with his mistresse Were it for grace or els in hope of gaine To say of my deserts it is but vaine For vvell in minde in case ye do them beare To tell them oft it should but irke your eare Be they forgot as likely should I faile To vvinne vvith vvordes vvhere deedes can not preuaile Then haue ye a figure very meete for Orators or eloquent perswaders such as our maker or Poet must in some cases shew him selfe to be Merismus or the Distributer and is when we may conueniently vtter a matter in one entier speach or proposition and will rather do it peecemeale and by distributiō of euery part for amplification sake as for exāple he that might say a house was outragiously plucked downe will not be satisfied so to say but rather will speake it in this sort they first vndermined the groundsills they beate downe the walles they vnfloored the loftes they vntiled it and pulled downe the roofe For so in deede is a house pulled downe by circūstances which this figure of distribution doth set forth euery one apart and therefore I name him the distributor according to his originall as wrate the Tuscane Poet in a Sonet which Sir Thomas Wyat translated with very good grace thus Set me vvhereas the sunne doth parch the greene Or vvhere his beames do not dissolue the yce In temperate heate vvhere he is felt and seene In presence prest of people mad or vvise Set me in hye or yet in low degree In longest night or in the shortest day In clearest skie or where clouds thickest bee In lustie youth or when my heares are gray Set me in heauen in earth or els in hell In hill or dale or in the foming flood Thrall or at large aliue where so I dwell Sicke or in health in euill fame or good Hers will I be and onely with this thought Content my selfe although my chaunce be naught All which might haue bene said in these two verses Set me wheresoeuer ye vvill I am and vvilbe yours still The zealous Poet writing in prayse of the maiden Queene would not seeme to wrap vp all her most excellent parts in a few words them entierly comprehending but did it by a distributor or merismus in the negatiue for the better grace thus Not your bewtie most gracious soueraine Nor maidenly lookes mainteind vvith maiestie Your stately port vvhich doth not match but staine For your presence your pallace and your traine All Princes Courts mine eye could euer see Not your quicke vvits your sober gouernaunce Your cleare forsight your faithfull memorie So sweete features in so staid countenaunce Nor languages with plentuous vtterance So able to discourse and entertaine Not noble race farre beyond Caesars raigne Runne in right line and bloud of nointed kings Not large empire armies treasurs domaine Lustie liueries of fortunes dearst darlings Not all the skilles fit for a Princely dame Your learned Muse vvith vse and studie brings Not true honour ne that immortall fame Of mayden raigne your only owne renowne And no Queenes els yet such as yeeldes your name Greater glory than doeth your treble crowne And then concludes thus Not any one of all these honord parts Your Princely happes and habites that do moue And as it were ensorcell all the hearts Of Christen kings to quarrell for your loue But to possesse at once and all the good Arte and engine and euery starre aboue Fortune or kinde could farce in flesh and bloud Was force inough to make so many striue For your person which in our world stoode By all consents the minionst mayde to wiue Where ye see that all the parts of her commendation which were partitularly remembred in twenty verses before are wrapt vp in the two verses of this last part videl Not any one of all your honord parts Those Princely haps and habites c. This figure serues for amplification and also for ornament and to enforce perswasion mightely Sir Geffrey Chaucer father of our English Poets hath these verses following in the distributor When faith failes in Priestes sawes And Lords hestes are holden for lawes And robberie is tane for purchase And lechery for solace Then shall the Realme of Albion Be brought to great confusion Where he might haue said as much in these words when vice abounds and vertue decayeth in Albion then c. And as another said When Prince for his people is wakefull and wise Peeres ayding with armes Counsellors with aduise Magistrate sincerely vsing his charge People prest to obey nor let to runne at large Prelate of holy life and with deuotion Preferring pietie before promotion Priest still preaching and praying for our heale Then blessed is the state of a common-weale All which might haue bene said in these few words when euery man in charge and authoritie doeth his duety executeth his function well then is the common-wealth happy The Greeke Poets who made musicall ditties to be song to the lute or harpe Epimone or the Loueburden did vse to linke their staues together with one verse running throughout the whole song by equall distance and was for the most part the first verse of the staffe which kept so good sence and conformitie with the whole as his often repetition did geue it greater grace They called such linking verse Epimone the Latines versus intercalaris and we may terme him the Loue-burden following the originall or if it please you the long repeate in one respect because that one verse alone beareth the whole burden of the song according to the originall in another respect for that it comes by large distances to be often repeated as in this ditty made by the noble knight Sir Philip Sidney My true loue hath my heart and I haue his By iust exchange one for another geuen I holde his deare and mine he cannot misse There neuer was a better bargaine driuen My true loue hath my heart and I haue his My heart in me keepes him and me in one My heart in him his thoughts and sences guides He loues my heart for once it was his owne I cherish his because in me it bides My true loue hath my heart and I haue his Many times our Poet is caried by some occasion to report of a thing that is maruelous Paradoxon or the Wondrer and then he will seeme not to speake it simply but with some signe of admiration as in our enterlude called the Woer I woonder much to see so many husbands thriue That haue but little wit before they come to wiue For one would easily weene who so hath little wit His wife to teach it him vvere a thing much vnfit Or as Cato the Romane Senatour said one day merily to his companion that walked with him pointing his finger to a yong vnthrift in the streete who lately before had sold his patrimonie of a goodly quātitie of salt marshes lying neere vnto Capua shore Now is it not a wonder to behold Yonder gallant skarce
the hearers we do sodainly flye out either speake or exclaime at some other person or thing and therefore the Greekes call such figure as we do the turnway or turnetale breedeth by such exchaunge a certaine recreation to the hearers minds as this vsed by a louer to his vnkind mistresse And as for you faire one say now by proofe ye finde That rigour and ingratitude soone kill a gentle minde And as we in our triumphals speaking long to the Queenes Maiestie vpō the sodaine we burst out in an exclamation to Phebus seeming to draw in a new matter thus But O Phebus All glistering in thy gorgious gowne Wouldst thou vvit safe to slide a dovvne And dvvell with vs But for a day I could tell thee close in thine eare A tale that thou hadst leuer heare I dare vvell say Then ere thou vvert To kisse that vnkind runneavvay Who vvas transformed to boughs of bay For her curst hert c. And so returned againe to the first matter The matter and occasion leadeth vs many times to describe and set foorth many things Hypotiposis or the counterfait representation in such sort as it should appeare they were truly before our eyes though they were not present which to do it requireth cunning for nothing can be kindly counterfait or represented in his absence but by great discretion in the doer And if the things we couet to describe be not naturall or not veritable than yet the same axeth more cunning to do it because to faine a thing that neuer was nor is like to be proceedeth of a greater wit and sharper inuention than to describe things that be true And these be things that a poet or maker is woont to describe sometimes as true or naturall Prosopographia and sometimes to faine as artificiall and not true viz. The visage speach and countenance of any person absent or dead and this kinde of representation is called the Counterfait countenance as Homer doth in his Iliades diuerse personages namely Achilles and Thersites according to the truth and not by fiction And as our poet Chaucer doth in his Canterbury tales set forth the Sumner Pardoner Manciple and the rest of the pilgrims most naturally and pleasantly Prosopopeia or the Counterfait in personation But if ye wil faine any person with such features qualities cōditiōs or if ye wil attribute any humane quality as reason or speech to dōbe creatures or other insensible things do study as one may say to giue thē a humane person it is not Prosopographia but Prosopopeia because it is by way of fictiō no prettier examples can be giuen to you thereof than in the Romant of the rose translated out of French by Chaucer describing the persons of auarice enuie old age and many others whereby much moralitie is taught Cronographia or the Counterfait time So if we describe the time or season of the yeare as winter summer haruest day midnight noone euening or such like we call such description the counterfait time Cronographia examples are euery where to be found Topographia or the Counterfait place And if this descriptiō be of any true place citie castell hill valley or sea such like we call it the counterfait place Topographia or if ye fayne places vntrue as heauen hell paradise the house of fame the pallace of the sunne the denne of sheepe and such like which ye shall see in Poetes so did Chaucer very well describe the country of Saluces in Italie which ye may see in his report of the Lady Gryfyll Pragmatographia or the Counterfait action But if such description be made to represent the handling of any busines with the circumstances belonging therevnto as the manner of a battell a feast a marriage a buriall or any other matter that lieth in feat and actiuitie we call it then the counterfait action Pragmatographia In this figure the Lord Nicholas Vaux a noble gentleman and much delighted in vulgar making a man otherwise of no great learning but hauing herein a maruelous facillitie made a dittie representing the battayle and assault of Cupide so excellently well as for the gallant and propre application of his fiction in euery part I cannot choose but set downe the greatest part of his ditty for in truth it can not be amended When Cupid scaled first the fort Wherein my hart lay wounded sore The battrie was of such a sort That I must yeeld or die therefore There saw I loue vpon the wall How he his banner did display Alarme alarme he gan to call And bad his souldiers keepe aray The armes the vvhich that Cupid bare Were pearced harts vvith teares besprent In siluer and sable to declare The stedfast loue he alvvaies meant There might you see his band all drest In colours like to vvhite and blacke With pouder and vvith pellets prest To bring them forth to spoile and sacke Good vvill the maister of the shot Stood in the Rampire braue and proude For expence of pouder he spared not Assault assault to crie aloude There might you heare the Canons rore Eche peece discharging a louers looke c. As well to a good maker and Poet as to an excellent perswader in prose the figure of Similitude is very necessary Omiosis or Resemblance by which we not onely bewtifie our tale but also very much inforce inlarge it I say inforce because no one thing more preuaileth with all ordinary iudgements than perswasion by similitude Now because there are sundry sorts of them which also do worke after diuerse fashions in the hearers conceits I will set them all foorth by a triple diuision exempting the generall Similitude as their common Auncestour and I will cal him by the name of Resemblance without any addition from which I deriue three other sorts and giue euery one his particular name as Resemblance by Pourtrait or Imagery which the Greeks call Icon Resemblance morall or misticall which they call Parabola Resemblance by example which they call Paradigma and first we will speake of the generall resemblance or bare similitude which may be thus spoken But as the watrie showres delay the raging wind So doeth good hope cleane put away dispaire out of my mind And in this other likening the forlorne louer to a striken deere Then as the striken deere withdrawes himselfe alone So do I seeke some secret place where I may make my mone And in this of ours where we liken glory to a shadow As the shadow his nature beyng such Followeth the body vvhether it vvill or no So doeth glory refuse it nere so much Wait on vertue be it in vveale or vvo And euen as the shadow in his kind What time it beares the carkas company Goth oft before and often comes behind So doth renowme that raiseth vs so hye Come to vs quicke sometime not till vve dye But the glory that growth not ouer fast Is euer great and
an impression as a more multitude of words to the purpose discreetely and without superfluitie vttered the minde being no lesse vanquished with large loade of speech than the limmes are with heauie burden Sweetenes of speech sentence and amplification are therfore necessarie to an excellent Orator and Poet ne may in no wise be spared from any of them And first of all others your figure that worketh by iteration or repetition of one word or clause doth much alter and affect the eare and also the mynde of the hearer and therefore is counted a very braue figure both with the Poets and rhetoriciens and this repetition may be in seuen sortes Repetition in the first degree we call the figure of Report according to the Greeke originall Anaphora or the Figure of Report and is when we make one word begin and as they are wont to say lead the daunce to many verses in sute as thus To thinke on death it is a miserie To thinke on life it is a vanitie To thinke on the world verily it is To thinke that heare man hath no perfit blisse And this writtē by Sir Walter Raleigh of his greatest mistresse in most excellent verses In vayne mine eyes in vaine you wast your teares In vayne my sighs the smokes of my despaires In vayne you search th' earth and heauens aboue In vayne ye seeke for fortune keeps my loue Or as the buffon in our enterlude called Lustie London said very knauishly and like himselfe Many a faire lasse in London towne Many a bavvdie basket borne vp and downe Many a broker in a thrid bare gowne Many a bankrowte scarce worth a crowne In London Ye haue another sort of repetition quite contrary to the former when ye make one word finish many verses in sute Antistrophe or the Counter turne and that which is harder to finish many clauses in the middest of your verses or dittie for to make them finish the verse in our vulgar it should hinder the rime and because I do finde few of our English makers vse this figure I haue set you down two litle ditties which our selues in our yonger yeares played vpon the Antistrophe for so is the figures name in Greeke one vpon the mutable loue of a Lady another vpon the meritorious loue of Christ our Sauiour thus Her lowly lookes that gaue life to my loue With spitefull speach curstnesse and crueltie She kild my loue let her rigour remoue Her cherefull lights and speaches of pitie Reuiue my loue anone with great disdaine She shunnes my loue and after by a traine She seekes my loue and saith she loues me most But seing her loue so lightly wonne and lost I longd not for her loue for well I thought Firme is the loue if it be as it ought The second vpon the merites of Christes passion toward mankind thus Our Christ the sonne of God chief authour of all good Was he by his allmight that first created man And vvith the costly price of his most precious bloud He that redeemed man and by his instance vvan Grace in the sight of God his onely father deare And reconciled man and to make man his peere Made himselfe very man brief to conclude the case This Christ both God and man he all and onely is The man brings man to God and to all heauens blisse The Greekes call this figure Antistrophe the Latines conuersio I following the originall call him the counterturne because he turnes counter in the middest of euery meetre Take me the two former figures and put them into one and it is that which the Greekes call symploche the Latines complexio or conduplicatio Symploche or the figure of replie and is a maner of repetition when one and the selfe word doth begin and end many verses in sute so wrappes vp both the former figures in one as he that sportingly complained of his vntrustie mistresse thus Who made me shent for her loues sake Myne owne mistresse Who would not seeme my part to take Myne owne mistresse What made me first so well content Her curtesie What makes me now so sore repent Her crueltie The Greekes name this figure Symploche the Latins Complexio perchaunce for that he seemes to hold in and to wrap vp the verses by reduplication so as nothing can fall out I had rather call him the figure of replie Ye haue another sort of repetition when with the worde by which you finish your verse Anadiplosis or the Redouble ye beginne the next verse with the same as thus Comforte it is for man to haue a wife Wife chast and wise and lowly all her life Or thus Your beutie was the cause of my first loue Looue while I liue that I may sore repent The Greeks call this figure Anadiplosis I call him the Redouble as the originall beares Ye haue an other sorte of repetition Epanalepsis or the Eccho sound otherwise the slow return when ye make one worde both beginne and end your verse which therefore I call the slow retourne otherwise the Eccho sound as thus Much must he be beloued that loueth much Feare many must he needs whom many feare Vnlesse I called him the eccho sound I could not tell what name to giue him vnlesse it were the slow returne Ye haue another sort of repetition when in one verse or clause of a verse ye iterate one word without any intermission as thus Epizeuxis the Vnderlay or Coocko-spel It was Maryne Maryne that wrought mine woe And this bemoaning the departure of a deere friend The chiefest staffe of mine assured stay With no small griefe is gon is gon away And that of Sir Walter Raleighs very sweet With wisdomes eyes had but blind fortune seene Than had my looue my looue for euer beene The Greeks call him Epizeuxis the Latines Subiunctio we may call him the vnderlay me thinks if we regard his manner of iteration would depart from the originall we might very properly in our vulgar and for pleasure call him the cuckowspell for right as the cuckow repeats his lay which is but one manner of note and doth not insert any other tune betwixt and sometimes for hast stammers out two or three of them one immediatly after another as cuck cuck cuckow so doth the figure Epizeuxis in the former verses Maryne Maryne without any intermission at all Ploche or the Doubler Yet haue ye one sorte of repetition which we call the doubler and is as the next before a speedie iteration of one word but with some little intermissiō by inserting one or two words betweene as in a most excellent dittie written by Sir Walter Raleigh these two closing verses Yet vvhen I savve my selfe to you vvas true I loued my selfe bycause my selfe loued you And this spoken in common Prouerbe An ape vvilbe an ape by kinde as they say Though that ye clad him all in purple array Or as we once sported vpon a fellowes name who was
examples which may suffise Her Maiestie resembled to the crowned piller Ye must read vpward Is blisse with immortalitie Her trymest top of all ye see Garnish the crowne Her iust renowne Chapter and head Parts that maintain And womanhead Her mayden raigne Integritie In honour and With veritie Her roundnes stand Strēgthen the state By their increase Without debate Concord and peace Of her support They be the base With stedfastnesse Vertue and grace Stay and comfort Of Albions rest The sounde Pillar And seene a farre Is plainely exprest Tall stately and strayt By this noble pourtrays Philo to the Lady Calia sendeth this Odolet of her prayse in forme of a Piller which ye must read downeward Thy Princely port and Maiestie Is my terrene deitie Thy wit and sence The streame source Of eloquence And deepe discours Thy faire eyes are My bright loadstarre Thy speache a darte Percing my harte Thy face alas My looking glasse Thy louely lookes My prayer bookes Thy pleasant cheare My sunshine cleare Thy rufull sight My darke midnight Thy will the stent Of my content Thy glorye flou◠Of myne honour Thy loue doth giue The lyfe I lyue Thy lyfe it is Mine earthly blisse But grace fauour in thine eies My bodies soule souls paradise The Roundell or Spheare The most excellent of all the figures Geometrical is the round for his many perfections First because he is euen smooth without any angle or interruption most voluble and apt to turne and to continue motion which is the author of life he conteyneth in him the commodious description of euery other figure for his ample capacitie doth resemble the world or vniuers for his indefinitenesse hauing no speciall place of beginning nor end beareth a similitude with God and eternitie This figure hath three principall partes in his nature and vse much considerable the circle the beame and the center The circle is his largest compasse or circumference the center is his middle and indiuisible point the beame is a line stretching directly from the circle to the center contrariwise from the center to the circle By this description our maker may fashion his meetre in Roundel either with the circumference and that is circlewise or from the circūference that is like a beame or by the circumference and that is ouerthwart and dyametrally from one side of the circle to the other A generall resemblance of the Roundell to God the world and the Queene All and whole and euer and one Single simple eche where alone These be counted as Clerkes can tell True properties of the Roundell His still turning by consequence And change doe breede both life and sence Time measure of stirre and rest Is also by his course exprest How swift the circle stirre aboue His center point doeth neuer moue All things that euer were or be Are closde in his concauitie And though he be still turnde and tost No roome there wants nor none is lost The Roundell hath no bonch or angle Which may his course stay or entangle The furthest part of all his spheare Is equally both farre and neare So doth none other figure fare Where natures chattels closed are And beyond his wide compasse There is no body nor no place Nor any wit that comprehends Where it begins or where it ends And therefore all men doe agree That it purports eternitie God aboue the heauens so hie Is this Roundell in world the skie Vpon earth she who beares the bell Of maydes and Queenes is this Roundell All and whole and euer alone Single sans peere simple and one A speciall and particular resemblance of her Maiestie to the Roundell FIrst her authoritie regall Is the circle compassing all The dominion great and large Which God hath geuen to her charge Within which most spatious bound She enuirons her people round Retaining them by oth and liegeance Within the pale of true obeysance Holding imparked as it were Her people like to heards of deere Sitting among them in the middes Where she allowes and bannes and bids In what fashion she list and when The seruices of all her men Out of her breast as from an eye Issue the rayes incessantly Of her iustice bountie and might Spreading abroad their beames so bright And reflect not till they attaine The fardest part of her domaine And makes eche subiect clearely see What he is bounden for to be To God his Prince and common wealth His neighbour kinred and to himselfe The same centre and middle pricke Whereto our deedes are drest so thicke From all the parts and outmost side Of her Monarchie large and wide Also fro whence reflect these rayes Twentie hundred maner of wayes Where her will is them to conuey Within the circle of her suruey So is the Queene of Briton ground Beame circle center of all my round Of the square or quadrangle equilater The square is of all other accompted the figure of most solliditie and stedfastnesse and for his owne stay and firmitie requireth none other base then himselfe and therefore as the roundell or Spheare is appropriat to the heauens the Spire to the element of the fire the Triangle to the ayre and the Lozange to the water so is the square for his inconcussable steadinesse likened to the earth which perchaunce might be the reason that the Prince of Philosophers in his first booke of the Ethicks termeth a constant minded man euen egal and direct on all sides and not easily ouerthrowne by euery litle aduersitie hominem quadratū a square man Into this figure may ye reduce your ditties by vsing no moe verses then your verse is of sillables which will make him fall out square if ye go aboue it wil grow into the figure Trapezion which is some portion longer then square I neede not giue you any example bycause in good arte all your ditties Odes Epigrammes should keepe not exceede the nomber of twelue verses and the longest verse to be of twelue sillables not aboue but vnder that number as much as ye will The figure Ouall This figure taketh his name of an egge and also as it is thought his first origine and is as it were a bastard or imperfect rounde declining toward a longitude and yet keeping within one line for his periferie or compasse as the rounde and it seemeth that he receiueth this forme not as an imperfection by any impediment vnnaturally hindring his rotunditie but by the wisedome and prouidence of nature for the commoditie of generation in such of her creatures as bring not forth a liuely body as do foure footed beasts but in stead thereof a certaine quantitie of shapelesse matter contained in a vessell which after it is sequestred from the dames body receiueth life and perfection as in the egges of birdes fishes and serpents for the matter being of some quantitie and to issue out at a narrow place for the easie passage thereof it must of necessitie beare such shape as might
His tongue a streame of sugred eloquence Wisdome and meekenes lay mingled in his harte In which verses ye see that these words source shop flud sugred are inuerted from their owne signification to another not altogether so naturall but of much affinitie with it Then also do we it sometimes to enforce a sence and make the word more significatiue as thus I burne in loue I freese in deadly hate I swimme in hope and sinke in deepe dispaire These examples I haue the willinger giuē you to set foorth the nature and vse of your figure metaphore which of any other being choisly made is the most commendable and most common Catachresis or the Figure of abuse But if for lacke of naturall and proper terme or worde we take another neither naturall nor proper and do vntruly applie it to the thing which we would seeme to expresse and without any iust inconuenience it is not then spoken by this figure Metaphore or of inuersion as before but by plaine abuse as he that bad his man go into his library and fet him his bowe and arrowes for in deede there was neuer a booke there to be found or as one should in reproch say to a poore man thou raskall knaue where raskall is properly the hunters terme giuen to young deere leane out of season and not to people or as one said very pretily in this verse I lent my loue to losse and gaged my life in vaine Whereas this worde lent is properly of mony or some such other thing as men do commonly borrow for vse to be repayed againe and being applied to loue is vtterly abused and yet very commendably spoken by vertue of this figure For he that loueth and is not beloued againe hath no lesse wrong than he that lendeth and is neuer repayde Metonimia or the Misnamer Now doth this vnderstanding or secret conceyt reach many times to the only nomination of persons or things in their names as of men or mountaines seas countries and such like in which respect the wrōg naming or otherwise naming of them then is due carieth not onely an alteration of sence but a necessitie of intendment figuratiuely as when we cal loue by the name of Venus fleshly lust by the name of Cupid bicause they were supposed by the auncient poets to be authors and kindlers of loue and lust Vulcane for fire Ceres for bread Bacchus for wine by the same reason also if one should say to a skilfull craftesman knowen for a glutton or common drunkard that had spent all his goods on riot and delicate fare Thy hands they made thee rich thy pallat made thee poore It is ment his trauaile and arte made him wealthie his riotous life had made him a beggar and as one that boasted of his house-keeping said that neuer a yeare passed ouer his head that he drank not in his house euery moneth foure tonnes of beere one hogshead of wine meaning not the caskes or vessels but that quantitie which they conteyned These and such other speaches where ye take the name of the Author for the thing it selfe or the thing cōteining for that which is contained in many other cases do as it were wrong name the person or the thing So neuerthelesse as it may be vnderstood it is by the figure metonymia or misnamer And if this manner of naming of persons or things be not by way of misnaming as before but by a conuenient difference Antonomasia or the Surnamer and such as is true or esteemed and likely to be true it is then called not metonimia but antonomasia or the Surnamer not the misnamer which might extend to any other thing aswell as to a person as he that would say not king Philip of Spaine but the Westerne king because his dominiō lieth the furdest West of any Christen prince and the French king the great Vallois because so is the name of his house or the Queene of England The maiden Queene for that is her hiest peculiar among all the Queenes of the world or as we said in one of our Partheniades the Bryton mayde because she is the most great and famous mayden of all Brittayne thus But in chaste stile am borne as I weene To blazon foorth the Brytton mayden Queene So did our forefathers call Henry the first Beauclerke Edmund Ironside Richard coeur de lion Edward the Confessor and we of her Maiestie Elisabeth the peasible Then also is the sence figuratiue when we deuise a new name to any thing consonant as neere as we can to the nature thereof Onomatopeia or the New namer as to say flashing of lightning clashing of blades clinking of fetters chinking of mony as the poet Virgil said of the sounding a trumpet ta-ra-tant taratantara or as we giue special names to the voices of dombe beasts as to say a horse neigheth a lyō brayes a swine grunts a hen cackleth a dogge howles and a hundreth mo such new names as any man hath libertie to deuise so it be fittie for the thing which he couets to expresse Epitheton or the Quallifier otherwise the figure of Attribation Your Epitheton or qualifier whereof we spake before placing him among the figures auricular now because he serues also to alter and enforce the sence we will say somewhat more of him in this place and do conclude that he must be apt and proper for the thing he is added vnto not disagreable or repugnant as one that said darke disdaine and miserable pride very absurdly for disdaine or disdained things cannot be said darke but rather bright and cleere because they be beholden and much looked vpon and pride is rather enuied then pitied or miserable vnlesse it be in Christian charitie which helpeth not the terme in this case Some of our vulgar writers take great pleasure in giuing Epithets and do it almost to euery word which may receiue them and should not be so yea though they were neuer so propre and apt for sometimes wordes suffered to go single do giue greater sence and grace than words quallified by attributions do But the sence is much altered the hearers conceit strangly entangled by the figure Metalepsis Metalepsis or the Farrefet which I call the farfet as when we had rather fetch a word a great way off thē to vse one nerer hād to expresse the matter aswel plainer And it seemeth the deuiser of this figure had a desire to please women rather then men for we vse to say by manner of Prouerbe things farrefet and deare bought are good for Ladies so in this manner of speach we vse it leaping ouer the heads of a great many words we take one that is furdest off to vtter our matter by as Medea cursing hir first acquaintance with prince Iason who had very vnkindly forsaken her said Woe worth the mountaine that the maste bare Which was the first causer of all my care Where she might aswell
than by vsing too much surplusage The vice of Surplusage and this lieth not only in a word or two more than ordinary but in whole clauses and peraduenture large sentences impertinently spoken or with more labour and curiositie than is requisite The first surplusge the Greekes call Pleonasmus I call him too full speech and is no great fault as if one should say I heard it with mine eares and saw it vvith mine eyes as if a man could heare with his heeles or see with his nose We our selues vsed this superfluous speech in a verse written of our mistresse neuertheles not much to be misliked for euen a vice sometime being seasonably vsed hath a pretie grace For euer may my true loue liue and neuer die Pleonasmus or Too ful speech And that mine eyes may see her crownde a Queene As if she liued euer she could euer die or that one might see her crowned without his eyes Another part of surplusage is called Macrologia Macrologia or Long language or long language when we vse large clauses or sentences more than is requisite to the matter it is also named by the Greeks Perissologia as he that said the Ambassadours after they had receiued this answere at the kings hands they tooke their leaue and returned home into their countrey from whence they came So said another of our rimers meaning to shew the great annoy and difficultie of those warres of Troy caused for Helenas sake Nor Menelaus vvas vnwise Or troupe of Troians mad When he vvith them and they vvith him For her such combat had These clauses he vvith them and they vvith him are surplusage and one of them very impertinent because it could not otherwise be intended but that Menelaus fighting with the Troians the Troians must of necessitie sight with him Another point of surplusage lieth not so much in superfluitie of your words as of your trauaile to describe the matter which yee take in hand and that ye ouer-labour your selfe in your businesse And therefore the Greekes call it Periergia Periergia or Ouerlabour otherwise called the curious we call it ouer-labor iumpe with the originall or rather the curious for his ouermuch curiositie and studie to shew himselfe fine in a light matter as one of our late makers who in most of his things wrote very well in this to mine opinion more curiously than needed the matter being ripely considered yet is his verse very good and his meetre cleanly His intent was to declare how vpon the tenth day of March he crossed the riuer of Thames to walke in Saint Georges field the matter was not great as ye may suppose The tenth of March vvhen Aries receiued Dan Phoebus raies into his horned head And I my selfe by learned lore perceiued That Ver approcht and frosty vvinter fled I crost the Thames to take the cheerefull aire In open fields the vveather was so faire First the whole matter is not worth all this solemne circumstance to describe the tenth day of March but if he had left at the two first verses it had bene inough But when he comes with two other verses to enlarge his description it is not only more than needes but also very ridiculous for he makes wise as if he had not bene a mā learned in some of the mathematickes by learned lore that he could not haue told that the x. of March had fallen in the spring of the yeare which euery carter and also euery child knoweth without any learning Then also whē he saith Ver approcht and frosty winter fled though it were a surplusage because one season must needes geue place to the other yet doeth it well inough passe without blame in the maker These and a hundred more of such faultie and impertinent speeches may yee finde amongst vs vulgar Poets when we be carelesse of our doings Tapinosis or the Abbaser It is no small fault in a maker to vse such wordes and termes as do diminish and abbase the matter he would seeme to set forth by imparing the dignitie height vigour or maiestie of the cause he takes in hand as one that would say king Philip shrewdly harmed the towne of S. Quintaines when in deede he wanne it and put it to the sacke and that king Henry the eight made spoiles in Turwin when as in deede he did more then spoile it for he caused it to be defaced and razed flat to the earth and made it inhabitable Therefore the historiographer that should by such wordes report of these two kings gestes in that behalfe should greatly blemish the honour of their doings and almost speake vntruly and iniuriously by way of abbasement as another of our bad rymers that very indecently said A misers mynde thou hast thou hast a Princes pelfe A lewd terme to be giuen to a Princes treasure pelfe and was a little more manerly spoken by Seriant Bendlowes when in a progresse time comming to salute the Queene in Huntingtonshire he said to her Cochman stay thy cart good fellow stay thy cart that I may speake to the Queene whereat her Maiestie laughed as she had bene tickled and all the rest of the company although very graciously as her manner is she gaue him great thankes and her hand to kisse These and such other base wordes do greatly disgrace the thing the speaker or writer the Greekes call it Tapinosis we the abbaser Others there be that fall into the contrary vice by vsing such bombasted wordes as seeme altogether farced full of winde Bomphiologia or Pompious speech being a great deale to high and loftie for the matter whereof ye may finde too many in all popular rymers Then haue ye one other vicious speach with which we will finish this Chapter Amphibologia or the Ambiguous and is when we speake or write doubtfully and that the sence may be taken two wayes such ambiguous termes they call Amphibologia we call it the ambiguous or figure of sence incertaine as if one should say Thomas Tayler saw William Tyler dronke it is indifferent to thinke either th' one or th' other dronke Thus said a gentleman in our vulgar pretily notwithstanding because he did it not ignorantly but for the nonce I sat by my Lady soundly sleeping My mistresse lay by me butterly weeping No man can tell by this whether the mistresse or the man slept or wept these doubtfull speaches were vsed much in the old times by their false Prophets as appeareth by the Oracles of Delphos and and of the Sybilles prophecies deuised by the religious persons of those dayes to abuse the superstitious people and to encomber their busie braynes with vaine hope or vaine feare Lucianus the merry Greeke reciteth a great number of them deuised by a coosening companion one Alexander to get himselfe the name and reputation of the God Aesculapius and in effect all our old Brittish and Saxon prophesies be of the same sort that turne them on which side ye will
Fraunce The word became not the greatnesse of her person and much lesse her sex whose chiefe vertue is shamefastnesse which the Latines call Verecundia that is a naturall feare to be noted with any impudicitie so as when they heare or see any thing tending that way they commonly blush is a part greatly praised in all women Yet will ye see in many cases how pleasant speeches and sauouring some skurrillity and vnshamefastnes haue now and then a certaine decencie and well become both the speaker to say and the hearer to abide but that is by reason of some other circumstance as when the speaker himselfe is knowne to be a common iester or buffon such as take vpon them to make princes merry or when some occasion is giuen by the hearer to induce such a pleasaunt speach and in many other cases whereof no generall rule can be giuen but are best knowen by example as when Sir Andrew Flamock king Henry the eights standerdbearer a merry conceyted man and apt to skoffe waiting one day at the kings heeles when he entred the parke at Greenewich the king blew his horne Flamock hauing his belly full and his tayle at commaundement gaue out a rappe nothing faintly that the king turned him about and said how now sirra Flamock not well knowing how to excuse his vnmanerly act if it please you Sir quoth he your Maiesty blew one blast for the keeper and I another for his man The king laughed hartily and tooke it nothing offensiuely for indeed as the case fell out it was not vndecently spoken by Sir Andrew Flamock for it was the cleaneliest excuse he could make and a merry implicatiue in termes nothing odious and therefore a sporting satisfaction to the kings mind in a matter which without some such merry answere could not haue bene well taken So was Flamocks action most vncomely but his speech excellently well becōming the occasion But at another time and in another like case the same skurrillitie of Flamock was more offensiue because it was more indecent As when the king hauing Flamock with him in his barge passing from Westminster to Greenewich to visite a fayre Lady whom the king loued and was lodged in the tower of the Parke the king comming within sight of the tower and being disposed to be merry said Flamock let vs rime as well as I can said Flamock if it please your grace The king began thus Within this towre There lieth a flowre That hath my hart Flamock for aunswer Within this hower she will c. with the rest in so vncleanly termes as might not now become me by the rule of Decorum to vtter writing to so great a Maiestie but the king tooke them in so euill part as he bid Flamock auant varlet and that he should no more be so neere vnto him And wherein I would faine learne lay this vndecencie in the skurrill and filthy termes not meete for a kings care perchance so For the king was a wise and graue man and though he hated not a faire woman yet liked he nothing well to heare speeches of ribaudrie as they report of th'emperour Octauian Licet fuerit ipse incontinentissimus fuit tamen incontinente seuerissimus vltor But the very cause in deed was for that Flamocks reply answered not the kings expectation for the kings rime commencing with a pleasant and amorous propositiō Sir Andrew Flamock to finish it not with loue but with lothsomnesse by termes very rude and vnciuill and seing the king greatly fauour that Ladie for her much beauty by like or some other good partes by his fastidious aunswer to make her seeme odious to him it helde a great disproportion to the kings appetite for nothing is so vnpleasant to a man as to be encountred in his chiefe affection specially in his loues whom we honour we should also reuerence their appetites or at the least beare with them not being wicked and vtterly euill and whatsoeuer they do affect we do not as becōmeth vs if we make it seeme to them horrible This in mine opinion was the chiefe cause of the vndecencie and also of the kings offence Aristotle the great philosopher knowing this very well what time he put Calistenes to king Alexāder the greats seruice gaue him this lesson Sirra quoth he ye go now from a scholler to be a courtier see ye speake to the king your maister either nothing at all or else that which pleaseth him which rule if Calistenes had followed and forborne to crosse the kings appetite in diuerse speeches it had not cost him so deepely as afterward it did A like matter of offence fell out betweene th'Emperour Charles the fifth an Embassadour of king Henry the eight whō I could name but will not for the great opinion the world had of his wisdome and sufficiency in that behalfe and all for misusing of a terme The king in the matter of controuersie betwixt him and Ladie Catherine of Castill the Emperours awnt found himselfe grieued that the Emperour should take her part and worke vnder hand with the Pope to hinder the diuorce and gaue his Embassadour commission in good termes to open his griefes to the Emperour and to expostulat with his Maiestie for that he seemed to forget the kings great kindnesse and friendship before times vsed with th'Emperour aswell by disbursing for him sundry great summes of monie which were not all yet repayd as also by furnishing him at his neede with store of men and munition to his warres and now to be thus vsed he thought it a very euill requitall The Embassadour for too much animositie and more then needed in the case or perchance by ignorance of the proprietie of the Spanish tongue told the Emperour among other words that he was Hombre el mas ingrato enel mondo the ingratest person in the world to vse his maister so The Emperour tooke him suddainly with the word and said callest thou me ingrato I tell thee learne better termes or else I will teach them thee Th'Embassadour excused it by his commission and said they were the king his maisters words and not his owne Nay quoth th'Emperour thy maister durst not haue sent me these words were it not for that broad ditch betweene him me meaning the sea which is hard to passe with an army of reuenge The Embassadour was cōmanded away no more hard by the Emperor til by some other means afterward the grief was either pacified or forgotten all this inconueniēce grew by misuse of one word which being otherwise spoken in some sort qualified had easily holpen all yet th'Embassadour might sufficiently haue satisfied his commission much better aduaunced his purpose as to haue said for this word ye are ingrate ye haue not vsed such gratitude towards him as he hath deserued so ye may see how a word spokē vndecently not knowing the phrase or proprietie of a language maketh a whole matter many times miscarrie