bear date from the end of the chapter; for in the letter, I must make a suite of that kinde to yo", in wch I know yow wyll give a good interpretation of myne ingenuity, that I would not forbear even the troublinge of yow, when I had a way presented to me, to do any service to yor noble family, to whom I owe even my posterity. Sr, at yr last election, Sr Rob. More (to whom I have the honor to be brother in law) had a sonne elected into yor schools, and hys place ys not falln, and so or hopes evacuated that way. Because yt was my worke at first, I would faine perfit yt, and I am in the right way of perfitinge yt when I addresse myselfe to yow, who have a perfit power in the business, and have multiplyed demonstrations of a perfit love to me. That wch was then donne, was donne by way of gratitude by Mr. Woodford, one of the then opposers, to whom I had given a church belonginge to our Pauls. And for ye favor w'ch yw shall be pleased to afford us herin, I offer yo" mother and daughters, all ye service that I shall be able to doe to any servant of yors in any place of any of or churches. Our most B. Savyor blesse yow wt all his graces, and restore us to a confident meetinge in wholesome place, and direct us all by good ways to good ends. Amen.

Yor

very true frinde and humble

servant in Chr. Jes.

J. DONNE.

* That is, any preferment in the cathedral church or its

dependencies.

From Sr John Davers (Danvers) house at Chelsey (of w'ch house and my

arlils at Hanworth

I make up my Tusculan) * 12 Julii, 1625.

To the Honorable Kt and my

most honored frinde Sr Henry Wotton, provost of Eton.

(143.)

Original Letters of Edward Lord Herbert of Cherbury.

state.

The four following Letters of Edward Lord Herbert of Cherbury, are addressed to Sir George More, whom he calls his father, for reasons which we shall subsequently Brief as these letters are, they are highly characteric of the extraordinary personage who penned them, and as autograph specimens of his epistolary style are singular curiosities. They are dated from Eyton in Shropshire, one of the seats of his maternal ancestors, the Newtons, where he was born in the year 1581. He died at London in 1648, and was buried at St. Giles's-in-thefields.

His character has been summed up by Walpole in the Advertisement to that most amusing piece of autobiography, his Memoirs, which survived in a MS. form, the chances of upwards of a century, and was printed at Strawberry-hill in 1764.

"As a soldier," says his editor, "he won the esteem of

• The reader will observe that this is a classical allusion to the villa of Cicero, Tusculanum, near Tusculum, the delightful spot called by the modern Italians Frescati.

those great captains the Prince of Orange and the Constable de Montmorency. As a knight his chivalry was drawn from the purest founts of the Fairy Queen. Had he been ambitious, the beauty of his person would have carried him as far as any gentle knight can aspire to go. As a public minis ter he supported the dignity of his country even when its Prince disgraced it; and that he was qualified to write its annals as well as to ennoble them, the history I have mentioned (his Life of Henry VIII.) proves. Strip each period of its excesses and errors, and it will not be easy to trace out or dispose the life of a man of quality into a succession of employments which would better become him. Valour and military activity in youth, business of state in the middle age, contemplation and labours for the information of posterity in the calmer scenes of closing life: this was Lord Herbert." To this eulogy we shall add some traits of his character and his opinions derived from himself.

*

"I was born," says Lord Herbert, "at Eyton in Shropshire, being a house which, together with fair lands, descended upon the Newports by my grandmother, between the hours of twelve and one of the clock in the morning; my infancy was very sickly, my head continually purging itself very much by the ears; whereupon also it was so long before I began to speak, that many thought I should ever be dumb.

"The very furthest thing I remember is that, when I understood what was said by others, I did yet forbear to speak, lest I should utter something that were imperfect or impertinent. When I came to talk, one of the first inquiries I made was, how I came into this world? I told my nurse, my keepers, and others, I found myself here, indeed, but from what cause or by what means I could

Advertisement to Life, p. xi. edit. 1809.

not imagine. When I came to riper years I made this observation, which afterwards a little comforted me, that as I found myself in possession of this life without knowing anything of the pangs and throes my mother suffered, yet doubtless they did no less press and afflict me than her; so I hope my soul shall pass into a better life than this, without being sensible of the anguish and pains my body shall feel in death; for as I believe then I shall be transmitted to a more happy state by God's great grace, I am confident I shall no more know how I came out of this world than how I came into it." This may be considered very philosophical, although not very orthodox reasoning ; other passages, however, shew that Lord Herbert's mind, prone to adopt singular opinions, was yet imbued with some of the great truths of Christianity. " None," he says,

can justly hope for an union with the supreme God, that doth not come as near to him in this life in virtue and goodness as he can; so that, if human frailty do interrout this union, by committing faults that make him incapable of his everlasting happiness, it will be fit, by a serious repentance, to expiate and emaculate those faults, and for the rest trust to the mercy of God, his Creator, Redeemer, and Preserver, who being our Father, and knowing well in what a weak condition through infirmities we are, will, I doubt not, commiserate those transactions we commit, when they are done without desire to offend his divine majesty, and together rectify our understanding through his grace."

To many Christians this confession of his faith may appear imperfect, because he has omitted altogether any direct mention of man's original corruption; yet probably that might be so far admitted in the writer's own mind, as to require, in his opinion, no particular notice in defining a general rule of conduct.

Of his accomplishments, he informs us that he was skilled in medicine, fencing, and horsemanship. He cured one of his servants of a malignant pestilent fever, when he had been given over by all the physicians, by administering to him a pill the size of a hazel-nut, of one of his rare recipes; and one of his relatives of an hydrocephalous disease that swelled his head and eyes to a frightful extremity, by a decoction of two diuretic roots, which subdued the complaint, and reduced his features to their proper proportions.

As his accomplishments were rare, so were some of his bodily peculiarities, which, although scarcely credible, he calls God to witness were true. He increased considerably in stature after he was twenty-one years of age. He was lighter when weighed in balances than men of smaller size than himself. He had a pulse in the crown of his head; and it was well known to those who waited in his chamber, that the shirts, waistcoats, and other garments which he wore, were sweet beyond what can either be easily believed or observed in any else. The same sweetness was observable in his breath before he took tobacco. From all these relations it may be observed that, notwithstanding his lordship's good sense and education, he was not proof against that most seducing of human foibles, personal vanity. This propensity leads him into various amusing details of ladies who irresistibly became enamoured with him, and who were in the habit of wearing his portrait in miniature secretly about their persons without the sanction of their lords! He wrote a treatise, "De Veritate, &c." or on Truth, and how it may be distinguished from probable, possible, and false revelation, which was much commended, he says, by the learned Grotius, and other theological writers of the day; and it is not a little singular (so prone is the human mind to self