s, and that it therefore operates on the same principle as the bed
of Procrustes. The lyrics of this period, with the exception of those
by Milton, were usually less idealistic, ethereal, and inspired than
the corresponding work of the Elizabethans. This age was far more
imitative, but it chose to imitate Jonson and Donne in preference to
Shakespeare. The greatest lyrical poet of this time thus addresses
Jonson as a patron saint:--

"Candles I'll give to thee,
And a new altar;
And thou, Saint Ben, shall be
Writ in my psalter."[2]

Cavalier Poets.--Robert Herrick (1591-1674), Thomas Carew
(1598?-1639?), Sir John Suckling (1609-1642), and Richard Lovelace
(1618--1658) were a contemporary group of lyrists who are often called
Cavalier poets, because they sympathized with the Cavaliers or
adherents of Charles I.

[Illustration: ROBERT HERRICK.]

By far the greatest of this school is Robert Herrick, who stands in
the front rank of the second class of lyrical poets. He was a graduate
of Cambridge University, who by an accident of the time became a
clergyman. The parish, or "living," given him by the king, was in the
southwestern part of Devonshire. By affixing the title _Hesperides_ to
his volume of nearly thirteen hundred poems, Herrick doubtless meant
to imply that they were chiefly composed in the western part of
England. In the very first poem of this collection, he announces the
subject of his songs:--

"I sing of brooks, of blossoms, birds, and bowers;
Of April, May, of June, and July flowers.
I sing of May-poles, hock-carts, wassails, wakes;
Of bridegrooms, brides, and of their bridal cakes
* * * * *
I write of groves, of twilights, and I sing
The court of Mab, and of the Fairie-king.
I write of hell; I sing and ever shall,
Of heaven, and hope to have it after all."

His lyric range was as broad as these lines indicate. The most of his
poems show the lightness of touch and artistic form revealed in the
following lines from _To the Virgins_:--

"Gather ye rose-buds while ye may:
Old Time is still a-flying;
And this same flower that smiles to-day,
To-morrow will be dying."

His facility in melodious poetic expression is evident in this stanza
from _The Litany_, one of the poems in _Noble Numbers_, as the
collection of his religious verse is called:--

"When the passing-bell doth toll
And the furies in a shoal
Come to fright a parting