my being there, said to me, 'So it is that the king hath sent me letters by this gentleman, Master Vincent, one of your old companions, who hath been of late in trouble in the Tower of London for money that my lord should have at his last departing from him, which now cannot be found. Wherefore the king, at this gentleman's request, for the declaration of his truth, hath sent him hither with his grace's letters directed unto me, commanding me by virtue thereof to examine my lord in that behalf, and to have your council herein, how it may be done, that he may take it well and in good part. This is the chief cause of my sending for you; therefore I pray you what is your best council to use in this matter for the true acquittal of this gentleman ?' 'Sir,' quoth I, 'as touching that matter, my simple advice shall be this, that your own person shall resort unto him and visit him, and in communication break the matter unto him; and if he will not tell the truth, there be that can satisfy the king's pleasure therein; and in any wise speak nothing of my fellow Vincent. And I would not advise you to tract the time with him: for he is very sick, and I fear me he will not live past to-morrow in the morning.' Then went Master Kingston unto him, and asked first how he did, and so forth proceeded in communication, wherein Master Kingston demanded of him the said money, saying, 'That my lord of Northumberland hath found a book at Cawood that reporteth how ye had but fifteen hundred pounds in ready money, and one penny thereof will not be found, who hath made the king privy by his letters thereof. Wherefore the king hath written unto me, to demand of you if you know where it is become; for it were pity that it should be embezzled from you both. Therefore, I shall require you, in the king's name, to tell me the truth herein, to the intent that I may make just report unto his majesty what answer ye make therein.' With that my lord paused awhile, and said, 'Ah, good lord! how much doth it grieve me that the king should think in me such deceit, wherein I should deceive him of any one penny that I have. Rather than I would, Master Kingston, embezzle or deceive him of a mite, I would it were moult, and put in my mouth;' which words he spake twice or thrice very vehemently. I have nothing, ne never had (God being my judge), that I esteemed, or had in it any such delight or pleasure, but that I took it for the king's goods, having but the bare use of the same during my life, and after my death to leave it to the king; wherein he hath but prevented my intent and purpose. And for this money that ye demand of me, I assure you it is none of mine; for I borrowed it of divers of my friends to bury me, and to bestow among my servants, who have taken great pains about me, like true and faithful men. Notwithstanding, if it be his pleasure to take this money from me, I must hold me therewith content. Yet I would most humbly beseech his majesty to see them satisfied, of whom I borrowed the same for the discharge of my conscience.' 'Sir,' quoth Master Kingston, 'there is no doubt in the king; ye need not to mistrust that, but when the king shall be advertised thereof, to whom I shall make report of your request, that his grace will do as shall become him. But, sir, I pray you, where is this money?' 'Master Kingston,' quoth he, 'I will not conceal it from the king; I will declare it to you, (ere) I die, by the grace of God. Take a little patience with me I pray you.' 'Well, sir, then will I trouble you no more at this time, trusting that ye will show me to-morrow.' "Howbeit my lord waxed very sick, most likeliest to die that night, and often swooned, and, as me thought, drew fast toward his end, until it was four of the clock in the morning, at which time, I asked him how he did: 'Well,' quoth he, 'if I had any meat; I pray you give me some.' 'Sir, there is none ready,' said I. 'I wis,' quoth he, 'ye be the more to blame, for you should have always some meat for me in a readiness, to eat when my stomach serveth me; therefore I pray you get me some; for I intend this day, God willing, to make me strong, to the intent I may occupy

myself in confession, and make me ready to God.' The dying man ate a spoonful or two. Then was he in confession the space of an hour. And when he had ended his confession, Master Kingston bade him good-morrow (for it was seven of the clock in the morning), and asked him how he did. 'Sir,' quoth he, 'I tarry but the will and pleasure of God, to render unto him my simple soul into his divine hands.' 'Not yet so, sir,' quoth Master Kingston, 'with the grace of God, ye shall live, and do very well, if ye will be of good cheer.' 'Master Kingston, my disease is such, that I cannot live; I have had some experience in my disease, and thus it is: I have a flux, with a continual fever; the nature whereof is this: that if there be no alteration with me of the same within eight days, then must either ensue excoriation of the entrails, or frenzy, or else present death; and the best thereof is death. And as I suppose, this is the eighth day; and if ye see in me no alteration, then is there no remedy (although I may live a day or twain), but death which is the best remedy of the three.' 'Nay, sir, in good faith' quoth Master Kingston, 'you be in such dolor and pensiveness, doubting that thing that indeed ye need not to fear, which maketh you much worse than ye should be.' 'Well, well, Master Kingston,' quoth he. 'I see the matter against me how it is framed; but if I had served God as diligently as I have done the king, he would not have given me over in my grey hairs. Howbeit this is the just reward that I must receive for my worldly diligence and pains that I may have had to do him service; only to satisfy his vain pleasure, not regarding my godly duty. Wherefore I pray you, with all my heart, to have me most humbly commended unto his royal majesty; beseeching him in my behalf to call to his most gracious remembrance all matters proceeding between him and me, from the beginning of the world unto this day, and the progress of the same: and most chiefly in the weighty matter yet depending (meaning the matter newly began between him and the good Queen Katherine), then shall his conscience declare whether I have offended him or no. He is sure a prince of royal courage, and hath a princely heart; and rather than he will either miss or want any part of his will or appetite, he will put the loss of one-half of his realm in danger. For I assure you, I have often kneeled before him in his privy chamber on my knees, the space of an hour or two, to persuade him from his will and appetite, but I could never bring to pass to dissuade him therefrom. Therefore, Master Kingston, if it chance hereafter you to be one of his privy council, as for your wisdom and other qualities ye are meet to be, I warn you to be well advised and assured what matter ye put in his head, for ye shall never put in out again.'"

Cardinal's against "Master Kingston,

The narrative then goes on to exhibit a long speech of the "this new pernicious sect of Lutherans." At last Wolsey said: farewell; I can no more, but wish all things to have good success. My time draweth on fast I may not tarry with you. And forget not, I pray you, what I have said and charged you withal: for when I am dead, ye shall peradventure remember my words much better.' And even with these words he began to draw his speech at length, and his tongue to fail; his eyes being set in his head, whose sight failed him. Then we began to put him in remembrance of Christ's passion; and sent for the abbot of the place to anneal him, who came with all speed and ministered unto him all the service to the same belonging: and caused also the guard to stand by, both to hear him talk before his death, and also to witness of the same; and incontinent the clock struck eight, at which time he gave up the ghost, and thus departed he this present life. And calling to our remembrance his words the day before, how he said that at eight of the clock we should lose our master, one of us looking upon another, supposing that he prophesied of his departure.

"Here is the end and fall of pride and arrogancy of such men, exalted by fortune to honours and high dignities; for I assure you, in his time of authority and glory,

he was then the haughtiest man in all his proceedings that then lived, having more respect to the worldly honour of his person than he had to his spiritual profession; wherein should be all meckness, humility, and charity; the process whereof I leave to them that be learned and seen in divine laws."

[LEIGH HUNT, one of the most original and fascinating of English prose writers-one, also, who has won an enduring station amongst English poets, is the son of a West Indian who came to England and took orders in the Church. He was born in 1784, and was educated at Christ's Hospital. As early as 1805 he was a writer of theatrical criticism in his brother's paper, The News;'-in 1808 the brothers established 'the Examiner'-a weekly paper which surpassed all its then contemporaries in ability and taste. In those days it was almost im possible for a public writer to speak out; and Leigh Hunt had to expiate a sarcasm upon the Prince Regent by two years' imprisonment. Mr. Hunt's subsequent connection with Lord Byron was not a fortunate one; and we are inclined to think that in future literary history most honest sympathies will be with the plebeian asserting his independence as a brother in letters, instead of with the patrician,-heartless and insolent,-a declaimer for liberty but in practice a tyrant. Mr. Hunt, who has borne much adversity with a cheerfulness beyond all praise, writes as freshly and brilliantly as ever. Long may those unfailing spirits which are the delight of his social and family circle be the sunshine of his old age. The following extract is from a delightful volume, published in 1847, entitled, 'Selections from the English Poets-Imagination and Fancy.']

If a young reader should ask, after all, What is the best way of knowing bad poets from good, the best poets from the next best, and so on? the answer is, the only and twofold way; first, the perusal of the best poets with the greatest attention; and second, the cultivation of that love of truth and beauty which made them what they are. Every true reader of poetry partakes a more than ordinary portion of the poetic nature; and no one can be completely such, who does not love, or take an interest in every thing that interests the poet, from the firmament to the daisy -from the highest heart of man, to the most pitiable of the low. It is a good practice to read with pen in hand, marking what is liked or doubted. It rivets the attention, realizes the greatest amount of enjoyment, and facilitates reference. It enables the reader also, from time to time, to see what progress he makes with his own mind, and how it grows up to the stature of its exalter.

If the same person should ask, What class of poetry is the highest? I should say, undoubtedly, the Epic; for it includes the drama, with narration besides; or the speaking and action of the characters, with the speaking of the poet himself, whose utmost address is taxed to relate all well for so long a time, particularly in the passages least sustained by enthusiasm. Whether this class has included the greatest poet, is another question still under trial; for Shakspeare perplexes all such verdicts, even when the claimant is Homer; though if a judgment may be drawn from his early narratives (Venus and Adonis,' and the Rape of Lucrece'), it is to be doubted whether even Shakspeare could have told a story like Homer, owing to that incessant activity and superfœtation of thought, a little less of which might be occasionally desired even in his plays;—if it were possible, once possessing anything of his, to wish it away. Next to Homer and Shakspeare come such narrators as the less universal but intenser Dante; Milton, with his dignified imagination; the universal profoundly simple Chaucer; and luxuriant remote Spenser-immortal child in poetry's most poetic solitudes: then the great second-rate dramatists; unless those who are better acquainted with Greek tragedy than I am, demand a place for them before Chaucer: then the airy yet robust universality of Ariosto; the hearty out-ofdoor nature of Theocritus, also a universalist; the finest lyrical poets (who only take short flights, compared with the narrators); the purely contemplative poets who have

more thought than feeling; the descriptive, satirical, didactic, epigrammatic. It is to be borne in mind, however, that the first poet of an inferior class may be superior to followers in the train of a higher one, though the superiority is by no means to be taken for granted; otherwise Pope would be superior to Fletcher, and Butler to Pope. Imagination, teeming with action and character, makes the greatest poets; feeling and thought the next; fancy (by itself) the next; wit the last. Thought by itself makes no poet at all; for the mere conclusions of the understanding can at best be only so many intellectual matters of fact. Feeling, even destitute of conscious thought, stands a far better poetical chance; feeling being a sort of thought without the process of thinking—a grasper of the truth without seeing it. And what is very remarkable, feeling seldom makes the blunders that thought does. An idle distinction has been made between taste and judgment. Taste is the very maker of jadgment. Put an artificial fruit in your mouth, or only handle it, and you will soon perceive the difference between judging from taste or tact, and judging from the abstract figment called judgment. The latter does but throw you into guesses and doubts. Hence the conceits that astonish us in the gravest and even subtlest thinkers, whose taste is not proportionate to their mental perceptions; men like Donne, for instance; who, apart from accidental personal impressions, seem to look at nothing as it really is, but only as to what may be thought of it. Hence, on the other hand, the delightfulness of those poets who never violate truth of feeling, whether in things real or imaginary; who are always consistent with their object and its requirements; and who run the great round of nature, not to perplex and be perplexed, but to make themselves and us happy. And luckily, delightfulness is not incompatible with greatness, willing soever as men may be in their present imperfect state to set the power to subjugate above the power to please. Truth, of any kind whatsoever, makes great writing. This is the reason why such poets as Ariosto, though not writing with a constant detail of thought and feeling like Dante, are justly considered great as well as delightful. Their greatness proves itself by the same truth of nature, and sustained power, though in a different way. Their action is not so crowded and weighty; their sphere has more territories less fertile ; but it has enchantments of its own which excess of thought would spoil-luxuries, laughing graces, animal spirits; and not to recognise the beauty and greatness of these, treated as they treat them, is simply to be defective in sympathy. Every planet is not Mars or Saturn. There is also Venus and Mercury. There is one genius of the south, and another of the north, and others uniting both. The reader who is too thoughtless or too sensitive to like intensity of any sort, and he who is too thoughtful or too dull to like anything but the greatest possible stimulus of reflection or passion, are equally wanting in complexional fitness for a thorough enjoyment of books. Ariosto occasionally says as fine things as Dante, and Spenser as Shakspeare; but the business of both is to enjoy ; and in order to partake their enjoyment to its full extent, you must feel what poetry is in the general as well as the particular, must be aware that there are different songs of the spheres, some fuller of notes, and others of a sustained delight; and as the former keep you perpetually alive to thought or passion, so from the latter you receive a constant harmonious sense of truth and beauty, more agreeable perhaps on the whole, though less exciting. Ariosto, for instance, does not tell a story with the brevity and concentrated passion of Dante; every sentence is not so full of matter, nor the style so removed from the indifference of prose; yet you are charmed with a truth of another sort, equally characteristic of the writer, equally drawn from nature, and substituting a healthy sense of enjoyment for intenser emotion. Exclusiveness of liking for this or that mode of truth, only shows, either that the reader's perceptions are limited, or that he would sacrifice truth itself to his favourite form of it. Sir

Walter Raleigh, who was as trenchant with his pen as his sword, hailed the 'Faerie Queene' of his friend Spenser in verses in which he said that "Petrarch" was henceforward to be no more heard of; and that, in all English poetry, there was nothing he counted" of any price" but the effusions of the new author. Yet Petrarch is still living; Chaucer was not abolished by Sir Walter; and Shakspeare is thought somewhat valuable. A botanist might as well have said that myrtles and oaks were to disappear because acacias had come up. It is with the Poet's creations as with Nature's, great or small. Wherever truth and beauty, whatever their amount, can be shaped into verse, and answer to some demand for it in our hearts, there poetry is to be found; whether in productions grand and beautiful as some great event, or some mighty, leafy solitude, or no bigger and more pretending than a sweet face or a bunch of violets; whether in Homer's epic or Gray's Elegy' in the enchanted gardens of Ariosto and Spenser, or the very pot-herbs of the 'Schoolmistress' of Shenstone, the balms of the simplicity of a cottage. Not to know and fecl this, is to be deficient in the universality of Nature herself, who is a poetess on the smallest as well as the largest scale, and who calls upon us to admire all her productions; not indeed with the same degree of admiration, but with no refusal of it, except to defect.

I cannot draw this essay towards its conclusion better than with three memorable words of Milton; who has said, that poetry, in comparison with science, is “simple, sensuous, and passionate." By simple, he means imperplexed and self-evident; by sensuous, genial and full of imagery; by passionate, excited and enthusiastic. I am aware that different constructions have been put on some of these words; but the context seems to me to necessitate those before us. I quote, however, not from the original, but from an extract in the 'Remarks on Paradise Lost' by Richardson.

What the poet has to cultivate above all things is love and truth;—what he has to avoid, like poison, is the fleeting and the false. He will get no good by proposing to be "in earnest at the moment.' 29 His earnestness must be innate and habitual; born with him, and felt to be his most precious inheritance. "I expect neither profit nor general fame by my writings," says Coleridge, in the Preface to his Poems; "and I consider myself as having been amply repaid without either. Poetry has been to me its own exceeding great reward; it has soothed my afflictions; it has multiplied and refined my enjoyments; it has endeared solitude; and it has given me the habit of wishing to discover the good and the beautiful in all that meets and surrounds me.”—-Pickering's edition, p. 10.

"Poetry," says Shelley, "lifts the veil from the hidden beauty of the world, and makes familiar objects be as if they were not familiar. It reproduces all that it represents; and the impersonations clothed in its Elysian light stand thenceforward in the minds of those who have once contemplated them, as memorials of that gentle and exalted content which extends itself over all thoughts and actions with which it coexists. The great secret of morals is love, or a going out of our own nature, and an identification of ourselves with the beautiful which exists in thought, action, or person, not our own. A man, to be greatly good, must imagine intensely and comprehensively; he must put himself in the place of another, and of many others: the pains and pleasures of his species must become his own. The great instrument of moral good is imagination; and poetry administers to the effect by acting upon the cause."--Essays and Letters, vol. i. p. 16.

I would not willingly say anything after perorations like these; but as treatises on poetry may chance to have auditors who think themselves called upon to vindicate the superiority of what is termed useful knowledge, it may be as well to add, that if the poet may be allowed to pique himself on any one thing more than another, compared with those who undervalue him, it is on that power of undervaluing nobody,