Herbert's acceptance of a benefice was esteemed a condescension by his contemporaries. “He was none of the nobles of Tekoa, who, at the building of Jerusalem, put not their necks to the work of the Lord," was the commentary of Fuller. His personal gifts added a lustre to his inherited. He would gain a grace from every comparison with his rural brethren, of whom we catch a glimpse in the remark of Walton, that, if Herbert "were at any time too zealous in his sermons, it was either in reproving the ill behaviour of congregations, or of those ministers that huddled up the churchprayers without a visible reverence and affection, namely, such as seemed to say the Lord's Prayer or Collect in a breath." How he labored in this happy corner of the Lord's field, hoping all things, and blessing all people, asking his own way to Sion, and showing it to others, we read in the artless page of Walton. But not long was he to sing his song in a strange land. While any portion of strength remained, he continued to read prayers twice every day, as his custom had been; and, when he felt himself no longer equal to that labour of love, he resigned it to his curate. About a month before his death, Mr. Duncon, subsequently Rector of Fryer Barnet, Middlesex, came to visit him; and, speaking to Walton of the interview, after an interval of nearly forty years, he declared that the pious discourse and the meek demeanour of Herbert were still fresh in his

memory.

Mr. Duncon's place was supplied by

an older and dearer friend, Mr. Woodnot, who never left the sick man until He who gives his beloved sleep had taken him.

The setting of the sun was as calm as its shining had been, only of a richer hue. The wife of Herbert, his three nieces, and Mr. Woodnot, stood beside him, while, in his own words, "he passed a conflict with his last enemy, and overcame him by the merits of his Master, Jesus." His last words were, "Lord, forsake me not now my strength faileth me; but grant me mercy for the merits of my Jesus. And now, Lord, Lord, now receive my soul." And so his Father in heaven took his child to his own home.

The following entry in the Register of Bemerton is the latest record of one of God's most devoted children: "Mr. George Herbert, Esq., Parson of St. Foughleston and Bemerton, was buried 3 day of March, 1632."

Few faces are better known than Herbert's, with its austere sweetness, and the evident marks of inward decline. In person, he is described by Walton as tall and unusually thin, but cheerful in look, and always attracting friends and strangers by the elegance and the benignity, of his manner and address. He stands amid a group of English worthies remarkable for their personal and historic interest. The eloquent Donne was one of his dearest friends; he knew the accomplishments of

Wotton, and the learned casuistry of Sanderson; the first portion of Hooker's wonderful treatise appeared while he was in his cradle; and his childish fancy was enriched by the Essays of Bacon. With Ben Jonson, who survived him about five years, he was likely to be acquainted. Shakspere he had probably seen in some festive interval of Cambridge life; for that illustrious poet did not retire from London before 1611, when Herbert was eighteen years old. In this splendid company of theologians, philosophers, and poets, he wore an expression and a costume of his own. If his court-views had been realized, we might have expected to have seen blended in him Sidney's chivalry, and the picturesque foppery of Raleigh. He was only seven years younger than the hero of Zutphen, to whom, in temperament, he seems to have shown a remarkable resemblance.

We are to consider Herbert as a poet, a pastor, and a writer of prose. His poetical reputation was wider and greater than Milton's. Within a few years, twenty thousand copies of the "Temple" were sold. Cowley alone outwent him in popularity; one being the laureate of religious, as the other was of fashionable, life. The history of his poems is most touching and beautiful. In his last sickness, he presented them to a friend in these words: "Sir, I pray deliver this little book to my dear brother Ferrar, and tell him he shall find in, it a picture of the many spiritual conflicts that

have passed betwixt God and my soul, before I could subject mine to the will of JESUS, MY MASTER, in whose service I have now found perfect freedom: desire him to read it; and then, if he can think it may turn to the advantage of any poor, dejected soul, let it be made public: if not, let him burn it; for I and it are less than the least of God's mercies."

The publication of the "Temple" produced an immediate impression. Henry Vaughan, whose rough lines abound in touches of a quaint and suggestive fancy, observes, in reference to the impure verses of the day, "The first that, with any effectual success, attempted a diversion of this foul and overflowing stream, was the blessed man, Mr. George Herbert, whose holy life and verse gained many pious converts, of whom I am the least; and gave the first check to a most flourishing and admired wit of his time." *

Herbert belongs to that third Italian school which was to occupy a chapter in Gray's history of poetry, as he communicated the plan to Warton. It was a school, in his opinion, full of conceit, beginning in the reign of Elizabeth; continued under James and Charles the First by Donne, Crashaw, and Cleveland; carried to its height by Cowley; and ending with Sprat. Herbert was certainly a disciple. Complicated metaphors abound.

Preface to Silex Scintillans, p. 37.

The poems of that age recall the mechanical contrivances of the eccentric Mr. Winstanley, the first architect of the Eddystone Lighthouse. In his strange abode, nothing was what it seemed to be. An old slipper upon the floor started into a spectral figure; a visitor, resting in a chair, was suddenly embraced by two muscular arms, or, sauntering into a summer-house, straightway found himself floating away into the middle of a canal. The poetical surprises of Herbert are sometimes equally unexpected, and, it must be confessed, not less ingenious. The reader's eye is perpetually struck with a transformation or a grotesque invention.

*

was

But

Even the friendly taste of Mr. Keble offended by the constant flutter of his fancy, for ever hovering round and round the theme. this was a peculiarity which the most gifted writers admired. Dryden openly avowed, that nothing appeared more beautiful to him than the imagery in Cowley, which some readers condemned. It must, at least, be said in praise of this creative playfulness, that it is a quality of the intellect singularly sprightly and buoyant; it ranges over a boundless landscape, pierces into every corner, and, by the light of its own fire, to adopt a phrase of Temple, discovers a thousand little bodies or images in the world, unseen by common

Prælectiones Academicæ, xx. 12.