And set vp saile, and sternlesse ships ysteares,
With wind and wave at pleasure sure he flies:
On euery side then glance his rolling eies:
Yet hoary haires do cause them downe to drowp,
And stealing steps of age do make him stoup.

Our health that doth the web of wo begin,
And pricketh forth our pampred flesh to sin,
By sicknesse soakt in many maladies,

Shall turne our mirthe to mone, and howling cries.

The wreathed haire of perfect golden wire,
The christall eies, the shining Angels face
That kindles coales to set the heart on fire,
When we doe thinke to runne a royall race,
Shall sodeinlie be gauled with disgrace;
Our goods, our beautie, and our braue araie,
That seemes to set our hearts on hoigh for aie,
Much like the tender floure in fragrant fields,
Whose sugred sap sweet smelling sauour yeelds,
Though we therein doe dailie laie our lust,
By dint of death shall vanish vnto dust.

Why seeke ye then this lingring life to saue,
A hugie heape of bale and miserie ?
Why loue we longer daies on earth to craue,
Where carke, and care, and all calamitie,
Where nought we finde but bitter ioylitie?
The longer that we liue, the more we fall,
The more we fall, the greater is our thrall,

The shorter life doth make the lesse account,

To lesse account the reckning soone doth mount,
And then the reckning brought to quiet end,
A ioyfull state of better life doth lend.

Thou God therefore that rules the rolling Skie,
Thou Lord that lends the props whereon we staie,
And turnes the spheares, and tempers all on hie,
Come, come in hast, to take vs hence awaie!
Thy goodnesse shall we then engraue for aie,
And sing a song of endlesse thankes to thee,
That deignest so from death to set vs free:

Redeeming vs from depth of dark decaie,
With foure and twentie Elders shall we saie,
To him be glorie, power, and praise alone,
That with the lambe doth sit in loftie throne.

Finis."

ELLIOT. I have had something to do to keep my patience till you arrived at the word Finis. I began to be tired of such stale sermonizing when you had read two stanzas; but the opening of the third pleased me, and certainly it is not so bad as what precedes it.

MORTON. I confess I wondered how you restrained your impetuosity, but I suppose the recollection that this is the only original poem known (with the exception of the commendatory verses hefore noticed), by a man of Gosson's celebrity, restrained you.

ELLIOT. Not at all: if an author write dull non

sense, the more rare it is the better, nor do I feel myself at all more bound to hear it merely because it is rare.

BOURNE. It cannot be said that Gosson's lines are not generally flowing and harmonious, and if the morality be stale, we ought to recollect that it is now nearly 250 years old. In that time it might well become so.

ELLIOT. Now it is done, I do not mean to say that I regret having heard it; some of the lines run well enough, but

"A filthie cloth, a stinking clod of clay,

A sack of sin that shall be swallow'd aye,"

are absurd enough, and those lines are not without companions vile to keep them countenance."

BOURNE. It does not merit very minute criticism, and having read all that is necessary from "the Schoole of Abuse," we will now look at the "short Apologie" for it, (as far as it really deserves the term) which is contained in a work by Gosson of severe puritanism, called "The Ephemerides of Phialo deuided into three books." The last book only concerns our inquiry, which contains "the Defence of a Courtezan ouerthrowen: and a short Apologie of the Schoole of Abuse against Poets, Pipers, Players and their excusers." It was first printed in 1579, and again in 1586; in both cases, as I have said, with a dedication to Sir P. Sidney.

MORTON. Who had become the excusers of the

players, &c. as he mentions?

BOURNE. Gosson says that the players had endeavoured to find a vindicator in one of the universities, and he had heard that they had at last actually employed some person in London to write "Honest Excuses" for them. This alludes to a tract by Thomas Lodge, of which I will speak presently. A few sentences from this "Apologie" by Gosson will satisfy all reasonable curiosity. He says in one place, "A theefe is a shrewde member in a Common wealth; he empties our bagges by force, these" (meaning players) " ransacke our purses by permission; he spoileth vs secretly, these rifle vs openly; hee getts the vpperhand by blowes, these by merry iestes; he suckes our blood, these our manners; he woundes our bodie, these our soule." And thus having wound himself up to an antithetical climax, he exclaims, with all the affected and furious zeal of a Puritan, "O God, O men, O heauen, O earth, O tymes, O manners, O miserable daies!"

ELLIOT. All this must seem to us nothing short of absolute madness; with our present notions we cannot form an idea why the unhappy players should excite such deadly animosity, and call down such terrific anathemas.

BOURNE. It is astonishing; but nothing better than such publications as these let us into a knowledge of the religious spirit of the times. Pursuing his

contrast between a thief and a player, Gosson adds, with much solemnity," He suffereth for his offence; these stroute without punishment vnder our noses, and lyke vnto a consuming fire are nourished stil with our decay." This pretended " Apologie" is, in truth, nothing but a reiteration of the first attack, and it ends in these words; "Wishing to my schoole some thriftier scholers, to players an honester occupation, and their excuser a better minde, I take my leave."

ELLIOT. And we have had enough of his company not to regret his departure. You said, I think, that Gosson wrote three pieces against the stage, and you have noticed two: what is the third?

BOURNE. It is called " Playes confuted in five actions, prouing that they are not to be suffred in a Christian Commonweale." This is a sermonizing production, and is divided like a play, into five acts or actions, and dedicated to Sir F. Walsingham, It has no date upon the title, but Prynne fixes it about 1581, and from what I am going next to offer it should seem that he is correct. I should observe, that in Reed's Shakespeare you will find sufficient quotations from this last tract by Gosson..

MORTON. What next then are you going to offer? BOURNE. A book to which you must allow me to make a preface of my own, to render its application clear. In 1579 Gosson printed his "School: of Abuse," and in the same year his" Ephemerides of Phialo," containing the "short Apology," and hinting