion. That is a superfluous wonder, which Dr. Johnsonexpresses at the assertion of Sir Thomas Browne that “his lifehas been a miracle of thirty years, which to relate, were nothistory but a piece of poetry, and would sound like a fable.”The wonder is, rather, that all men do not assert as much. Thatwould be a rare praise, if it were true, which was addressed toFrancis Beaumont, — “Spectators sate part in your tragedies.”Think what a mean and wretched place this world is; that half thetime we have to light a lamp that we may see to live in it. Thisis half our life. Who would undertake the enterprise if it wereall? And, pray, what more has day to offer? A lamp that burns moreclear, a purer oil, say winter-strained, that so we may pursueour idleness with less obstruction. Bribed with a little sunlightand a few prismatic tints, we bless our Maker, and stave off hiswrath with hymns.

MICHAEL DRAYTON

DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON

PEOPLE OFA WEEK

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http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/explanation.pdf


http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/WEEK/PeopleMentionedInWEEK.pdf


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Michael Drayton was born at Hartshill, near Nuneaton, Warwickshire, England.

NOBODY COULD GUESS WHAT WOULD HAPPEN NEXT

1563

Michael Drayton “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo” Project







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Almost nothing is known about Michael Drayton’s life earlier than this year, in which he is recorded to have been in the service of Thomas Goodere of Collingham, Nottinghamshire, a member of the family of Sir Henry Goodere of Powlsworth (now Polesworth), on the river Ancor, not far from Tamworth.

LIFE IS LIVED FORWARD BUT UNDERSTOOD BACKWARD?— NO, THAT’S GIVING TOO MUCH TO THE HISTORIAN’S STORIES.

LIFE ISN’T TO BE UNDERSTOOD EITHER FORWARD OR BACKWARD.

1580








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Michael Drayton’s THE HARMONY OF THE CHURCH, a volume of spiritual poems dedicated to Lady Devereux. The edition was destroyed under public order, except for 40 copies seized by the Archbishop of Canterbury — in these preserved copies, we can note that this poet’s version of the Song of Solomon had been guilty of a remarkable richness of expression.

DO I HAVE YOUR ATTENTION? GOOD.

1591





http://www.archive.org/stream/elegantextractso00knoxuoft#page/n769/mode/2up




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Michael Drayton’s historical poem THE LEGEND OF PIERS GAVESTON. His IDEA: THE SHEPHERD’S GARLAND, a collection of pastorals in which under the pen name “Rowland” he reprocessed his love-sorrows.

It is conjectured that at this point, when Richard Barnfield left grad school at Brasenose College without an advanced diploma, he probably went to London and there presumably made the acquaintance of Thomas Watson, Michael Drayton, and possibly Edmund Spenser (bear in mind that in the preceding year one resident in every ten in this teeming capital city had died in an outbreak of the plague, and that in this year the spasm of mortality was moving on to the university town of Oxford).

CHANGE IS ETERNITY, STASIS A FIGMENT

1593

LONDON







The standing figure is "Londinia" herself, and in the background are St Paul’s Cathedral and the Tower of London.


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Michael Drayton’s epic poem in rhyme royal MATILDA, his ENDIMION AND PHOEBE, and a cycle of 64 sonnets, IDEA’S MIRROR.

Robert Greene’s THE HISTORY OF ORLANDO FURIOSO (based on Ludovico Ariosto’s epic poem),

FRIAR BACON AND FRIAR BUNGAY,

and A LOOKING GLASS FOR LONDON AND ENGLAND.

THE FUTURE IS MOST READILY PREDICTED IN RETROSPECT

1594

GREENE’S ORLANDO FURIOSO

FRIERS BACON & BUNGAY

A LOOKING GLASS







http://www.luminarium.org/editions/orlando.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Looking_Glass_for_London


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Michael Drayton’s MORTIMERIADOS, about the Wars of the Roses, in ottava rima. Also published in this year was a volume THE LEGEND OF ROBERT, DUKE OF NORMANDY, in which also was reprinted his PIERS GAVESTON.

THE FUTURE CAN BE EASILY PREDICTED IN RETROSPECT

1596








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Michael Drayton’s ENGLAND’S HEROICAL EPISTLES, historical studies in imitation of those of Ovid, in heroic couplets.

For the following five years Drayton would be one of the group of playwrights who would be supplying material for the theatrical syndicate of Philip Henslowe. In Henslowe’s DIARY, although Drayton’s name is associated with 23 plays during this period, it is clear that almost always he was working in collaboration with other playwrights such as Thomas Dekker, Anthony Munday, and Henry Chettle, etc. There was one play in which he was supposedly the sole author, the play William Longsword — but said script didn’t got completed, let alone performed. A surviving portion of the play Sir John Oldcastle, allegedly composed by Drayton in collaboration with Anthony Munday, Robert Wilson, and Richard Hathwaye, provides us with no markers of whatever his involvement might have amounted to.

1597




http://www.archive.org/stream/elegantextractso00knoxuoft#page/n769/mode/2up


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By this point Michael Drayton had already made a monumental resolve, that he was going celebrate in verse all the points of topographical or antiquarian interest in the island of Great Britain.

Jean Bauhin, a former student of Conrad Gesner, prepared a monograph about the medicinal waters and surrounding environment of the German fountains at Boll, and this has turned out to amount to a really important first — the 1st publication of a complete set of fossils from a specific location.

WHAT I’M WRITING IS TRUE BUT NEVER MINDYOU CAN ALWAYS LIE TO YOURSELF

1598

THE SCIENCE OF 1598PALEONTOLOGY







http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1598_in_science


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Michael Drayton sat for his portrait:

1599





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Francis Beaumont’s SALMACIS AND HERMAPHRODITUS.

John Beaumont, who had begun early to write verse, at the age of 19 was able to create an anonymous publication, METAMORPHOSIS OF TABACCO, written in couplets. In this book he addressed Michael Drayton as his loving friend, and for many years, at Grace-Dieu in Leicestershire, he would live as a bachelor while explaining himself as a man “who never felt Love’s dreadful arrow.”

1602





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Michael Drayton enlarged and modified his poem MORTIMERIADOS and republished it as THE BARONS’ WARS.

1603





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July 25, Sunday (Old Style): Queen Elizabeth having died on March 23rd, on this day King James VI of Scotland was

crowned in London (he was, not incidentally, alleging his Stuarts to be descended from the King Arthur of British fakelore). In his service Francis Bacon would flourish. On this day of the new king’s coronation Bacon was knighted, becoming Sir Francis. He would rise to become Baron Verulam, Viscount St. Albans and Lord Chancellor of England. His fall would come about in the course of a struggle between King and Parliament. He would be accused of having taken a bribe while a judge, and found guilty as charged. He thus would lose his personal honor, as well as his fortune and his place at court.

By the coronation of James VI of Scotland as James I, King of England (1603-1625), the idea that the educated, informed, and sometimes conflicting and confused voices of esquires, merchants, lawyers, and





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clergymen might be tolerated and even encouraged had received the sanction of decades of experience.

(The portrait above does not reveal a couple of significant things about the person of this scholarly monarch. His tongue was too large for his mouth, and he had some sort of neurological condition in his legs that was causing numerous stumbles, and injuries.)

This monarch would extend and modify the Lieutenant’s house at the Tower of London, which had been built in the 1540s and now is referred to as the Queen’s House. He would relocate his royal lions to better dens in the west gate barbican. He would come to refer to his kingdom as “Great Britain.”

Sir Walter Raleigh, accused of treason against him (“him” = James, not “him” = Arthur), was imprisoned in the Tower. King James’s efforts to suppress dissent would alienate many of his citizen-subjects, and then his son, ruling as Charles I, would attempt even greater rigour, reasserting censorship with a comprehensiveness not before experienced in England. Thus, after the English civil war, it would be due not to John Milton’s AEROPAGITICA but rather to a Hobbesian pragmatism, that the need to inform the general public, if only in a rudimentary manner, would be becoming accepted as an integral part of English politics.

But perhaps at this point we should not be speaking of “a Hobbesian pragmatism,” for at this point Master Thomas Hobbes, barely 15 years of age, was just beginning his studies at Magdalen Hall in Oxford:

It is not to be forgotten that before he went to the University,

JAMES I

AN INFORMED CITIZENRY





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he had turned Euripides’ MEDEA out of Greek into Latin iambics.

Michael Drayton, who had gotten along well with the court of Queen Elizabeth, would address a poem of compliment to James on his accession as King of England — but his effort would be ridiculed and this court would rudely reject his services.

With James Stuart (I and VI) coming to the throne, with a single crown for England and Scotland, with the Treaty of Mellifont in which O’Neill surrendered, with the end of the Elizabethan Wars and the enforcement of English law, with the municipality of Belfast being founded upon the former estate of late Earl of Donegall in order to recover his debts, there began in Ireland, particularly in Ulster, the period of the English encroachment by plantation, which would endure until 1641.




This is from "A Brief Life," by John Aubrey.

A wig and some plastic surgery, to make the portrait look a big younger.


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Having been rejected with rudeness by the court of King James I of England, Michael Drayton found an outlet for his bitterness in an unfortunate satire, THE OWLE (entered at Stationers’ Hall in February). The “owle,” keeping a careful eye on all the other birds, amused no-one. In this year he would also create a misbegotten scriptural narrative, MOYSES IN A MAP OF HIS MIRACLES, as an epic in heroic stanzas.1

Samuel Purchas was presented by King James I of England to the vicarage of St. Laurence and All Saints, Eastwood, Essex.

The POETICALL ESSAYES OF ALEXANDER CRAIGE, SCOTO-BRITANE, by Alexander Craig of Rosecraig, imprinted by William White dwelling in Cow-lane neere Holborne Conduit and dedicated to King James I of England.

William Alexander’s TRAGEDIE OF DARIUS was reprinted in London together with a 2d tragedy, CROESUS. Introduced by Argyll at the court of King James VI in Scotland, this playwright gained the favour of the monarch, whom he followed to England, where he was made one of the gentlemen-extraordinary of Prince Henry’s chamber. In this timeframe he wrote AURORA and also created a set of 8-lined stanzas on the familiar theme of princely duty, intituled A PARÆNESIS TO PRINCE HENRY2 (as Sir William wrote of the River Forth of Scotland in this poetic source, Henry Thoreau would eventually be writing of the Merrimack River of New England).

1604

1. 26 years later this would be revised into MOSES, HIS BIRTH AND MIRACLES.





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2. Thoreau seems to have quoted from Sir William Alexander’s “A Parænsis to Prince Henry” on page 85 of A WEEK ON THE CONCORD AND MERRIMACK RIVERS.Professor E. Robert Sattelmeyer indicates on his page 119 that Thoreau had become familiar with this during his study in Alexander Chalmers, THE WORKS OF THE ENGLISH POETS, FROM CHAUCER TO COWPER; INCLUDING THE SERIES EDITED WITH PREFACES, BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL, BY DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON: AND THE MOST APPROVED TRANSLATIONS. Although we do not have a record that Thoreau ever consulted that particular volume, Volume V, of this 21-volume set,

I must acknowledge that I presently know only of a secondary source from which Thoreau might have accessed such materials, and have no greater evidence that Thoreau was familiar with any such secondary source. Thoreau might possibly have copied this extract from some secondary source such as pages 585/586 of the Reverend William Nimmo, Minister of Bothkennar’s HISTORY OF STIRLINGSHIRE. CORRECTED AND BROUGHT DOWN TO THE PRESENT TIME BY THE REV. WILLIAM MACGREGOR STIRLING, MINISTER OF PORT (Re-issued in 1817 by John Fraser for Andrew Bean, Bookseller, Stirling; A. Constable & Co. Oliphant & Co. J. Ogle, J. Fairbairn, J. Anderson & Co. Oliver and Boyd, Edinburgh; Lumsden & Son, A. & J.M. Duncan, Brash and Reid, M. Ogle, W. & P. Jenkins, Glasgow; W. Reid, Leith; J. Rankine, Falkirk; and, J. Macisack, Alloa), for that secondary source reads as follows:

A still earlier writer, Sir William Alexander 1st Earl of Stirling, was correct, when, in his “Parænsis, or Exhortation toGovernment,” addressed to the renowned Prince Henry, he says,

“Forth, when she first doth from Benlowmond rinne,Is poore of waters, naked of renowne;But Carron, Allan, Teath and Devon in,Doth grow the greater still the further downe:Till that abounding both in power and fame,She long doth strive to give the sea her name.”

The Romans, adopting, no doubt, the words of the natives, and fitting them to their own pronunciation, called this river“Bodotria.” Tacitus in Agricolam, c. 23. But what was Bodotria, and what was the pronunciation of the nativesthat suggested the name? To this question a Celtic scholar has favoured us with the following answer.“I have been induced to think that the Celts, in comparing this much finer river, the Teath, “the hot or boiling stream,”with the sluggish, moss-banked river which the Forth exhibits from Gartmore to Frew, called the latter Bao-shruth,“insignificant stream.” We observe that Mr P. MacFarlan translates Bath-shruth “smooth slow stream.”Gaelic Vocabulary, Edinburgh, 1815. A question still occurs, how came it to be called Forth? Phorth pronouncedwith the aspirates quiescent, becomes Port. Changing Ph into F, we have Forth; a name applicable to a riveraffording the means of navigation.

E. Robert Sattelmeyer. THOREAU’S READING: A STUDY IN INTELLECTUAL HISTORY WITH BIOGRAPHICAL CATALOGUE. Princeton NJ: Princeton UP, 1988

PERUSE VOLUME V

PARÆNSIS TO PRINCE HENRY

LIST AS PREPARED IN 1988




http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmersV.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/WilliamAlexandersParaensisToPrinceHenry.pdf


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A WEEK: By the law of its birth never to become stagnant, for it hascome out of the clouds, and down the sides of precipices worn in theflood, through beaver-dams broke loose, not splitting but splicing andmending itself, until it found a breathing-place in this low land.There is no danger now that the sun will steal it back to heaven againbefore it reach the sea, for it has a warrant even to recover its owndews into its bosom again with interest at every eve. It was alreadythe water of Squam and Newfound Lake and Winnipiseogee, and WhiteMountain snow dissolved, on which we were floating, and Smith’s andBaker’s and Mad Rivers, and Nashua and Souhegan and Piscataquoag, andSuncook and Soucook and Contoocook, mingled in incalculableproportions, still fluid, yellowish, restless all, with an ancient,ineradicable inclination to the sea. So it flows on down by Lowell andHaverhill, at which last place it first suffers a sea change, and afew masts betray the vicinity of the ocean. Between the towns ofAmesbury and Newbury it is a broad commercial river, from a third tohalf a mile in width, no longer skirted with yellow and crumblingbanks, but backed by high green hills and pastures, with frequent whitebeaches on which the fishermen draw up their nets. I have passed downthis portion of the river in a steamboat, and it was a pleasant sightto watch from its deck the fishermen dragging their seines on thedistant shore, as in pictures of a foreign strand. At intervals youmay meet with a schooner laden with lumber, standing up to Haverhill,or else lying at anchor or aground, waiting for wind or tide; until,at last, you glide under the famous Chain Bridge, and are landed atNewburyport. Thus she who at first was “poore of waters, naked ofrenowne,” having received so many fair tributaries, as was said of theForth,

“Doth grow the greater still, the further downe; Till that abounding both in power and fame, She long doth strive to give the sea her name”;

or if not her name, in this case, at least the impulse of her stream.From the steeples of Newburyport you may review this river stretchingfar up into the country, with many a white sail glancing over it likean inland sea, and behold, as one wrote who was born on its head-waters, “Down out at its mouth, the dark inky main blending with theblue above. Plum Island, its sand ridges scolloping along the horizonlike the sea-serpent, and the distant outline broken by many a tallship, leaning, still, against the sky.”

SIR WILLIAM ALEXANDER





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As King James I of England, James increased his import tax on tobacco by 4,000% and issued

A COUNTERBLASTE TO TOBACCO:

The monarch indicated the contempt in which he held those of his subjects who needed daily to use a drug for mere pleasure, and who were able easily to accept a habit of a bunch of mere unbaptized barbarians. He bewailed the cost of a “precious stink,” and repeated some of the horror stories then being circulated by nonsmokers. Among other things, he reminded his readers that some great tobacco-takers had been found, upon dissection, to have “infected” their “inward parts” with “an oily kind of soot.” King James said if he ever had the Devil to dinner, he’d offer him a pipe. With regards to secondhand smoke, he offered accurately enough that “The wife must either take up smoking or resolve to live in a perpetual stinking torment.” The government of James would be the first to find a tax upon tobacco to be enormously profitable. Trying to stamp out smoking, he first increased taxes on tobacco 4,000%, from 2 pence/pound to 6 shillings,

Smoking is a custom loathsome to the eye, hateful to the nose,harmful to the brain, dangerous to the lungs, and in the black,stinking fume thereof nearest resembling the horrible Stygian smokeof the pit that is bottomless.





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8 pence/pound. That stopped his subjects from buying licit tobacco but dried up the money stream that had been coming into his Treasury. He therefore slashed his tax to 2 shillings/pound and watched as the coin of the realm again poured into his coffers. As a result of the high duty placed upon tobacco (a duty which was continually advanced during King James I’s and Charles I’s reigns over England), a situation would arise similar to our own during our prohibition era. The common phrases and conditions of that era are also applicable to the tobacco trade in London early in the 17th Century; the commodity was “free of duty,” was retailed by smugglers as “right off the ship,” all dandies knew where the best stuff was to be secretly had, domestic tobacco was reworked to give it the semblance of “Spanish,” and the wide advertising which smoking received because of the campaign against it induced many, who had never smoked before, to experiment with the habit.

A PARAENESIS to prince HENRY.Lo here, brave youth, as zeal and duty move,I labour, though in vain, to find some giftBoth worthy of thy place, and of my love ;But whilst myself above myself I lift,And would the best of my inventions prove,I stand to study what should be my drift ;Yet this the greatest approbation brings,Still to a prince to speak of princely things.

When those of the first age that erst did liveIn shadowy woods, or in a humid cave,And taking that which th’ earth not forced did give,Would only pay what nature’s need did crave ;Then beasts of breath such numbers did deprive,That, following Amphion, they did deserts leave,Who with sweet sounds did lead them by the ears,Where mutual force might banish common fears.

Then building walles, they barbarous rites disdain’d,The sweetnesse of society to finde;And to attayne what unity maintain’d,As peace, religion, and a vertuous minde,That so they might have restless humours rayn’d,They straight with lawes their liberty confin’d,

JAMES I





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And of the better sort the best preferr’d,To chastise them against the lawes that err’d.

I wot not if proud minds who first aspir’dOre many realms to make themselves a right ;Or if the world’s disorders so requir’d,That then had put Astræa to the flight ;Or else if some whose vertues were admir’d,And eminent in all the people’s sight,Did move peace-lovers first to reare a throne,And give the keys of life and death to one.

That dignity, when first it did begin,Did grace each province and each little towne ;Forth, when she first doth from Benlowmond rinne,Is poore of waters, naked of renowne,But Carron, Allon, Teith, and Doven in,Doth grow the greater still, the further downe :Till that, abounding both in power and fame,She long doth strive to give the sea her name.

Even so those soveraignties which once were small,Still swallowing up the nearest neighbouring state,With a deluge of men did realmes appall,And thus th’ Egyptian Pharoes first grew great ;Thus did th’ Assyrians make so many thrall,Thus rear’d the Romans their imperiall seat :And thus all those great states to worke have gone,Whose limits and the worlds were all but one.

But I’le not plunge in such a stormy deepe,Which hath no bottome, nor can have no shore,But in the dust will let those ashes sleepe,Which (cloath’d with purple) once th’ Earth did adore ;Of them scarce now a monument wee keepe,Who (thund’ring terrour) curb’d the world before;Their states, which by a number’s ruine stood,Were founded, and confounded both, with bloud.

If I would call antiquity to minde,I, for an endlesse taske might then prepare;But what ? ambition, that was ever blinde,Did get with toyle that which was kept with care,And those great states ’gainst which the world repin’d,Had falls, as famous, as their risings rare :And in all ages it was ever seene,What vertue rais’d, by vice hath ruin’d been.

Yet registers of memorable thingsWould help, great Prince, to make thy judgment sound,Which to the eye a perfect mirror brings,Where all should glass themselves who would be crowned.Read these rare parts that acted were by kings,The strains heroic, and the end renowned ;Which, whilst thou in thy cabinet dost sit,Are worthy to bewitch thy growing wit.

And do not, do not thou the means omit,Times matched with times, what they beget to spy,Since history may lead thee unto it —A pillar whereupon good sp’rits rely,Of time the table, and the nurse of wit,The square of reason, and the mind’s clear eye,Which leads the curious reader through huge harms,Who stands secure whilst looking on alarms.





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Nor is it good o’er brave men’s lives to wander,As one who at each corner stands amazed.No, study like some one thyself to render,Who to the height of glory hath been raised ;So Scipio, Cyrus, Caesar, Alexander,And that great Prince choosed him whom Homer praised.Or make, as which is recent, and best known,Thy father’s life a pattern for thine own.

Yet, marking great men’s lives, this much impairsThe profit which that benefit imparts,While as, transported with preposterous cares,To imitate but superficial parts.Some for themselves frame of their fancies snares,And shew what folly doth o’er-sway their hearts’:For counterfeited things do stains embrace,And all that is affected, hath no grace.

Of outward things who, shallow wits, take hold,Do shew by that they can no higher win.So, to resemble Hercules of old,Mark Antony would bear the lion’s skin ;A brave Athenian’s son, as some have told,Would such a course, though to his scorn, begin,And bent, to seem look like his father dead,Would make himself to lisp, and bow his head.

They who would rightly follow such as those,Must of the better parts apply the powers,As the industrious bee advis’dly goes,To seize upon the best, shun baser flowers.So, where thou dost the greatest worth disclose,To compass that, be prodigal of hours.Seek not to seem, but be. Who be, seem too.Do carelessly, and yet have care to do.

Thou to resemble thy renowned sire,Must not, though some there were, mark trivial things,But matchless virtues, which all minds admire,Whose treasure to his realms great comfort brings.That to attain, thou race of kings ! aspire,Which for thy fame may furnish airy wings ;And like to eaglets thus thou prov’st thy kind,When both like him in body and in mind.

Ah, be not those most miserable souls,Their judgments to refine who never strive,Nor will not look upon the learned scrolls,Which without practice do experience give ;But, whilst base sloth each better care controls,Are dead in ignorance, entombed alive?’Twixt beasts and such the difference is but small —They use not reason, beasts have none at all.

Heavenly treasure which the best sort loves,Life of the soul, reformer of the will,Clear light which from the mind each cloud removes,Pure spring of virtue, physic for each ill,Which in prosperity a bridle proves,And in adversity a pillar still !Of thee the more men get, the more they crave,And think, the more they get, the less they have.

But if that knowledge be required of all,





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What should they do this treasure to obtain,Whom in a throne time travels to install,Where they by it of all things must ordain ?If it make them, who by their birth were thrall,As little kings, whilst o’er themselves they reign,Then it must make, when it hath throughly graced them,Kings more than kings, and like to him who placed them.

This is a grief which all the world bemoans,When those lack judgment who are born to judge,And, like to painted tombs or gilded stones,To troubled souls cannot afford refuge.Kings are their kingdoms’ hearts, which, tainted once,The bodies straight corrupt in which they lodge ;And those by whose example many fallAre guilty of the murder of them all.

The means which best make majesty to standAre laws observed, whilst practice doth direct :The crown the head, the sceptre decks the hand,But only knowledge doth the thoughts erect.Kings should excel all them whom they command,In all the parts which do procure respect;And this a way to what they would, prepares,Not only as thought good, but as known theirs.

Seek not due reverence only to procureWith shows of sovereignty and guards oft lewd ;So Nero did, yet could not so assureThe hated diadem, with blood embrued :Nor as the Persian kings, who lived obscure,And of their subjects rarely would be viewed ;So one of them was secretly o’er-thrown,And in his place the murderer reigned unknown.

No, only goodness doth beget regard,And equity doth greatest glory win ;To plague for vice, and virtue to reward,What they intend, that, bravely, to begin :This is to sovereignty a powerful guard,And makes a prince’s praise o’er all come in :Whose life, his subjects law, cleared by his deeds,More than Justinian’s toils, good order breeds.

All those who o’er unbaptized nations reigned,By barbarous customs sought to foster fear,And with a thousand tyrannies constrainedAll them whom they subdued their yoke to bear ;But those whom great Jehovah hath ordainedAbove the Christians lawful thrones to rear,Must seek by worth to be obeyed for love,So, having reigned below, to reign above.

Happy Henry, who art highly born,Yet beautifi’st thy birth with signs of worth,And, though a child, all childish toys dost scorn,To shew the world thy virtues budding forth,Which may by time this glorious isle adorn,And bring eternal trophies to the north,While as thou dost thy father’s forces lead,And art the hand, whileas he is the head.

Thou, like that gallant thunder-bolt of war,Third Edward’s son, who was so much renowned,Shalt shine in valour as the morning star,





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And plenish with thy praise the peopled round.But like to his, let nought thy fortune mar,Who in his father’s time did die uncrowned !Long live thy sire, so all the world desires,But longer thou, so Nature’s course requires.

And, though time once thee by thy birth-right owesThose sacred honours which men most esteem,Yet flatter not thyself with those fair showsWhich often-times are not such as they seem,Whose burdenous weight, the bearer but o’er-throws,That could before of no such danger deem :Then if not, armed in time, thou make thee strong,Thou dost thyself and many a thousand wrong.

Since thou must manage such a mighty state,Which hath no borders but the seas and skies,Then, even as he who justly was called greatDid, prodigal of pains where fame might rise,With both the parts of worth in worth grow great,As learned as valiant, and as stout as wise,So now let Aristotle lay the ground,Whereon thou after may thy greatness found.

For if, transported with a base repose,Thou did’st, as thou dost not, misspend thy prime,O what a fair occasion would’st thou lose,Which after would thee grieve, though out of time !To virtuous courses now thy thoughts dispose,While fancies are not glued with pleasure’s lime.Those who their youth to suchlike pains engage,Do gain great ease unto their perfect age.

Magnanimous now, with heroic parts,Shew to the world what thou dost aim to be,The more to print in all the people’s heartsThat which thou would’st they should expect of thee ;That so, preoccupied with such deserts,They after may applaud the heavens’ decreeWhen that day comes, which, if it comes too soon,Then thou and all this isle would be undone.

And otherwise what trouble should’st thou find,If first not seized of all thy subjects love,To ply all humours till thy worth have shined,That even most malcontents must it approve ;For else a number would suspend their mind,As doubting what thou afterwards might’st prove,And when a state’s affections thus are cold,Of that advantage foreigners take hold.

I grant in this thy fortune to be good,That art t’ inherit such a glorious crown —As one descended from that sacred blood,Which oft hath filled the world with true renown.The which still on the top of glory stood,And not so much as once seemed to look down —For who thy branches to remembrance brings,Count what he list, he cannot count but kings.

And pardon me, for I must pause a while,And at a thing of right to be admired.Since those from whom thou cam’st reigned in this isle,Lo, now of years even thousands are expired,Yet none could there them thrall, nor thence exile,





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Nor ever failed the line so much desired :The hundred and seventh parent living free,A never-conquered crown may leave to thee.

Nor hath this only happened as by chance ;Of alterations then there had been some.But that brave race which still did worth enhance,Would so presage the thing that was to come,That this united Isle should once advance,And, by the Lion led, all realms o’er-come.For if it kept a little free before,Now, having much, no doubt it must do more.

And though our nations long, I must confess,Did roughly woo before that they could wed,That but endears the union we possess,Whom Neptune both combines within one bed.All ancient injuries this doth redress,And buries that which many a battle bred :Brave discords reconciled, if wrath expire,Do breed the greatest love, and most entire.

Of England’s Mary had it been the chanceTo make King Philip father of a son,The Spaniard’s high designs so to advance,All Albion’s beauties had been quite o’er-run.Or yet if Scotland’s Mary had heired France,Our bondage then had by degrees begun :Of which, if that a stranger hold a part,To take the other that would means impart.

Thus from two dangers we were twice preservedWhen as we seemed without recovery lost,As from their freedom those who freely swerved,And suffered strangers of our bounds to boast.Yet were we for this happy time reserved,And, but to hold it dear, a little crossed,That of the Stewarts the illustrious raceMight, like their minds, a monarchy embrace.

Of that blest progeny, the wellknown worthHath of the people a conceit procured,That from the race it never can go forth,But, long hereditary, is well assured.Thus, son of that great monarch of the north,They to obey are happily inured,O’er whom thou art expected once to reign.To have good ancestors one much doth gain.

He who by tyranny his throne doth rear,And dispossess another of his right,Whose panting heart dare never trust his care,Since still made odious in the people’s sight,Whilst he both hath, and gives, great cause of fear,Is, spoiling all, at last spoiled of the light,And those who are descended of his blood,Ere that they be believed, must long be good.

Yet though we see it is an easy thingFor such a one his state still to maintain,Who, by his birthright born to be a king,Doth with the country’s love the crown obtain,The same doth many to confusion bring,Whilst, for that cause, they care not how they reign.O never throne established was so sure,





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Whose fall a vicious prince might not procure.

Thus do a number to destruction run,And so did Tarquin once abuse his place,Who for the filthy life he had begun,Was barred from Rome, and ruined all his race;So he whose father of no king was son,Was father to no king, but, in disgraceFrom Sicily banished by the people’s hate,Did die at Corinth in an abject state.

And as that monarch merits endless praiseWho by his virtue doth a state acquire,So all the world with scornful eyes may gazeOn their degener’d stems, which might aspire,As having greater power, their power to raise,Yet of their race the ruin do conspire,And for their wrong-spent life with shame do end.Kings chastised once, are not allowed t’ amend.

Those who, reposing on their princely name,Can never give themselves to care for ought,But for their pleasures everything would frame,As all were made for them, and they for nought,Once th’ earth their bodies, men will spoil their fame,Though, whilst they live, all for their ease be wrought ;And those conceits on which they do dependDo but betray their fortunes in the end.

This self-conceit doth so the judgment choke,That when with some aught well succeeds through it,They on the same with great affection look,And scorn th’ advice of others to admit.Thus did brave Charles, the last Burgundian duke,Dear buy a battle purchased by his wit ;By which in him such confidence was bred,That blind presumption to confusion led.

O sacred council, quintessence of souls,Strength of the commonwealth, which chains the fates,And every danger, ere it come, controls,The anchor of great realms, staff of all states !O sure foundation which no tempest fouls,On which are builded the most glorious seats !If ought with those succeed who scorn thy care,It comes by chance, and draws them in a snare.

Thrice happy is that king, who hath the graceTo choose a council whereon to rely,Which loves his person, and respects his place,And, like to Aristides, can cast byAll private grudge, and public cares embrace,Whom no ambition nor base thoughts do tie —And that they be not, to betray their seats,The partial pensioners of foreign states.

None should but those of that grave number boast,Whose lives have long with many virtues shined.As Rome respected the Patricians most,Use nobles first, if to true worth inclined ;Yet so, that unto others seem not lostAll hopes to rise; for else, high hopes resigned,Industrious virtue in her course would tire,If not expecting honour for her hire.





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But such as those a prince should most eschew,Who dignities do curiously affect ;A public charge those who too much pursueSeem to have some particular respect.All should be godly, prudent, secret, true,Of whom a king his council should elect ;And he, whilst they advise of zeal and love,Should not the number, but the best approve.

A great discretion is required to knowWhat way to weigh opinions in his mind;But ah ! this doth the judgment oft o’er-throw,When whilst he comes within himself confined,And of the senate would but make a show,So to confirm that which he hath designed—As one who only hath whereon to restFor councillors, his thoughts, their seat his breast.

But what avails a senate in this sort,Whose power within the capital is pent —A blast of breath which doth for nought import,But mocks the world with a not acted intent?Those are the councils which great states support,Which never are made known but by the event:Not those where wise men matters do propose,And fools thereafter as they please dispose.

Nor is this all which ought to be desiredIn this assembly, since the kingdom’s soul,That, with a knowledge more than rare inspired,A commonwealth, like Plato’s, in a scrollThey can paint forth ; but means are, too, acquiredDisorder’s torrent freely to control,And, arming with authority their lines,To act with justice that which wit designs.

Great empress of this universal frame,The Atlas on whose shoulders states are stayed,Who sway’st the reins which all the world do tame,And mak’st men good by force, with red arrayed!Disorder’s enemy, virgin without blame,Within whose balance good and bad are weighed,O ! sovereign of all virtues, without theeNor peace nor war can entertained be !

Thou from confusion all things hast redeemed.The meeting of Amphictyons had been vain,And all those senates which were most esteemed,Were ’t not by thee their councils crowned remain;And all those laws had but dead letters seemed,Which Solon, or Lycurgus, did ordain,Were ’t not thy sword made all alike to die,And not the weak, while as the strong ’scaped by.

O not without great cause all th’ ancients didPaint magistrates placed to explain the laws,Not having hands, so bribery to forbid,Which them from doing right too oft withdraws;And with a veil the judges’ eyes were hid,Who should not see the party, but the cause.God’s deputies, which his tribunal rear,Should have a patent, not a partial ear.

An lack of justice hath huge evils begun,





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Which by no means could be repaired again ;The famous sire of that most famous son,From whom, while as he sleeping did remain,One did appeal, till that his sleep was done,And whom a widow did discharge to reignBecause he had not time plaints to attend,Did lose his life for such a fault in th’ end.

This justice is the virtue most divineWhich like the King of kings shews kings inclined,Whose sure foundations nought can undermine,If once within a constant breast confined :For otherwise she cannot clearly shine,While as the magistrate oft changing mindIs oft too swift, and sometimes slow to strike,As led by private ends, not still alike.

Use mercy freely, justice as constrained ;This must be done, although that be more dear,And oft the form may make the deed disdained,Whilst justice tastes of tyranny too near.One may be justly, yet in rage arraigned,Whilst reason ruled by passions doth appear :Once Socrates, because o’ercome with ire,Did from correcting one, till calmed, retire.

Those who want means their anger to assuage,Do oft themselves, or others, rob of breath.Fierce Valentinian, surfeiting in rage,By bursting of a vein did bleed to death ;And Theodosus, still but then, thought sage,Caused murder thousands, whilst quite drunk with wrath,Who, to prevent the like opprobrious crime,Made still suspend his edicts for a time.

Of virtuous kings all the actions do proceedForth from the spring of a paternal love,To cherish, or correct, as realms have need ;For which he more than for himself doth move,Who, many a million’s ease that way to breed,Makes sometime some his indignation prove,And like to Codrus, would even death embrace,If for the country’s good and people’s peace.

This lady, that so long unarmed hath strayed,Now holds the balance, and doth draw the sword,And never was more gloriously arrayed,Nor in short time did greater good afford ;The state which to confusion seemed betrayed,And could of nought but blood and wrongs record,Lo! freed from trouble and intestine rage,Doth boast yet to restore the golden age.

Thus doth thy father, generous prince, prepareA way for thee to gain immortal fame,And lays the grounds of greatness with such care,That thou may’st build great works upon the same;Then since thou art to have a field so fair,Whereas thou once mayst eternize thy name,Begin, whileas a greater light thine smothers,And learn to rule thyself ere thou rul’st others.

For still true magnanimity, we find,Both harbour early in a generous breast :To match Miltiades, whose glory shined,





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Themistocles, a child, was robbed of rest ;Yet strive to be a monarch of thy mind,For as to dare great things all else detest ;A generous emulation spurs the sp’rit,Ambition doth abuse the courage quite.

Whilst of illustrious lives thou look’st the story,Abhor those tyrants which still swimmed in blood,And follow those who, to their endless glory,High in their subjects’ love by virtue stood;O ! be like him who on a time was sorryBecause that whilst he chanced to do no goodThere but one day had happened to expire :He was the world’s delight, the heaven’s desire.

But as by mildness some great states do gain,By lenity some lose that which they have.England’s sixth Henry could not live and reign,But, being simple, did huge foils receive:Brave Scipio’s army mutinied in Spain,And, by his meekness bold, their charge did leave.O ! to the state it brings great profit oft,To be sometimes severe, and never soft.

To guide his coursers warily through the sky,Erst Phoebus did his phaeton require,Since from the middle way if swerving by,The heavens would burn or the earth would be on fire.So doth ’twixt two extremes each virtue lieTo which the purest sp’rits ought to aspire;He lives most sure who no extreme doth touch,Nought would too little be, nor yet too much.

Some kings whom all men did in hatred hold,With avaricious thoughts whose breasts were torn,Too basely given to feast their eyes with gold,Used ill and abject means, which brave minds scorn ;Such whilst they only seek, no vice controlled,How they may best their treasuries adorn,Are, though like Crœsus rich, whilst wealth them blinds,Yet still as poor as Irus in their minds.

And some again, as foolish fancies move,Who praise preposterous fondly do pursue,Not liberal, no, but prodigal do prove,Then, whilst their treasures they exhausted view,With subsidies do lose their subject’s love,And spoil whole realms, though but t’ enrich a few,Whilst with authority their pride they cloak,Who ought to die by smoke for selling smoke.

But O ! the prince most loathed in every landIs one all given to lust ; who hardly canFree from some great mishap a long time stand ;For all the world his deeds with hatred scan.Should he who hath the honour to commandThe noblest creature, great God’s image — man,Be to the vilest vice the basest slave,The body’s plague, soul’s death, and honour’s grave ?

That beastly monster who, retired a part,Amongst his concubines began to spin,Took with the habit too a woman’s heartAnd ended that which Ninus did begin.Faint-hearted Xerxes, who did gifts impart





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To them who could devise new ways to sin,Though backed with worlds of men, straight took the flight,And had not courage but to see them fight.

Thus doth soft pleasure but abase the mind,And making one to servile thoughts descend,Doth make the body weak, the judgment blind —An hateful life, an ignominious end ;Where those who did this raging tyrant bindWith virtue’s chains, their triumphs to attend,Have by that means a greater glory gainedThan all the victories which they attained.

The valorous Persian who not once but gaz’dOn faire Panthea’s face to ease his toyls,His glory, by that continency, rais’dMore than by Babylon’s and Lydia’s spoyls;The Macedonian monarch was more prais’dThan for triumphing ore so many soils,That of his greatest foe (though beauteous seene)He chastely entertain’d the captiv’d queene.

Thus have still-gazed-at monarchs much adoWho, all the world’s disorders to redress,Should shine like to the sun, the which still, lo !The more it mounts aloft, doth seem the less;They should with confidence go freely to,And, trusting to their worth, their will express;Not like French Louis th’ Eleventh, who did maintainThat who could not dissemble could not reign.

But still, to guard their state, the strongest barAnd surest refuge in each dangerous stormIs to be found a gallant man of war,With heart that dare attempt, hands to perform.Not that they venture should their state too far,And to each soldiers course their course conform;The skilful pilots at the rudder sit,Let others use their strength, and them their wit.

In Mars his mysteries to gain renownIt gives kings glory, and assures their place ;It breeds them a respect among’st their own,And makes their neighbours fear to lose their grace;Still all those should, who love to keep their crown,In peace prepare for war, in war for peace :For as all fear a prince who dare attempt,The want of courage brings one in contempt.

And, royal off-spring, who mayst high aspire,As one to whom thy birth high hopes assigned,This well becomes the courage of thy sire,Who trains thee up according to thy kind ;He, though the world his prosperous reign admire,In which his subjects such a comfort find,Hath, if the bloody art moved to embrace,That wit then to make war, which now keeps peace.

And O ! how this, dear prince, the people charms,Who flock about thee oft in ravished bands —To see thee young, yet manage so thine arms,Have a mercurial mind and martial hands.This exercise thy tender courage warms ;And still true greatness but by virtue stands ;Agesilaus said no king could be





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More great, unless more virtuous than he.

And though that all of thee great things expect,Thou, as too little, mak’st their hopes ashamed.As he who on Olympus did detectThe famous Theban’s foot, his body framed,By thy beginnings so we may collectHow great thy worth by time may he proclaimed.For who thy actions doth remark, may seeThat there he many Qesars within thee.

Though every state by long experience findsThat greatest blessings prospering peace impartsAs which all subjects to good order binds,Yet breeds this isle, still populous in all parts,Such vigorous bodies and such restless minds,That they disdain to use mechanic arts,And, being haughty, cannot live in rest,Yea, such, when idle, are a dangerous pest.

A prudent Roman told in some few hoursTo Rome’s estate what danger did redoundThen, when they razed the Carthaginian towers,By which, while as they stood, still means were foundWith others’ harms to exercise their powers ;The want whereof their greatness did confound,For when no more with foreign foes embroiled.

Straight by intestine wars the state was spoiled.No, since this soil, which with great sp’rits abounds,Can hardly nurse her nurslings all in peace,Then let us keep her bosom free from wounds,And spend our fury in some foreign place.There is no wall can limit now our bounds,But all the world will need walls in short spaceTo keep our troops from seizing on new thrones.

The marble chair must pass the ocean once.“What fury o’er my judgment doth prevail ?Methinks I see all th’ earth glance with our arms,And groaning Neptune charged with many a sail ;I hear the thundering trumpet sound th’ alarms,Whilst all the neighbouring nations do look pale,Such sudden fear each panting heart disarms,To see those martial minds together gone,The lion and the leopard in one.

I, Henry, hope with this mine eyes to feed,Whilst, ere thou wear’st a crown, thou wear’st a shield,And when thou, making thousands once to bleedThat dare behold thy count’nance and not yield,Stirr’st through the bloody dust a foaming steed.An interested witness in the field,I may amongst those bands thy grace attend,And be thy Homer when the wars do end.

But stay, where fliest thou, Muse, so far astray?And whilst affection doth thy course command,Dar’st thus above thy reach attempt a wayTo court the heir of Albion’s warlike land,Who gotten hath, his generous thoughts to sway,A royal gift out of a royal hand,And hath before his eyes that type of worth,That star of state, that pole which guides the north.





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Yet o’er thy father, lo, such is thy fate,Thou hast this vantage which may profit thee —An orphaned infant, settled in his seat,He greater than himself could never see,Where thou may’st learn by him the art of state,And by another what thyself should’st be,Whilst that which he had only but heard told,In all his course thou practised may’st behold,And this advantage long may’st thou retain,By which to make thee blest the heavens conspire,And labour of his worth to make thy gain,To whose perfections thou may’st once aspire ;When as thou shew’st thyself, whilst thou dost reign,A son held worthy of so great a sire,And with his sceptres and the people’s hearts,Dost still inherit his heroic parts.





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Michael Drayton’s historical poems and IDEA’S MIRROR were reprinted as a single volume, which would during his lifetime through eight editions (there is another volume, POEMS LYRIC AND PASTORAL, undated but probably published during this year, consisting of a collection of this poet’s BALLAD OF AGINCOURT dedicated to “the Cambro-Britans and their Harpe,” some of his smaller odes and eclogues, and a fantastical satire THE MAN IN THE MOONE).

1605





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In about this year Michael Drayton was part of a syndicate that chartered a short-lived company of child actors, “The Children of the King’s Revels.”

1606





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Michael Drayton’s THE LEGEND OF GREAT CROMWEL.

1607




That would be Thomas Cromwell (1485?-1540), Earl of Essex, not his descendant Oliver Cromwell the Protector.


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Michael Drayton was one of the lessees of the new “Whitefriars Theatre.”

1608





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Publication by H. Lownes of the initial 18 books of Michael Drayton’s POLY-OLBION, OR, A CHOROGRAPHICALL DESCRIPTION OF TRACTS, RIUERS, MOUNTAINES, FORESTS, AND OTHER PARTS OF THIS RENOWNED ISLE OF GREAT BRITAINE, with notes provided by the learned John Selden.

DESCRIPTION OF MORNING, BIRDS, AND HUNTING THE DEER

(POLY-OLBION, SONG XIII)3

WHEN Phoebus lifts his head out of the winter’s wave,No sooner doth the earth her flowery bosom brave,At such time as the year brings on the pleasant spring,But hunts-up to the morn the feath’red sylvans sing :And in the lower grove, as on the rising knoll,Upon the highest spray of every mounting pole.Those quiristers are percht with many a speckled breast,Then from her burnisht gate the goodty glitt’ring eastGilds every lofty top, which late the humorous nightBespangled had with pearl, to please the morning’s sight:On which the mirthful quires, with their clear open throats,Unto the joyful morn so strain their warbling notes,That hills and vallies ring, and even the eehoing airSeems all compos’d of sounds, about them every where.The throstel, with shrill sharps ; as purposely he sungT’ awake the lustless sun ; or chiding, that so longHe was in coming forth, that should the thickets thrill ;The woosel near at hand, that hath a golden bill ;As nature him had markt of purpose, t’ let us seeThat from all other birds his tunes should different be:For, with their vocal sounds, they sing to pleasant May;Upon his dulcet pipe the merle doth only play.When in the lower brake, the nightingale hard by,In such lamenting strains the joyful hours doth ply,As though the other birds she to her tunes would draw

1613

3. Henry Thoreau would extract from this into his “Miscellaneous Extracts” notebook.





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And, but that nature (by her all-constraining law)Each bird to her own kind this season doth invite,They else, alone to hear that charmer of the night,(The more to use their ears) their voices sure would spare,That moduleth her tunes so admirably rare,As man to set in parts at first had learn’d of her.To philomel the next, the linnet we prefer;And by that warbling bird, the wood-lark place we then,The red-sparrow, the nope, the red-breast, and the wren.The yellow-pate; which though she hurt the blooming tree,Yet scarce hath any bird a finer pipe than she.And of these chaunting fowls, the goldfinch not behind,That hath so many sorts descending from her kind.The tydy for her notes as delicate as they,The laughing hecco, then the counterfeiting jay,The softer with the shrill (some hid among the leaves,Some in the taller trees, some in the lower greaves)Thus sing away the morn, until the mounting sun,Through thick exhaled fogs his golden head hath run,And through the twisted tops of our close covert creepsTo kiss the gentle shade, this while that sweetly sleeps.And near to these our thicks, the wild and frightful herds,Not hearing other noise but this of chattering birds,Feed fairly on the lawns; both sorts of season’d deer:Here walk the stately red, the freckled fallow there:The bucks and lusty stags amongst the rascals strew’d,As sometime gallant spirits amongst the multitude.Of all the beasts which we for our venerial name,The hart among the rest, the hunter’s noblest game :Of which most princely chase sith none did e’er report,Or by description touch, t’ express that wondrous sport(Yet might have well beseem’d th’ ancients nobler songs)To our old Arclen here, most fitly it belongs:Yet shall she not invoke the muses to her aid ;But thee, Diana bright, a goddess and a maid :In many a huge-grown wood, and many a shady grove,Which oft hast borne thy bow (great huntress, us’d to rove)At many a cruel beast, and with thy darts to pierceThe lion, panther, ounce, the bear, and tiger fierce ;And following thy fleet game, chaste mighty forest’s queen,With thy dishevel’d nymphs attir’d in youthful green,About the lawns hast scour’d, and wastes both far and near,Brave huntress ; but no beast shall prove thy quarries here;Save those the best of chase, the tall and lusty red,The stag for goodly shape, and stateliness of head,Is fitt’st to hunt at force. For whom, when with his houndsThe labouring hunter tufts the thick unbarbed groundsWhere harbour’d is the hart ; there often from his feedThe dogs of him do find ; or thorough skilful heed,The huntsman by his slot, or breaking earth, perceives,Or ent’ring of the thick by pressing of the greaves,Where he had gone to lodge. Now when the hart doth hearThe often-bellowing hounds to vent his secret leir,He rousing rusheth out, and through the brakes doth drive,As though up by the roots the bushes he would rive.And through the curnb’rous thicks, as fearfully he makes,He with his branched head the tender saplings shakes,That sprinkling their moist pearl do seem for him to weep ;When after goes the cry, with yellings loud and deep.That all the forest rings, and every neighbouring place :And there is not a hound but falleth to the chase.Rechating with his horn, which then the hunter cheers,Whilst still the lusty stag his high-palm’d head up bears,His body showing state, with unbent knees upright,Expressing from all beasts, his courage in his flight.





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But when th’ approaching foes still following he perceives,That he his speed must trust, his usual walk he leaves :And o’er the champain flies : which when th* assembly find,Each follows, as his horse were footed with the wind.But being then imbost, the noble stately deerWhen he hath gotten ground (the kennel cast arrear)Doth beat the brooks and ponds for sweet refreshing soil :That serving not, then proves if he his scent can foil,And makes amongst the herds, and flocks of shag-wool’d sheep,Them frighting from the guard of those who had their keep.But when as all his shifts his safety still denies,Put quite out of his walk, the ways and fallows tries-Whom when the ploughman meets, his team he letteth standT’ assail him with his goad : so with his hook in hand,The shepherd him pursues, and to his dog doth hallo :When, with tempestuous speed, the hounds and huntsmen follow jUntil the noble deer through toil bereav’d of strength,His long and sinewy legs then failing him at length,The villages attempts, enrag’d, not giving wayTo any thing he meets now at his sad decay.The cruel ravenous hounds and bloody hunters near,This noblest beast of chase, that vainly doth but fear,Some bank or quickset finds : to which his haunch oppos’d,He turns upon his foes, that soon have him inclos’d.The churlish-throated hounds then holding him at bay,And as their cruel fangs on his harsh skin they lay,With his sharp-pointed head he dealeth deadly wounds.The hunter, coming in to help his wearied hounds,He desperately assails ; until opprest by force,He who the mourner is to his own dying corse,Upon the ruthless earth his precious tears lets fall.





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Publication of a collection of ELEGIES of which a couple were by Michael Drayton.

1618





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Michael Drayton’s ODES, published with a portrait of the poet by William Hole.

TO HIS COY LOVE.I PRAY thee, love, love me no more,Call home the heart you gave me,I but in vain that saint adore,That can, but will not save me :These poor half kisses kill me quite ;Was ever man thus served ?Amidst an ocean of delight,For pleasure to be starved.Shew me no more those snowy breasts,With azure rivers branched,Where whilst mine eye with plenty feasts,Yet is my thirst not stanched.O Tantalus, thy pains ne’er tell,By me thou art prevented ;’Tis nothing to be plagu’d in hell,But thus in heaven tormented.Clip me no more in those dear arms,Nor thy life’s comfort call me ;O, these are but too powerful charms,And do but more enthral me.But see how patient I am grown,In all this coil about thee ;Come, nice thing, let thy heart alone,I cannot live without thee.

1619





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Finally Michael Drayton was able to cut a deal with a publisher willing to undertake a 2d volume of his massive POLY-OLBION.

1622





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Michael Drayton’s unfortunate translation into epic ottava rima of his BALLAD OF AGINCOURT appeared in print as THE BATTAILE OF AGINCOURT (also, THE MISERIES OF QUEENE MARGARITE, WIFE OF HENRY VI, NIMPHIDIA, THE COURT OF FAERY, THE QUEST OF CINTHIA, THE SHEPHERD’S SIRENA, and THE MOONE-CALFE).

Also in this his 63d year of life, his “To my most dearely-loued friend HENERY REYNOLDS Esquire, of Poets & Poesie,”4 an effort which would be mentioned by Henry Thoreau in A WEEK:

My dearely loued friend how oft haue we,

1627

4. Henry Reynolds was a poet and literary critic employed as a schoolteacher in Suffolk, about whose life very little is known (we do know him to have been preparing an English translation of Torquato Tasso’s AMINTA ENGLISHT).

THE BATTAILE OF AGINCOVRT




http://www.gutenberg.org/files/27770/27770-h/27770-h.htm


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In winter evenings (meaning to be free,)To some well-chosen place vs’d to retire;And there with moderate meate, and wine, and fire,Haue past the howres contentedly with chat,Now talk of this, and then discours’d of that,Spoke our owne verses ’twixt our selves, if notOther mens lines, which we by chance had got,Or some Stage pieces famous long before,Of which your happy memory had store;And I remember you much pleased were,Of those who liued long agoe to heare,As well as of those, of these latter times,Who have inricht our language with their rimes,And in succession, how still vp they grew,Which is the subiect, that I now pursue;For from my cradle, (you must know that) I,Was still inclin’d to noble Poesie,And when that once Pueriles I had read,And newly had my Cato construed,In my small selfe I greatly marueil’d then,Amonst all other, what strange kinde of menThese Poets were; And pleased with the name,To my milde Tutor merrily I came,(For I was then a proper goodly page,Much like a Pigmy, scarse ten yeares of age)Clasping my slender armes about his thigh.O my deare master! cannot you (quoth I)Make me a Poet, doe it if you can,And you shall see, Ile quickly bee a man,Who me thus answered smiling, boy quoth he,If you’le not play the wag, but I may seeYou ply your learning, I will shortly readSome Poets to you; Phoebus be my speed,Too’t hard went I, when shortly he began,And first read to me honest Mantuan,Then Virgils Eglogues, being entred thus,Me thought I straight had mounted Pegasus,And in his full Careere could make him stop,And bound vpon Parnassus’ by-clift top.I scornd your ballet then though it were doneAnd had for Finis, William Elderton.But soft, in sporting with this childish iest,I from my subiect haue too long digrest,Then to the matter that we tooke in hand,Ioue and Apollo for the Muses stand. Then noble Chaucer, in those former times,The first inrich’d our English with his rimes,And was the first of ours, that euer brake,Into the Muses treasure, and first spakeIn weighty numbers, deluing in the MineOf perfect knowledge, which he could refine,And coyne for currant, and as much as thenThe English language could expresse to men,He made it doe; and by his wondrous skill,Gaue vs much light from his abundant quill. And honest Gower, who in respect of him,Had only sipt at Aganippas brimme,And though in yeares this last was him before,Yet fell he far short of the others store. When after those, foure ages very neare,They with the Muses which conuersed, wereThat Princely Surrey, early in the timeOf the Eight Henry, who was then the primeOf Englands noble youth; with him there cameWyat; with reuerence whom we still doe name





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Amongst our Poets, Brian had a shareWith the two former, which accompted areThat times best makers, and the authors wereOf those small poems, which the title beare,Of songs and sonnets, wherein oft they hitOn many dainty passages of wit. Gascoine and Churchyard after them againeIn the beginning of Eliza’s raine,Accoumpted were great Meterers many a day,But not inspired with braue fier, had theyLiu’d but a little longer, they had seene,Their works before them to have buried beene. Graue morrall Spencer after these came onThen whom I am perswaded there was noneSince the blind Bard his Iliads vp did make,Fitter a taske like that to vndertake,To set downe boldly, brauely to inuent,In all high knowledge, surely excellent. The noble Sidney with this last arose,That Heroe for numbers, and for Prose.That throughly pac’d our language as to show,The plenteous English hand in hand might goeWith Greek or Latine, and did first reduceOur tongue from Lillies writing then in vse;Talking of Stones, Stars, Plants, of fishes, Flyes,Playing with words, and idle Similies,As th’ English, Apes and very Zanies be,Of euery thing, that they doe heare and see,So imitating his ridiculous tricks,They spake and writ, all like meere lunatiques. Then Warner though his lines were not so trim’d,Nor yet his Poem so exactly lim’dAnd neatly ioynted, but the Criticke mayEasily reprooue him, yet thus let me say;For my old friend, some passages there beIn him, which I protest haue taken me,With almost wonder, so fine, cleere, and newAs yet they haue bin equalled by few. Neat Marlow bathed in the Thespian springsHad in him those braue translunary things,That the first Poets had, his raptures were,All ayre, and fire, which made his verses cleere,For that fine madnes still he did retaine,Which rightly should possesse a Poets braine. And surely Nashe, though he a Proser wereA branch of Lawrell yet deserues to beare,Sharply Satirick was he, and that wayHe went, since that his being, to this dayFew haue attempted, and I surely thinkeThose wordes shall hardly be set downe with inke;Shall scorch and blast, so as his could, where he,Would inflict vengeance, and be it said of thee,Shakespeare, thou hadst as smooth a Comicke vaine,Fitting the socke, and in thy naturall braine,As strong conception, and as Cleere a rage,As any one that trafiqu’d with the stage. Amongst these Samuel Daniel, whom if IMay spake of, but to sensure doe denie,Onely haue heard some wisemen him rehearse,To be too much Historian in verse;His rimes were smooth, his meeters well did closeBut yet his maner better fitted prose:Next these, learn’d Johnson, in this List I bring,Who had drunke deepe of the Pierian spring,Whose knowledge did him worthily prefer,





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And long was Lord here of the Theater,Who in opinion made our learn’st to sticke,Whether in Poems rightly dramatique,Strong Seneca or Plautus, he or they,Should beare the Buskin, or the Socke away.Others againe here liued in my dayes,That haue of vs deserued no lesse praiseFor their translations, then the daintiest witThat on Parnassus thinks, he highst doth sit,And for a chaire may mongst the Muses call,As the most curious maker of them all;As reuerent Chapman, who hath brought to vs,Musæus, Homer and HesiodusOut of the Greeke; and by his skill hath reardThem to that height, and to our tongue endear’d,That were those Poets at this day aliue,To see their bookes thus with vs to suruiue,They would think, hauing neglected them so long,They had bin written in the English tongue. And Siluester who from the French more weake,Made Bartas of his sixe dayes labour speakeIn naturall English, who, had he there stayd,He had done well, and neuer had bewraidHis owne inuention, to haue bin so pooreWho still wrote lesse, in striuing to write more. Then dainty Sands that hath to English done,Smooth sliding Ouid, and hath made him runWith so much sweetnesse and vnusuall grace,As though the neatnesse of the English pace,Should tell the Ietting Lattine that it cameBut slowly after, as though stiff and lame. So Scotland sent vs hither, for our owneThat man, whose name I euer would haue knowne,To stand by mine, that most ingenious knight,My Alexander, to whom in his right,I want extreamely, yet in speaking thusI doe but shew the loue, that was twixt vs,And not his numbers which were braue and hie,So like his mind, was his clear Poesie,And my deare Drummond to whom much I oweFor his much loue, and proud I was to know,His poesie, for which two worthy men,I Menstry still shall loue, and Hauthorne-den.Then the two Beamounts and my Browne arose,My deare companions whom I freely choseMy bosome friends; and in their seuerall wayes,Rightly borne Poets, and in these last dayes,Men of much note, and no lesse nobler parts,Such as haue freely tould to me their hearts,As I have mine to them; but if you shallSay in your knowledge, that these be not allHaue writ in numbers, be inform’d that IOnly my selfe, to these few men doe tye,Whose works oft printed, set on euery post,To publique censure subiect haue bin most;For such whose poems, be they nere so rare,In priuate chambers, that incloistered are,And by transcription daintyly must goe;As though the world vnworthy were to know,Their rich composures, let those men that keepeThese wonderous reliques in their iudgement deepe;And cry them vp so, let such Peeces beeSpoke of by those that shall come after me,I passe not for them: nor doe meane to run,In quest of these, that them applause haue wonne,





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Vpon our Stages in these latter dayes,That are so many, let them haue their bayesThat doe deserue it; let those wits that hauntThose publique circuits, let them freely chauntTheir fine Composures, and their praise pursueAnd so my deare friend, for this time adue.

A WEEK: The world is a strange place for a playhouse to standwithin it. Old Drayton thought that a man that lived here, andwould be a poet, for instance, should have in him certain “brave,translunary things,” and a “fine madness” should possess hisbrain. Certainly it were as well, that he might be up to theoccasion. That is a superfluous wonder, which Dr. Johnsonexpresses at the assertion of Sir Thomas Browne that “his lifehas been a miracle of thirty years, which to relate, were nothistory but a piece of poetry, and would sound like a fable.”The wonder is, rather, that all men do not assert as much. Thatwould be a rare praise, if it were true, which was addressed toFrancis Beaumont, — “Spectators sate part in your tragedies.”Think what a mean and wretched place this world is; that half thetime we have to light a lamp that we may see to live in it. Thisis half our life. Who would undertake the enterprise if it wereall? And, pray, what more has day to offer? A lamp that burns moreclear, a purer oil, say winter-strained, that so we may pursueour idleness with less obstruction. Bribed with a little sunlightand a few prismatic tints, we bless our Maker, and stave off hiswrath with hymns.

MICHAEL DRAYTON

DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON

PEOPLE OFA WEEK




http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/WEEK/PeopleMentionedInWEEK.pdf


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The last of Michael Drayton’s voluminous publications, The MVSES’ ELIZIVM, LATELY DIFCOUERED, BY A NEW WAY OVER PARNASSVS. THE PAFFAGES THEREIN, BEING THE FUBIECT OF TEN FUNDRY NYMPHALLS, LEADING THREE DIUINE POEMS, NOAHS FLOUD. MOSES, HIS BIRTH AND MIRACLES. DAVID AND GOLIA (London, Printed by Thomas harper, for Iohn Waterfon, and are to be fold at the figne of the Crowne in Pauls Church-yard).

1630

THE MUSES’ ELIZIUM




http://books.google.com/books?id=zgozAQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false


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Michael Drayton died, probably in London, probably toward the end of the year, still a bachelor. The body, in Westminster Abbey, would have a monument placed over it by the Countess of Dorset, the memorial lines of which have been attributed to Ben Jonson.

1631





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Alexander Chalmers’s THE WORKS OF THE ENGLISH POETS, FROM CHAUCER TO COWPER; INCLUDING THE SERIES EDITED WITH PREFACES, BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL, BY DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON: AND THE MOST APPROVED TRANSLATIONS, a revised and expanded version of Dr. Johnson’s 1779-1781 LIVES OF THE POETS, began to come across the London presses of C. Wittingham. It would amount to 21 volumes and the printing would require until 1814 to be complete. According to the Preface, this massive thingie was “a work professing to be a Body of the Standard English Poets”5:

1810

5. When the massive collection would come finally to be reviewed in July 1814, the reviewer would, on the basis of Chalmers’s selection of poems and poets, broadly denounce this editor as incompetent.





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PERUSE VOLUME I

PERUSE VOLUME III

PERUSE VOLUME IV

PERUSE VOLUME V

PERUSE VOLUME VI

PERUSE VOLUME VII

PERUSE VOLUME VIII

PERUSE VOLUME IX

PERUSE VOLUME X

PERUSE VOLUME XI

PERUSE VOLUME XII

PERUSE VOLUME XIII

PERUSE VOLUME XIV

PERUSE VOLUME XV

PERUSE VOLUME XVI

PERUSE VOLUME XVII

PERUSE VOLUME XVIII

PERUSE VOLUME XIX

PERUSE VOLUME XX

PERUSE VOLUME XXI




http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmersI.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmersIII.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmersIV.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmersV.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmersVI.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmersVII.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmersVIII.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmersIX.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmersX.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmersXI.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmersXII.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmersXIII.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmersXIV.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmersXV.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmersXVI.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmersXVII.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmersXVIII.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmersXIX.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmersXX.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmersXXI.pdf


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THE ENGLISH POETS:Joseph Addison, Akenside; Armstrong; Beattie; Francis Beaumont;

PEOPLE OFWALDEN

WALDEN: Breed’s hut was standing only a dozen years ago, thoughit had long been unoccupied. It was about the size of mine. Itwas set on fire by mischievous boys, one Election night, if I donot mistake. I lived on the edge of the village then, and had justlost myself over Davenant’s Gondibert, that winter that I laboredwith a lethargy, –which, by the way, I never knew whether toregard as a family complaint, having an uncle who goes to sleepshaving himself, and is obliged to sprout potatoes in a cellarSundays, in order to keep awake and keep the Sabbath, or as theconsequence of my attempt to read Chalmers’ collection of Englishpoetry without skipping. It fairly overcame my Nervii. I had justsunk my head on this when the bells rung fire, and in hot hastethe engines rolled that way, led by a straggling troop of men andboys, and I among the foremost, for I had leaped the brook.We thought it was far south over the woods, –we who had run tofires before,– barn, shop, or dwelling-house, or all together.“It’s Baker’s barn,” cried one. “It is the Codman Place,” affirmedanother. And then fresh sparks went up above the wood, as if theroof fell in, and we all shouted “Concord to the rescue!” Wagonsshot past with furious speed and crushing loads, bearing,perchance, among the rest, the agent of the Insurance Company,who was bound to go however far; and ever and anon the engine belltinkled behind, more slow and sure, and rearmost of all, as itwas afterward whispered, came they who set the fire and gave thealarm. Thus we kept on like true idealists, rejecting the evidenceof our senses, until at a turn in the road we heard crackling andactually felt the heat of the fire from over the wall, andrealized, alas! that we were there. The very nearness of the firebut cooled our ardor. At first we thought to throw a frog-pond onto it; but concluded to let it burn, it was so far gone and soworthless. So we stood round our engine, jostled one another,expressed our sentiments through speaking trumpets, or in lowertone referred to the great conflagrations which the world haswitness, including Bascom’s shop, and, between ourselves wethought that, were we there in season with our “tub”, and a fullfrog-pond by, we could turn that threatened last and universalone into another flood. We finally retreated without doing anymischief, –returned to sleep and Gondibert. But as for Gondibert,I would except that passage in the preface about wit being thesoul’s powder, –“but most of mankind are strangers to wit,as Indians are to powder.”

INSURANCE

NARCOLEPSY

ALEXANDER CHALMERS

BASCOM & COLE




http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/WALDEN/PeopleOfWALDEN.pdf


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Sir J. Beaumont; Blacklock; Blackmore; Robert Blair; Boyse;Brome; Brooke; Broome; Sir Thomas Browne; Charles Butler;George Gordon, Lord Byron; Cambridge; Thomas Carew; Cartwright;Cawthorne; Chatterton; Geoffrey Chaucer; Churchill;William Collins; William Congreve; Cooper; Corbett;Charles Cotton; Dr. Cotton; Abraham Cowley; William Cowper;Crashaw; Cunningham; Daniel; William Davenant; Davies;Sir John Denham; Dodsley; John Donne; Dorset; Michael Drayton;Sir William Drummond; John Dryden; Duke; Dyer; Falconer; Fawkes;Fenton; Giles Fletcher; John Fletcher; Garth; Gascoigne; Gay;Glover; Goldsmith; Gower; Grainger; Thomas Gray; Green;William Habington; Halifax; William Hall; Hammond; Harte; Hughes;Jago; Jenyns; Dr. Samuel Johnson; Jones; Ben Jonson; King;Langhorne; Lansdowne; Lloyd; Logan; Lovibond; Lyttelton; Mallett;Mason; William Julias Mickle; John Milton; Thomas Moore; Otway;Parnell; A. Phillips; J. Phillips; Pitt; Pomfret; Alexander Pope;Prior; Rochester; Roscommon; Rowe; Savage; Sir Walter Scott;William Shakespeare; Sheffield; Shenstone; Sherburne; Skelton;Smart; Smith; Somerville; Edmund Spenser; Sprat; Stepney;Stirling; Suckling; Surrey; Jonathan Swift; James Thomson; W.Thomson; Tickell; Turberville; Waller; Walsh; Warner; J. Warton;T. Warton; Watts; West; P. Whitehead; W. Whitehead; Wilkie;Wyatt; Yalden; Arthur Young.

TRANSLATIONS: Alexander Pope’s Iliad & Odyssey; John Dryden’s Virgil & Juvenal;Pitt’s Aeneid & Vida; Francis’ Horace; Rowe’s Lucan; Grainger’sAlbius Tibullus; Fawkes’ Theocritus, Apollonius Rhodius,Coluthus, Anacreon, Sappho, Bion and Moschus, Museus; Garth’sOvid; Lewis’ Statius; Cooke’s Hesiod; Hoole’s Ariosto & Tasso;William Julias Mickle’s Lusiad.

COMMENTARY:William Julias Mickle’s “Inquiry into the Religion Tenets andPhilosophy of the Bramins,” which Thoreau encountered in 1841 inVolume 21 (pages 713-33).




http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmers_ChaucerPoetry.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmers_Daniel_I.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmers_Denham.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmers_Donne.pdf



http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmers_Drummond.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmers_Dryden.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmers_Dryden.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmers_Gascoigne.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmers_Gascoigne.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmers_Gower.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmers_Skelton.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmers_Skelton.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmers_Spenser.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmers_Spenser.pdf

http://www.kouroo.info/kouroo/transclusions/18/10/1810_AlexanderChalmers_Turberville.pdf




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June 19, Monday: Frederick Douglass delivered an anti-slavery lecture in Fall River, Massachusetts.

June 19th: Marlowe had many of the qualities of a great poet. He had the poetic madness, as Draytonjustly says — And we read his Dr Faustus — Dido Queen of Carthage — and Hero & Leander with greatpleasure. Especially the last. He was even worthy in some respects to preceeded Shakespeare. Such a poet seemsto have run to waste mainly for want of seclusion and solitude — as if mere pause and deliberation would haveadded a new element of greatness to his poetry—In his unquestionable fine and heroic tone it seems as if he had the raresst part of genius — and education couldhave added the rest. I do not know but the Hero and Leander is purely imagined throughout— It can be read so— which is the best evidence — it is like Shakspere’s Venus and Adonis — in this — and tells much better forthe author’s character than the anecdotes that survive.

{One-half page blank, 252 pages missing}

Tonight while I am arranging these sprigs of white cedar in my scrap-book I am reminded by their fragrance ofthe pines and hemlocks which over hang the river in my native town. I love the whole race of pines Theyaddress my senses with the authority of a revelation — The pine is a sacred treeMen no where live as yet a natural life. THe poets even have not described it. Man’s life must be of equalsimplicity and sincerity with nature, and his action’s harmonize with her grandeur and beauty. I do not know ofany reformer who is ultra plus ne one unworthy to speak with critical reserve on this subjects.Shall we suffer a single action to be mean? We have now our sabbaths and our moments of inspiration — as ifthese could be too protracted or constant. I see plainly that my own meanness is that which which robs me ofmy birth-right — and shuts me out from the society of the gods.The life of men will ere long be of such purity and innocence, that it will deserve to have the sun to light it byday and the moon by night.— to be ushered in by the freshness and melody of spring — to be entertained bythe luxuriance and vigor of summer — and matured and solaced by the hues and dignity of Autumn.

[See also the 1837-1847 volume of Thoreau’s Journal: We read Marlowe as so much poetical pabulum. It isfood for poets, water from the Castalian Spring, some of the atmosphere of Parnassus, raw and crude indeed,and at times breezy, but pure and bracing. Few have so rich a phrase! He had drunk deep of the Pierian Spring,though not deep enough, and had that fine madness, as Drayton says,

“Which justly should possess a poet’s brain.”6

We read his “Dr. Faustus,” “Dido, Queen of Carthage,” and “Hero & Leander,” especially the last, without beingwearied. He had many of the qualities of a great poet, and was in some degree worthy to precede Shakespeare.But he seems to have run to waste for want of seclusion and solitude, as if mere pause and deliberation wouldhave added a new element of greatness to his poetry. In his unquestionably fine, heroic tone it would seem as ifhe had the rarest part of genius, and education could have added the rest. The “Hero and Leander” tells betterfor his character than the anecdotes which survive.]

“MAGISTERIAL HISTORY” IS FABULATION: HISTORY IS CHRONOLOGY

1843

6. Michael Drayton’s “To My Dearly Loved Friend, Henry Reynolds....”

MICHAEL DRAYTON






HDT WHAT? INDEX


COPYRIGHT NOTICE: In addition to the property of others,such as extensive quotations and reproductions ofimages, this “read-only” computer file contains a greatdeal of special work product of Austin Meredith,copyright 2014. Access to these interim materials willeventually be offered for a fee in order to recoup someof the costs of preparation. My hypercontext buttoninvention which, instead of creating a hypertext leapthrough hyperspace —resulting in navigation problems—allows for an utter alteration of the context withinwhich one is experiencing a specific content alreadybeing viewed, is claimed as proprietary to AustinMeredith — and therefore freely available for use byall. Limited permission to copy such files, or anymaterial from such files, must be obtained in advancein writing from the “Stack of the Artist of Kouroo”Project, 833 Berkeley St., Durham NC 27705. Pleasecontact the project at <[email protected]>.

Prepared: September 19, 2014

“It’s all now you see. Yesterday won’t be over untiltomorrow and tomorrow began ten thousand years ago.”

– Remark by character “Garin Stevens”in William Faulkner’s INTRUDER IN THE DUST




mailto:[email protected]

Well, tomorrow is such and such a date and so it began on that date in like 8000BC? Why 8000BC, because it was the beginning of the current interglacial -- or what?

Bearing in mind that this is America, "where everything belongs," the primary intent of such a notice is to prevent some person or corporate entity from misappropriating the materials and sequestering them as property for censorship or for profit.


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ARRGH AUTOMATED RESEARCH REPORT

GENERATION HOTLINE

This stuff presumably looks to you as if it were generated by ahuman. Such is not the case. Instead, someone has requested thatwe pull it out of the hat of a pirate who has grown out of theshoulder of our pet parrot “Laura” (as above). What thesechronological lists are: they are research reports compiled byARRGH algorithms out of a database of modules which we term theKouroo Contexture (this is data mining). To respond to such arequest for information we merely push a button.





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Commonly, the first output of the algorithm has obviousdeficiencies and we need to go back into the modules stored inthe contexture and do a minor amount of tweaking, and then weneed to punch that button again and recompile the chronology —but there is nothing here that remotely resembles the ordinary“writerly” process you know and love. As the contents of thisoriginating contexture improve, and as the programming improves,and as funding becomes available (to date no funding whateverhas been needed in the creation of this facility, the entireoperation being run out of pocket change) we expect a diminishedneed to do such tweaking and recompiling, and we fully expectto achieve a simulation of a generous and untiring roboticresearch librarian. Onward and upward in this brave new world.

First come first serve. There is no charge.Place requests with <[email protected]>. Arrgh.




mailto:[email protected]

PEOPLE MENTIONED IN A WEEK - Kouroo

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