How can they feed him with
intelligence?
John Donne
' and the suggestion came from
the two epigrams in the Greek Anthology attributed to Posidippus and
Metrodorus respectively. In the first ([Greek: Poien tis biotoio tame
tribon? ]) each kind of life in turn is condemned; in the second each
is defended. These epigrams were paraphrased in _Tottel's Miscellany_
(1557) by Nicholas Grimald, and again in the _Arte of English Poesie_
(1589), attributed to George Puttenham. Stimulated perhaps by the
latter version, in which the Court first appears as one of the
principal spheres of life, or by Ronsard's French version in which
also the 'cours des Roys', unknown to the Greek poet, are introduced,
Bacon wrote his well-known paraphrase:
The world's a bubble: and the life of man
Less than a span.
It is just possible too that he wrote a paraphrase, similar in verse,
of the second epigram, which I have printed in the article referred
to. A copy of _The World_ was found among Wotton's papers and was
printed in the _Reliquiae Wottonianae_ (1651) signed 'Fra. Lord
Bacon'. It had already been published by Thomas Farnaby in his
_Florilegium Epigrammatum Graecorum &c. _ (1629). Bacon probably gave
Wotton a copy and he appears to have shown it to his friends. Among
these was Thomas Bastard, who, to judge by the numerous epigrams he
addressed to Essex, belonged to the same circle as Bacon, Donne, and
Wotton,--if we may so describe it, but probably every young man of
letters looked to Essex for patronage. Bastard's poem runs:
Ad Henricum Wottonum.
Wotton, the country, and the country swayne,
How can they yeeld a Poet any sense?
How can they stirre him up or heat his vaine?
How can they feed him with intelligence?
You have that fire which can a witt enflame
In happy London Englands fayrest eye:
Well may you Poets have of worthy name
Which have the foode and life of Poetry.
And yet the Country or the towne may swaye
Or beare a part, as clownes do in a play.
Donne was one of those to whom Wotton showed Bacon's poem, and the
result was the present letter which occasionally echoes Bacon's words.
Wotton replied to it in some characteristic verses preserved in _B_
(Lord Ellesmere's MS. ) and _P_ (belonging to Captain Harris). I print
it from the former:
_To J: D: from M^r H: W:_
Worthie Sir:
Tis not a coate of gray or Shepheards life,
Tis not in feilds or woods remote to live,
That adds or takes from one that peace or strife,
Which to our dayes such good or ill doth give:
It is the mind that make the mans estate 5
For ever happy or unfortunate.
Then first the mind of passions must be free
Of him that would to happiness aspire;
Whether in Princes Pallaces he bee,
Or whether to his cottage he retire; 10
For our desires that on extreames are bent
Are frends to care and traitors to content.
Nor should wee blame our frends though false they bee
Since there are thousands false, for one that's true,
But our own blindness, that we cannot see 15
To chuse the best, although they bee but few:
For he that every fained frend will trust,
Proves true to frend, but to himself unjust.
The faults wee have are they that make our woe,
Our virtues are the motives of our joye, 20
Then is it vayne, if wee to desarts goe
To seek our bliss, or shroud us from annoy:
Our place need not be changed, but our Will,
For every where wee may do good or ill.
But this I doe not dedicate to thee, 25
As one that holds himself fitt to advise,
Or that my lines to him should precepts be
That is less ill then I, and much more wise:
Yet 'tis no harme mortality to preach,
For men doe often learne when they do teach.
The date of the _debat_ is before April 1598, when Bastard's
_Chrestoleros_ was entered on the Stationers' Register, probably
1597-8, the interval between the return of the Islands Expedition and
Donne's entry into the household of Sir Thomas Egerton. Mr. Chambers
has shown that during this interval Donne was occasionally employed
by Cecil to carry letters to and from the Commanders of the English
forces still in France. But it was not till about April 1598 that he
found permanent employment.
l.
the two epigrams in the Greek Anthology attributed to Posidippus and
Metrodorus respectively. In the first ([Greek: Poien tis biotoio tame
tribon? ]) each kind of life in turn is condemned; in the second each
is defended. These epigrams were paraphrased in _Tottel's Miscellany_
(1557) by Nicholas Grimald, and again in the _Arte of English Poesie_
(1589), attributed to George Puttenham. Stimulated perhaps by the
latter version, in which the Court first appears as one of the
principal spheres of life, or by Ronsard's French version in which
also the 'cours des Roys', unknown to the Greek poet, are introduced,
Bacon wrote his well-known paraphrase:
The world's a bubble: and the life of man
Less than a span.
It is just possible too that he wrote a paraphrase, similar in verse,
of the second epigram, which I have printed in the article referred
to. A copy of _The World_ was found among Wotton's papers and was
printed in the _Reliquiae Wottonianae_ (1651) signed 'Fra. Lord
Bacon'. It had already been published by Thomas Farnaby in his
_Florilegium Epigrammatum Graecorum &c. _ (1629). Bacon probably gave
Wotton a copy and he appears to have shown it to his friends. Among
these was Thomas Bastard, who, to judge by the numerous epigrams he
addressed to Essex, belonged to the same circle as Bacon, Donne, and
Wotton,--if we may so describe it, but probably every young man of
letters looked to Essex for patronage. Bastard's poem runs:
Ad Henricum Wottonum.
Wotton, the country, and the country swayne,
How can they yeeld a Poet any sense?
How can they stirre him up or heat his vaine?
How can they feed him with intelligence?
You have that fire which can a witt enflame
In happy London Englands fayrest eye:
Well may you Poets have of worthy name
Which have the foode and life of Poetry.
And yet the Country or the towne may swaye
Or beare a part, as clownes do in a play.
Donne was one of those to whom Wotton showed Bacon's poem, and the
result was the present letter which occasionally echoes Bacon's words.
Wotton replied to it in some characteristic verses preserved in _B_
(Lord Ellesmere's MS. ) and _P_ (belonging to Captain Harris). I print
it from the former:
_To J: D: from M^r H: W:_
Worthie Sir:
Tis not a coate of gray or Shepheards life,
Tis not in feilds or woods remote to live,
That adds or takes from one that peace or strife,
Which to our dayes such good or ill doth give:
It is the mind that make the mans estate 5
For ever happy or unfortunate.
Then first the mind of passions must be free
Of him that would to happiness aspire;
Whether in Princes Pallaces he bee,
Or whether to his cottage he retire; 10
For our desires that on extreames are bent
Are frends to care and traitors to content.
Nor should wee blame our frends though false they bee
Since there are thousands false, for one that's true,
But our own blindness, that we cannot see 15
To chuse the best, although they bee but few:
For he that every fained frend will trust,
Proves true to frend, but to himself unjust.
The faults wee have are they that make our woe,
Our virtues are the motives of our joye, 20
Then is it vayne, if wee to desarts goe
To seek our bliss, or shroud us from annoy:
Our place need not be changed, but our Will,
For every where wee may do good or ill.
But this I doe not dedicate to thee, 25
As one that holds himself fitt to advise,
Or that my lines to him should precepts be
That is less ill then I, and much more wise:
Yet 'tis no harme mortality to preach,
For men doe often learne when they do teach.
The date of the _debat_ is before April 1598, when Bastard's
_Chrestoleros_ was entered on the Stationers' Register, probably
1597-8, the interval between the return of the Islands Expedition and
Donne's entry into the household of Sir Thomas Egerton. Mr. Chambers
has shown that during this interval Donne was occasionally employed
by Cecil to carry letters to and from the Commanders of the English
forces still in France. But it was not till about April 1598 that he
found permanent employment.
l.
