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nor succeeding biographers, having noticed this event. There is reason to suppose, however, that he lived to enjoy his re-acquired preferment some years, and died the Vicar of Dean Prior.

I have already mentioned, that the talents displayed in his "Hesperides, had obtained him popularity among his contemporaries, and the poetry of the times, therefore, has not neglected to record the pretensions, and the characteristic merits of the bard. In the "Musarum Delicia," published in 1655, he is thus mentioned;

old sack

Young Herrick took to entertain
The Muses in a sprightly vein.

To this liquor, indeed, it appears, from several parts of the Hesperides, that our author was uncommonly partial; in page 86, for instance, he declares,

thy isles shall lack

Grapes, before Herrick leaves Canarie sack;
Thou mak'st me airy, active to be born,

Like Iphyclus, upon the tops of corn.

Thou mak'st me nimble, as the winged hours,
To dance and caper on the heads of flowers,
And ride the sun-beams.

In a singular Satire, likewise, called "Naps upon Parnassus, &c." 1658, he is again noticed in the following quaint lines,

Flaccus Horace,

He was but a sour-ass,

And good for nothing but Lyrick;
There's but one to be found
In all English ground

Writes as well;-who is hight Robert Herrick,

*

The few succeeding writers, however, who have recorded the labours of Robert Herrick, say but little in his favour. Edward Phillips, who published his Theatrum Poetarum in 1675, after observing, that he was not particularly influenced by any nymph or goddess, except his maid Prue," admits, that "a pretty flowery and pastoral gale of fancy, a vernal prospect of some hill,

Not having had an opportunity of consulting the biographical compilation of Jacobs, I know not whether he includes any detail of our poet. Cibber has not mentioned him,

cave, rock, or fountain, but for the interruption of other trivial passages, might have made up none of the worst poetic landskips."* Winstanley, in general the mere copyist of Phillips, ventures to esteem him "one of the scholars of Apollo of the middle form, yet something above George Wither,' and, after quoting four of the worst lines in his book, declares, “I account him, in Fame, much of the same rank, as he was of the same standing, with one Robert Heath, the author of a poem entitled Clarastella. Anthony Wood says nothing more, than that "these two books of poetry (namely, his Hesperides and his Noble Numbers,) made him much admired in the time when they were published;" and Grainger, when repeating the satiric observation of Phillips on the poet's Maid, has been so obliging as to furnish us with an additional sarcasm; "it appears," remarks he, "from the effects of her inspiration, that Prue was but indifferently qualified for a tenth muse."

* Theatrum Poetarum, page 162.

+ Lives of the most Famous English Poets, page 166 and 167, published in 1687. Heath printed his Clarastella in 1650.

One chief cause of the neglect into which the poetry of Herrick has fallen, is its extreme inequality. It would appear he thought it necessary to publish every thing he composed, however trivial, however ridiculous. or indecorous. The consequence has been, that productions, which Marlowe or Milton might have owned with pleasure, have been concealed, and nearly buried, in a crude and undigested mass. Had he shewn any taste in selection, I have no doubt the fate of his volume, though reduced two thirds of its present size, had been widely different. Perhaps there is no collection of poetry in our language, which, in some respects, more nearly resembles the Carmina of Catullus. It abounds in Epigrams disgusting and indecent, in satirical delineations of personal defects, in frequent apologies for the levity of his Muse, and repeated declarations of the chastity of his life; it is interspersed, also, with several exquisite pieces of the amatory and descriptive kind, and with numerous addresses to his friends and relations, by whom he appears to have been greatly beloved. The variety of metre he has used in this work is truly astonishing; he has almost ex

hausted every form of rhymed versification, and in many he moves with singular ease and felicity.

It has been observed by Mr. Headley, that "Waller is too exclusively considered as the first man, who brought versification. to any thing like its present standard. Carew's pretensions to the same merit, are seldom sufficiently either considered or allowed.* I may venture, I think, to introduce Herrick to my reader, as having greatly contributed toward this mechanical perfection. Many of his best effusions have the sweetness, the melody and elegance of modern compositions. He was nearly, if not altogether, contemporary with Carew, for, if the account of Clarendon, who had been intimate with him, be correct, Carew lived fifty years, and as we know that he died in 1639, he must have been born only a year or two anterior to Herrick. It is true Carew's Poems were published earlier, being given to the world shortly after his death, probably

Headley's Biographical Sketches, page 39.

+ Clarendon's Life and Continuation, vol. i. page 36.

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