No More Learning

'Groans' are generally the sign of care, not of its absence. However,
I find that Ashmole MS. 38, in the Bodleian, and some others read:

Welcome pure thoughts! welcome ye careless groves!
These are my guests, this is that court age loves.

This explains the mystery. But Mr. Chambers followed Grosart; and
Grosart was inclined to prefer the version of a bad MS. which he had
found to a good printed version.




SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES.

PAGES =5=, =6=. The poems of Ben Jonson are here printed just as
they stand in the 1650, 1654, 1669 editions of Donne's _Poems_.
A comparison with the 1616 edition of Jonson's _Works_ shows some
errors. The poem _To John Donne_ (p. 5) is xxiii of the _Epigrammes_.
The sixth line runs

And which no affection praise enough can give!

The absurd 'no'n' of 1650 seems to have arisen from the printing
'no'affection' of the 1640 edition of Jonson's _Works_. The 1719
editor of Donne's _Poems_ corrected this mistake. A more serious
mistake occurs in the ninth line, which in the _Works_ (1616) runs:

All which I meant to praise, and, yet I would.

The error 'mean' comes from the 1640 edition of the _Works of Ben
Jonson_, which prints 'meane'.

_To Lucy, &c. _, is xciii of the _Epigrammes_. The fourteenth line
runs:

Be of the best; and 'mongst those, best are you.

The comma makes the sense clearer. In l. 3, 1616 reads 'looke,' with
comma.

_To John Donne_ (p. 6) is xcvi. There are no errors; but 'punees' is
in _1616_ more correctly spelt 'pui'nees'.

PAGES =7=, =175=, =369=. I am indebted for the excellent copies of
the engravings here reproduced to the kind services of Mr.