affairs, with the after-claps of fortune, shall never lament to die young. Who knows what alterations and sudden disasters in outward estate or inward contentments, in this wilderness of the world, might have befallen him who dieth young, if he had lived to be old? Heaven foreknowing imminent harms, taketh those which it loves to itself before they fall forth. Death in youth is like the leaving a superfluous feast before the drunken cups be presented. Pure, and (if we may so say) virgin souls carry their bodies with no small agonies, and delight not to remain long in the dregs of human corruption, still burning with a desire to turn back to the place of their rest; for this world is their inn, and not their home. That which may fall forth every hour, cannot fall out of time. Life is a journey on a dusty way, the furthest rest is Death, in this some go more heavily burdened than others: Swift and active pilgrims come to the end of it in the morning or at noon, which tortoise-paced wretches, clogged with the fragmentary rubbish of this world, scarce with great travail crawl unto at midnight. Days are not to be esteemed after the number of them, but after the goodness. More compass maketh not a sphere more complete, but as round is a little as a large ring; nor is that musician most praiseworthy who hath longest played, but he in measured accents who hath made sweetest melody. To live long hath often been a let to live well. Muse not how many years thou mightest have enjoyed life, but how sooner thou mightest have losed it; neither grudge so much that it is no better, as comfort thyself that it hath been no worse. Let it suffice that thou hast lived till this day, and (after the course of this world) not for nought thou hast had some smiles of fortune, favours of the worthiest, some friends, and thou hast never been disfavoured of Heaven. As those images were pourtrayed in my mind (the morning star now almost arising in the East), I found my thoughts in a mild and quiet calm; and not long after, my senses, one by one, forgetting their uses, began to give themselves over to rest, leaving me in a still and peaceable sleep, if sleep it may be called, when the mind awaking is carried with free wings from our fleshly bondage. For heavy lids had not long covered their lights, when I thought, nay sure, I was, where I might discern all in this great All, the large compass of the rolling circles, the brightness and continual motion of those rubies of the night, which by their distance here below cannot be perceived; the silver-countenance of the wandering Moon, shining by another's light; the hanging of the Earth, as environed with a girdle of crystal; the Sun enthronised in the midst of the planets, eye of the heavens, and gem of this precious ring, the World. But whilst with wonder and amazement I gazed on those celestial splendours and the beaming lamps of that glorious temple, like a poor country man brought from his solitary mountains and flocks to behold the magnificence of some great city, there was presented to my sight a Man, as in the spring of years, with that self-same grace, comely features, and majestic look, which the late was wont to have; on whom I had no sooner set mine eyes, when (like one planet-stricken) I became amazed: But he, with a mild demeanour, and voice surpassing all human sweetness, appeared (methought) to say: Who "What is it doth thus anguish and trouble thee? Is it the remembrance of Death, the last period of wretchedness, and entry to these happy places; the lantern which lighteneth men to see the mystery of the blessedness of Spirits, and that glory which transcendith the curtain of things visible? Is thy fortune below on that dark globe (which scarce by the smallness of it appeareth here) so great, that thou are heart-broken and dejected to leave it? What if thou wert to leave behind thee a so glorious in the eye of the world (yet but a mote of dust encircled with a pond) as that of mine, so loving- such great hopes, these had been apparent occasions for lamenting; and but apparent. Dost thou think thou leav'st life too soon? Death is best young. Things fair and excellent are not of long endurance upon earth. liveth well liveth long. Souls most beloved of their Maker are soonest relieved from their bleeding cares of life, and most swiftly wafted through the surges of human miseries. Opinion, that great enchantress and poiser of things, not as they are but as they seem, hath not in anything more than in the conceit of Death, abused man: who must not measure himself, and esteem his estate, after his earthly being, which is but as a dream; for, though he be born on the earth, he is not born for the earth, more than the embryo for the mother's womb. It complaineth to be delivered of its bands, and to come to the light of this world; and man bewaileth to be loosed from the chains with which he is fettered in that valley of vanities." (From A Cypress Grove.) 1 GEORGE HERBERT [George Herbert (1593-1633), the fifth of seven sons of Richard Herbert, of the famous Monmouthshire family of that name, was educated at Westminster School, and Trinity College, Cambridge, where he graduated in 1611, and became Fellow in 1615. In 1619 he was elected Public Orator for the University, in the discharge of the duties of which office he attracted the attention of King James, who appointed him to a sinecure office of £120 a year. The death of many friends, and later of the king, having weakened his position at court, and his health becoming increasingly feeble, he took Holy Orders, the profession for which his character and talents from the first pointed him out. In 1629 he married, and in 1630 was inducted to the living of Bemerton, near Salisbury, where he continued until his death three years later. During these three years, he wrote his Country Parson, which was not, however, printed until after his death.] IN his Life of George Herbert, Izaak Walton informs us that when Herbert delivered his first sermon at Bemerton, after his induction to that living, the discourse was "after a most florid manner, both with great learning and eloquence"; but that at the close he warned his congregation that it "should not be his constant way of preaching . . but that for their sakes his language and his expressions should be more plain and practical in his future sermons." As far as I am aware, this opening sermon was never printed and given to the world, so that it is impossible to compare Herbert's style when "eloquent" with that other style which was plain and practical; but this is certain, that the only prose work of Herbert's of any length that we possess, his Country Parson, partakes of the latter character. In fact, when we recall the incessant effort after simile and analogy in his poems, this prose treatise is curiously simple and straightforward, and owes its effectiveness to just these qualities. The later euphuism was indeed abundantly conspicuous in Herbert's verse, but it was the euphuism of thought and fancy, rather than of style. His similes are often as far fetched as those of Lovelace or Cowley, but they are rarely, if ever, grotesque. They are, in fact, chastened and kept in check by a genuine earnestness and religious power which are never absent. Apart from the thoughts expressed, the literary diction of Herbert's verse is as free from ornament as Wordsworth's. He is rarely, if ever, florid or rhetorical. The taste of the age for conceits finds its gratification in other ways—in puns and quibbles, as well as in tricks of construction, such as verses arranged in the shape of wings or altars, or in mechanical ingenuity like the following— What open force or hidden CHARM Can blast my fruit or bring me HARM No trace of such misapplied cleverness is to be found in Herbert's prose; and we cannot doubt that the same restraining force was at work, and for the same reasons, as dictates the style of his later Bemerton sermons. Not for the first or last time in our literature was it to be shown that the euphuistic tendency is killed when the writer begins to think more of his topic than of himself. The style of Herbert's simple prose treatise was no doubt further determined by the form he chose for it. Its complete title is A Priest to the Temple, or The Country Parson, his Character and Rule of Holy Life. The word "Character," printed in large capitals, was perhaps meant to convey that the "Characters" of Theophrastus was in the author's mind. He may have wished to suggest that the acts and habits of the Country Parson were as well worth record and analysis as some of the more frivolous types of the Greek philosopher. Moreover, to write "Characters," had become a fashion. Overbury's had appeared after his death in 1614, and Earle's Microcosmography in 1628. For the rest, there are traces here and there of the antithesis, and the balanced sentence of Lyly and the earlier euphuists, which is only saying that the dexterous manipulation of language was still a little too evident, and that style, which means the perfection of such skill, had not yet fully learned the ars celare artem. But throughout, the style is what may be called "well-bred,” and the native sweetness and courtesy of George Herbert are reflected even in the choice and arrangement of his words and phrases. ALFRED AINGER. THE PARSON PREACHING THE Country Parson preacheth constantly; the pulpit is his joy and his throne. If he at any time intermit, it is either for want of health, or against some great festival, that he may the better celebrate it, or for the variety of the hearers, that he may be heard at his return more attentively. When he intermits, he is ever very well supplied by some able man, who treads in his steps, and will not throw down what he hath built; whom also he entreats to press some point, that he himself hath often urged with no great success, that so, in the mouth of two or three witnesses, the truth may be more established. When he preacheth he procures attention by all possible art, both by earnestness of speech (it being natural to men to think that where is much earnestness there is somewhat worth hearing), and by a diligent and busy cast of his eye on his auditors, with letting them know that he observes who marks and who not; and with particularising of his speech-now to the younger folk, then to the elder; now to the poor, and now to the rich: "This is for you, and this is for you; " for particulars ever touch and awake more than generals. Herein also he serves himself of the judgments of God, as those of ancient times, so especially of the late ones; and those most which are nearest to his parish; for people are very attentive at such discourses, and think it behoves them to be so, when God is so near them, and even over their heads. Sometimes he tells them stories and sayings of others, according as his text invites him; for them also men heed and remember better than exhortations, which though earnest, yet often die with the sermon, especially with country people, which are thick and heavy, and hard to raise to a point of zeal and fervency, and need a mountain of fire to kindle them; but stories and sayings they will well remember. He often tells them that sermons are dangerous things, that none goes out of Church as he came in, but either better or worse; that none is careless before his Judge, |