Collated with the editions of 1646, 1648, and 1670 (Nos. 2, 3 above, 7 below). This is a carefully and in the circumstances a well-produced volume, containing some important matter never before published, but consisting chiefly of poems either first printed in 1648 or first printed there in their altered and expanded forms. It is reprinted here entirely, with due corrections. The numerous misprints which it contains are yet not more numerous than might have been expected from its having been set up by a foreign compositor with probably little knowledge of English and perhaps none at all. The sign 'y' for th' in the MS. caused him a good deal of confusion. Crashaw had now been dead for about three years and the volume was no doubt seen through the press by Thomas Car (see p. xxxiv above), who contributes two prefatory poems. Thomas Car seems to have wished posterity to believe that the twelve engravings in this volume were all from the hand of Crashaw himself, and his words to that effect (p. 235, below) have usually been accepted. But that they need some serious qualification is suggested both by the inequalities of style and technique which the engravings present and by the fact that several of them are marked 'I. Messager excud.' or Messager excud.' Jean Messager was a printer and publisher of engravings whose business, according to Nagler, Neues allgemeines Kunstler-Lexicon (1840), flourished between 1615 and 1631. An engraving from his studio of later date (1637) has been seen in the Bibliothèque Nationale, but it seems difficult to believe that he engraved these drawings in the first instance for Crashaw's volume, especially as their style is in general more characteristic of the first than of the second quarter of the century. And if he executed some he might equally well have done the rest. One, that heading the poem 'In the Holy Nativity' (see p. 247, below), bears the initials I. G. and comprises a couplet in French. Nevertheless it seems probable that at least the two engravings heading respectively the poem addressed to the Countess of Denbigh (p. 236, below) and 'The Weeper' (p. 308, below) represent Crashaw's own drawings. Different copies of this issue occasionally vary in respect of these engravings. One of the two British Museum copies lacks them altogether. In the Bodleian copy the engraving usually preceding' The Himn, O Gloriosa Domina ' (see p. 302, below) is replaced by another, as follows: The engraving reproduced on p. 254 below from the Bodleian copy sometimes appears without its framework and with other varieties of detail. 5. A Letter from Mr. Crashaw to the Countess of Denbigh, Against Irresolution and Delay in matters of Religion London. (Title-page reproduced on p. 347, below.) Size 8x63 in. Two leaves only. Poem begins on verso of titlepage (p. 1) and ends on A 2 verso (p. 3). The copy of this work in the British Museum, with the date 1653 added in ink in a contemporary hand, is believed to be unique. The Letter is a longer form of the poem first published in Carmen Deo Nostro (1652), from which it also differs greatly in the lines common to both versions. 6. Richardi Crashawi Poemata et Epigrammata Secunda, Auctior et emendatior. . . Cantabrigiae (Title-page reproduced on p. 65, below.) A 2-B 2, prefatory matter and 'poemata '; page to Epigrams; B3 verso-B 6 recto, verso-F 8 in eights, epigrams. ... Editio 1670. A 1, title-page; 1 G. Thomason, to whom it belonged, has added 'Sept: 23' above the year date. STEPS TO THE TEMPLE, THE DELIGHTS OF THE MUSES, AND CARMEN DEO NOSTRO By Ric. Crashaw, fometimes Fellow of Pembroke Hall, and late Fellow of St Peters Colledge in Cambridge. The 2d Edition. In the SAVOr, Printed by T. N. for Henry Herringman at the Blew Anchor in the Lower Walk of the New Exchange. 1670. Collated with the editions of 1634, 1646, and 1648 (nos. I, 2, and 3, above). The 1648 edition of Steps to the Temple apparently supplies the 'poemata', printed here, with emendations, between the dedicatory poem beginning 'O mihi' and the poem headed 'Lectori ', in the following order; and with the following headings: In Picturam Reverendissimi Episcopi, D. Andrews. In cæterorum Operum difficili Parturitione Gemitus. In Eundem Natalis Principis Mariæ. In Serenissimæ Reginæ partum hyemalem. Natalis Ducis Eboracensis. In faciem Augustiss. Regis à morbillis integram. Ad CAROLUM Primum, Rex Redux. Ad Principem nondum natum, Reginâ gravidâ. Page nos. in present edn. 163 206 207 164 214 154 161 187 190 193 194 The additions to the epigrams consist of five in Latin, of which the two following are also in MS. Tanner 465 (No. 12, below) : Improba turba tace. Mihi tam mea vota propinquant, (p. 69, below) O ut ego angelicis fiam bona gaudia turmis, (p. 70, below) and of Greek versions of nine which had already been published in Latin in 1634. The Greek immediately follows the Latin in each instance. Only one emendation of the earlier text has been found, apart from trifling differences of punctuation. Designated' 70L' in the foot-notes. 7. Steps to the Temple, The Delights Of The Muses, and Carmen Deo Nostro. By Ric. Crashaw, . . . The 2d Edition. In the Savoy,... 1670. (Title-page and engraving reproduced above.) Engraving faces A 1, title-page; A 2-8, prefatory matter and index; B-07 in eights, poems with separate title-page to The Delights of the Muses at F 8 (reproduced opposite); and separate title-page to Carmen Deo Nostro at K 5.1 Collated with the editions of 1646, 1648, and 1652 (Nos. 2, 3, and 4, above). This volume is a reprint of the editions of 1646 and 1652, and its claim to be the second edition' is no doubt made in ignorance of the genuine second edition (1648). It thus has 1 For the strange treatment of this by John Lidyat in 1675, see p. xli, above. |