Like to the grass that's newly sprung,
Or like a tale that's new begun,
Or like the bird that's here to-day,
Or like the pearléd dew of May,
Or like an hour, or like a span,
Or like the singing of a swan:
Even such is man, who lives by breath,
Is here, now there, in life and death:
The grass withers, the tale is ended,
The bird is flown, the dew's ascended,
The hour is short, the span not long;
The swan's near death-man's life is done.

Like to the bubble in the brook,
Or in a glass much like a look,
Or like a shuttle in weaver's hand,
Or like the writing on the sand,
Or like a thought, or like a dream,
Or like the gliding of the stream:
Even such is man, who lives by breath,
Is here, now there, in life and death:
The bubble's cut, the look's forgot,
The shuttle's flung, the writing's blot;
The thought is past, the dream is gone,
The water glides-man's life is done.

Like to an arrow from the bow,
Or like swift course of watery flow;
Or like the time 'twixt flood and ebb,
Or like the spider's tender web;
Or like a race, or like a goal,
Or like the dealing of a dole:
Even such is man, whose brittle state
Is always subject unto fate:

The arrow's shot, the flood soon spent,
The time no time, the web soon rent;
The race soon run, the goal soon won,
The dole soon dealt-man's life first done.

Like to the lightning from the sky,
Or like a post that quick doth hie,
Or like a quaver in short song,
Or like a journey three days long;
Or like the snow when summer's come,
Or like the pear, or like the plum:

Even such is man who heaps up sorrow,
Lives but this day, and dies to-morrow:
The lightning's past, the post must go,
The song is short, the journey's so;
doth rot, the plum doth fall,
The snow dissolves-and so must all.

The pear

LITTLE is known of the personal history of this writer. He was a pupil of John Hopkins, the fellow translator, with Sternhold, of the Psalms. In the dedication of one of his earlier works, he informs us that he was an attorney in the Common Pleas; observing at the same time that the "name of an attorney in the Common Pleas is now a dayes growen into contempt." In 1568 he published "The Imitation; or, following of Christ, and the Contemning of Worldly Vanities, also the Perpetual Rejoyce of the Godlye, even in this life." The volume from which the following lines are taken was published in 1604, and entitled, "Of the Golds Kingdome and this unhelping age: described in Sundry Poems intermixedly placed after certaine other Poems of more speciall Respect: and before the same is an oration of speech intended to have been delivered by the author hereof unto the King's Majesty."

Through many of Hake's productions there breathes a spirit of cynical mistrust, which gives colour to the supposition that he was a dependant on court favour,

66

and like many others, a disappointed one." Much of his poetry is such as to have won the golden opinion that he "learned yersification under his master Hopkins."

The following verses are not without harmony; and they exhibit a picture of resignation and hope calmly looking beyond the present of trouble and neglect.

COMPLAINING OF HIS WANT OF FRIENDS.

Waking in my bed, I wept,
And silently complained;
The cares that on me crept
All hope of sleep restrained,

I called on my hap,

I criéd on my chance:
Will none stand in the gap?
Will none my state advance?

My woe that never ends,
My want that never dies,
My state that never mends,
My soul that ever cries.

All these are but the loom
That warpeth up my death;
All these presage my doom,
The loss of later breath.

But is there not a joy

That worldly joy excels,
That helpeth all annoy,

And worldly woe expels?

There is, no doubt: God grant it me!
So shall those woes extinguished be.

SIR HENRY WOTTON, son of Thomas Wotton, Esq., and member of a family which, says Walton, "seemed to be beloved of God," was born at Bocton Hall, in Kent, on the 30th March, 1568. He received his early education at Winchester; and in the beginning of 1584, entered New College, Oxford, which he soon after quitted for Queen's College, in the same university. Here he became well versed in logic and philosophy, and attracted attention by the acuteness of his intellect, and the extensive range of his acquirements, of which he afterwards gave proof in the varied character of his writings, completed or contemplated. Izaak Walton says that at nineteen years of age he proceeded master of arts; but this statement, along with others circumstantially recorded by the same pleasant biographer, is impugned by Wood, whose minutest researches could not enable him to determine that Wotton ever graduated at all. Leaving Oxford, Wotton travelled in France, Germany, and Italy; and after an absence of nine years, during which he made the acquaintance of many eminent and learned menamongst others, of Theodore Beza and Isaac Casaubonreturned to England in his thirtieth year, accomplished in person, mind, and manner.

He now became secretary to the unfortunate Earl of Essex; but quitted the service of that impetuous and ambitious nobleman when his fall became imminent. Wotton retired to Florence, and so recommended himself

to the great Duke of Tuscany, that he was employed by him to carry letters to James VI. of Scotland, to advise that sovereign of a design to take away his life. This mission he accomplished in the disguise of an Italian, and under the assumed name of Octavio Baldi. Having distinguished himself by his zeal and adroitness in the conduct of this business, he returned to Florence, and remained there till the death of Queen Elizabeth.

The accession of James to the English throne promised to Wotton a home sphere of advancement; and he was knighted by the sovereign whom he had so weightily obliged, before the titles conferred by him had become vulgar. Wotton was employed in many important foreign missions, till, in 1619, he quitted his embassy at Venice with a vain hope of obtaining the office of Secretary of State.

On the 26th July, 1624, he was appointed to the Provostship of Eton College, "which he kept to his dying day, being," as Wood pathetically observes, “all the reward he had for the good services he had done the crown of England." The most enduring and most comprehensive result of his diplomatic career is a burlesque definition : 66 Legatus est vir bonus peregre missus ad mentiendum reipublicæ causâ; Anambassador is an honest man sent abroad to lie for the good of his country."

It has been asserted, and more than once repeated by reckless biographers who act upon the assumption that dead men have no claim to character, that Wotton, at nearly sixty years of age, entered into holy orders in order to qualify himself for the provostship of Eton. A moment's reflection shows this to be a charge of considerable gravity. Happily for Sir Henry's memory, his genial biographer and brother angler, Walton, is explicit upon this point: "Being thus settled according to the desires of his heart, his first study was the statutes of the college; by which he conceived himself bound to enter into holy orders, which he did, being made deacon