English poetry (1170-1892)

Preface

The idea and plan of the present volume originated ten years ago when Professor Bronson, Professor Dodge, and I were engaged in giving an introductory course in English literature to a class of one hundred and forty freshmen and sophomores in Brown University. We found that we secured the best results by having the students read as widely as their time permitted and then discussing freely with them such points as seemed vital to the interest or the significance of the literature read. We proceeded on the theory that literary productions are vital, organic wholes, and that they must be treated as such to produce the effects intended by their authors. Special beauties of detail were noted and enjoyed, but were subordinated to the main meaning and beauty unless, indeed, as sometimes occurred, the significance of the piece we were reading lay in the beauty of its details, in the nature of its ornamentation, rather than in its meaning or form as a whole. Questions of structure and relation of parts were discussed, but with a view primarily to the main theme. Lectures on authors were given, but the greater part of each lecture was devoted to trying to show what the author meant by his work, what he wished to say, what was significant or interesting in his special way of saying it, and why it was or was not of permanent value. Dates and facts and groups of names were given and required to be learned, but not without an attempt to express their significance in such terms of human experience as had actuality for the students themselves.

That the interest and intelligent cooperation of every member of the class were f :ined by this method, I will not pretend ; but I can testify that I have never seen i)etter results from any class or a larger proportion of interested and intelligent listeners in any audience; and I have good reason to know that this method awakened a«^ love of : terature and the habit of reading in many members of the course. Experience with this class and with many classes before and since convinces me that we teachers are inclined to underestimate the capacity of pupils for grasping large ideas and their susceptibility to the beautiful thoughts and forms in which we ourselves have found delight.

For such work as was done in the course of which I speak, it is necessary to have a much larger range of reading matter than is usually given in any single volume of selections. We found no volume that met our needs, and were obliged to ask the class to purchase numerous cheap prints of single pieces. But the expense even of these amounted to more than we could reasonably impose upon the students. I then decided to collect into a single volume all the pieces of nondramatic poetry that any teacher would likely care to have at hand from which to make his own selections. The puDlishers readily agreed to aid me in bringing the price of the volume within the reach iv ENGLISH POETRY

of every student. Circumstances prevented me from beginning the book for several years, but five years ago I began it and have continued to work upon it whenever it was possible to find time and strength for it. Two years of illness sadly interrupted the work, which has, indeed, been much more dit^icult than I expected. It is now completed, and I hope it will be of service to teachers who believe, with me, that the love of reading and the habit of it are best awakened by treating pieces of literature as living, organic wholes and by subordinating all other considerations to this during the student's first introduction to the study of literature. It may also be useful to that large group of teachers who believe, as I do, that however small may be the number of poems that time permits one to read with his class, they should be chosen by the teacher himself with special reference to the taste and mental development of the pupils he actually has to deal with in each class.

In general the poems in this volume are given without introductory remarks or annotations. Such information can best be supplied by the teacher in the form and amount suggested by his knowledge of his pupils. In regard to most of the authors and poems presented, the most necessary information is to be found in any of the good elementary histories of English literature, and it is presumed that one of them will be used in connection with the course. In certain special cases I have supplied in the Introduction brief remarks intended to supplement the text-book.

Explanations of difficulties of thought or allusion I have avoided altogether. In such reading they are neither welcome nor helpful to a pupil until he feels the need of them, and then they can best be supplied by the teacher.

The earlier poems are provided with notes giving the meanings of unfamiliar words. It is believed that these notes and an ordinary dictionary will enable any student to read intelligently any of these poems. It will be observed that the modern equivalents of prepositions have not usually been given, and that rude English will often result from substituting the words in the notes for those in the text and making no further change. But it is only thus that the student can learn to receive the ancient thought in the ancient forms. Except in vocabulary Middle English is really not very difficult to any intelligent Englishman, and it is hoped that this book may help to remove the prevalent ignorance and fear of it. A little ingenuity and intelligent guessing at the identity of words disguised by their spelling will soon repay the student richly. Authors and poems which have hitherto been mere names to burden the student's memory may easily accjuire meaning and interest by reading or even skimming these early poems.

Two principles have determined the choice of authors and poems : none has been omitted that seemed of real importance for the main features of the history of English literature ; to these none has been added that had not a clear title to intrinsic beauty and value. It has of course been impossible to include all the poems of this character that exist in English literature, but it is hoped that no teacher will miss any old favorite whose place is not filled by a poem equally deserving of his favor.

Dramatic selections have been excluded because every play that deserves to be read should be read as a whole, and no single volume could contain all the good ones.

PREFACE V

The selection from Ford's The Lover's Melancholy (p. 163) does not in reality violate this principle of exclusion, for the passage chosen is in no sense dramatic. It is a bit of pure narration, slightly helped in its movement by the interrupting questions, but not dependent upon them. It is highly characteristic of Ford, and under the circumstances there seemed no more impropriety in including it than in including a song from a play.

From some of the longer narrative and reflective poems only extracts are given. An effort has been made to choose extracts characteristic in themselves and, as far as possible, self-explanatory. Usually omissions are indicated by stars, but in a few instances these have been left out where the line numbering makes clear the nature and amount of the omission. Some teachers will be disappointed to find that the familiar Knighfs Tale is not given among the selections from Chaucer. The authority of Milton, as well as its greater brevity, may be pleaded in justification for making the unfinished Squire's Tale the representative of the Canterbury Tales.

It is hoped that both teachers and students will approve the inclusion of specimens of the work of some of the living poets who belong to the age of Tennyson. Certainly George Meredith and Swinburne could not have been excluded without serious loss.

All chronological divisions of literature are in some respects unsatisfactory. The _ division made in this book of the Renaissance in England into the Beginning of the Renaissance, the Renaissance, and the End of the Renaissance is perhaps even more unsatisfactory than usual. The authors are arranged in the order of birth, but unfortunately they neglected to mature and to die at any standard uniform rate or to be equally quick and sensitive in responding to new ideas and new influences in poetical style. Thus it will be found that even before Wyatt and Surrey some writers showed traces, faint indeed but real, of the intellectual awakening that we call the Renaissance. And within the period itself it seems absurd — and from the point of view of style and ideas it is absurd — to find Giles Fletcher the Elder in the division called the Beginning of the Renaissance and William Warner in the Renaissance itself, as if the latter belonged tr a more advanced stage of development than the former. Of course the explanation is that the work of Edmund Spenser is generally regarded as the first perfect flower of the epoch, and Fletcher, who happened to be born earlier, naturally finds place in the earlier period, though he outlived Spenser and shows in some of his work the tally developed qualities of the period of Spenser ; while, on the other hand, Warner, though born later, seems to have been insensitive to the new ideas and the new style and belongs artistically to the previous generation of crude and antiquated workmanship.

In printing the texts the best accessible editions have been used and great pains have been exercised to avoid errors of every kind, but entire freedom from errors is too much to expect. I shall be grateful for any aid which will enable me to correct such as occur. The spelling of the earlier texts has been scrupulously reproduced with only such modifications as are accepted and used by good editors. In the single case of The Ormuluin the ancient symbols for th and palatal g have been used. In it this procedure seemed necessary, as the main value of the work lies in the spelling. It would be inexcusable pedantry to preserve these old forms in other poems in such a book as this.

vi ENGLISH POETRY

For aid in making the book I have to thank several friends. My cousin, Louise Manly, began making the selections with me and did a very large amount of work. These selections were revised by me and many were rejected for lack of space, while others were replaced by selections which seemed to me, for one reason or another, better suited to the purposes of the book ; but my debt to her is very great, both because her selections were made with taste and judgment and because without her aid I should probably not yet have begun to carry out my plan. To Dr. Hardin Craig, Mr. A. E. Hill, and Miss Elizabeth Calhoun I am indebted for aid in verifying readings while the book was going through the press. To my sister, Annie Manly, I owe the greatest debt for aid in copying and for reading with me every revise of the proofs of the whole book.

J. M. M.

Lake Zurich, Illinois

I

THE MIDDLE ENGLISH PERIOD

Unknown Author (c. 1170)

The Poema Morale, or Moral Ode i

The Ormulum 2

Layamon (c. 1205)

The Brut 2

Unknown Author (before 1250)

Nicholas de Guildford? (fl. 1250)

Unknown Author (c. 1300)

Cursor Mundi (The Flight into Egypt) . . 9 Thomas de Hales (before 1300)

A Luve Ron 10

A Middle English Miscellany

Springtime (c. 1300) 13

The Man in the Moon (c. 1350) 13

Ubi sunt qui ante nos fuerunt? (c. 1350) 14 Richard Rolle de Hampole (1290?-: 349)

The Pricke of Conscience 14

THE AGE OF CHAUCER

Unknown Author (c. 1350)

Pearl iS

Syr Gawayn and the Grene Knyght 18

John Gower (i325?-i4o8)

Confessio Amantis (Medea and Eson). . . 22 William Langland (?) (i332?-i4oo?) Piers the Plowman

The Prologue, A-Text 24

The Prologue, B-Text: The Fable

of Belling the Cat 26

Passus VI, A-Text 27

Geoffrey Chaucer (1340 ?-i 400)

Troilus and Criseyde, Bk. I 28

Troilus and Criseyde, Bk. II 29

Troilus and Criseyde, Bk. V 30

The Canterbury Tales, The Prologue. ... 32 The Canterbury Tales, The Squieres

Tale 38

A Roundel (from The Parlement of

Foules) 45

Balade de Bon Conseyl 45

The Compleint of Chaucer to his Empty

Purse 46

Moral Balade of Chaucer 46

THE FOLLOWERS OF CHAUCER

Thomas Hoccleve (i37o?-i45o?)

De Regimine Principum (On Chaucer) . . 47

To Sir John Oldcastle 47

John Lydgate (i37o?-i45i ?)

London Lyckpenny 48

The Story of Thebes 49

King James I of Scotland (1394-143 7)

The Kingis Quair 50

Robert Henryson (i43o?-i5o6?)

The Mouse and the Paddock 52

Unknown Author (c. 1500)

William Dunbar (i46o?-i5i3 +)

The Thrissill and the Rois 58

Stephen Hawes (d. 1523)

The Pastime of Pleasure

The Mariage betwene Graunde

Amour and La bell Pucell 59

The Epitaph of Graunde Amour 59

The Excusation of the Aucthoure ... 60

THE END OF THE MIDDLE AGES

John Skelton (i 460?-: 5 29)

A Dirge for Phyllip Sparowe 6i

Why Come Ye not to Court ? 62

Colyn Cloute 62

Early Tudor Lyrics (c. 1500) Religious Lyrics

Who shall have my fayr lady? 63

Quho is at my windo ? 63

Christmas Carols

Thys ender nyght 63

Quid petis, O' fily? 64

Make we mery, bothe more and lasse 64

What cher? Gud cher ! 65

Convivial Songs

Pastyme with good companye 65

Fyll the cuppe, Phylyppe 65

Make rome, syrs, and let us be mery 65 Love Songs

Lully, lulley, iulley, luUey 65

The lytyll, prety nyghtyngale 66

Sir Patrick Spens 75

Vlll

Ballads {Continued)

Captain Car; or, Edom o Gordon 76

Lord Randal 77

Hind Horn 77

Thomas Rymer 78

St. Stephen and Herod 79

THE BEGINNING OF THE RENAISSANCE

Sir Thomas Wyatt (i 503-1 542)

A Renouncing of Love 80

Divers doth use, as I have heard and know 80

Unstable dream, according to the place. . 80

My lute, awake 80

A Description of Such a One as He Would

Love 81

Of the Mean and Sure Estate 81

Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey (i5i7?-i547)

Description of the Restless State of a Lover 82

Description of Spring 82

Complaint of a Lover Rebuked 83

Description and Praise of his Love Geral-

dine 83

The Means to Attain Happy Life 83

Of the Death of Sir T. W 83

Virgil's ^neid, Bk. II 84

George Gascoigne (1525?-! 577)

The Steel Glass (Epilogus) 84

Thomas Sackville, Lord Buckhurst (1536- 1608) The Mirror for Magistrates (The Induction) 85

Giles Fletcher, the Elder (i549?-i6ii)

Licia (Sonnet xlvii) 87

Sir Edward Dyer (i55o?-i6o7)

My mind to me a kingdom is 88

Sir Walter Raleigh (i552?-i6i8)

The Silent Lover 88

His Pilgrimage 89

The Conclusion 89

THE RENAISSANCE

Amoretti (viii, .xxiv, l.x.x, Ixxix) (jp

Prothalamion 90

An Epithalamion 92

An Hymn in Honour of Beauty 95

An Hymn of Heavenly Beauty 96

The Shepheards Calender (Februarie) ... 96 The Faerie Queene

Bk. I, Canto 1 99

Bk. I, Canto HI 103

Sir Philip Sidney (i 554-1 586)

Astrophel and Stella (i, vii, xv, xxi, xxxi,

xxxii, xxxix, xli) 104

Eleventh Song 105

Song. The Nightingale 106

Love is Dead 106

Wooing StufT 106

John Lyly (i554?-i6o6)

Apelles' Song 107

Spring's Welcome 107

Fairy Revels 107

Song of Paris and ffinone 107

Harvestmen a-Singing 108

Farewell to Arms 108

William Warner (i558?-i6o9)

Albion's England, Bk. IV, Chapter XX. 108 George Chapman (1559 7-1634)

The Sixth Book of Homer's Iliads iii

The Twelfth Book of Homer's Odysseys 113 Robert Greene (1560 7-1592)

Sweet are the thoughts that savour of content 115

Philomela's Ode 115

Sephestia's Song to her Child 116

Menaphon's Song 116

The Shepherd's Wife's Song 116

Robert Southwell (1561 7-1595)

The Burning Babe 117

Samuel Daniel (1562-1619)

Sonnets to Delia (xix, xxxix, liv,

The Complaint of Rosamond 118

Epistle to the Countess of Cumberland. 119

Musophilus 119

Joshua Sylvester (1563-1618)

Were I as base as is the lowly plain. ... 120

The Fruits of a Clear Conscience 120

Idea (To the Reader, and iv, xx, xxiv,

xxxvii, xliv, l.xi) 120

Ode XI (To the Virginian Voyage) 121

Ode XII (To the Cambro-Britans : Agin-

court) 122

England's Heroical Epistles (Surrey to

Geraldine) 123

Nymphidia (The Court of Fairy) 124

Christopher Marlowe (1564-1593)

Hero and Leander (The First Sestiad) ... 125 England's Helicon (1600)

Phyllida and Corydon (N. Breton, 1545 7-

16267) 127

To Colin Clout (Shepherd Tony) 127

As it fell upon a day (Ignoto, i.e. Richard

Happy shepherds, sit and see (W. H.,

i.e. William Hunnis, d. 1597).. 128 Phyllida's Love-Call to her Corydon (Ignoto) 128

The Shepherd's Commendation of his Nymph (Earl of Oxenford,

1 550-1 604) 129

The Shepherd's Description of Love (Ignoto, i.e. Sir Walter Raleigh 7). 129 Damclus' Song to his Diaphenia (H. C,

i.e. Henry Constable, 15 62- 161 3) 130 A Nymph's Disdain of Love (Ignoto) . . . 130 Rosalind's Madrigal (Thorn. Lodge,

15587-1625) 130

IX

England's Helicon {Continued)

The Herdman's Happy Life (Out of M.

Bird's Set Songs) 131

The Passionate Shepherd to his Love

(Chr. Marlow) 131

The Nymph's Reply to the Shepherd (Ig-

noto) 131

The Shepherd's Resolution in Love

(Thorn. Watson, i557?-i592). 132 William Shakespeare (1564-1616)

Venus and Adonis 132

The Rape of Lucrece -. 136

A Lover's Complaint 137

cxlvi) 138

Songs from the Plays 143

Death's Summons 145

Thomas Campion (d. 1619)

Chance and Change 146

Sir Henry Wotton (i 568-1 639)

An Elegy of a Woman's Heart 146

The Character of a Happy Life 146

On the Sudden Restraint of Robert Carr 147 Sir John Davies (1569-1626)

Nosce Teipsum 147

Thomas Dekker (i57o?-i64i)

Song from The Shoemaker's Holiday. . . . 147

Song from Old Fortunatus 148

Content (from Patient Grissill) 148

THE END OF THE RENAISSANCE

Ben Jonson (i573?-i637)

Song to Celia 149

The Triumph of Charis 149

To the Memory of my Beloved, Master

An Epitaph on Salathiel Pavy 152

Epitaph on Elizabeth, L. H 152

Ode to Himself upon the Censure of his

"New Inn" 152

On my First Son 152

Inviting a Friend to Supper 152

Go and catch a falling star 153

The Indifferent 153

The Canonization 153

The Dream 154

Love's Deity 154

The Funeral 155

The Computation 155

Forget 155

A Hymn to God the Father 155

Commendatory Verses on Mr. Thomas

Coryat's Crudities 156

Bk. I, Satire III 156

John Marston (1575-1634)

The Scourge of Villainy 157

George Sandys (1578-1644)

A Paraphrase upon the Psalms of David

Psalm XXX, Part II 157

Psalm XLVI 158

A Paraphrase upon the Song of Solomon