CVIII. TO TRUE SOLDIERS." TRENGTH of my country, whilst I bring to view Such as are miscall'd captains, and wrong you, I swear by your true friend, my muse, I love 6 To true soldiers.] We have this epigram in the Apologetical Dialogue, printed at the end of the Poetaster: and it seems to have been written as a kind of compensation for the character of captain Tucca, in that play. WHAL. This was written before the Poetaster. Could not Whalley see that it alluded to the captain in the preceding epigram? If there was any soldier stupid enough to take the character of Tucca as a reflection on the army, he was not to be reclaimed to sense by the power of verse. Jonson produced the epigram in his Apology to shew that he entertained no disrespectful opinion of the profession of a soldier. In a word, it is impossible to read that comedy, and listen to the complaints which the men of arms and of law are said to have made on the occasion, without discovering that they were more captious than just, and that the poet himself was the calumniated person. 7 is such,] i. e. is the captain Hungry whom I have just satirized. The observation is well-timed. CIX. TO SIR HENRY NEVIL.8 HO now calls on thee, Nevil, is a muse, That serves not fame, nor titles; but doth chuse Where virtue makes them both, and that's in thee: Where all is fair beside thy pedigree. 8 To sir Henry Nevil.] Son to Edward lord Abergavenny: he succeeded his father in the title in 1622, and died in December, 1641. Holland, in his additions to Camden's Britannia, mentions a place in Berkshire, called Bilingsbere, the inhabitation of sir Henry Nevil, issued from the lord Abergavenny. WHAL. Surely Whalley has mistaken the person to whom this is addressed, or confounded two different characters. The sir Henry Neville of the poet was the son of sir H. Neville of Billingbear, by Elizabeth, a daughter of sir John Gresham. He was a very distinguished statesman, and much employed by the Queen, to whom he was introduced by Cecil. He was connected with the secretary by marriage; but he was less indebted to this for his promotion at court than to his own merits: "being," as Mr. Lodge says, "a person of great wisdom and integrity." He was sent ambassador to France in 1599, whence he returned in the following year, time enough, unfortunately for his future peace and prosperity, to be implicated in the wild treason of the earl of Essex. He was committed to the Tower, "which," says Cecil to sir Ralph Winwood, "being rather matter of form than substance, if any of his friends should have industriously opposed, it had been the ready way to have forced a course of more severity." What more was to be feared, I know not, but he was heavily fined; and his release from the Tower did not take place till some months after the accession of James. That he had really been in some danger, may be collected from the following passage: "Thou rather striv'st the matter to possess, And elements of honour, than the dress; To make thy lent life good against the fates, But though restored to liberty, he was not advanced, as was generally expected. "All men (sir Henry Wotton says) contemplate sir Henry Neville for the future secretary; some saying that Thou art not one seek'st miseries with hope, Is private gain, which hath long guilt to friend. To make thy lent life good against the fates: And that thy soul should give thy flesh her weight. Now I have sung thee thus, shall judge of thee. it is but deferred till the return of the queen (Anne, who was then at Bath) that she may be allowed a hand in his introduction!" James, however, had strong prepossessions against him, which no interest could overcome, and the little remainder of this able statesman's life (for his correspondence is among the best in Winwood's collection) passed in dejection and comparative obscurity. It is to the honour of Jonson's steady friendship, that he liberally praises, and commends to the notice of posterity a worthy man depressed by two sovereigns, by each of whom he was himself favoured and patronized. Sir Henry died 1615. He married Anne, daughter of sir Henry Killigrew of Cornwall; by whom he had seven sons, whose descendants yet enjoy the family seat of their great ancestor. CX. TO CLEMENT EDMONDS, ON HIS CÆSAR'S COMMENTARIES OBSERVED AND OT Cæsar's deeds, nor all his honours won, The name of Pompey for an enemy, To have engraved these acts with his own style, 9 To Clement Edmonds, on his Cæsar's Commentaries.] Of this learned gentleman, who bore several public offices, during the reigns of queen Elizabeth and James I., the reader has an account in the Athenæ Oxoniensis. WHAL. This, and the following poem were prefixed, with other commendatory verses, to Observations upon Cæsar's Commentaries: by Clement Edmundes, Remembrancer of the city of London. fol. In these west parts,] i. e. in Gaul and Britain. WHAL. CXI. TO THE SAME. ON THE SAME. HO, Edmonds, reads thy book, and doth not see What the antique soldiers were, the modern be? Wherein thou shew'st, how much the later are And that in action there is nothing new, That to the world thou should'st reveal so much, By thy great help; and doth proclaim by me, CXII. TO A WEAK GAMESTER IN POETRY. ITH thy small stock, why art thou venturing At this so subtle sport, and play'st so ill? Art still at that, and think'st to blow me' up too? Tragic or comic; but thou writ'st the play. |