TO A VERY YOUNG LADY.

WHY came I so untimely forth

Into a world which wanting thee, Could entertain us with no worth Or shadow of felicity?

That time should me so far remove

From that which I was born to love!

Yet, fairest blossom, do not slight

That age which you may know so soon; The rosie morn resigns her light, And milder glory, to the noon; And then what wonders shall you do, Whose dawning beauty warms us so?

Hope waits upon the flowry prime,
And summer, though it be less gay,
Yet is not look'd on as a time

Of declination or decay.

For, with a full hand, that does bring
All that was promis'd by the spring.

Go lovely rose,

BONG.

Tell her that wastes her time and me,
That now she knows,

When I resemble her to thee,

How sweet and fair she seems to be.

Tell her that's young,

And shuns to have her graces spy'd,
That hadst thou sprung
In desarts, where no men abide,
Thou must have uncommended dy’d.

Small is the worth

Of beauty from the light retir'd;
Bid her come forth,

Suffer her self to be desir'd,

And not blush so to be admir'd.

Then die, that she

The common fate of all things rare
May read in thee:

How small a part of time they share,
That are so wondrous sweet and fair.

TO A LADY SINGING A SONG OF HIS COMPOSING.

CHLORIS, your self you so excel,

When you vouchsafe to breath my thought,

That like a spirit with this spell

Of my own teaching I am caught.

That eagle's fate and mine are one,

Which on the shaft that made him die

Espy'd a feather of his own,

Wherewith he wont to soar so high.

Had eccho, with so sweet a grace,

Narcissus loud complaints return'd, Not for reflection of his face,

But of his voice the boy had burn'd.

ON A GIRDLE.

THAT which her slender waste confin'd,
Shall now my joyful temples bind;
No monarch but wou'd give his crown,
His arms might do what this has done.

It was my heav'ns extreamest sphear,
The pale which held that lovely dear;
My joy, my grief, my hope, my love,
Did all within this circle move.

A narrow compass, and yet there
Dwelt all that's good, and all that's fair:
Give me but what this riban bound,
Take all the rest the sun goes round.

LOVE'S FAREWELL.

TREADING the path to nobler ends,
A long farewel to love I gave;
Resolv'd my country, and my friends,
All that remain'd of me should have.

And this resolve no mortal dame,

None but those eyes cou'd have o'erthrown,

The nymph, I dare not, need not name,
So high, so like her self alone.

Thus the tall oak which now aspires

Above the fear of private fires,

Grown and design'd for nobler use,

Not to make warm but build the house,
Tho' from our meaner flames secure,
Must that which falls from heav'n indure.

WILLIAM HABINGTON was born at Hendlip, in Worcestershire, on the 5th November, 1605. His family were Roman Catholics, and appear to have been deeply involved in the intrigues of the time, his father having suffered six years' imprisonment in the Tower, and his uncle having been executed for high treason. The mother of the Poet is believed to have written to Lord Monteagle the letter that led to a discovery of the Gunpowder Plot. Habington was educated by the Jesuits at St. Omers, with a view to his becoming a member of their Society; but the ill fortunes of his relatives, and, doubtless, his own taste, led him to disrelish the embroilment of politics; he returned to his own country, and married Lucia, the daughter of William Herbert, the first Lord Powis; the lady whom he has immortalized under the name of Castara. He died in the prime of life on the 30th of November, 1654, having taken little part in the eventful struggles of the period; for there appears to be no ground for the insinuation of Wood, that he "did run with the times, and was not unknown to Oliver the usurper."

His Poems were first published in 1634, classed under three heads: -a Mistress; a Wife; a Holy-Man; each part being prefaced by "a character" in prose. The works of the Poet bear evidence of the excellence of his disposition and the purity of his heart; and

"the just

Keepes something of his glory in his dust."

He regards woman, not as the slave of sensual pleasures, but as, because of her virtue, modesty, gentleness, and intellectual endowments, deserving "a noble love to serve her, and a free poesie to speake her." His compositions, therefore, present a grateful contrast to the "loose copies of lust" that distinguish the times in which he lived; unhappily, so fine an example found but few imitators. It is delightful to know that the beautiful and perfect picture the Poet has drawn of a "good woman,” is not an imaginary one-and that he who writes so sweetly of the mistress writes as sweetly of the wife; that she was his companion and his friend-so true a friend, that "her husband may to her communicate even his ambitions; and if successe crowne not expectation, remaine neverthelesse uncontemn'd"—" colleague with him in the empire of prosperity, and a safe retiring place when adversity exiles him from the world;"-" • inquisitive onely of new wayes to please him," while "her wit sayles by no other compasse than that of his direction." Such a woman therefore could be loved and lauded only by a true heart and a respectful muse. Consequently, in the poems of Habington we find nothing of the rude passion of the Satyr, or of the turbulent strains of one who mingles in riotous union Love and Bacchus. If he occasionally indulges in quaint conceits; if at times he is more ingenious than imaginative; if he is now and then caught by the glare of false wit rather than warmed by the light of true feeling; if he yields more to reason than to passion-we have enough to make amends for these defects in the veritable beauties with which his compositions abound. Our readers will probably agree with us, if they peruse the selections we have introduced from the writings of one whose muse "never felt a wanton heat," and whose invention was never "sinister from the straight way of purity." If Habington "did drive against the stream of best wits, in erecting the self-same altar to Chastity and Love," we must, at least, admit that his anticipations-characteristic of the man-have been realized; his verses have that proportion, in the world's opinion, that Heaven allotted him in fortune-"not so high as to be wondered at, nor so low as to be contemned." But we may give him praise far higher than that he sought for his productions; in his life he was "the holy-man" he painted; whose "happinesse is not meteor-like, exhaled from the vapours of this world; but shines a fixt starre, which when by misfortune it appears to fall, onely casts away the slimie matter"-who "sees the covetous prosper by usury, yet waxeth not leane with envie; and when the posteritie of the impious flourish, questions not the divine justice; for temporall rewards distinguish not ever the merits of men; and who hath beene of councel with the Eternall?" Posterity is his debtor for much that is admirable in his verse, and disclaims him for nothing that is unbecoming or prejudicial; and

"When their holy flame

True lovers to pure beauties would rehearse,
They may invoke the genins of his verse."

SCORN'D in thy watry urne Narcissus lye,
Thou shalt not force more tribute from my eye
T'increase thy streames: or make me weepe a showre,
To adde fresh beauty to thee, now a flowre.
But should relenting Heaven restore thee sence,
To see such wisedome temper innocence,
In faire Castara's loves; how shee discreet,
Makes causion with a noble freedome meete,

At the same moment; thou'ld'st confesse, fond boy,
Fooles onely thinke them vertuous, who are coy.
And wonder not that I, who have no choyce
Of speech, have, praysing her, so free a voyce:
Heaven her severest sentence doth repeale,
When to Castara I would speake my zeale.

FF