"Can my enemies say that I bore up the reins of government too hard, and exercised my jurisdiction in a rigorous and tyrannical way, insolently lording it over my charge? Malice itself, perhaps, would, but dare not speak it; or if it should, the attestation of so numerous and grave a clergy would choke such impudence. Let them witness whether they were not still entertained with an equal return of reverence, as if they had been all bishops with me, or I only a presbyter with them. Let them say whether aught here looked despotical, or sounded rather of imperious command than of brotherly complying; whether I have not rather from some beholders undergone the censure of a too humble remissness, as stooping too low beneath the eminence of episcopal dignity; whether I have not suffered as much in some opinions, for the winning mildness of my administration, as some others for a rough severity.

"Can they say that I barred the free course of religious exercises, by the suppression of painful and peaceable preachers? If shame will suffer any man to object it, let me challenge him to instance but in one name. Nay, the contrary is so famously known in the western parts, that every mouth will herein justify me. What free admission and encouragement have I always given to all the sons of peace, that came to me with God's message in their mouths! What mis-suggestions have I waived! How have I often and publicly professed, that as well might we complain of too many stars in the sky, as too many orthodox preachers in the church!

"Can they challenge me as a close and back-stair friend to Popery and Arminianism, who have in so many pulpits, and so many presses, cried down both? Surely the very paper that I have spent in the refutation of both these, is enough to stop more mouths than can be guilty of this calumny.

"Lastly, since no man can offer to upbraid me with too much pomp, which is wont to be the common eyesore of our envied profession, can any man pretend to a ground of taxing me of too much worldliness? Surely, of all the vices forbidden in the decalogue, there is no one which my heart, upon due examination, can less fasten upon me than this. No, no; I know the world too well to doat upon it. It were too great a shame for a philosopher, a Christian, a divine, a bishop, to have his thoughts grovelling here upon earth; for mine, they scorn the employment, and look upon all those sublunary distractions with no other eyes than contempt."

After five months' confinement Hall was liberated, and repaired to Norwich, where he was well received. The ordinance of sequestration, however, which was soon after issued, deprived him of his income, and ejected him from his palace. Having obtained a lease of a small property at Higham, near Norwich, he retired there upon a small pension which had been allowed his wife. At Higham he spent the remainder of his life in studious seclusion-continuing, however, his ministerial functions, until prevented by increasing inirmity and legal disabilities. In 1652 he lost his wife; and four years afterwards, on

xvi

MEMOIRS OF GEORGE HERBERT AND BISHOP HALL.

the 8th of September 1656, he followed her to the grave, in his eightysecond year.

"The author," says Dr. Hamilton, "whom we have attempted to portray, recurs to our imagination as the gentle, self-denied, and benignant parish priest, whom his neighbours met and eyed reverentially as he took his stated evening walk, cheerful at times, but oftener pensive, in the fields near Waltham parsonage a man of that calm resolution and ardent faith, which could at any warning have followed the Saviour whom he loved to prison and to death, and whose aspirations often soared so high as to forget the Meshech where he sojourned. And the end will be answered, if we who read them learn for ourselves to live the same divine life, and acquire the same skill in heavenly meditation-an art little esteemed and less practised in an age which would not be too busy if it thought as much as it toils.

'More sweet than odours caught by him who sails

Near spicy shores of Araby the blest,

A thousand times more exquisitely sweet,

The freight of holy feeling which we meet,

In thoughtful moments, wafted by the gale

From fields where good men walk, or bowers wherein they rest.'

WORDSWORTH."

1. The Temple.

THE DEDICATION.

:

Lord, my first fruits present themselves to thee;
Yet not mine neither for from thee they came,
And must return. Accept of them and me,
And make us strive, who shall sing best thy name.
Turn their eyes hither, who shall make a gain
Theirs, who shall hurt themselves or me, refrain.

1. THE CHURCH-PORCH.

Perirrhanterium.

THOU, whose sweet youth and early hopes inhance
Thy rate and price, and mark thee for a treasure,
Hearken unto a Verser, who may chance

Ryme thee to good, and make a bait of pleasure :
A verse may finde him who a sermon flies,

And turn delight into a sacrifice.

Beware of lust; it doth pollute and foul

Whom God in baptisme washt with his own blood:
It blots thy lesson written in thy soul;

The holy lines cannot be understood.

How dare those eyes upon a Bible look,

Much lesse towards God, whose lust is all their book!

९

Abstain wholly, or wed. Thy bounteous Lord
Allows thee choise of paths: take no by-wayes;
But gladly welcome what he doth afford;
Not grudging, that thy lust hath bounds and staies.
Continence hath his joy: weigh both; and so
If rottennesse have more, let Heaven go.

If God had laid all common, certainly

Man would have been th' incloser: but since now
God hath impal'd us, on the contrarie

Man breaks the fence, and every ground will plough.
O what were man, might he himself misplace!

Sure to be crosse he would shift feet and face.

Drink not the third glasse, which thou canst not tame,
When once it is within thee; but before

Mayst rule it, as thou list and poure the shame,
Which it would poure on thee, upon the floore.
It is most just to throw that on the ground,
Which would throw me there, if I keep the round.

He that is drunken, may his mother kill
Bigge with his sister: he hath lost the reins,
Is outlaw'd by himself: all kinde of ill
Did with his liquor slide into his veins.

The drunkard forfets Man, and doth devest
All worldly right, save what he hath by beast.

Shall I, to please anothers wine-sprung minde,
Lose all mine own? God hath giv'n me a measure
Short of his canne, and bodie; must I finde
A pain in that, wherein he findes a pleasure?
Stay at the third glasse: if thou lose thy hold,
Then thou art modest, and the wine grows bold.

If reason move not Gallants, quit the room;
(All in a shipwrack shift their severall way)
Let not a common ruine thee intombe :
Be not a beast in courtesie, but stay,

Stay at the third cup, or forego the place.

Wine above all things doth God's stamp deface.

Yet, if thou sinne in wine or wantonnesse,

Boast not thereof; nor make thy shame thy glorie.
Frailtie gets pardon by submissivenesse ;

But he that boasts, shuts that out of his storie:

He makes flat warre with God, and doth defie
With his poore clod of earth the spacious sky.

Take not his name, who made thy mouth, in vain :
It gets thee nothing, and hath no excuse.
Lust and wine plead a pleasure, avarice gain :
But the cheap swearer through his open sluce
Lets his soul runne for nought, as little fearing:
Were I an Epicure, I could bate swearing.

When thou dost tell another's jest, therein
Omit the oathes, which true wit cannot need:
Pick out of tales the mirth, but not the sinne.
He pares his apple, that will cleanly feed.

Play not away the vertue of that name,

Which is thy best stake, when griefs make thee tame.

The cheapest sinnes most dearly punisht are;
Because to shun them also is so cheap :
For we have wit to mark them, and to spare.
O crumble not away thy soul's fair heap.

If thou wilt die, the gates of hell are broad:
Pride and full sinnes have made the way a road.