SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY L YRICS.*

THE lyrics of the seventeenth century are scarcely known except to students. Mr. %lien, to whom Mr. Saintsbury constantly refers in the notes to this little book, has done much, with his careful and well-chosen selections, to make them popular ; but we have hardly till now had a small portable collection, suitable not only for the connoisseur, but for any one with an ear for poetry. It is true that most people with any pretension to literary taste are familiar with Suckling and Campion, and know that it was Herrick who immortalised the daffodils ; but few have even heard the names of Davison, Heywood, Brome, and others, who flourished in what has been well called "England's singing-time." These Mr. Saintsbury has fittingly represented. The selec- tions are so well made, that it will be hard for the most captious critic to find anything to cavil at, the editor having wisely included many well-known poems as well as the less familiar ones,—an example which it would be not amiss if other compilers followed, the tendency often being to exclude much that is fine on the plea that it is hackneyed. In art, unlike life, it is impossible to have too much of a really good thing. And we most of us prefer the tunes we know.

Among the lyrics with which we were unacquainted, we were especially delighted with a little song (p. 73) by William Rowley, the date of which appears to be uncertain, and with a lovely • Seventeenth-Century Lyrics. Edited by George Saintsbury. London : Percival and Co.

lyric by Donne (p. 10), also unknown to us. There is in this book, together with many of his more familiar verses, a curious "Litany" by Herrick, containing a mixture of the grotesque and solemn that is almost American (p. 208). We also found a fine poem which we have seen attributed to George Herbert (p. 75), but which Mr. Saintsbnry, with far more probability, supposes to be by Henry Vaughan, though it is impossible to be quite sure. We wonder rather that the beautiful song, "Love not me for comely grace" (from John Wlldbye's second set of madri- gals), is omitted, and also that the poem from John Dowland's Book of Airs (1600) in which occur the lines,— " Sorrow was there made fair, And passion wise, tears a delightful thing, Silence beyond all speech, a wisdom rare She made her sighs to sing," finds no place. It is not, perhaps, actually a lyric, but no more are several of the poems Mr. Saintsbury has included. However, if he had attempted to collect all the lovely lyrics of that songful time, his book could not have formed part of the "Pocket Library Series."

The editor, in his introduction, raises an interesting question. He asks how a somewhat debased parson, a shy, self-absorbed tutor, and a frivolous courtier, such as were Herrick, Cra.shaw, and Carew, could write lyrics which we have rarely touched, never surpassed, in the whole course of English literature. He adds :—" There is no explanation of these things, or rather, the explanations fail to be explanatory, to such an extent that, except as sets-off to critical conversation, we need not trouble ourselves about them." But surely the answer lies in the fact that the atmosphere round this courtier, this parson, this tutor, was a poetic and a fresh one. Nothing has changed more com- pletely in history, than the English character since the days of "Merry England." Should any unbiassed critic, not knowing our literature, read a number of such poems as are included in this book, and then turn to a selection of lyrics of this century, were it not that both sets are in English, he would swear that the respective authors were men of a different nationality. It is a wide subject, and one that it is impossible to go into in the space of an ordinary review ; but if we look for a moment at one or two of the most apparent traits in these lyrics, we shall realise it at once. For instance, the careless gaiety, the joie de vivre, which characterises them, —where do we find it now ? Certainly not in Lord Tennyson, the finest lyrical poet of the age. Certainly not in that greatest of the deeadents, whose lyrics are in point of form and finish as perfect as we can desire,—Mr. Swinbutne. Nor, going back, can any one accuse Wordsworth, Byron, or Shelley of having written lyrics which can be termed gay.

What, for example, could be more different than the two lyrics we quote ? The first, which occurs in Mr. Saintsbury's collection, is from Dryden's Indian Emperor ; the second is by Shelley, and was written in 1821. They treat of the same subject, and yet how distinct the tone of the seventeenth- century poet is from that of his nineteenth-century brother !—

" Ah, fading joy ! how quickly art thou past !

Yet we thy ruin baste As if the cares of human life were few, We seek out new : And follow fate which would too fast pursue.

See how on every bough the birds express In their sweet notes their happiness. They all enjoy, and nothing spare, But on their mother Nature lay their care ;

Why then, should man, the lord of all below, Such troubles choose to know,

As none of all his subjects undergo ?

Hark, bark, the waters fall, fall, fall ; And with a murmuring sound Dash, dash upon the ground, To gentle slumbers call."

"MUTABILITY.

The flower that smiles to-day, To-morrow dies : All that we wish to stay Tempts and then flies.

What is this world's delight ? Lightning that mocks the night, Brief, even as bright.

Virtue, how frail it is ! Friendship, how rare ! Love, how it sells poor bliss For proud despair ! But we, though soon they fall, Survive their joy, and all Which ours we call. Whilst skies are blue and bright, Whilst flowers are gay, Whilst eyes that change ere night Make glad the day, Whilst yet the calm hours creep, Dream thou,—and from thy sleep Then wake to weep."

The first leaves one with the impression that life, in spite of its drawbacks, has much to be said for it ; whilst after reading the second, we feel that it is indeed a bad business.

Turning to minor poets, Tom Moore, who has many admirers, and who in some ways is nearer the spirit of the seventeenth century, has not often accomplished anything superlatively joyous. Nor has Praed, nor, later, the many living writers of attractive lyrics and vers de socielj. Moreover, even when they attempt to be cheerful, they too often remind one of the line :—

" Under them all runs a low perpetual wail, as of souls in pain."

There are one or two exceptions, of whom Mr. Austin Dobson is the chief. He, at all events, among our living English poets has written lyrics which have something of the fresh country sweetness of Herrick, and the finished elegance of Carew.

Another very striking difference between the lyrics of to-day, and those of 200 or 250 years ago, is the entire difference of the attitude towards women expressed in them. Whether our present attitude is a better or a worse one, we do not pretend to say; but we have lost "the love of love, for love's sake," in our poetry. The tender reverence for, mixed with intense interest in, le beau sere, which breathes all through the lyrics of England during the period we are treating of, is comparatively unknown in modern English verse, though we find it still very strongly in German, and to a certain extent in French, lyrics. Even when Suckling and Carew are derisive, it is from pique ; there is always the same absorbed, though perfectly healthy, interest in those strange creatures, women. While in modern English lyrics, though we have plenty of passion—more. indeed, than necessary— and perhaps occasionally a higher ideal of women's perfection

than had the old song-writers, as in Wordsworth's- " A spirit, yet a woman too,"

yet the standpoint is absolutely different. Women, as women, do not form the theme of English poets as they did. The one woman does, and always will, but the sex have lost their power, —a fact possibly due to the short-haired ladies who wish for total equality ! Much of the change of character in English literature can be traced to the Puritan influence. It leavened slowly, but very surely, bringing so many graceful and fair things into disrepute, and taking away from us, both in our own estimation and that of our neighbours, the name of "Merry England." And from this gloomy period we can only hope to emerge very slowly. Some of our writers are doing their best to free us, but as yet the attempt has not been made by our poets. They still take themselves and their love-affairs very seriously. Where they are not melancholy, they are saturnine and unhealthy, or they are terribly involved. "Ernst ist das Leben," grave and earnest enough for us to allow ourselves a little gaiety in our verses. We sigh for a reprieve from the fatal passions and strange analyses, the curious sins and morbid despondency, of our song-writers. Even when they are amusing, they are bitter.

Perhaps there will be a revulsion. Let us hope so. Our grandchildren may write lyrics about cowslips and hawthorn, and men and maidens who weave cheerful romances. If they do, they will look back with wonder on the days when poets wrote only of fantastic orchids and heavily scented lilies, and were too self-analytical even to fall in love.