.

earth would suffer, and whose pregnant virtues deserve as faithful a register as earth can keep. In whose happy remembrance I have here trusted these Elegies to time and your favour. Had he been a lamp to light me alone, my private griefs had been sufficient'; but being a sun whose beams reflected on all, all have an interest in his memory."

We know that "true worth and grief were parents" to these tears. Strype has related some interesting anecdotes of Dr. Aylmer, in the Life of Bishop Aylmer*. Quarles might well call him a "great favourer and fast friend to the Muses:" his charity was extended not only to the poor of his own neighbourhood, but to all who needed it; to indigent scholars and strangers, especially, his hand and heart were ever open. Fugitives from Spain, Holland, France, Italy, and Greece, were all received with kindness and hospitality; for he remembered that his father had once been an exile for his religion. Besides his numberless private acts of beneficence, he supported several deserving Students at the University. The last days of this good man were "beautiful exceedingly." When asked how he felt, he answered, "I thank God, heart-whole;" and laying one hand on his breast, and lifting up the other to heaven, he said, "The glory above giveth no room to sickness." And when death was rapidly approaching,-" Let my people know," he said, "that their pastor died undaunted, and not afraid of death. I biess my God I have no fear, no doubt, no reluctation, but an assured confidence in the sin-overcoming merits of Jesus Christ."

Quarles's verses are worthy of so noble a subject; the soul of solemn grief is poured into every line. The 6th • Oxford edition, p. 118-121.

and 13th Elegies will gain an increased interest from the truth of their allusions. Dr. Aylmer had declared on his death-bed, that his "own eyes" had ever been " his overseers," and it is recorded that he "shut his own eyes with his own hands." Thus the "self-closed eyes" of the poet have a peculiar beauty.

ELEGY VI.

Farewell those eyes, whose gentle smiles forsook
No misery, taught Charity how to look.

Farewell those cheerful eyes, that did erewhile
Teach succour'd Misery how to bless a smile:
Farewell those eyes, whose mixt aspect of late
Did reconcile humility and state.

Farewell those eyes, that to their joyful guest
Proclaim'd their ordinary fare, a feast.

Farewell those eyes, the loadstars late whereby
The graces sailed secure from eye to eye.
Farewell dear eyes, bright lamps-O, who can tell
Your glorious welcome, or our sad farewell!

ELEGY X.

I wondered not to hear so brave an end,
Because I knew, who made it, could contend
With death, and conquer, and in open chase
Would spit defiance in his conquer'd face-
And did. Dauntless he trod him underneath,
To shew the weakness of unarmed death.
Nay, had report or niggard fame denied
His name, it had been known that Ailmer died.
It was no wonder to hear rumour tell

That he, who died so oft, once died so well.

Great Lord of Life, how hath thy dying breath
Made man, whom Death had conquer'd, conquer Death.

ELEGY VIII.

Had virtue, learning, the diviner arts,

Wit, judgment, wisdom (or what other parts

That make perfection, and return the mind
As great as earth can suffer) been confin'd
To earth-had they the patent to abide
Secure from change, our Ailmer ne'er had died.
Fond earth forbear, and let thy childish eyes
Ne'er weep for him, thou ne'er knew'st how to prize;
Shed not a tear, blind earth, for it appears

Thou never lov'dst our Ailmer, by thy tears;
Or if thy floods must needs o'ertlow their brim,
Lament, lament thy blindness, and not him.

ELEGY XIII.

No, no, he is not dead; the mouth of fame,
Honour's shrill herald, would preserve his name,
And make it live, in spite of death and dust,
Were there no other heaven, no other trust.
He is not dead; the sacred Nine deny
The soul that merits fame should ever die.
He lives; and when the latest breath of fame
Shall want her trump to glorify a name,
He shall survive, and these self-closed eyes,
That now lie slumb'ring in the dust, shall rise,
And, fill'd with endless glory, shall enjoy

The perfect vision of eternal joy.

The tautology of the concluding couplet appears to have escaped the poet's notice.

In the same year he printed Sion's Elegies, a paraphrase upon the songs of mourning "wept by Jeremie the prophet." In these Elegies are many noble lines: this sublime prayer for Divine inspiration may be offered as a specimen :

-

Thou, Alpha and Omega, before whom

Things past, and present, and things yet to come,

Are all alike; O prosper my designs,

And let thy spirit enrich my feeble lines.

Revive my passion; let mine eye behold

Those sorrows present, which were wept of old;

Strike sad my soul, and give my pen the art
To move, and me an understanding heart.
O, let the accent of each word make known,

I mix the tears of Sion with my own!

Alas! that he who could write thus, should have sacrificed his genius to an impracticable theory!

In 1631, he lost his friend Drayton, whose virtues he commemorated in the epitaph inscribed on his monument in Westminster Abbey.

Do, pious marble, let thy readers know
What they, and what their children, owe
To Drayton's name, whose sacred dust
We recommend unto thy trust.

Protect his memory, and preserve his story,
Remain a lasting monument of his glory.
And when thy ruins shall disclaim

To be the treasurer of his name,

His name, that cannot fade, shall be

An everlasting monument to thee.

In the folio edition of Drayton's works, 1748, these verses are attributed to Ben Jonson, but they are here given to Quarles upon the authority of his intimate friend, Marshall, the "stone-cutter of Fetter-Lane," who erected the monument, and told Aubrey that Quarles was the author.

Drayton lived "at the bay-window house, next the east end of St. Dunstan's church, in Fleet-Street," and was generally beloved for the gentleness and amiability of his manners. The puritan and the papist united in his praise; and it has been remarked by his biographer, that if his morals had been worse, his fortune would have been better. His sacred poems, like all his longer productions, are tedious and diffuse; but they are the offspring of an humble and religious mind, and many fine thoughts, bold images, and much commanding ver

sification, are buried in Noah's Flood, Moses, his Birth and Miracles, and David and Goliah. He also composed, during the reign of Elizabeth, a volume of spiritual songs, not included in any edition of his works.

In the same year was published the History of Sampson, a work valuable only for the beautiful letter in which it is dedicated.

"To the uncorrupted lover of all goodness, and my honourable friend, Sir James Fullerton, Knight, one of the Gentlemen of his Majestie's Bedchamber, &c.

"Sir,-There be three sorts of friends: the first is like a torch, we meet in a dark street; the second is like a candle in a lanthorn, that we overtake; the third is like a link that offers itself to the stumbling passenger. The met torch is the sweet-lipt friend, which lends us a flash of compliment for the time, but quickly leaves us to our former darkness; the overtaken lanthorn is the true friend, which, though it promise but a faint light, yet it goes along with us as far as it can, to our journey's end. The offered link is the mercenary friend, which, though it be ready enough to do us service, yet that service hath a servile relation to our bounty. Sir, in the middle rank I find you, hating the first, and scorning the last; to whom, in the height of my undissembled affection, and unfeigned thankfulness, I commend myself and this book, to receive an equal censure from your uncorrupted judgment. In the bud it was yours, it blossomed yours, and now your favourable acceptance confirms the fruit yours, All I crave is, that you would be pleased to interpret these my intentions to proceed from an ardent desire, that hath long been in labour, to express the true affections of him,

"That holds it an honour to honour you.

"FRANCIS QUARLES."