'O could I flow like thee, and make thy stream Though deep yet clear, though gentle yet not dull, It is a curious fact that this exquisite apostrophe, which is one of the gems of our language, does not occur in the first edition of Cooper's Hill. There are no other lines in that poem which approach these in elegance and force, and it occurs to the mind of the present writer that they may possibly have been contributed by Waller. This, however, is unlikely, and it would be unfair, without shadow of proof, to deprive Denham of his chief claim to immortality. The two passages we select give the reader a fair idea of the general manner of this poem, which has certainly been over-praised. The style is obscure and the wit laboured, while it probably contains more errors against the rules of grammar than any other poem in the language; but Denham is at all times a singularly ungrammatical writer. Of his other long poems, by far the best is the Elegy on Cowley, which was written but a very few months before his own death, and after a long attack of insanity. In this poem he is brighter and more easy than in any other long composition, and it contains some interesting critical matter. Denham was highly esteemed for his comical vein, and his lampoons are not devoid of wit, though incredibly brutal and coarse. He is very unlike the amorous poets of his age in this, that he has left behind him not one copy of love-verses; and his best poem is written in dispraise of love. Among the royalist lyrists there is but one, Cleveland, who forms a connecting link between Denham and the old lyric school. His satires and squibs are closely allied to those of Cleveland, and he has something of the same cynical and defiant attitude of mind. He adored literature with the worship of one who practises it late in life, and without much ease; his conception of the ideal dignity of the poet's function contrasts oddly with the indecorous matter that he puts forth as comic poetry. There was nothing about him very original, for Cooper's Hill, which was destined to inspire Windsor Forest, had been itself preceded by Ben Jonson's Penshurst. But he forms an important link in the chain of transition, and ranks chronologically second among our Augustan poets. EDMUND W. GOSSE. VIEW OF LONDON FROM COOPER'S HILL. Through untraced ways and airy paths I fly, And like a mist beneath a hill doth rise, Whose state and wealth, the business and the crowd, And is to him who rightly things esteems Where, with like haste, though several ways, they run, While luxury and wealth, like war and peace, Are each the other's ruin and increase; As rivers lost in seas some secret vein PRAISE OF THE THAMES. [From Cooper's Hill.] My eye, descending from the hill, surveys Hasting to pay his tribute to the sea, Like mortal life to meet eternity; Though with those streams he no resemblance hold, Nor, with a sudden and impetuous wave, The mower's hopes, nor mock the ploughman's toil, First loves to do, then loves the good he does ; Brings home to us, and makes both Indies ours, O could I flow like thee, and make thy stream My great example, as it is my theme! Though deep, yet clear, though gentle, yet not dull, Strong without rage, without o'erflowing full. AGAINST LOVE. Love making all things else his foes This was the cause the poets sung, Her father, not her son, art thou; And from the cause the effect must flow. Love is as old as place or time ; Love drowsy days and stormy nights Makes, and breaks friendship, whose delights. How happy he, that loves not, lives! SONG. [From The Sophy, Act V.] Morpheus, the humble god, that dwells Hates gilded roofs and beds of down, Come, I say, thou powerful god, O'er his wakeful temples shake, Nature, alas! why art thou so Yet of death it bears a taste, And both are the same thing at last. FROM THE 'ELEGY ON COWLEY.' Old Chaucer, like the morning-star, His light those mists and clouds dissolved But he descending to the shades, By Shakespeare's, Jonson's, Fletcher's lines Till time had blasted all their bays; But cursed be the fatal hour That plucked the fairest, sweetest flower That in the Muses' garden grew, And amongst withered laurels threw. Time, which made them their fame outlive, To Cowley scarce did ripeness give. Old mother-wit and nature gave Shakespeare and Fletcher all they have; |