Edmund Spenser 1552?-1599 John Bartlett


1
Fierce warres and faithful loves shall moralize my song. 1
Faerie Queene. Introduction. St. 1.
2
A gentle knight was pricking on the plaine.
Faerie Queene. Book i. Canto i. St. 1.
3
O happy earth, Whereon thy innocent feet doe ever tread!
Faerie Queene. Book i. Canto i. St. 9.
4
The noblest mind the best contentment has.
Faerie Queene. Book i. Canto i. St. 35.
5
A bold bad man. 2
Faerie Queene. Book i. Canto i. St. 37.
6
Her angels face, As the great eye of heaven, shyned bright, And made a sunshine in the shady place.
Faerie Queene. Book i. Canto iii. St. 4.
7
Ay me, how many perils doe enfold The righteous man, to make him daily fall! 3
Faerie Queene. Book i. Canto viii. St. 1.
8
As when in Cymbrian plaine An heard of bulles, whom kindly rage doth sting, Doe for the milky mothers want complaine, 4 And fill the fieldes with troublous bellowing.
Faerie Queene. Book i. Canto viii. St. 11.
9
Entire affection hateth nicer hands.
Faerie Queene. Book i. Canto viii. St. 40.
10
That darksome cave they enter, where they find That cursed man, low sitting on the ground, Musing full sadly in his sullein mind.
Faerie Queene. Book i. Canto ix. St. 35.



11
No daintie flowre or herbe that growes on grownd, No arborett with painted blossoms drest And smelling sweete, but there it might be fownd To bud out faire, and throwe her sweete smels al arownd.
Faerie Queene. Book ii. Canto vi. St. 12.
12
And is there care in Heaven? And is there love In heavenly spirits to these Creatures bace?
Faerie Queene. Book ii. Canto viii. St. 1.
13
How oft do they their silver bowers leave To come to succour us that succour want!
Faerie Queene. Book ii. Canto viii. St. 2.
14
Eftsoones they heard a most melodious sound.
Faerie Queene. Book ii. Canto xii. St. 70.
15
Through thick and thin, both over bank and bush, 5 In hope her to attain by hook or crook. 6
Faerie Queene. Book iii. Canto i. St. 17.
16
Her berth was of the wombe of morning dew, 7 And her conception of the joyous Prime.
Faerie Queene. Book iii. Canto vi. St. 3.
17
Roses red and violets blew, And all the sweetest flowres that in the forrest grew.
Faerie Queene. Book iii. Canto vi. St. 6.
18
Be bolde, Be bolde, and everywhere, Be bold. 8
Faerie Queene. Book iii. Canto xi. St. 54.
19
Dan Chaucer, well of English undefyled, On Fame’s eternall beadroll worthie to be fyled.
Faerie Queene. Book iv. Canto ii. St. 32.
20
For all that Nature by her mother-wit 9 Could frame in earth.
Faerie Queene. Book iv. Canto x. St. 21.
21
Ill can he rule the great that cannot reach the small.
Faerie Queene. Book v. Canto ii. St. 43.
22
Who will not mercie unto others show, How can he mercy ever hope to have? 10
Faerie Queene. Book v. Canto ii. St. 42.
23
The gentle minde by gentle deeds is knowne; For a man by nothing is so well bewrayed As by his manners.
Faerie Queene. Book vi. Canto iii. St. 1.
24
For we by conquest, of our soveraine might, And by eternall doome of Fate’s decree, Have wonne the Empire of the Heavens bright.
Faerie Queene. Book vii. Canto vi. St. 33.
25
For of the soule the bodie forme doth take; For soule is forme, and doth the bodie make.
An Hymne in Honour of Beautie. Line 132.
26
For all that faire is, is by nature good; 11 That is a signe to know the gentle blood.
An Hymne in Honour of Beautie. Line 139.
27
To kerke the narre from God more farre, 12 Has bene an old-sayd sawe; And he that strives to touche a starre Oft stombles at a strawe.
The Shepheardes Calender. July. Line 97.
28
Full little knowest thou that hast not tride, What hell it is in suing long to bide: To loose good dayes, that might be better spent; To wast long nights in pensive discontent; To speed to-day, to be put back to-morrow; To feed on hope, to pine with feare and sorrow. `. . . . . . . . .` To fret thy soule with crosses and with cares; To eate thy heart through comfortlesse dispaires; 13 To fawne, to crowche, to waite, to ride, to ronne, To spend, to give, to want, to be undonne. Unhappie wight, borne to desastrous end, That doth his life in so long tendance spend!
Mother Hubberds Tale. Line 895.
29
What more felicitie can fall to creature Than to enjoy delight with libertie, And to be lord of all the workes of Nature, To raine in th’ aire from earth to highest skie, To feed on flowres and weeds of glorious feature.
Muiopotmos: or, The Fate of the Butterflie. Line 209.
30
I hate the day, because it lendeth light To see all things, but not my love to see.
Daphnaida, v. 407.
31
Tell her the joyous Time will not be staid, Unlesse she doe him by the forelock take. 14
Amoretti, lxx.
32
I was promised on a time To have reason for my rhyme; From that time unto this season, I received nor rhyme nor reason. 15
Lines on his Promised Pension. 16
33
Behold, whiles she before the altar stands, Hearing the holy priest that to her speakes, And blesseth her with his two happy hands.
Epithalamion. Line 223.

Note 1.
And moralized his song.—Alexander Pope: Epistle to Arbuthnot. Line 340. [back]

Note 2.
This bold bad man.—William Shakespeare: Henry VIII. act ii. sc. 2. Philip Massinger: A New Way to Pay Old Debts, act iv. sc. 2. [back]

Note 3.
Ay me! what perils do environ
The man that meddles with cold iron!
Samuel Butler: Hudibras, part i. canto iii. line 1. [back]

Note 4.
”Milky Mothers,”—Alexander Pope: The Dunciad, book ii. line 247. Sir Walter Scott: The Monastery, chap. xxviii. [back]

Note 5.
Through thick and thin.—Michael Drayton: Nymphidiæ. Thomas Middleton: The Roaring Girl, act iv. sc. 2. Kemp: Nine Days’ Wonder. Samuel Butler: Hudibras, part i. canto ii. line 370. John Dryden: Absalom and Achitophel, part ii. line 414. Alexander Pope: Dunciad, book ii. William Cowper: John Gilpin. [back]

Note 6.
See Skelton, Quotation 5. [back]

Note 7.
The dew of thy birth is of the womb of the morning.—Psalm cx. 3, Book of Common Prayer. [back]

Note 8.
De l’audace, encore de l’audace, et toujours de l’audace (Boldness, again boldness, and ever boldness).—Danton: Speech in the Legislative Assembly, 1792. [back]

Note 9.
Mother wit.—Christopher Marlowe: Prologue to Tamberlaine the Great, part i. Thomas Middleton: Your Five Gallants, act i. sc. 1. William Shakespeare: Taming of the Shrew, act ii. sc. 1. [back]

Note 10.
Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy.—Matthew v. 7. [back]

Note 11.
The hand that hath made you fair hath made you good.—William Shakespeare: Measure for Measure, act iii. sc. 1. [back]

Note 12.
See Heywood, Quotation 40. [back]

Note 13.
Eat not thy heart; which forbids to afflict our souls, and waste them with vexatious cares.—Plutarch: Of the Training of Children.

But suffered idleness
To eat his heart away.
Bryant: Homer’s Iliad, book i. line 319. [back]

Note 14.
Take Time by the forelock.—Thales (of Miletus). 636–546 B. C. [back]

Note 15.
Rhyme nor reason.—Pierre Patelin, quoted by Tyndale in 1530. Farce du Vendeur des Lieures, sixteenth century. George Peele: Edward I. William Shakespeare: As You Like It, act iii. sc. 2; Merry Wives of Windsor, act v. sc. 5; Comedy of Errors, act ii. sc. 2.

Sir Thomas More advised an author, who had sent him his manuscript to read, “to put it in rhyme.” Which being done, Sir Thomas said, “Yea, marry, now it is somewhat, for now it is rhyme; before it was neither rhyme nor reason.” [back]

Note 16.
Thomas Fuller: Worthies of England, vol ii. p. 379. [back]

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