Poems of Henry Vaughan, Silurist Part 40

P. 99. To my worthy Friend, Master T. Lewes.

Some of the lines in this poem are borrowed from Horace's verses, _Ad Thaliarcham_ (Book I., Ode 9):

"Vides, ut alta stet nive candida Soracte, nec iam sustineant onus Sylvae laborantes, geluque Flumina const.i.terint acuto?

Quid sit futurum eras, fuge quaerere; Quam sors dierum cunque debit; lucro Appone."

G. G.

Dr. Grosart thinks that T. Lewes was "probably of Maes-mawr, opposite Newton, on the south side of the Usk." Miss Southall identifies him with Thomas Lewis, inc.u.mbent in 1635 of Llanfigan, near Llansantffread. He was expelled from his living, but returned to it at the Restoration.

P. 100. To the most excellently accomplished Mrs. K. Philips.

Katherine Philips, by birth Katherine Fowler, became the wife in 1647 of Colonel James Philips, of the Priory, Cardigan. She was a wit and poetess, and well-known to a large circle of friends as "the matchless Orinda." Each member of her coterie had a similar fantastic pseudonym, and it is possible that this may account for the Etesia and Timander, the Fida and Lysimachus, of Vaughan's poems. The poems of Orinda were surrept.i.tiously published in 1664, and in an authorised version in 1667.

They include her poem on Vaughan, afterwards prefixed to _Thalia Rediviva_ (cf. p. 169), but are not accompanied by the present verses nor by those to her editor in _Thalia Rediviva_ (p. 211).

_A Persian votary_--_i.e._, a Pa.r.s.ee, or fire-wors.h.i.+pper.

P. 102. An Epitaph upon the Lady Elizabeth, Second Daughter to his late Majesty.

Elizabeth, second daughter of Charles I., was born in 1635. She suffered from ill-health and grief after her father's execution, and died at Carisbrooke on September 8, 1650. This poem, therefore, like others in the volume, must be of later date than the dedication.

P. 104. To Sir William Davenant, upon his Gondibert.

Davenant's _Gondibert_ was first published in 1651. It does not contain Vaughan's verses.

_thy aged sire._ Is this an allusion to the story that Davenant was in reality the son of William Shakespeare?

_Birtha_, the heroine of _Gondibert_.

P. 119. Cupido [Cruci Affixus].

Another translation of Ausonius' poems was published by Thomas Stanley in 1649. There is nothing in the original corresponding to the last four lines of Vaughan's translation.

Ll. 89-94. The Latin is:

"Se quisque absolvere gest.i.t, Transferat ut proprias aliena in crimina culpas."

Vaughan's simile is borrowed from Donne's _Fourth Elegy_ (_Muses'

Library_, I., 107):

"as a thief at bar is questioned there, By all the men that have been robb'd that year."

P. 125. Translations from Boethius.

These translations are from the _De Consolatione Philosophiae_, a medley of prose and verse. Vaughan has translated all the verse in the first two books except the Metrum 3 of Book I. and Metrum 6 of Book II. The headings of Metra 7 and 8 of Book II. are given in error in _Olor Isca.n.u.s_ as Metra 6 and 7. Some further translations from Books III. and IV. will be found in _Thalia Rediviva_, pp. 224-235.

P. 144. Translations from Casimirus.

These translations are from the Polish poet Mathias Casimirus Sarbievius, or Sarbiewski (1595-1640). His Latin _Lyrics_ and _Epodes_, modelled on Horace, were published in 1625-1631. Sarbiewski was a Jesuit, and a complete edition of his poems was published by the Jesuits in 1892.

P. 158. Venerabili viro, praeceptori suo olim et semper colendissimo Magistro Mathaeo Herbert.

Matthew Herbert was Rector of Llangattock, and apparently acted as tutor to the young Vaughans. He is mentioned in the lines _Ad Posteros_ (p.

51). Thomas Vaughan also has two sets of Latin verses to him (Grosart, II., 349), and dedicated to him his _Man-Mouse taken in a Trap_ (1650).

On July 19, 1655, he pet.i.tioned for the discharge of the sequestration on his rectory, which had been sequestered for the delinquency of the Earl of Worcester (_Cal. Proc. Ctee. for Compositions_, p. 1713). He died in 1660.

P. 159. Praestantissimo viro Thomae Poello in suum de Elementis Opticae Libellum.

The _Elementa Opticae_ appeared in 1649. It has no name on the t.i.tle-page, but the preface is signed "T. P.," and dated 1649. It contains the present prefatory verses, together with some others, also in Latin, by Eugenius Philalethes (Thomas Vaughan).

THALIA REDIVIVA.

This volume, published in 1578, at a late date in Henry Vaughan's life, twenty-three years after the second part of _Silex Scintillans_, must have been written, at least in part, much earlier. The poem on _The King Disguised_, for instance, goes back to 1646. At the end of the volume, with a separate t.i.tle-page (_cf. Bibliography_), come the Verse Remains of the poet's brother, Thomas Vaughan. This is the rarest of Vaughan's collections of poems. The copy once in Mr. Corser's collection, and now in the British Museum, was believed to be unique. It was used both by Lyte and Dr. Grosart. But Miss Morgan has come across two other copies, one in Mr. Locker-Lampson's library at Rowfant, the other in that of Mr.

Joseph, at Brecon.

P. 163. The Epistle-Dedicatory.

Henry Somerset, third Marquis of Worcester, was created Duke of Beaufort in 1682. He was a distant kinsman of Vaughan's, whose great-great-grandfather, William Vaughan of Tretower, married Frances Somerset, granddaughter of Henry, Earl of Worcester. He was a firm adherent of the Stuarts, and refused to take the oath of allegiance to William III. (Dr. Grosart).

P. 164. Commendatory Verses.

These are signed by _Orinda_; _Tho. Powell, D.D._; _N. W., Ies. Coll., Oxon._; _I. W., A.M. Oxon._

On Orinda, _cf._ the note to p. 100, and on Dr. Powell, that to P. 57.

Mr. Firth suggests that N. W., of Jesus, probably a young man, who imitates Cowley's _Pindarics_, and does not claim any personal acquaintance with Vaughan, may be N[athaniel] W[illiams], son of Thomas Williams, of Swansea, who matriculated in 1672, or N[icholas] W[adham], of Rhydodyn, Carmarthen, who matriculated in 1669.

I. W., also an Oxford man, is probably the writer of the prefaces to the Marquis of Worcester and to the Reader, which are signed respectively J.

W. and I. W. Mr. Firth suggests that he may be J[ohn] W[illiams], son of Sir Henry Williams of Gwernevet, Brecon, who matriculated at Brasenose in 1642. I have thought that he might be Vaughan's cousin, the second John Walbeoffe (_cf._ p. 189, note), who is mentioned in Thomas Vaughan's diary (_cf. Biographical Note_, vol. ii., p. x.x.xviii), but there is no proof that Walbeoffe was an Oxford man. Perhaps he is the friend James to whom a poem in _Olor Isca.n.u.s_ is addressed (p. 70).