23. From Ascham's" Schoolmaster: "—about 1563.

Quick wits commonly be apt to take, unapt to keep; soon hot, and desirous of this and that; as cold and soon weary [as soon cold and weary?] of the same again; more quick to enter speedily than able to pierce far; even like over-sharp tools, whose edges be very soon turned. Such wits delight themselves in easy and pleasant studies, and never pass far forward in high and hard sciences. And therefore the quickest wits commonly may prove the best poets, but not the wisest orators; ready of tongue to speak boldly, not deep of judgment either for good counsel or wise writing. Also for manners and life, quick wits commonly be in desire newfangled; in purpose unconstant; light to promise any thing; ready to forget every thing, both benefit and injury; and thereby neither fast to friend nor fearful to foe; inquisitive of every trifle; not secret in the greatest affairs; bold with any person; busy in every matter; soothing such as be present; nipping any that is absent; of nature, also, always flattering their betters, envying their equals, despising their inferiors; and, by quickness of wit, very quick and ready to like none so well as themselves.*

*The spelling is modernised in this specimen.

24. From Sir Philip Sidney's "Apologie for Poetrie: about 1580.

The Philosopher, therefore, and the Historian are they which would win the gole; the one by precept, the other by example. But both, not having both, do both halte. For the Philosopher, setting downe with thorny argument the bare rule, is so hard of utterance, and so mistie to bee conceived, that one that hath no other guide but him shall wade in him till hee be olde before he shall finde sufficient cause to bee honest: for his knowledge standeth so upon the abstract and generall, that happie is that man who may understande him, and more happie that can applye what hee dooth understand. On the other side, the Historian, wanting the precept, is so tyed, not to what shoulde bee, but to what is, to the particuler truth of things, and not to the generall reason of things, that hys example draweth no necessary consequence, and therefore a lesse fruitful doctrine.

Now dooth the peereless Poet performe both; for, whatsoever the philosopher sayth should be doone, hee giveth a perfect picture of it in some one by whom hee presupposeth it was doone; so as he coupleth the generall notion with the particuler example. A perfect picture,

I say; for he yeeldeth to the powers of the minde an image of that whereof the Philosopher bestoweth but a woordish description, which dooth neyther strike, pierce, nor possesse the sight of the soule so much as that other dooth. For as, in outward things, to a man that had never seene an elephant or a rinoceros, who should tell

him most exquisitely all theyr shapes, cullour, bignesse, and particular markes, or, of a gorgeous pallace the architecture, with declaring the full beauties might well make the hearer able to repeate, as it were, by rote all hee had heard, yet should never satisfie his inward conceit with being witnes to it selfe of a truly lively knowledge; but the same man, as soone as hee might see those beasts well painted, or the house wel in modell, should straightwaies grow, without need of any discription, to a judiciall comprehending of them; so no doubt the philosopher, with his learned definition, bee it of virtue, vices, matters of publick policie or privat government, replenisheth the memory with many infallible grounds of wisdom; which, notwithstanding, lye darke before the imaginative and judging powre, if they bee not illuminated or figured foorth by the speaking picture of Poesie.

25. Beginning of the 16th Chapter of St Luke, from the version in the Rheims New Testament (as reprinted in the "English Hexapla ") :—1582.

And he said also to his Disciples, There was a certaine riche man that had a bailife: and he was il reported of unto him, as he that had wasted his goods. And he called him, and said to him, What heare I this of thee? render account of thy bailiship: for now thou canst no more be bailife. And the bailife said within him self, What shal I doe, because my lord taketh away from me the bailiship? digge I am not able, to begge I am ashamed. I know what I wil doe, that when I shal be removed from the bailiship, they may receive me into

their houses. Therfore calling together every one of his lords detters, he said to the first, How much doest thou owe my lord? But he saith, An hundred pipes of oile. And he said to him, Take thy bil: and sit downe, quickly write fiftie. After that he said to an other, But thou, how much doest thou owe? Who said, An hundreth quarters of wheat. He said to him, Take thy bil, and write eightie. And the lord praised the bailife of iniquitie, because he had done wisely: for the children of this world, are wiser then the children of light in their generation. And I say to you, Make unto you frendes of the mammon of iniquitie: that when you faile, they may receive you into the eternal tabernacles.

26. The Reply of Belphoebe to Braggadocio, in the Third Canto of the Second Book of Spenser's "Faerie Queene:"-about 1590.

"Whoso in pompe of prowd estate," quoth she,
“Does swim, and bathes himselfe in courtly blis,
Does waste his daies in dark obscuritee,
And in oblivion ever buried is :

Where ease abownds yt's eath' to do amis :
But who his limbs with labours, and his mynd
Behaves with cares, cannot so easy mis.

Abroad in armes, at home in studious kynd,

Who seekes with painfull toile shall Honor soonest fynd

"In woods, in waves, in warres she wonts to dwell,

And wil be found with perill and with paine;

L

Ne can the man that moulds in ydle cell
Unto her happy mansion attaine;

Before her gate High God did Sweate ordaine
And wakefull Watches ever to abide:

But easy is the way and passage plaine

To Pleasures pallace: it may soone be spide,

And day and night her dores to all stand open wide."

27. Description of the Irish Mantle, from Spenser's View of the State of Ireland :”—about 1595.

It is a fit house for an out-law, a meet bed for a rebel, and an apt cloke for a thiefe. First, the out-law, being for his many crimes and villanyes banished from the townes and houses of honest men, and wandring in waste places, far from danger of law, maketh his mantle his house, and under it covereth himselfe from the wrath of heaven, from the offence of the earth, and from the sight of men. When it raineth it is his pent-house; when it bloweth it is his tent; when it freezeth it is his tabernacle. In summer he can wear it loose, in winter he can wrap it close; at all times he can use it; never heavy, never cumbersome. Likewise, for a rebell it is as serviceable. For in his warre that he maketh (if at least it deserves the name of warre), when he still flyeth from his foe, and lurketh in the thicke woods and straite passages, waiting for advantages, it is his bed, yea and almost his household stuff. For the wood is his house against all weathers. and his mantle is his couch to sleep in. Therein