DESCRIPTION OF BELPHEBE.

XXI.

Eftsoone' there stepped foorth

A goodly Ladie clad in hunters weed,

That seemd to be a woman of great worth,
And by her stately portance borne of heavenly birth.

XXII.

Her face so faire, as flesh it seemed not,
But hevenly pourtraict of bright angels hew,
Cleare as the skye, withouten blame or blot,
Through goodly mixture of complexions dew;
And in her cheekes the vermeill red did shew
Like roses in a bed of lillies shed,

The which ambrosiall odours from them threw,
And gazers sence with double pleasure fed,
Hable, to heale the sicke and to revive the ded.

XXIII.

In her faire eyes two living lamps did flame,
Kindled above at th' Hevenly Makers light,
And darted fyrie beames out of the same,
So passing persant,3 and so wondrous bright,
That quite bereav'd the rash beholders sight;
In them the blinded god his lustfull fyre
To kindle oft assayd, but had no might;
For, with dredd maiestie and awfull yre

She broke his wanton darts, and quenched bace desyre.

XXIV.

Her yvorie forhead, full of bountie brave,
Like a broad table did itselfe dispred,
For Love his loftie triumphes to engrave,
And write the battailes of his great godhed:

All good and honour might therein be red;

For there their dwelling was. And, when she spake,
Sweete wordes, like dropping honny, she did shed;
And twixt the perles and rubins1 softly brake
A silver sound, that heavenly musicke seemd to make.

XXV.

Upon her eyelids many Graces sate,
Under the shadow of her even browes,
Working belgardes and amorous retrate ;6
And everie one her with a grace endowes,

2 Portance, demeanor. 5 Belgardes, sweet looks.

3 Persant, piercing. • Retrate, picture.

Eftsoone, immediately.
Rubins, rubies.

XXI. 7.-A goodly Ladie, &c.] In the beautiful and elaborate portrait of Belphœbe, Spenser has drawn a flattered likeness of Queen Elizabeth.

And everie one with meekenesse to her bowes:
So glorious mirrhour of celestiall grace,
And soveraine moniment of mortall vowes,

How shall frayle pen descrive her heavenly face,
For feare, through want of skill, her beauty to disgrace!

XXVI.

So faire, and thousand thousand times more faire,
She seemd, when she presented was to sight;
And was yelad, for heat of scorching aire,

All in a silken camus' lilly whight,

Purfled upon with many a folded plight,3
Which all above besprinckled was throughout
With golden aygulets,4 that glistred bright
Like twinckling starres; and all the skirt about
Was hemd with golden fringe.

Her yellow lockes,5 crisped like golden wyre,
About her shoulders weren loosely shed,
And, when the winde emongst them did inspyre,6
They waved like a penon wyde dispred,
And low behinde her backe were scattered:
And, whether art it were or heedlesse hap,

As through the flouring forrest rash she fled,

In her rude heares sweet flowres themselves did lap,7
And flourishing fresh leaves and blossomes did enwrap.

THE CARE OF ANGELS OVER MEN.

Book ii. Canto 8.

4

I.

AND is there care in heaven? And is there love

In heavenly spirits to these creatures base,

That may compassion of their evils move?

There is-else much more wretched were the case

Of men than beasts: But O! th' exceeding grace

Of Highest God that loves his creatures so,
And all his workes with mercy doth embrace,
That blessed Angels he sends to and fro,

To serve to wicked man, to serve his wicked foe!

II.

How oft do they their silver bowers leave
To come to succor us that succor want!
How oft do they with golden pinions cleave
The flittings skyes like flying pursuivant,

Camus, thin dress. 2 Purfled, embroidered.
Aygulets, tagged points.

3 Plight, plait. The yellow locks of Queen Elizabeth enter largely into the descriptions of her beauty by the poets of her reign. spyre, breathe. Lap, entwine themselves.

Yielding.

& In

Against fowle feendes to ayd us militant!
They for us fight, they watch and dewly ward,
And their bright squadrons round about us plant;
And all for love and nothing for reward:

O, why should Hevenly God to men have such regard!

THE SEASONS.

Book vii. Canto 7.

XXVIII.

So forth issew'd the Seasons of the yeare:
First, lusty Spring all dight' in leaves of flowres
That freshly budded and new bloosmes did beare,
In which a thousand birds had built their bowres
That sweetly sung to call forth paramours;
And in his hand a iavelin he did beare,
And on his head (as fit for warlike stoures2)
A guilt engraven morion he did weare;
That as some did him love, so others did him feare.

XXIX.

Then came the iolly Sommer, being dight
In a thin silken cassock colored greene,
That was unlyned all, to be more light:
And on his head a girlond well beseene

He wore, from which as he had chauffed5 been
The sweat did drop; and in his hand he bore
A bowe and shaftes, as he in forrest greene

Had hunted late the libbard or the bore,

And now would bathe his limbes with labor heated sore.

XXX.

Then came the Autumne all in yellow clad,

As though he ioyed in his plentious store,

Laden with fruits that made him laugh, full glad

That he had banisht hunger, which to-fore

Had by the belly oft him pinched sore:

Upon his head a wreath, that was enrold

With ears of corne of every sort, he bore;

And in his hand a sickle he did holde,

To reape the ripened fruits the which the earth had yold.”

XXXI.

Lastly, came Winter cloathed all in frize,

Chattering his teeth for cold that did him chill;
Whil'st on his hoary beard his breath did freese,
And the dull drops, that from his purpled bills
As from a limbeck9 did adown distill:
In his right hand a tipped staffe he held,
With which his feeble steps he stayed still;

For he was faint with cold, and weak with eld;1
That scarce his loosed limbes he able was to weld.2

The following are the four last verses of his hymn on

HEAVENLY LOVE.

With all thy heart, with all thy soule and mind,
Thou must Him love, and His beheasts embrace;
All other loves, with which the world doth blind
Weake fancies, and stirre up affections base,
Thou must renounce and utterly displace,
And give thy self unto Him full and free,
That full and freely gave Himselfe to thee.
Then shalt thou feele thy spirit so possest,
And ravisht with devouring great desire
Of His dear selfe, that shall thy feeble brest
Inflame with love, and set thee all on fire
With burning zeale, through every part entire,
That in no earthly thing thou shalt delight,
But in His sweet and amiable sight.

Thenceforth all worlds desire will in thee dye,
And all earthes glorie, on which men do gaze,
Seeme dirt and drosse in thy pure-sighted eye,
Compar'd to that celestiall beauties blaze,
Whose glorious beames all fleshly sense doth daze,
With admiration of their passing light,
Blinding the eyes, and lumining the spright.

Then shall thy ravisht soul inspired bee

With heavenly thoughts, far above human skill,
And thy bright radiant eyes shall plainely see
Th' idee of His pure glorie present still
Before thy face, that all thy spirits shall fill

With sweete enragements of celestiall love,

Kindled through sight of those faire things above.

His verse

"I have just finished 'The Faerie Queen.' I never parted from a long poem with so much regret. He is a poet of a most musical ear-of a tender heart-of a peculiarly soft, rich, fertile, and flowery fancy. always flows with ease and nature, most abundantly and sweetly; his diffusion is not only pardonable, but agreeable. Grandeur and energy are not his characteristic qualities. He seems to me a most genuine poet, and to be justly placed after Shakspeare and Milton, and above all other English poets."-Sir James Mackintosh.

"Spenser excels in the two qualities in which Chaucer is most deficient -invention and fancy. The invention shown in his allegorical personages is endless, as the fancy shown in his description of them is gorgeous and delightful. He is the poet of romance. He describes things as in a splendid and voluptuous dream."-Hazlitt.

1 Old age.

2 Wield, move.

3

Enragement, fervent admiration.

"No poet has ever had a more exquisite sense of the beautiful than Spenser."-Blackwood's Magazine.

"His command of imagery is wide, easy, and luxuriant. He threw the soul of harmony into our verse, and made it more warmly, tenderly, and magnificently descriptive than it ever was before, or, with a few exceptions, than it ever has been since. It must certainly be owned that in description he exhibits nothing of the brief strokes and robust power which characterize the very greatest poets; but we shall nowhere find more airy and expansive images of visionary things, a sweeter tone of sentiment, or a finer flush in the colours of language, than in this Rubens of English poetry."—Campbell's Specimens, i. 125.1

RICHARD HOOKER. 1553-1600.

ONE of the most learned and distinguished prose writers in the age of Elizabeth, was RICHARD HOOKER. He was born near Exeter in 1553. His parents, being poor, destined him for a trade; but he displayed at school so much aptitude for learning, and gentleness of disposition, that through the efforts of the Bishop of Salisbury he was sent to Oxford. Here he pursued his studies with great ardor and success, and became much respected for his modesty, learning and piety. In 1577 he was elected fellow of his college, and in 1581 took orders in the Episcopal Church. Soon after this he went to preach in London, at Paul's Cross, and took lodgings in a house set apart for the reception of the preachers. The hostess, an artful and designing woman, perceiving Hooker's great simplicity of character, soon inveigled him into a marriage with her daughter, which proved a source of disquietude and vexation to him throughout his life. He was soon advanced in ecclesiastical preferment, and made master of the Temple, where he commenced his labors as forenoon preacher. But this situation accorded neither with his temper nor his literary pursuits, and he petitioned the Archbishop of Canterbury to remove him to "some quiet parsonage." He obtained his desire, and was presented by Elizabeth to the rectory of Bishop's Bourne, in Kent, where he spent the remainder of his life. He died in 1600, of pulmonic disease, brought on by an accidental cold, when only forty-seven years of age.

Hooker's great work is his "Ecclesiastical Polity," a defence of the Church of England against the Puritans. It doubtless owes its origin to the fact that the office of afternoon lecturer at the Temple was filled by Walter Travers, of highly Calvinistic views; while the views of Hooker,

The best, or variorum edition of Spenser, (so called because it has all the notes of the various commentators,) is that of Todd, 8 vols., 8vo. London, 1805. Read-an article on Spenser's Minor Poems in Retrospective Review, xii. 142: also, Edinburgh Review, vol. xxiv., June, 1815: also, a brilliant series of papers on the Faerie Queene, in Blackwood's Magazine, 1834 and 1835.