THE BURIAL OF AN INFANT. Blest infant bud, whose blossom-life Sweetly didst thou expire: thy soul Softly rest all thy virgin-crumbs Lapt in the sweets of thy young breath, To dress them, and unswaddle death! THE WORLD. I saw Eternity the other night, Like a great ring of pure and endless light, And round beneath it, Time in hours, days, years, Like a vast shadow mov'd; in which the world The doting lover in his quaintest strain Did there complain; Near him, his lute, his fancy, and his slights, With gloves, and knots, the silly snares of pleasure, All scatter'd lay, while he his eyes did pour Upon a flower. The darksome statesman, hung with weights and woe, Condemning thoughts—like sad eclipses-scowl And clouds of crying witnesses without Yet digg'd the mole, and lest his ways be found, Where he did clutch his prey; but one did see Churches and altars fed him; perjuries It rain'd about him blood and tears, but he The fearful miser on a heap of rust Sate pining all his life there, did scarce trust Yet would not place one piece alone, but lives Thousands there were as frantic as himself, The downright epicure plac'd heav'n in sense, While others, slipt into a wide excess, The weaker sort, slight, trivial wares enslave, And poor despised Truth sate counting by Yet some, who all this while did weep and sing, O fools-said I-thus to prefer dark night To live in grots, and caves, and hate the day The way, which from this dead and dark abode A way where you might tread the sun, and be But as I did their madness so discuss One whisper'd thus, 'This ring the Bridegroom did for none provide, But for His bride.' BEYOND THE VEIL. They are all gone into the world of light! It glows. and glitters in my cloudy breast, Or those faint beams in which this hill is drest, I see them walking in an air of glory, Whose light doth trample on my days: O holy Hope! and high Humility, High as the heavens above! These are your walks, and you have shew'd them me, To kindle my cold love. Dear, beauteous Death! the jewel of the just, Shining no where, but in the dark; What mysteries do lie beyond thy dust; Could man outlook that mark! He that hath found some fledg'd birds' nest, may know At first sight, if the bird be flown; But what fair well or grove he sings in now, And yet as angels in some brighter dreams So some strange thoughts transcend our wonted themes. If a star were confin'd into a tomb, The captive flames must needs burn there; O Father of eternal life, and all Created glories under Thee! Resume thy spirit from this world of thrall Into true liberty. Either disperse these mists, which blot and fill Or else remove me hence unto that hill, Where I shall need no glass. JAMES SHIRLEY. [SHIRLEY was born in London about the year 1596, and lived through the Civil War and Commonwealth into the Restoration, dying in 1667. His copious dramatic activity began in 1625, in which year he produced the comedy entitled Love's Tricks. Before this, in 1618, he had published an imitation of Venus and Adonis under the title of Echo. His plays were produced in rapid succession up to 1641. In 1646 he published a volume of poems, chiefly erotic, and two small volumes of Masques etc. in 1653 and 1659.] Shirley was essentially an imitative not an original genius. His claim to a place among the great poets of his age rests solely upon his wonderful manipulative dexterity, his power of assimilating and reshaping the creations of his great predecessors. Towards the close of a grand period, perhaps even while its leading spirits are in full creative swing, two distinct tendencies manifest themselves. Men of independent mind separate themselves from the main current, and cast about for fields which the masters have left unoccupied. Men of more pliant and docile intellect follow humbly in the footsteps of the masters, and seize freely upon the wealth which they have accumulated. Shirley belonged to the latter class. He did not try to invent new types, or to say what had not been said before; but stored his mind with the thoughts and the imagery of his predecessors, and reproduced them with joyous facility. We may admire the fluency, the elegance, and the force of Shirley's verse, the ease and naturalness of his dramatic situations, but the attentive reader of his predecessors is never called upon to admire anything new. Fletcher was his chief model and exemplar, but he laid them all freely under contribution. The chief critical pleasure in reading him is the pleasure of memory. W. MINTO. |