PUBLIC LIBRARY

THOUGH THOU HADST MADE A GENERAL SURVEY
OF ALL THE BEST OF MEN'S BEST KNOWLEDGES,
AND KNEW SO MUCH AS EVER LEARNING KNEW;
YET DID IT MAKE THEE TRUST THYSELF THE LESS,
AND LESS PRESUME. AND YET WHEN BEING MOV'D
IN PRIVATE TALK TO SPEAK; THOU DIDST BEWRAY
HOW FULLY FRAUGHT THOU WERT WITHIN; AND PROV
THAT THOU DIDST KNOW WHATEVER WIT COULD SAY.
WHICH SHOW'D THOU HADST NOT BOOKS AS MANY BAYP,
FOR OSTENTATION, BUT FOR USE; AND THAT
THY BOUNTEOUS MEMORY WAS SUCH AS GAVE

A LARGE REVENUE OF THE GOOD IT GAT.

WITNESS SO MANY VOLUMES, WHERETO THOU

HAST SET THY NOTES UNDER THY LEARNED HAND,

AND MARK'D THEM WITH THAT PRINT, AS WILL SHOW HOS
THE POINT OF THY CONCEIVING THOUGHTS DID STAND;
THAT NONE WOULD THINK, IF ALL THY LIFE HAD BEEN
URN'D INTO LEISURE, THOU COULDST HAVE ATTAIN'D
SO MUCH OF TIME, TO HAVE PERUS'D AND SEEN
SO MANY VOLUMES THAT SO MUCH CONTAIN'D."

DANIEL. Funeral Poem upon the Death of the late Noble Lari ut
Devonshire." WELL LANGUAGED DANIEL," as BROWNE calls
him in his BRITANNIA'S PATORALS," was one of Southen's
favourite Peets.

JOHN WOOD WARTER.

Preface.

HE scholar," said that meek and Christian spirit, Henry Hammond, "that hath all his life laboured, and at last attained to some habit of knowledge; and then resolves to enjoy the happiness and fruits of learning, in the quiet and rest of a perpetual contemplation, is impatient if any piece of ignorance cross or thwart him in his walk:-he'll to his books again, and never rest till he hath overcome and turned it out."

Such was the Author of these volumes, who, although as Eunapius said of Longinus, a Βιβλιοθήκη τις ἔμψυχος καὶ περιπατῶν μεσεῖον—a sort of living library, and a walking study,—was ever adding to his immense funds of information, and storing his capacious mind with the contents of those books he loved so well.

The Series of the Common-Place Book now presented to the Reader will be an evident proof of this. The difficulty has been to select out of such a mass of materials, and so to arrange them as to interest and instruct at the same time. It will be readily understood by those whose reading has been continuous, and whose extracts from the works they have read have kept pace with their reading-(a rare thing)-how responsible a matter this has been. Almost on any one subject, Southey's reading would have filled a volume like the present; but it is only those who were familiar with his figuring of pages, who can realize the extent of his notes. Individually, I can say, as Bishop Patrick said in his Funeral Sermon on the learned John Smith, "I never got so much good among all my books by a whole day's plodding in a study, as by an hour's discourse I have got with him. For he was not a library locked up, nor a book clasped, but stood open for any to converse withal that had a mind to learn. Yea, he was a fountain running over, labouring to do good to those who perhaps had no mind to receive it. None more free and communicative than he was to such as desired to discourse with him; nor would he grudge to be taken off from his studies upon such an occasion. It may be truly said of him, that a man might always come better from

him; and his mouth could drop sentences as easily as an ordinary man's could speak sense." Such was the condensation, so to say, of this good man's study; one, of whom it might be said, as Selden said of Archbishop Ussher, " Vir summâ pietate, judicio singulari, usque ad miraculum doctus, et literis severioribus promovendis natus."

As regards the extracts on particular subjects, I may notice those on Memoirs and Travels, from which so little is given, for want of space. It will be seen, however, how multifarious was Southey's reading, by such a sample as Brasbridge's Memoirs, and Hodgskin's North of Germany. No wheat escaped him, and he bolted it as clean as he could, after he had thrown out the chaff. By figuring of pages before me, I am inclined to think that few books of travels, subsequent to 1794, but underwent the winnowing of his judgment.

One asked-x & тuxàν avǹo̟-How could a man of Southey's intellect have given up time to such extracts as are contained in these volumes? The answer is, that, combined with his super-eminent talent, this reading and these extracts gave him that super-eminence of information which has rarely been surpassed since Aristotle's time, whom Hooker calls "the Mentor of human wisdom," and "the Patriarch of Heathen Philosophers." He that reads indifferent books may winnow the chaff from the wheat; but, as Jeremy Taylor said, "He that perpetually reads good books, if his parts be answerable, will have a huge stock of knowledge." Probably since the collection of the Two Zuingers,-Theodore and James-no volume has contained more condensed information than the present. It is in itself a smaller Theatrum Humanæ Vitæ.

I have to request the Reader will judge candidly the faults of mine which he may find. I have bestowed no little pains in the examination of the several works; but I am well aware of my own ignorance and deficiencies. I regret also to observe more foot-notes than I was aware of -he will please to consider them as a mark rather of my small knowledge than of his.

JOHN WOOD WARTER.

WEST TARRING VICARAGE, SUSSEX,

June 21st, 1850.

CONTENTS.

ANALYTICAL Readings in and Illustrations of English History, Civil.

Ecclesiastical History, English.