Anne Bradstreet and Her Time Part 14

Nathaniel Ward speaks next and with his usual conviction that his word is all that is necessary to stamp a thing as precisely what he considers it to be.

Mercury shew'd Appollo, Bartas Book, Minerva this, and wish't him well to look, And tell uprightly which did which excell, He view'd and view'd, and vow'd he could not tel.

They bid him Hemisphear his mouldy nose, With's crack't leering gla.s.ses, for it would pose The best brains he had in's old pudding-pan, s.e.x weigh'd, which best, the Woman or the Man?

He peer'd and por'd & glar'd, & said for wore, I'me even as wise now, as I was before; They both 'gan laugh, and said it was no mar'l The Auth'ress was a right Du Bartas Girle, Good sooth quoth the old Don, tell ye me so, I muse whither at length these Girls will go; It half revives my chil frost-bitten blood, To see a Woman once, do aught that's good; And chode by Chaucer's Book, and Homer's Furrs, Let Men look to't, least Women wear the Spurrs.

N. Ward.

John Woodbridge takes up the strain in lines of much easier verse, in which he pays her brotherly tribute, and is followed by his brother, Benjamin, who had been her neighbor in Andover.

UPON THE AUTHOR; BY A KNOWN FRIEND.

Now I believe Tradition, which doth call The Muses, Virtues, Graces, Females all; Only they are not nine, eleven nor three; Our Auth'ress proves them but one unity.

Mankind take up some blushes on the score; Monopolize perfection no more; In your own Arts confess yourself out-done, The Moon hath totally eclips'd the Sun, Not with her Sable Mantle m.u.f.fling him; But her bright silver makes his gold look dim; Just as his beams force our pale lamps to wink, And earthly Fires, within their ashes shrink.

_B. W._

IN PRAISE OF THE AUTHOR, MISTRESS ANNE BRADSTREET,

Virtues true and lively Pattern, Wife of the Wors.h.i.+pfull Simon Bradstreet Esq: At present residing in the Occidental parts of the World in America, _Alias Nov-Anglia_.

What golden splendent Star is this so bright, One thousand Miles twice told, both day and night, (From the Orient first sprung) now from the West That s.h.i.+nes; swift-winged Phoebus, and the rest Of all Jove's fiery flames surmounting far As doth each Planet, every falling Star; By whose divine and lucid light most clear, Nature's dark secret mysteryes appear; Heavens, Earths, admired wonders, n.o.ble acts Of Kings and Princes most heroick facts, And what e're else in darkness seemed to dye, Revives all things so obvious now to th' eye, That he who these its glittering rayes views o're, Shall see what's done in all the world before.

_N. H._

Three other friends add their testimony before we come to the dedication.

UPON THE AUTHOR.

'Twere extream folly should I dare attempt, To praise this Author's worth with complement; None but herself must dare commend her parts, Whose sublime brain's the Synopsis of Arts.

Nature and Skill, here both in one agree, To frame this Master-piece of Poetry: False Fame, belye their s.e.x no more, it can Surpa.s.s, or parrallel the best of Man.

_C. B._

ANOTHER TO MRS. ANNE BRADSTREET,

Author of this Poem.

I've read your Poem (Lady) and admire, Your s.e.x to such a pitch should e're aspire; Go on to write, continue to relate, New Historyes, of Monarchy and State: And what the Romans to their Poets gave, Be sure such honour, and esteem you'l have.

_H. S._

AN ANAGRAM.

ANNA BRADSTREET. DEER NEAT AN BARTAS.

So Bartas like thy fine spun Poems been, That Bartas name will prove an Epicene.

ANOTHER.

ANNA BRADSTREET. ARTES BRED NEAT AN.

There follows, what can only be defined as a gus.h.i.+ng tribute from John Rogers, also metrical, though this was not included until the second edition.

"Twice I have drunk the nectar of your lines," he informs her, adding that, left "thus weltring in delight," he is scarcely capable of doing justice either to his own feelings, or the work which has excited them, and with this we come at last to the dedication in which Anne herself bears witness to her obligations to her father.

_To her most Honoured Father, Thomas Dudley, Esq; these humbly presented,_

Dear Sir of late delighted with the sight Of your four Sisters cloth'd in black and white.

Of fairer Dames the Sun n'er Saw the face, Though made a pedestal for Adams Race; Their worth so s.h.i.+nes in these rich lines you show Their paralels to finde I scarely know To climbe their Climes, I have nor strength nor skill To mount so high requires an Eagle's quill; Yet view thereof did cause my thoughts to soar, My lowly pen might wait upon these four I bring my four times four, now meanly clad To do their homage, unto yours, full glad; Who for their Age, their worth and quality Might seem of yours to claim precedency; But by my humble hand, thus rudely pen'd They are, your bounden handmaids to attend These same are they, from whom we being have These are of all, the Life, the Muse, the Grave; These are the hot, the cold, the moist, the dry, That sink, that swim, that fill, that upwards fly, Of these consists our bodies, Clothes and Food, The World, the useful, hurtful, and the good, Sweet harmony they keep, yet jar oft times Their discord doth appear, by these harsh rimes Yours did contest for wealth, for Arts, for Age, My first do shew their good, and then their rage.

My other foures do intermixed tell Each others faults, and where themselves excel; How hot and dry contend with moist and cold, How Air and Earth no correspondence hold, And yet in equal tempers, how they 'gree How divers natures make one Unity Something of all (though mean) I did intend But fear'd you'ld judge Du Bartas was my friend.

I honour him, but dare not wear his wealth My goods are true (though poor) I love no stealth But if I did I durst not send them you Who must reward a Thief, but with his due.

I shall not need, mine innocence to clear These ragged lines will do 't when they appear; On what they are, your mild aspect I crave Accept my best, my worst vouchsafe a Grave.

From her that to your self, more duty owes Then water in the boundess Ocean flows.

_Anne Bradstreet_.

March 20, 1642.

The reference in the second line, to "your four Sisters, clothed in black and white," is to a poem which the good governor is said to have written in his later days, "on the Four Parts of the World," but which a happy fate has spared us, the ma.n.u.script having been lost or destroyed, after his death. His daughter's verse is often as dreary, but both dedication and prologue admit her obligations to du Bartas, and that her verse was modeled upon his was very plain to Nathaniel Ward, who called her a "right du Bartas girl," with the feeling that such imitation was infinitely more creditable to her than any originality which she herself carefully disclaims in the

PROLOGUE.

1

To sing of Wars, of Captains, and of Kings, Of cities founded, Commonwealths begun, For my mean pen are too superior things: Or how they all, or each their dates have run Let Poets and Historians set these forth, My obscure Lines shall not so dim their worth.

2

But when my wondring eyes and envious heart Great Bartas sugared lines, do but read o'er Fool I do grudg the Muses did not part 'Twixt him and me that overfluent store; A Bartas can do what a Bartas will But simple I according to my skill.

3

From school-boyes' tongues no rhet'rick we expect Nor yet a sweet Consort from broken strings, Nor perfect beauty, where's a main defect; My foolish, broken, blemish'd Muse so sings And this to mend, alas, no Art is able, 'Cause nature, made it so irreparable.

4

Nor can I, like that fluent sweet-tongu'd Greek, Who lisp'd at first, in future times speak plain By Art he gladly found what he did seek A full requital of his, striving pain Art can do much, but this maxima's most sure A weak or wounded brain admits no cure.

5

I am obnoxious to each carping tongue Who says my hand a needle better fits, A Poet's pen all Scorn I should thus wrong, For such despite they cast on Female wits; If what I do prove well, it won't advance, They'l say it's stolen, or else it was by chance.

6

But sure the Antique Greeks were far more mild Else of our s.e.xe, why feigned they those Nine And poesy made, Calliope's own child; So 'mongst the rest they placed the Arts' Divine, But this weak knot, they will full soon untie, The Greeks did nought, but play the fools & lye.

7

Let Greeks be Greeks, and women what they are Men have precedency and still excel, It is but vain unjustly to wage warre: Men can do best, and women know it well Preheminence in all and each is yours; Yet grant some small acknowledgement of ours.

8

And oh ye high flown quills that soar the Skies, And ever with your prey still catch your praise, If e're you daigne these lowly lines your eyes Give Thyme or Parsley wreath, I ask no bayes, This mean and unrefined ure of mine Will make you glistening gold, but more to s.h.i.+ne.

With the most ambitious of the longer poems--"The Four Monarchies"-- and one from which her readers of that day probably derived the most satisfaction, we need not feel compelled to linger. To them its charm lay in its usefulness. There were on sinful fancies; no trifling waste of words, but a good, straightforward narrative of things it was well to know, and Tyler's comment upon it will be echoed by every one who turns the apallingly matter-of-fact pages: "Very likely, they gave to her their choicest praise, and called her, for this work, a painful poet; in which compliment every modern reader will most cordially join."