Or, like a gallant horse fallen in first rank,
Lie there for pavement to the abject rear,
O'errun and trampled on: Then what they do in

present,

Though less than yours in past, must o'ertop yours:
For time is like a fashionable host,

That slightly shakes his parting guest by the hand,
And with his arms outstretched, as he would fly,
Grasps in the comer: Welcome ever smiles,
And Farewell goes out sighing. Oh, let not virtue
seek

Remuneration for the thing it was;

For beauty, wit,

High birth, vigor of bone, desert in service,
Love, friendship, charity, are subjects all
To envious and calumniating time.

One touch of nature makes the whole world kin,—
That all, with one consent, praise new-born gawds,
Though they are made and moulded of things past;
And give to dust that is a little gilt
More laud than gilt o'erdusted.

The present eye praises the present object;
Then marvel not, thou great and complete man,
That all the Greeks begin to worship Ajax;
Since things in motion sooner catch the eye
Than what not stirs.

THE QUALITY OF MERCY.

FROM THE MERCHANT OF VENICE."

The quality of mercy is not strained;
It droppeth, as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath: it is twice blessed;
It blesseth him that gives, and him that takes:
"Tis mightiest in the mightiest; it becomes
The throned monarch better than his crown;
His sceptre shows the force of temporal power,
The attribute to awe and majesty,
Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings;
But mercy is above this sceptred sway,
It is enthronéd in the hearts of kings,
It is an attribute to God himself;

And earthly power doth then show likest God's
When mercy seasons justice. Therefore, Jew,
Though justice be thy plea, consider this,-
That in the course of justice, none of us
Should see salvation: we do pray for mercy,
And that same prayer doth teach us all to render
The deeds of mercy. I have spoke thus much
To mitigate the justice of thy plea,

Which if thou follow, this strict court of Venice Must needs give sentence 'gainst the merchant there.

MOONLIGHT AND MUSIC.

FROM THE MERCHANT OF VENICE."

How sweet the moonlight sleeps upon this bank! Here will we sit, and let the sounds of music Creep in our ears; soft stillness, and the night Become the touches of sweet harmony.

:

Sit, Jessica look, how the floor of heaven
Is thick inlaid with patens of bright gold.
There's not the smallest orb which thou behold'st
But in his motion like an angel sings,
Still quiring to the young-eyed cherubims:
Such harmony is in immortal souls;
But, whilst this muddy vesture of decay
Doth grossly close it in, we cannot hear it.-
Come, ho, and wake Diana with a hymn;
With sweetest touches pierce your mistress's ear,
And draw her home with music.-

"I am never merry when I hear sweet music."
The reason is, your spirits are attentive:
For do but note a wild and wanton herd,
Or race of youthful and unhandled colts,
Fetching mad bounds, bellowing, and neighing loud,
Which is the hot condition of their blood;
If they but hear, perchance, a trumpet sound,
Or any air of music touch their ears,

You shall perceive them make a mutual stand,
Their savage eyes turned to a modest gaze,
By the sweet power of music: therefore, the poet
Did feign that Orpheus drew trees, stones, and
floods;

Since naught so stockish, hard, and full of rage,
But music for the time doth change his nature;
The man that hath not music in himself,
Nor is not moved with concord of sweet sounds,
Is fit for treasons, stratagems, and spoils;
The motions of his spirit are dull as night,
And his affections dark as Erebus:
Let no such man be trusted.

ENGLAND.

FROM "RICHARD II."

This royal throne of kings, this sceptred isle,
This earth of majesty, this seat of Mars,
This other Eden, demi-paradise;
This fortress, built by nature for herself,
Against infection, and the hand of war;
This happy breed of men, this little world,
This precious stone set in the silver sea,
Which serves it in the office of a wall,
Or as a moat defensive to a house,
Against the envy of less happier lands;

This dear, dear land,

Dear for her reputation through the world.

With all appliances and means to boot,

Deny it to a king?-Then, happy low, lie down! Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.

SONG FROM "TWELFTH NIGHT."

O mistress mine! where are you roaming?
O stay and hear; your true love's coming,
That can sing both high and low:
Trip no further, pretty sweeting;
Journeys end in lovers' meeting,

Every wise man's son doth know.

What is love? 'tis not hereafter:
Present mirth bath present laughter;
What's to come is still unsure:
In delay there lies no plenty;
Then come kiss me, sweet and twenty,
Youth's a stuff will not endure.

HENRY IV.'S SOLILOQUY ON SLEEP.
How many thousands of my poorest subjects
Are at this hour asleep!-O sleep! O gentle sleep!
Nature's soft nurse, how have I frighted thee,
That thou no more wilt weigh my eyelids down,
And steep my senses in forgetfulness?

Why rather, sleep, liest thou in smoky cribs,
Upon uneasy pallets stretching thee,

.

And hushed with buzzing night-flies to thy slumber,

Than in the perfumed chambers of the great,
Under the canopies of costly state,
And lulled with sound of sweetest melody?

Oh, thou dull god! why liest thou with the vile
In loathsome beds, and leav'st the kingly couch
A watch-case, or a common 'larum bell?1
Wilt thou, upon the high and giddy mast,
Seal up the ship-boy's eyes, and rock his brains,
In cradle of the rude imperious surge,
And in the visitation of the winds,
Who take the ruffian billows by the top,
Carling their monstrons heads, and hanging them
With deaf'ning clamors in the slippery clouds,
That with the hurly death itself awakes?
Can'st thon, O partial sleep! give thy repose
To the wet sea-boy in an hour so rude,

I The alarm of danger was communicated by the watchman In zarrison towns by a bell. "He had a case or box to shelter

Liu from the weather."

DETACHED PASSAGES FROM THE PLAYS. How far that little candle throws his beams! So shines a good deed in a naughty world.

Love all, trust a few,

Do wrong to none: be able for thine enemy Rather in power than use; and keep thy friend Under thy own life's key: be checked for silence, But never taxed for speech.

The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces, The solemn temples, the great globe itself, Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve; And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff As dreams are made on, and our little life Is rounded with a sleep.

O world, thy slippery turns! Friends now fast

sworn,

Whose double bosoms seem to wear one heart, Whose hours, whose bed, whose meal, and exercise, Are still together; who twin, as 'twere, in love Unseparable, shall within this hour,

On a dissension of a doit, break out

To bitterest enmity: so, fellest foes,

Whose passions and whose plots have broke their

sleep,

To take the one the other, by some chance, Some trick not worth an egg, shall grow dear friends,

And interjoin their issues.

So it falls out, That what we have we prize not to the worth, Whiles we enjoy it; but being lacked and lost, Why then we rack the value; then we find The virtue that possession would not show us Whiles it was ours.

Cowards die many times before their deaths; The valiant never taste of death but once. Of all the wonders that I yet have heard, It seems to me most strange that men should fear; Seeing that death, a necessary end,

Will come when it will come.

Our indiscretion sometimes serves us well,

When our deep plots do pall; and that should

teach us,

There's a divinity that shapes our ends, Rough-hew them how we will.

There is some soul of goodness in things evil, Would men observingly distil it out, For our bad neighbor makes us early stirrers, Which is both healthful, and good husbandry : Besides, they are our outward consciences, And preachers to us all; admonishing, That we should dress us fairly for our end. Thus may we gather honey from the weed, And make a moral of the devil himself.

O momentary grace of mortal men,

Which we more hunt for than the grace of God!
Who builds his hope in air of your good looks,
Lives like a drunken sailor on a mast;
Ready with every nod to tumble down
Into the fatal bowels of the deep.

Who shall go about

To cozen fortune, and be honorable

Without the stamp of merit? Let none presume To wear an undeservéd dignity.

Oh that estates, degrees, and offices,

Were not derived corruptly! and that clear honor
Were purchased by the merit of the wearer!
How many then should cover that stand bare;
How many be commanded, that command;
How much low peasantry would then be gleaned
From the true seed of honor; and how much honor
Picked from the chaff and ruin of the times
To be new varnished!

John Webster.

Webster (circa 1570-1640) and Thomas Dekker were partners in writing plays. Webster also wrote for the stage independently, and ranks among the chief of the minor Elizabethan tragic dramatists. Charles Lamb said of the following dirge from "The White Devil," that he knew nothing like it, except the ditty that reminds Ferdinand of his drowned father, in "The Tempest." "As that is of the water watery, so this is of the earth earthy."

A DIRGE.

Call for the robin-redbreast and the wren, Since o'er shady groves they hover,

And with leaves and flowers do cover

The friendless bodies of unburied men.
Call unto his funeral dole

The ant, the field-mouse, and the mole,

To rear him hillocks that shall keep him warm, And, when gay tombs are robbed, sustain no harm; But keep the wolf far thence, that's foe to men, For with his nails he'll dig them up again.

FROM "THE DUCHESS OF MALFI.”

This tragedy turns on the mortal offence which the duchess gives to her two proud brothers by indulging in a generous though infatuated passion for Antonio, her steward.

Cariola. Hence, villains, tyrants, murderers! Alas! What will you do with my lady? Call for help. Duchess. To whom? to our next neighbors? They are mad folks.

Farewell, Cariola.

I pray thee look thou giv'st my little boy
Some sirup for his cold; and let the girl
Say her prayers ere she sleep.- Now what you
please.

What death?

Bosola. Strangling. Here are your executioners.
Duch. I forgive them.

The apoplexy, catarrh, or cough o' the lungs,
Would do as much as they do.

Bos. Doth not death fright you?
Duch. Who would be afraid on't,
Knowing to meet such excellent company
In the other world.

Bos. Yet, methinks,

The manner of your death should much afflict you: This cord should terrify you.

Duch. Not a whit.

What would it pleasure me to have my throat cut
With diamonds? or to be smothered

With cassia? or to be shot to death with pearls?
I know death hath ten thousand several doors
For men to take their exits: and 'tis found
They go on such strange geometrical hinges,
You may open them both ways: any way — for
heaven sake-

So I were out of your whispering. Tell my brothers
That I perceive death-now I'm well awake—
Best gift is they can give or I can take.

I would fain put off my last woman's fault;
I'd not be tedious to you.

Pull, and pull strongly, for your able strength
Must pull down heaven upon me.

Yet stay heaven gates are not so highly arched
As princes' palaces; they that enter there

Must go upon their knees. Come, violent death,
Serve for mandragora to make me sleep.
Go, tell my brothers: when I am laid out,
They then may feed in quiet.

[They strangle her, kneeling.

Sir Robert Ayton.

A Scottish courtier and poet, Ayton (1570-1638) enjoyed, like Drummond, the advantages of foreign travel, and of acquaintance with English poets. He was born in Fifeshire. Ben Jonson seemed proud of his friendship, for he told Drummond that Sir Robert loved him (Jonson) dearly. An edition of Ayton's poems was published as late as 1871.

ON WOMAN'S INCONSTANCY. I loved thee once, I'll love no more; Thine be the grief, as is the blame; Thou art not what thou wast before: What reason I should be the same? He that can love unloved again Hath better store of love than brain: God send me love my debts to pay, While unthrifts fool their love away.

Nothing could have my love o'erthrown,
If thou hadst still continued mine;
Yea, if thou hadst remained thy own,
I might, perchance, have yet been thine.
But thou thy freedom did recall,

That if thou might elsewhere inthrall;
And then how could I but disdain
A captive's captive to remain ?

When new desires had conquered thee,
And changed the object of thy will,

It had been lethargy in me,
Not constancy, to love thee still.

Yea, it had been a sin to go
And prostitute affection so;

Since we are taught no prayers to say
To such as must to others pray.

Yet do thou glory in thy choice,

Thy choice of his good fortune boast; I'll neither grieve nor yet rejoice

To see him gain what I have lost; The height of my disdain shall be

To laugh at him, to blush for thee; To love thee still, but go no more A-begging to a beggar's door.

Alexander Hume.

Hume (circa 1560-1609) was a minister of the Scotch Kirk in the latter half of the seventeenth century. He published in Edinburgh, in 1599, a collection of " Hymns, or Sacred Songs," of which now only three copies are known to exist. The "Story of a Summer Day" has some precious passages, showing an original vein, but it is much too long. Campbell and Trench have both abridged it, and the same liberty has been taken in the following version. Hume died in 1609.

All laborers draw home at even,

And can to other say,

"Thanks to the gracious God of heaven, Which sent this summer day!"

Thomas Heywood.

The dates of this writer's birth and death are unknown. He is found writing for the stage in 1596, and he continued to exercise his ready pen down to the year 1640. He lived in the reigns of Elizabeth, James I., and Charles I. He had, as he informs his readers, "an entire hand, or at least a main finger," in two hundred and twenty plays. He wrote, also, several prose works, besides attending to his businesss as an actor. Of his plays only twenty-three have come down to us; and among the best is "The Woman killed with Kindness." He seems to have been a man of genius; and his "Search after God" is a very noble poem, showing that, in his higher moods, the true spirit of poesy animated the humble playwright.

FANTASIES OF DRUNKENNESS.

FROM "THE ENGLISH TRAVELLER."

This gentleman and I

Passed but just now by your next neighbor's house,
Where, as they say, dwells one young Lionel,
An unthrift youth; his father now at sea:
And there, this night, was held a sumptuous feast.
In the height of their carousing, all their brains
Warmed with the heat of wine, discourse was of
fered

Of ships and storms at sea; when, suddenly,
Out of his giddy wildness, one conceives

The room wherein they quaffed to be a pinnace,
Moving and floating, and the confused noise
To be the murmuring winds, gusts, mariners;
That their unsteadfast footing did proceed
From rocking of the vessel. This conceived,
Each one begins to apprehend the danger,
And to look out for safety. Fly, saith one,
Up to the main-top, and discover. He
Climbs by the bedpost to the tester, there
Reports a turbulent sea and tempest towards,
And wills them, if they'll save their ship and lives,

To cast their lading overboard. At this,

All fall to work, and hoist into the street,

As to the sea, what next came to their handStools, tables, tressels, trenchers, bedsteads, cups, Pots, plate, and glasses. Here a fellow whistles; They take him for the boatswain: one lies strug

gling