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mentioned, which was profeffedly written to shew the spiritual efficacy or virtue of the pfalms in metre, and in which he directs a distinct and audible mode of congregational finging, he probably fuppreffed it, because he faw that the practice had been abused to the purposes of fanaticism, and adopted by the puritans in contradiction to the national worship; or at least that fuch a publication, whatever his private fentiments might have been, would not have suited the nature and dignity of his high office in the church. Some of our mufical antiquaries, however, have justly conjectured, that the archbishop, who was skilled in mufic, and had formerly founded a mufic-fchool in his college' of Stoke Clare, intended these pfalms, which are adapted to complicated tunes of four parts probably conftructed by himself and here given in fcore, for the use of cathedrals; at a time, when compofitions in counterpoint were uncommon in the church, and when that part of our choir-fervice called the motet or anthem, which admits a more artificial difplay of harmony, and which is recommended and allowed in queen Elifabeth's earliest ecclefiaftical injunctions, was yet almost unknown, or but in a very imperfect state. Accordingly, although the di rection is not quite comprehenfible, he orders many of them to be fung by the rector chori, or chantor, and the quier, or choir, alternately. That at least he had a taste for music, we may conclude from the following not inelegant scale of modulation, prefixed to his eight tunes abovementioned.

"THE NATURE OF THE EYGHT TUNES.

The first is meke, devout to see,

The second fad, in maiefty:

The third doth rage, and roughly brayth,
The fourth doth fawne, and flattry playth:
The fifth deligth, and laugheth the more,
The fixt bewayleth, it wepeth full fore.
The seventh tredeth ftoute in froward race,
The eyghte goeth milde in modeft pace."

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What follows is another proof, that he had proposed to introduce these pfalms into the choir-service. "The tenor of these partes be for the people when they will fyng alone, the other partes put for the greater quiers, or to fuche as will fyng or play them privately '."

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How far this memorable prelate, perhaps the most accomplished scholar that had yet filled the archbishoprick of Canterbury, has fucceeded in producing a tranflation of the pfalter preferable to the common one, the reader may judge from these stanzas of a pfalm highly poetical, in which I have exactly preferved the translator's peculiar ufe of the hemiftic punctuation.

To feede my neede: he will me leade

To pastures greene and fat:
He forth brought me in libertie,
To waters delicate.

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Thou shalt provyde: a table wyde,

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For me against theyr fpite:

With oyle my head: thou haft befpred,
My cup is fully dight".

I add, in the more fublime character, a part of the eighteenth pfalm, in which Sternhold is fuppofed to have exerted his powers most successfully, and without the interruptions of the pointing which perhaps was defigned for fome regulations of the mufic, now unknown.

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The Lorde from heaven fent downe his leaven

And thundred thence in ire;

He thunder caft in wondrous blast
With hayle and coales of fyre.

Fol. 13.

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• Fol. 35.

Here

Here is fome degree of spirit, and a choice of phraseology. But on the whole, and efpecially for this fpecies of stanza, Parker will be found to want facility, and in general to have been unpractised in writing English verfes. His abilities were destined to other studies, and adapted to employments of a more archiepifcopal nature.

The industrious Strype, Parker's biographer, after a diligent fearch never could gain a fight of this tranflation: nor is it even mentioned by Ames, the inquifitive collector of our typographical antiquities. In the late Mr. Weft's library there was a fuperb copy, once belonging to bishop Kennet, who has remarked in a blank page, that the archbishop permitted his wife dame Margaret to present the book to fome of the nobility. It is certainly at this time extremely fcarce, and would be defervedly deemed a fortunate acquifition to those capricious students who labour only to collect a library of rarities. Yet it is not generally known, that there are two copies in the Bodleian library of this anonymous verfion, which have hitherto been given to an obscure poet by the name of John Keeper. One of them, in 1643, appears to have been the property of bishop Barlow and on the opposite fide of the title, in somewhat of an antient hand, is this manuscript infertion. "The "auctor of this booke is one John Keeper, who was brought "6 upp in the close of Wells." Perhaps Antony Wood had no better authority than this flender unauthenticated note, for faying, that John Keeper, a native of Somerfetfhire, and a graduate at Oxford in the year 1564, and who afterwards studied music and poetry at Wells, "tranflated The whole Pfalter into English "metre which containeth 150 psalms, etc. printed at London by "John Day living over Alderfgate, about 1570, in quarto: and "added thereunto The Gloria Patri, Te Deum, The Song of "the three Children, Quicunque vult, Benedictus, &c. all in At the end of which, are musical notes fet in four "parts to several pfalms. What other things, he adds, of "poetry, mufic, or other faculties, he has published, I know

"metre.

"not;

"not, nor any thing more; yet I suppose he had some dignity " in the church of Wells." If this verfion fhould really be the work of Keeper, I fear we are ftill to feek for archbishop Parker's psalms, with Strype and Ames".

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A confiderable contribútor to the metrical theology was Robert Crowley, educated in Magdalene college at Oxford, where he obtained a fellowship in 1542. In the reign of Edward the fixth, he commenced printer and preacher in London. He lived in Ely-rents in Holborn: "where, fays Wood, he "fold books, and at leisure times exercifed the gift of preaching in the great city and elsewhere '.' In 1550 he printed the first edition of PIERCE PLOWMAN'S VISION, but with the ideas of a controverfialist, and with the view of helping forward the reformation by the revival of a book, which exposed the absurdities of popery in strong satire, and which at present is only valuable or useful, as it ferves to gratify the harmless researches of those peaceable philofophers who study the progreffion of antient literature. His pulpit and his press, those two prolific fources of faction, happily cooperated in propagating his principles of predeftination: and his shop and his fermons were alike frequented. Poffeffed of thofe talents which qualified him for captivating the attention and moving the paffions of the multitude, under queen Elifabeth he held many dignities in a church, whofe doctrines and polity his undifcerning zeal had a tendency to deftroy. He tranflated into popular rhyme, not only the pfalter, but the litany, with hymns, all which he printed together in 1549. In the fame year, and in the fame measure, he published The Voice of the laft Trumpet blown by the feventh angel. This piece contains twelve several leffons, for the inftruction or amendment of those who seemed at that time chiefly to need advice; and among whom he enumerates lewd priests, scholars, phyficians, beggars, yeomen, gen

PATH. OXON. i. 181.

There is a metrical English verfion of the Pfalms among the Cotton manufcripts

about the year 1320, which has merit. See also fupr. Vol. i. 23.

ATH. OXON, i. 235,

tlemen,

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