HENRY REYNOLDS MYTHOMYSTES, WHEREIN A SHORT SVRVAY IS TAKEN OF THE NATVRE AND VALVE OF TRVE POESY AND DEPTH OF THE ANCIENTS ABOVE OVR MODERNE POETS. -1633?/2 To the Right Hon11 and my euer-honor'd Lord, My Lord, As I haue euer beene a louer (though ignorant one) 5 of the Art of Painting, a frute of the Fancy that may be fitly called a silent Poěsy, so of necessity must I loue her Sister the Art of Poësy, which is no other then a speaking Painting or Picture. And because I presume your Lop, fauoring and so well vnderstanding the one, cannot but 10 vnderstand and like the other, I aduenture to present a slight drafte of her to your Loo, that, as you haue daily before your eyes one of the best suruayes of what is or can be in Picture, you may haue likewise limned, though in little, by a creature no lesse your owne then they are 15 (how artfully I dare not auouch, but sure) a true picture of her Sister, Poësy: A Birth, my Lord, some moneths since conceived, and euen as soone borne; and which, though now ope to other eyes, yet askes no other honour then your acceptance; to whome, in gratefull acknowledgment 20 of your noble fauours, are (no lesse then this his slight issue is) for euer dedicated the best of the poore indeauors of the parent, Your Lops humble and most affectionate seruant, 25 H. R, TO THE CANDID AND INGENVOVS READER. LOOKE not, generous Reader (for such I write to), for more in the few following leaues then a plaine and simple verity, vnadorned at all with eloquution or Rhetori- 5 call phrase, glosses fitter perhaps to be set vpon silken and thinne paradoxicall semblances, then appertaining to the care of who desires to lay downe a naked & vnmasked Trueth. Nor expect heere an Encomium or praise of any such thing as the world ordinarily takes Poësy for: That 10 same thing beeing, as I conceiue, a superficiall meere outside of Sence, or gaye barke only (without the body) of Reason: Witnesse so many excellent witts that haue taken so much paines in these times to defend her; which sure they would not haue done, if what is generally 15 receiued now a dayes for Poësy were not meerely a faculty or occupation of so little consequence, as by the louers thereof rather to be (in their owne fauour) excused, then for any good in the thing it selfe to be commended. Nor must thou heere expect thy solution, if thy curiosity 20 inuite thee to a satisfaction in any the vnder-Accidents, but in meerely the Essentiall Forme, of true Poësy: Such I call the Accidents or appendixes thereto, as conduce somewhat to the Matter and End, nothing to the reall Forme and Essence thereof. And these accidents, as I call them, 25 our commenders & defenders of Poësy haue chiefely and indeed sufficiently insisted and dilated vpon; and are, first, those floures (as they are called) of Rhetorick, consisting of their Anaphoras, Epistrophes, Metaphors, Metonymyes, Synecdoches, and those their other potent 30 Tropes and Figures; helpes (if at all of vse to furnish out expressions with) much properer sure and more fitly belonging to Poësy then Oratory; yet such helpes, as if Nature haue not beforehand in his byrth giuen a Poët, all such forced Art will come behind as lame to the businesse, and deficient, as the best-taught countrey Morris dauncer with all his bells and napkins will ill deserue to be in an 5 Inne of Courte at Christmas tearmed the thing they call a fine reueller. The other Accidents of Poësy, and that are the greater part of the appurtenances thereof in the accoumpt of our Poëts of these times, are also heere vtterly vnmencioned; such as are, what sort of Poëme 10 may admit the blanke verse, what requires exacte rime; where the strong line (as they call it), where the gentle sortes best; what subject must haue the verse of so many feete, what of other; where the masculine rime, where the feminine, and where the threesillabled (which the Italians 15 call their rime sdrucciole) are to be vsed. These, I say, and the like Adjuncts of Poësy, elsewhere amply discoursed of by many curious witts, are not heere mencioned. Only what I conceiued fit to speake, and with what breuity I could, of the Auncient Poëts in generall, and of the Forme 20 and reall Essence of true Poësy, considered meerely in it owne worth and validity, without extrinsick and suppeditatiue ornament at all, together with the paralell of their foyle, our Moderne Poëts and Poësyes, I haue (to the end to redeeme in some parte and vindicate that excellent Art 25 from the iniury it suffers in the worlds generall misprizion and misconstruction thereof) heere touched, and but touched; the rather to awake some abler vnderstanding then my owne to the pursute, if they please, of a theame I conceiue well worthy a greater industry and happyer 30 leisures then I my selfe possesse. I MYTHOMYSTES WHEREIN A SHORT SVRVAY IS TAKEN OF THE NATVRE AND VALVE OF TRVE Poësie, and depth of the Ancients aboue our Moderne Poëts. 5 HAUE thought vpon the times wee liue in, and am forced to affirme the world is decrepit, and, out of its 10 age & doating estate, subiect to all the imperfections that are inseparable from that wracke and maime of Nature, that the young behold with horror, and the sufferers thereof lye vnder with murmur and languishment. Euen the generall Soule of this great Creature, whereof euery 15 one of ours is a seuerall peece, seemes bedrid, as vpon her deathbed and neere the time of her dissolution to a second better estate and being; the yeares of her strength are past, and she is now nothing but disease, for the Soules health is no other then meerely the knowledge of the 20 Truth of things: Which health the worlds youth inioyed, *For the and hath now* exchanged for it all the diseases of all errors, heresies, and different sects and schismes of youth, and opinions and vnderstandings in all matter of Arts, world hath lost his the times begin to waxe old. 2 Esd. cap. 14. Sciences, and Learnings whatsoeuer. To helpe on these 25 our Auncients (for auoiding of this present malady the world is now falne into) couched and carefully infoulded, but must bee by euery illiterate person without exception deflowred and broke open, or broke in pieces, because 5 beyond his skill to vnlocke them? Or what Law haue we that prouides for the restraint of these myriads of hotheaded wranglers & ignorant writers and teachers, which, out of the bare priuiledge of perhaps but puny graduate in some Vniuersity, will venter vpon all, euen the most 10 remoued and most abstruse knowledges, as perfect vnderstanders and expounders of them, vpon the single warrant of their owne braine, or inuenters of better themselues than all Antiquity could deliuer downe to them, out of the treasonous mint of their owne imaginations? What 15 hauocke, what mischiefe to all learnings, and how great a multiplicity of poysonous errours and heresies must not of necessity hence ensue and ouerspread the face of all Truths whatsoeuer? Among these heresies (to omit those in matter of 20 Diuinity, or the right forme of worshipping God, which the Doctors of his Church are fitter to make the subiects of their tongues and pens, then I, a Layman, and allvnworthy the taske), among, I say, these (if I may so call them) heresies, or ridiculous absurdities in matter of 25 humane letters, and their professors in these times, I find none so grosse, nor indeed any so great scandall or maime to humane learning, as in the almost generall abuse and violence offered to the excellent art of Poesye; first, by those learned, as they thinke themselues, of our dayes, 30 who call themselues Poets; and next by such as out of their ignorance heede not how much they prophane that high and sacred title in calling them so. From the number of these first mentioned (for, for the last, I will not mention them, nor yet say as a graue Father, 35 and holy one too, of certaine obstinate heretikes said, |