English Literary Criticism by Charles Edwyn Vaughan (color ebook reader txt) 📖

lover supposes his lady acquainted with the ancient laws of augury and rites of sacrifice:

  And yet this death of mine, I fear,
  Will ominous to her appear:
    When found in every other part,
  Her sacrifice is found without an heart.
    For the last tempest of my death
  Shall sigh out that too, with my breath.

That the chaos was harmonized, has been recited of old; but whence the different sounds arose remained for a modern to discover:

  Th' ungovern'd parts no correspondence knew,
  And artless war from thwarting motions grew;
  Till they to number and fixt rules were brought.
  Water and air he for the Tenor chose.
  Earth made the Base, the Treble flame arose.
                      —Cowley.

The tears of lovers are always of great poetical account, but Donne has extended them into worlds. If the lines are not easily understood, they may be read again:

                           On a round ball
  A workman, that hath copies by, can lay
  An Europe, Afric, and an Asia,
  And quickly make that, which was nothing, all.
    So doth each tear,
    Which thee doth wear,
  A globe, yea world, by that impression grow,
  Till thy tears mixt with mine do overflow
  This world, by waters sent from thee my heaven dissolved so.

On reading the following lines, the reader may perhaps cry out,
"Confusion worse confounded":

  Here lies a she sun, and a he moon here,
    She gives the best light to his sphere,
    Or each is both, and all, and so
  They unto one another nothing owe.
                  —Donne.

Who but Donne would have thought that a good man is a telescope?

  Though God be our true glass, through which we see
  All, since the being of all things is He,
  Yet are the trunks, which do to us derive
  Things, in proportion fit, by perspective
  Deeds of good men; for by their living here,
  Virtues, indeed remote, seem to be near.

Who would imagine it possible that in a very few lines so many remote ideas could be brought together?

  Since't is my doom, Love's undershrieve,
      Why this reprieve?
  Why doth my She Advowson fly
      Incumbency?
  To sell thyself dost thou intend
      By candle's end,
  And hold the contrast thus in doubt,
      Life's taper out?
  Think but how soon the market fails,
  Your sex lives faster than the males;
  As if to measure age's span,
  The sober Julian were th' account of man,
  Whilst you live by the fleet Gregorian.
                    —Cleveland.

Of enormous and disgusting hyperboles, these may be examples:

    By every wind, that comes this way,
    Send me at least a sigh or two,
    Such and so many I'll repay
  As shall themselves make winds to get to you.
                     —Cowley.

    In tears I'll waste these eyes,
    By Love so vainly fed;
  So lust of old the Deluge punished.
                    —Cowley.

  All arm'd in brass the richest dress of war,
  (A dismal glorious sight) he shone afar.
  The sun himself started with sudden fright,
  To see his beams return so dismal bright.
                     —Cowley.

An universal consternation:

  His bloody eyes he hurls round, his sharp paws
  Tear up the ground; then runs he wild about,
  Lashing his angry tail and roaring out.

  Beasts creep into their dens, and tremble there;
  Trees, though no wind is stirring, shake with fear;
  Silence and horror fill the place around:
  Echo itself dares scarce repeat the sound.
                     —Cowley.

Their fictions were often violent and unnatural.

OF HIS MISTRESS BATHING.

  The fish around her crowded, as they do
  To the false light that treacherous fishers shew,
  And all with as much ease might taken be,
    As she at first took me:
    For ne'er did light so clear
    Among the waves appear,
  Though every night the sun himself set there.
                     —Cowley.

The poetical effect of a lover's name upon glass:

            My name engrav'd herein
  Doth contribute my firmness to this glass;
    Which, ever since that charm, hath been
  As hard as that which grav'd it was.
                     —Donne.

Their conceits were sometimes slight and trifling.

ON AN INCONSTANT WOMAN.

  He enjoys thy calmy sunshine now,
    And no breath stirring hears,
  In the clear heaven of thy brow,
    No smallest cloud appears.
    He sees thee gentle, fair and gay,
  And trusts the faithless April of thy May.
                     —Cowley.

Upon a paper written with the juice of lemon, and read by the fire:

    Nothing yet in thee is seen:
    But when a genial heat warms thee within,
  A new-born wood of various lines there grows;
    Here buds an L, and there a B,
    Here sprouts a V, and there a T,
  And all the flourishing letters stand in rows.
                     —Cowley

As they sought only for novelty, they did not much inquire whether their allusions were to things high or low, elegant or gross; whether they compared the little to the great, or the great to the little.

PHYSICK AND CHIRURGERY FOR A LOVER.

  Gently, ah gently, madam, touch
    The wound, which you yourself have made;
  That pain must needs be very much,
    Which makes me of your hand afraid.
  Cordials of pity give me now,
  For I too weak for purgings grow.
                     —Cowley.

THE WORLD AND A CLOCK.

  Mahol, th' inferior world's fantastic face,
  Through all the turns of matter's maze did trace;
  Great Nature's well-set clock in pieces took;
  On all the springs and smallest wheels did look
  Of life and motion; and with equal art
  Made up again the whole of every part.
                     —Cowley.

A coal-pit has not often found its poet; but, that it may not want its due honour, Cleveland has paralleled it with the sun:

  The moderate value of our guiltless ore
  Makes no man atheist, and no woman whore;
  Yet why should hallow'd vestals' sacred shrine
  Deserve more honour than a flaming mine?
  These pregnant wombs of heat would fitter be
  Than a few embers, for a deity.

    Had he our pits, the Persian would admire
  No sun, but warm's devotion at our fire:
  He'd leave the trotting whipster, and prefer
  Our profound Vulcan 'bove that waggoner.
  For wants he heat or light? or would have store
  Of both? 'tis here: and what can suns give more?
  Nay, what's the sun but, in a different name,
  A coal-pit rampant, or a mine on flame!
  Then let this truth reciprocally run
  The sun's heaven's coalery, and coals our sun.

DEATH, A VOYAGE.

                               No family
  E'er rigg'd a soul for heaven's discovery,
  With whom more venturers might boldly dare
  Venture their stakes, with him in joy to share.
                     —Donne.

Their thoughts and expressions were sometimes grossly absurd, and such as no figures or licence can reconcile to the understanding.

A LOVER NEITHER DEAD NOR ALIVE.

  Then down I laid my head,
  Down on cold earth; and for a while was dead,
  And my freed soul to a strange somewhere fled:
  Ah, sottish soul, said I,
  When back to its cage again I saw it fly:
  Fool to resume her broken chain!
  And row her galley here again!
  Fool, to that body to return
  Where it condemn'd and destin'd is to burn!
  Once dead, how can it be,
  Death should a thing so pleasant seem to thee,
  That thou should'st come to live it o'er again in me?
                     —Cowley.

A LOVER'S HEART A HAND GRENADO.

  Wo to her stubborn heart, if once mine come
    Into the self-same room,
    'T will tear and blow up all within,
  Like a grenado shot into a magazin.

  Then shall Love keep the ashes, and torn parts,
    Of both our broken hearts:
    Shall out of both one new one make;
  From hers th' allay; from mine, the metal take.
                     —Cowley.

THE POETICAL PROPAGATION OF LIGHT.

  The Prince's favour is diffus'd o'er all,
   From which all fortunes, names, and natures fall;
   Then from those wombs of stars, the Bride's bright eyes,
   At every glance a constellation flies,
   And sows the court with stars, and doth prevent
   In light and power, the all-ey'd firmament:
   First her eye kindles other ladies' eyes,
   Then from their beams their jewels' lustres rise;
   And from their jewels torches do take fire,
   And all is warmth, and light, and good desire.
                     —Donne.

They were in very little care to clothe their notions with elegance of dress, and therefore miss the notice and the praise which are often gained by those who think less, but are more diligent to adorn their thoughts.

That a mistress beloved is fairer in idea than in reality is by Cowley thus expressed:

  Thou in my fancy dost much higher stand,
  Than woman can be plac'd by Nature's hand;
  And I must needs, I'm sure, a loser be,
  To change thee, as thou 'rt there, for very thee.

That prayer and labour should co-operate are thus taught by Donne:

  In none but us, are such mixt engines found,
  As hands of double office: for the ground
  We till with them; and them to heaven we raise;
  Who prayerless labours, or without this, prays,
  Doth but one half, that's none.

By the same author, a common topic, the danger of procrastination, is thus illustrated:

—That which I should have begun In my youth's morning, now late must be done; And I, as giddy travellers must do, Which stray or sleep all day, and having lost Light and strength, dark and tir'd must then ride post.

All that Man has to do is to live and die; the sum of humanity is comprehended by Donne in the following lines:

  Think in how poor a prison thou didst lie;
  After, enabled but to suck and cry.
  Think, when't was grown to most, 't was a poor inn,
  A province pack'd up in two yards of skin,
  And that usurp'd, or threaten'd with a rage
  Of sicknesses, or their true mother, age.
  But think that death hath now enfranchis'd thee;
  Thou hast thy expansion now, and liberty;
  Think, that a rusty piece discharg'd is flown
  In pieces, and the bullet is his own,
  And freely flies; this to thy soul allow,
  Think thy shell broke, think thy soul hatched but now.

They were sometimes indelicate and disgusting. Cowley thus apostrophizes beauty:

—Thou tyrant, which leav'st no man free! Thou subtle thief, from whom nought safe can be! Thou murderer, which hast kill'd, and devil, which would'st damn me.

Thus he addresses his mistress:

  Thou who, in many a propriety,
  So truly art the sun to me.
  Add one more likeness, which I'm sure you can,
  And let me and my sun beget a man.

Thus he represents the meditations of a lover:

  Though in thy thoughts scarce any tracts have been
  So much as of original sin,
  Such charms thy beauty wears as might
  Desires in dying confest saints excite.
  Thou with strange adultery
  Dost in each breast a brothel keep;
  Awake, all men do lust for thee,
  And some enjoy thee when they sleep.

The true taste of tears:

  Hither with crystal vials, lovers, come,
    And take my tears, which are Love's wine,
  And try your mistress' tears at home;
    For all are false, that taste not just like mine.
                     —Donne.

This is yet more indelicate:

  As the sweet sweat of roses in a still
  As that which from chaf'd musk-cat's pores doth trill,
  As th' almighty balm of th' early East,
  Such are the sweet drops of my mistress' breast.
  And on her neck her skin such lustre sets,
  They seem no sweat-drops, but pearl coronets:
  Rank sweaty froth thy mistress' brow defiles.
                     —Donne.

Their expressions sometimes raise horror, when they intend perhaps to be pathetic:

  As men in hell are from diseases free,
    So from all other ills am I.
    Free from their known formality:
  But all pains eminently lie in thee.
                     —Cowley.

They were not always strictly curious, whether the opinions from which they drew their illustrations were true; it was enough that they were popular. Bacon remarks that some falsehoods are continued by tradition, because they supply commodious allusions.

  It gave a piteous groan, and so it broke;
  In vain it something would have spoke:
  The love within too strong for't was,
  Like poison put into a Venice-glass.
                     —Cowley.

In forming descriptions, they looked out, not for images, but for conceits. Night has been a common subject, which poets have contended to adorn. Dryden's Night is well known; Donne's is as follows:

  Thou seest me here at midnight, now all rest:
  Time's dead low-water; when all minds divest
  To-morrow's business, when the labourers have
  Such rest in bed, that their last church-yard grave,
  Subject to change, will scarce be a type of this;
  Now when the client, whose last hearing is
  To-morrow, sleeps; when the condemned man,
  Who when he opens his eyes, must shut them then
  Again by death, although sad watch he keep,
  Doth practise dying by a little sleep,
  Thou at this midnight seest me.

It must be, however, confessed of these writers that if they are upon common subjects often unnecessarily and unpoetically subtle, yet where scholastic speculation can be properly admitted, their copiousness and acuteness may justly be