SECTION XLIII. I KNOW not if sir Thomas More may properly be considered as an English poet. He has, however, left a few obsolete poems, which although without any striking merit, yet, as productions of the restorer of literature in England, seem to claim some notice here. One of these is, A MERY JEST how a SERGEANT would learne to play the FREERE. Written by Maister Thomas More in hys youth. The story is too dull and too long to be told here. But I will cite two or three of the prefatory stanzas. He that hath lafte" the Hosier's crafte, And falleth to making shone; A blacke draper with whyte paper, To goe to writyng scole, An olde butler becum a cutler, I wene shall prove a fole. And an olde trot, that can, got wot, Nothyng but kysse the cup, Till she have soused hym up. A man of lawe that never sawe To fall in sute tyll he dispute His money cleane away; * WORKES, Lond. 1557. in folio. Sign. i. b left. shoes. Pletyng the lawe for every strawe, With bated and strife, but by my life, Or a pedlar waxe a medlar In theology. In these lines, which are intended to illustrate, by familiar examples, the absurdity of a serjeant at law assuming the business of a friar, perhaps the reader perceives but little of that festivity, which is supposed to have marked the character and the conversation of sir Thomas More. The last two stanzas deserve to be transcribed, as they prove, that this tale was designed to be sung to music by a minstrel, for the entertainment of company. Now Masters all, here now I shall Ende there as I began; In any wyse, I would avyse, And counsayle every man, His own craft use, all newe refuse, And lyghtly let them gone: Play not the FRERE, Now make good cheere, And welcome everych one. This piece is mentioned, among other popular story-books in 1575, by Laneham, in his ENTERTAINMENT AT KILLINGWORTH CASTLE in the reign of queen Elisabeth. IN CERTAIN METERS, written also in his youth, as a prologue for his BOKE OF FORTUNE, and forming a poem of considerable length, are these stanzas, which are an attempt at personification and imagery. FORTUNE is represented sitting on a lofty throne, smiling on all mankind, who are gathered around her eagerly expecting a distribution of her favours. Then, as a bayte, she bryngeth forth her ware, Flattery, Dysceyt, Mischiefe, and Tiranny.f Another of sir Thomas More's juvenile poems is, A RUFUL LAMENTACION on the death of queen Elisabeth, wife of Henry the Seventh, and mother of Henry the Eighth, who died in childbed, in 1503. It is evidently formed on the tragical soliloquies, which compose Lydgate's paraphrase of Boccace's book DE CASIBUS VIRORUM ILLUSTRIUM, and which gave birth to the MIRROR FOR MAGISTRATES, the origin of our historic dramas. These stanzas are part of the queen's complaint at the approach of death. Where are our castels now, where are our towers? Ibid. Sign. T vi. the palace of Richmond. King Henry the Seventh's chapel, begun in the year 1502. The year be VOL. III. 2 c fore the queen died. I Married in 1503 to James the Fourth, king of Scotland. Now I am gone and have left you behynde. Adew lord Henry, my lovyng sonne adewTM, Thy mother never know, for lo now here I ly.P In the fourth stanza, she reproaches the astrologers for their falsity in having predicted, that this should be the happiest and most fortunate year of her whole life. This, while it is a natural reflection in the speaker, is a proof of More's contempt of a futile and frivolous science, then so much in esteem. I have been prolix in my citation from this forgotten poem: but I am of opinion, that some of the stanzas have strokes of nature and pathos, and deserved to be rescued from total oblivion. More, when a young man, contrived in an apartment of his father's house a goodly hangyng of fyne paynted clothe, exhibiting nine pageants, or allegoric representations, of the stages of man's life, together with the figures of Death, Fame, Time, and Eternity. Under each picture he wrote a stanza. The first is under CHILDHODE, expressed by a boy whipping a top. I am called CHYLDHOD, in play is all my mynde, Next was pictured MANHOD, a comely young man mounted on a fleet horse, with a hawk on his fist, and followed by two greyhounds, with this stanza affixed. MANHOD I am, therefore I me delyght To hunt and hawke, to nourishe up and fede The personification of FAME, like RUMOUR in the Chorus to Tapestry, with metrical legends illustrating the subject, was common in this age: and the public pageants in the streets were often exhibited with explanatory verses. I am of opinion, that the COMEDIOLA, or little interludes, which More is said to have written and acted in his father's house, were only these nine pageants". Another juvenile exercise of More in the English stanza, is annexed to his prose translation of the LIFE of John Picus Mirandula, and entitled, TWELVE RULES OF JOHN PICUS EARLE OF MIRANDULA, partely exciting, partely directing a man ¶ a quoit. a stick for throwing at a cock. STELE is handle, Sar. * WORKES, Sign. C. iii. |