EDMUND WALLER.

EDMUND WALLER, born at Coleshill, Hertford Waller had a brother-in-law, named Tomkyns, shire, in March, 1605, was the son of Robert Wal- who was clerk of the queen's council, and possess. ler, Esq., a gentleman of an ancient family and good ed great influence in the city among the warm fortune, who married a sister of the celebrated John loyalists. On consulting together, they thought it Hampden. The death of his father during his infancy would be possible to raise a powerful party, which left him heir to an estate of 35001. a year, at that might oblige the parliament to adopt pacific measperiod an ample fortune. He was educated first at ures, by resisting the payment of the taxes levied Eton, whence he was removed to King's College for the support of the war. About this time Sir in Cambridge. His election to parliament was as Nicholas Crispe formed a design of more dangerous early as between his sixteenth or seventeenth year; import, which was that of exciting the king's and it was not much later that he made his appear- friends in the city to an open resistance of the auance as a poet: and it is remarkable that a copy of thority of parliament; and for that purpose he obverses which he addressed to Prince Charles, in his tained a commission of array from his majesty. eighteenth year, exhibits a style and character of This plan appears to have been originally unconversification as perfectly formed as those of his nected with the other; yet the commission was maturest productions. He again served in parlia- made known to Waller and Tomkyns, and the whole ment before he was of age; and he continued his was compounded into a horrid and dreadful plot. services to a later period. Not insensible of the Waller and Tomkyns were apprehended, when the value of wealth, he augmented his paternal fortune pusillanimity of the former disclosed the whole by marriage with a rich city heiress. In the long secret. “Ilo was so confounded with fear,” (says intermissions of parliament which occurred after Lord Clarendon,) “that he confessed whatever he 1628, he retired to his mansion of Bea onsfield, had heard, said, thought, or seen, all that he knew where he continued his classical studies, under the of himself, and all that he suspected of others, with. direction of his kinsman Morley, afterwards bishop out concealing any person, of what degree or quali. of Winchester; and he obtained admission to a ty soever, or any discourse which he had ever upon society of able men and polite scholars, of whom any occasion entertained with them.” The conclu. Lord Falkland was the connecting medium. sion of this business was, that Tomkyns, and Cha

Waller became a widower at the age of twenty- loner, another conspirator, were hanged, and that five: he did not, however, spend much time in Waller was expelled the House, tried, and conmourning, but declared himself the suitor of Lady demned; but after a year's imprisonment, and a fine Dorothea Sydney, eldest daughter of the Earl of of ten thousand pounds, was suffered to go into Leicester, whom he has immortalized under the exile. He chose Rouen for his first place of foreign poetical name of Saccharissa. She is described by exile, where he lived with his wife till his removal him as a majestic and scornful beauty; and he to Paris. In that capital he maintained the appear. seems to delight more in her contrast, the gentler ance of a man of fortune, and entertained hospitaAmoret, who is supposed to have been a Lady So-bly, supporting this style of living chiefly by the phia Murray. Neither of these ladies, however, sale of his wife's jewels. At length, after the lapse was won by his poetic strains; and, like another of ten years, being reduced to what he called his man, he consoled himself in a second marriage. rump jewel, he thought it time to apply for per

When the king's necessities compelled him, in mission to return to his own country. He obtained 1640, once more to apply to the representatives this license, and was also restored to his estate, of the people, Waller, who was returned for Ag- though now diminished to half its former rental. mondesham, decidedly took part with the members Here he fixed his abode, at a house built by himwho thought that the redress of grievances should self, at Beaconsfield ; and he renewed his courtly precede a vote for supplies; and he made an ener- strains by adulation to Cromwell, now Protector, getic speech on the occasion. He continued during to whom his mother was related. To this usurper three years to vote in general with the Opposition the noblest tribute of his muse was paid. in the Long Parliament, but did not enter into all When Charles II. was restored to the crown, their measures. In particular, he employed much and past character was lightly regarded, the stains cool argument against the proposal for the abolition of that of Waller were forgotten, and his wit and of Episcopacy; and he spoke with freedom and poetry procured him notice at court, and admission severity against some other plans of the House. to the highest circles. He had also sufficient in. In fact, he was at length become a zealous loyalist terest to obtain a seat in the House of Commons, in his inclinations; and his conduct under the dif- in all the parliaments of that reign. The king's ficulties into which this attachment involved him gracious manners emboldened him to ask for the became a source of his indelible disgrace. A short vacant place of provost of Eton college, which was narrative will suffice for the elucidation of this granted him; but Lord Clarendon, then Lord Chan. matter.

cellor, refused to set the seal to the grant, alleging

that by the statutes laymen were excluded from died at Beaconsfield in October, 1687, the 83d year that provostship. This was thought the reason why of his age. He left several children by his second Waller joined the Duke of Buckingham, in his wife, of whom, the inheritor of his estate, Edmund, hostility against Clarendon.

after representing Agmondesham in parliament, On the accession of James II., Waller, then in became a convert to Quakerism. his 80th year, was chosen representative for Saltash. Waller was one of the earliest poets, who obHaving now considerably passed the usual limit of tained reputation by the sweetness and sonorousness human life, he turned his thoughts to devotion, and of his strains; and there are perhaps few masters composed some divine poems, the usual task in at the present day who surpass him in this parwhich men of gaiety terminate their career. Heticular.

TO AMORET.

Unto that adored dame :
For 'tis not unlike the same,
Which I thither ought to send.
So that if it could take end,
"Twould to Heaven itself be due,
To succeed her, and not you:
Who already have of me
All that's not idolatry :
Which, though not so fierce a flame,
Is longer like to be the same.

Then smile on me, and I will prove
Wonder is shorter-liv'd than love.

TO AMORET.

Fair! that you may truly know,
What you unto Thyrsis owe;
I will tell you how I do
Sacharissa love, and you.

Joy salutes me, when I set
My blest eyes on Amoret :
But with wonder I am strook,
While I on the other look.

If sweet Amoret complains,
I have sense of all her pains :
But for Sacharissa I
Do not only grieve, but die.

All that of myself is mine,
Lovely Amoret! is thine,
Sacharissa's captive fain
Would untie his iron chain;
And, those scorching beams to shun,
To thy gentle shadow run.

If ibe soul had free election
To dispose of her affection;
I would not thus long have borne
Haughiy Sacharissa's scorn:
But 'tis sure some power above,
Which controls our wills in love!

If not a love, a strong desire
To create and spread that fire
In my breast, solicits me,
Beauteous Amoret! for thee.

"Tis amazement more than love,
Which her radiant eyes do move :
If less splendor wait on thine,
Yet they so benignly shine,
I would turn my dazzled sight
To behold their milder light.
But as hard 'tis to destroy
That high flame, as to enjoy:
Which how eas'ly I may do,
Heaven (as eas’ly scald) does know!

Amoret! as sweet and good
As the most delicious food,
Which, but tasted, does impart
Life and gladness to the heart.

Sacharissa's beauty's wine,
Which to madness doth incline:
Such a liquor, as no brain
That is mortal can sustain.

Scarce can I to Heaven excuse
The devotion, which I use

AMORET, the Milky Way,

Fram'd of many nameless stars!
The smooth stream, where none can say,

He this drop to that prefers !
Amoret, my lovely foe!

Tell me where thy strength does lie?
Where the power that charms us so ?

In thy soul, or in thy eye?
By that snowy neck alone,

Or thy grace in motion seen,
No such wonders could be done;

Yet thy waist is straight, and clean,
As Cupid's shaft, or Hermes' rod :
And powerful too, as either god.

OF LOVE.
Anger, in hasty words, or blows,
Itself discharges on our foes;
And sorrow too finds some relief
In tears, which wait upon our grief:
So every passion but fond love,

Unto its own redress does move :
But that alone the wretch inclines
To what prevents his own designs;
Makes him lament, and sigh, and weep,
Disorder'd, tremble, fawn, and creep;
Postures which render him despis'd,
Where he endeavors to be priz'd:

As Egypt does not on the clouds rely,

Your never failing sword made war to cease, But to the Nile owes more than to the sky; And now you heal us with the acts of peace; So, what our Earth, and what our Heaven, denies, Our minds with bounty and with awe engage, Our ever-constant friend, the sea, supplies. Invite affection, and restrain our rage.

The taste of hot Arabia's spice we know,
Free from the scorching sun that makes it grow:
Without the worm, in Persian silks we shine ;
And, without planting, drink of every vine.

Less pleasure take brave minds in battles won,
Than in restoring such as are undone :
Tigers have courage, and the rugged bear,
But man alone can, whom he conquers, spare.

To dig for wealth, we weary not our limbs ;
Gold, though the heaviest metal, hither swims.
Ours is the harvest where the Indians mow,
We plow the deep, and reap what others sow.

To pardon, willing, and to punish, loth,

You strike with one hand, but you heal with both;
Lifting up all that prostrate lie, you grieve
You cannot make the dead again to live.

Things of the noblest kind our own soil breeds; When Fate or error had our age misled,
Stout are our men, and warlike are our steeds : And o'er this nation such confusion spread ;
Rome, though her eagle through the world had flown, Theonly cure, which could from Heaven come down
Could never make this island all her own. Was so much power and piety in one.

Here the third Edward, and the Black Prince too, One! whose extraction from an ancient line
France-conquering Henry, flourish'd, and now you ; Gives hope again, that well-born men may shine:
For whom we stay'd, as did the Grecian state, The meanest in your nature, mild and good;
Till Alexander came to urge their fate.

The noblest rest secured in your blood.

Whom the old Roman wall, so ill confin'd, Still, as you rise, the state, exalted too,
With a new chain of garrisons you bind :

Finds no distemper while 'tis changed by you; Here foreign gold no more shall make them come; Chang'd like the world's great scene ! when withou Our English iron holds them fast at home.

noise,

The rising sun night's vulgar lights destroys. They, that henceforth must be content to know No warmer region than their hills of snow, Had you, some ages past, this race of glory May blame the sun; but must extol your grace,

Run, with amazement we should read your story: Which in our senate hath allow'd them place.

But living virtue, all achievements past,

Meets envy still, to grapple with at last.
Preferr'd by conquest, happily o'erthrown,

This Cæsar found ; and that ungrateful age,
Falling they rise, to be with us made one:
So kind dictators made, when they came home,

With losing him, went back to blood and rage;

Mistaken Brutus thought to break their yoke, Their vanquish'd foes free citizens of Rome.

But cut the bond of union with that stroke. Like favor find the Irish, with like fate

That sun once set, a thousand meaner stars Advanc'd to be a portion of our state ;

Gave a dim light to violence and wars ; While by your valor, and your bounteous mind,

To such a tempest as now threatens all, Nations divided by the sea are join'd.

Did not your mighty arm prevent the fall. Holland, to gain your friendship, is content If Rome's great senate could not wield that sword To be our out-guard on the continent:

Which of the conquer'd world had made them lord ; She from her fellow-provinces would go,

What hope had ours, while yet their power was new, Rather than hazard to have you her foe.

To rule victorious armies, but by you? In our late fight, when cannons did diffuse, You! that had taught them to subdue their foes, Preventing posts, the terror and the news, Could order teach, and their high spirits compose . Our neighbor princes trembled at their roar : To every duty could their minds engage, But our conjunction makes them tremble more. Provoke their courage, and command their rage.

So, when a lion shakes his dreadful mane,
And angry grows, if he that first took pain
To tame his youth, approach the haughty beast,
He bends to him, but frights away the rest.

Verse, thus design'd, has no ill fate,
If it arrive but at the date
Of fading beauty, if it prove
But as long-liv'd as present love.

As the vex'd world, to find repose, at last
Itself into Augustus' arms did cast;
So England now does, with like toil opprest,
Her weary head upon your bosom rest.

THE STORY OF

Then let the Muses, with such notes as these,

PH@BUS AND DAPHNE
Instruct us what belongs unto our peace!

APPLIED.
Your battles they hereafter shall indite,
And draw the image of our Mars in fight;

Thyrsis, a youth of the inspired train,

Fair Sacharissa lov'd, but lov'd in vain :
Tell of towns storm'd, of armies over-run,

Like Phoebus sung the no less amorous boy ;
And mighty kingdoms by your conduct won; Like Daphne she, as lovely, and as coy!
How, while you thunder'd, clouds of dust did choke With numbers he the flying nymph pursues ;
Contending troops, and seas lay hid in smoke.

With numbers, such as Phæbus' self might use!

Such is the chase, when Love and Fancy leads, Illustrious acts high raptures do infuse,

O'er craggy mountains, and through flowery meads; And every conqueror creates a Muse:

Invok'd to testify the lover's care, Here in low strains your milder deeds we sing : Or form some image of his cruel fair. But there, my lord! we'll bays and olive bring

Urg'd with his fury, like a wounded deer,

O'er these he fled ; and now, approaching near,
To crown your head, while you in triumph ride

Had reach'd the nymph with his harmonious lay,
O'er vanquish'd nations, and the sea beside ; Whom all his charms could not incline to stay.
While all your neighbor princes unto you, Yet, what he sung in his immortal strain,
Like Joseph's sheaves, pay reverence and bow.

Though unsuccessful, was not sung in vain :
All, but the nymph that should redress his wrong,
Attend his passion, and approve his song.
Like Phoebus thus, acquiring unsought praise,

He catch'd at love, and fill’d his arms with bays.
OF ENGLISH VERSE.