Edmund Spenser (1552?–1599). The Complete Poetical Works. 1908.
ComplaintsThe Teares of the Muses
LONDON
IMPRINTED FOR WILLIAM PONSONBIE, DWELLING IN PAULES CHURCHYARD AT THE SIGNE OF THE BISHOPS HEAD
1591
TO THE RIGHT HONORABLE
THE LADIE STRANGE
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[To what period this poem may belong has been somewhat disputed. On the whole, it would seem, like ‘Mother Hubberd’s Tale,’ to be early work revised, for though the allusions in the lament of Thalia refer that passage to 1589 or 1590, there are good grounds for believing that the poem first took form before 1580. Its doleful account of the state of literature, for instance, is quite at odds with that survey in Colin Clout’s Come Home Again (of 1591) wherein Spenser deals so sympathetically with his fellow poets, and is not unlike in tone to various passages in the Calendar. One can hardly understand, moreover, how, in 1590, even as a matter of convention, he could take so dismal a view of English literature. In 1580, on the other hand, before Sidney, Greene, Marlowe, and their fellows of the first great generation had begun to write, when, Spenser himself excepted, Lyly with his Euphues was the one brilliant name in English letters, such a view is quite conceivable. The matter might be argued much further, to the same result.
The general tone of the poem, its mental attitude, cannot but impress a modern reader somewhat unpleasantly. The complaint that ‘mightie peeres’ no longer care for the immortality which only poets can confer, that poets and scholars, ‘the learned,’ are left without patronage, may be set down partly to a trying personal experience. The note of contempt, however, and of arrogance that one is glad to believe youthful, the complaint of universal vulgarity, the cry that Ignorance and Barbarism have quite laid waste the fair realm of the Muses—all this comes near, in the end, to seeming insufferable. If the Areopagus, the select literary club in which Sidney and Dyer and Fulke Greville, with perhaps Spenser himself, discussed the condition of English letters and planned great reforms, if this cénacle is fairly represented by ‘The Tears of the Muses,’ it must have been, one thinks, a more than usually supercilious clique of young radicals. Yet what may be distasteful in the poem is not so much the underlying opinions, which for 1579 or 1580 are quite intelligible, as the particular tone or mood. In this one almost suspects an echo of Ronsard. For in the great movement by which, thirty years before the Areopagus and in much the same way, the Pléiade endeavored to regenerate French literature, Ronsard is notably distinguished from his colleagues by an odd faculty for making their common views offensive or ridiculous. His rampant egotism and utter deficiency in the sense of humor lured him at times, like his greater descendant Victor Hugo, into strange extravagances. Now, the members of the Areopagus knew the poets of the Pléiade well, especially Ronsard and Du Bellay. They seem to have felt that their own problem in England was not unlike that which these men had met in France. In them they found ideals with which they sympathized, opinions which seemed to be of value for their own difficulties. That the poet was directly inspired of God (or the gods), that great men could obtain immortality from the poets alone, that poetry must go hand in hand with learning, that the arch enemy of the Muses was Ignorance, that poetry in their day languished because the great were given over to luxury and the vulgar would listen only to a horde of unlearned and base rhymesters,—these theories of the Pléiade and various precepts for the elevation of their own mother tongue to a place beside the tongues of Greece and Rome were caught at by the youthful members of the Areopagus with very lively interest. In the work of Spenser they may be traced unmistakably, chiefly in ‘October,’ ‘The Ruins of Time,’ and ‘The Tears of the Muses.’ This last, unhappily, voices them in a tone which, as so often in Ronsard and rarely in Du Bellay, makes sympathy quite impossible.]
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The golden brood of great Apolloes wit,
Those piteous plaints and sorowfull sad tine,
Which late ye powred forth as ye did sit
Beside the silver springs of Helicone,
Making your musick of hart-breaking mone.
Ythundered through Joves avengefull wrath,
For traversing the charret of the Sunne
Beyond the compasse of his pointed path,
Of you, his mournfull sisters, was lamented,
Such mournfull tunes were never since invented.
Her loved twinnes, the dearlings of her joy,
Her Palici, whom her unkindly foes,
The Fatall Sisters, did for spight destroy,
Whom all the Muses did bewaile long space,
Was ever heard such wayling in this place.
Of their sweete instruments were wont to sound,
And th’ hollow hills, from which their silver voyces
Were wont redoubled echoes to rebound,
Did now rebound with nought but rufull cries,
And yelling shrieks throwne up into the skies.
To romble gently downe with murmur soft,
And were by them right tunefull taught to beare
A bases part amongst their consorts oft,
Now forst to overflowe with brackish teares,
With troublous noyse did dull their daintie eares.
Which thether came to heare their musick sweet,
And to the measure of their melodies
Did learne to move their nimble shifting feete,
Now hearing them so heavily lament,
Like heavily lamenting from them went.
Through the divine infusion of their skill,
And all that els seemd faire and fresh in sight,
So made by nature for to serve their will,
Was turned now to dismall heavinesse,
Was turned now to dreadfull uglinesse.
Might be the cause of so impatient plight?
What furie, or what feend with felon deeds
Hath stirred up so mischievous despight?
Can griefe then enter into heavenly harts,
And pierce immortall breasts with mortall smarts?
To me those secret causes to display;
For none but you, or who of you it learnes,
Can rightfully aread so dolefull lay.
Begin, thou eldest sister of the crew,
And let the rest in order thee ensew.
That most art dreaded for thy thunder darts:
And thou our syre, that raignst in Castalie
And Mount Parnasse, the god of goodly arts:
Heare and behold the miserable state
Of us thy daughters, dolefull desolate.
The which is day by day unto us wrought
By such as hate the honour of our name,
The foes of learning and each gentle thought;
They, not contented us themselves to scorne,
Doo seeke to make us of the world forlorne.
The sonnes of darknes and of ignoraunce;
But they whom thou, great Jove, by doome unjust
Didst to the type of honour earst advaunce;
They now, puft up with sdeignfull insolence,
Despise the brood of blessed Sapience.
That wont to be the worlds chiefe ornament,
And learned impes that wont to shoote up still,
And grow to hight of kingdomes government,
They underkeep, and with their spredding armes
Doo beat their buds, that perish through their harmes.
Of mightie peeres true wisedome to sustaine,
And with their noble countenaunce to grace
The learned forheads, without gifts or gaine:
Or rather learnd themselves behoves to bee;
That is the girlond of nobilitie.
Of th’ heavenly gift of wisdomes influence,
And to be learned it a base thing deeme;
Base minded they that want intelligence:
For God himselfe for wisedome most is praised,
And men to God thereby are nighest raised.
Through pompous pride, and foolish vanitie;
In th’ eyes of people they put all their praise,
And onely boast of armes and auncestrie:
But vertuous deeds, which did those armes first give
To their grandsyres, they care not to atchive.
To register, and sound in trump of gold,
Through their bad dooings, or base slothfulnesse,
Finde nothing worthie to be writ, or told:
For better farre it were to hide their names,
Than telling them to blazon out their blames.
Of things forepast, nor moniments of time,
And all that in this world is worthie hight
Shall die in darknesse, and lie hid in slime:
Therefore I mourne with deep harts sorrowing,
Because I nothing noble have to sing.
That could have made a stonie heart to weep,
And all her sisters rent their golden heares,
And their faire faces with salt humour steep.
So ended shee: and then the next anew
Began her grievous plaint, as doth ensew.
A sea of teares that never may be dryde,
A brasen voice that may with shrilling cryes
Pierce the dull heavens and fill the ayer wide,
And yron sides that sighing may endure,
To waile the wretchednes of world impure?
Deformd with filth and fowle iniquitie;
Ah, wretched world! the house of heavinesse,
Fild with the wreaks of mortall miserie;
Ah, wretched world, and all that is therein!
The vassals of Gods wrath, and slaves of sin.
Man without understanding doth appeare;
For all this worlds affliction he thereby,
And Fortunes freakes, is wisely taught to beare:
Of wretched life the onely joy shee is,
And th’ only comfort in calamities.
Against the bitter throwes of dolours darts,
She solaceth with rules of sapience
The gentle minds, in midst of worldlie smarts:
When he is sad, shee seeks to make him merie,
And doth refresh his sprights when they be werie.
And wants the staffe of wisedome him to stay,
Is like a ship in midst of tempest left
Withouten helme or pilot her to sway:
Full sad and dreadfull is that ships event:
So is the man that wants intendiment.
The precious store of this celestiall riches?
Why doo they banish us, that patronize
The name of learning? Most unhappie wretches!
The which lie drowned in deep wretchednes,
Yet doo not see their owne unhappines.
The stage with tragick buskin to adorne,
And fill the scene with plaint and outcries shrill
Of wretched persons, to misfortune borne:
But none more tragick matter I can finde
Than this, of men depriv’d of sense and minde.
Full of sad sights and sore catastrophees;
First comming to the world with weeping eye,
Where all his dayes, like dolorous trophees,
Are heapt with spoyles of fortune and of feare,
And he at last laid forth on balefull beare.
Fit for Megera or Persephone;
But I, that in true tragedies am skild,
The flowre of wit, finde nought to busie me:
Therefore I mourne, and pitifully mone,
Because that mourning matter I have none.
Her wretched hands in lamentable wise;
And all her sisters, thereto answering,
Threw forth lowd shrieks and drerie dolefull cries.
So rested she: and then the next in rew
Began her grievous plaint, as doth ensew.
That wont with comick sock to beautefie
The painted theaters, and fill with pleasure
The listners eyes, and eares with melodie;
In which I late was wont to raine as queene,
And maske in mirth with graces well beseene?
Which wont to be the glorie of gay wits,
Is layd abed, and no where now to see;
And in her roome unseemly Sorrow sits,
With hollow browes and greisly countenaunce,
Marring my joyous gentle dalliaunce.
And brutish Ignorance, ycrept of late
Out of dredd darknes of the deep abysme,
Where being bredd, he light and heaven does hate:
They in the mindes of men now tyrannize,
And the faire scene with rudenes foule disguize.
And with vaine toyes the vulgare entertaine;
But me have banished, with all the rest
That whilome wont to wait upon my traine,
Fine Counterfesaunce and unhurtfull Sport,
Delight and Laughter deckt in seemly sort.
With seasoned wit and goodly pleasance graced,
By which mans life in his likest image
Was limned forth, are wholly now defaced;
And those sweete wits which wont the like to frame
Are now despizd, and made a laughing game.
To mock her selfe, and truth to imitate,
With kindly counter under mimick shade,
Our pleasant Willy, ah! is dead of late:
With whom all joy and jolly meriment
Is also deaded, and in dolour drent.
And scornfull Follie with Contempt is crept,
Rolling in rymes of shameles ribaudrie
Without regard, or due decorum kept;
Each idle wit at will presumes to make,
And doth the learneds taske upon him take.
Large streames of honnie and sweete nectar flowe,
Scorning the boldnes of such base-borne men,
Which dare their follies forth so rashlie throwe,
Doth rather choose to sit in idle cell,
Than so himselfe to mockerie to sell.
And laughing stocke of all that list to scorne,
Not honored nor cared for of anie;
But loath’d of losels as a thing forlorne:
Therefore I mourne and sorrow with the rest,
Untill my cause of sorrow be redrest.
Pouring forth streames of teares abundantly;
And all her sisters, with compassion like,
The breaches of her singulfs did supply.
So rested shee: and then the next in rew
Began her grievous plaint, as doth ensew.
Faire Philomele, when winters stormie wrath
The goodly fields, that earst so gay were dyde
In colours divers, quite despoyled hath,
All comfortlesse doth hide her chearlesse head
During the time of that her widowhead:
All places with our pleasant notes to fill,
Whilest favourable times did us afford
Free libertie to chaunt our charmes at will,
All comfortlesse upon the bared bow,
Like wofull culvers, doo sit wayling now.
The beautie of the world hath lately wasted,
And those fresh buds, which wont so faire to flowre,
Hath marred quite, and all their blossoms blasted:
And those yong plants, which wont with fruit t’ abound,
Now without fruite or leaves are to be found.
And livelie spirits of each living wight,
And dimd with darknesse their intelligence,
Darknesse more than Cymerians daylie night:
And monstrous Error, flying in the ayre,
Hath mard the face of all that semed fayre.
Borne in the bosome of the black abysse,
And fed with Furies milke, for sustenaunce
Of his weake infancie, begot amisse
By yawning Sloth on his owne mother Night;
So hee his sonnes both syre and brother hight:
(For blind is bold) hath our fayre light defaced;
And gathering unto him a ragged rout
Of faunes and satyres, hath our dwellings raced,
And our chast bowers, in which all vertue rained,
With brutishnesse and beastlie filth hath stained.
So oft bedeawed with our learned layes,
And speaking streames of pure Castalion,
The famous witnesse of our wonted praise,
They trampled have with their fowle footings trade,
And like to troubled puddles have them made.
That with our musick wont so oft to ring,
And arbors sweet, in which the shepheards swaines
Were wont so oft their pastoralls to sing,
They have cut downe, and all their pleasaunce mard,
That now no pastorall is to bee hard.
With fearfull howling do all places fill;
And feeble Eccho now laments and howles,
The dreadfull accents of their outcries shrill.
So all is turned into wildernesse,
Whilest Ignorance the Muses doth oppresse.
To teach the warbling pipe to sound aloft,
My spirits now dismayd with sorrow dull,
Doo mone my miserie in silence soft.
Therefore I mourne and waile incessantly,
Till please the heavens affoord me remedy.
And pitious lamentation did make,
And all her sisters, seeing her doo soe,
With equall plaints her sorrowe did partake.
So rested shee: and then the next in rew
Began her grievous plaint, as doth ensew.
Beene long time luld, and fed with pleasures sweet,
Feareles through his own fault or Fortunes spight,
To tumble into sorrow and regreet,
Yf chaunce him fall into calamitie,
Findes greater burthen of his miserie.
And in the bosome of all blis did sit,
Like virgin queenes with laurell garlands cround,
For vertues meed and ornament of wit,
Sith Ignorance our kingdome did confound,
Bee now become most wretched wightes on ground.
In th’ hearts of men to rule them carefully,
He now hath placed his accursed brood,
By him begotten of fowle Infamy;
Blind Error, scornefull Follie, and base Spight,
Who hold by wrong that wee should have by right.
And make them merrie with their fooleries;
They cherelie chaunt and rymes at randon fling,
The fruitfull spawne of their ranke fantasies;
They feede the eares of fooles with flattery,
And good men blame, and losels magnify.
And raigne in liking of the multitude;
The schooles they fill with fond newfanglenesse,
And sway in court with pride and rashnes rude;
Mongst simple shepheards they do boast their skill,
And say their musicke matcheth Phœbus quill.
And tell their Prince that learning is but vaine;
Faire ladies loves they spot with thoughts impure,
And gentle mindes with lewd delights distaine;
Clerks they to loathly idlenes entice,
And fill their bookes with discipline of vice.
For their usurped kingdomes maintenaunce,
The whiles we silly maides, whom they dispize
And with reprochfull scorne discountenaunce,
From our owne native heritage exilde,
Walk through the world of every one revilde.
Or once vouchsafeth us to entertaine,
Unlesse some one perhaps of gentle kin,
For pitties sake, compassion our paine,
And yeeld us some reliefe in this distresse;
Yet to be so reliev’d is wretchednesse.
Yet none doth care to comfort us at all;
So seeke we helpe our sorrow to redresse,
Yet none vouchsafes to answere to our call:
Therefore we mourne and pittilesse complaine,
Because none living pittieth our paine.
That naught on earth her griefe might pacifie;
And all the rest her dolefull din augmented
With shrikes and groanes and grievous agonie.
So ended shee: and then the next in rew
Began her piteous plaint, as doth ensew.
Where ye in Venus silver bowre were bred,
Thoughts halfe devine, full of the fire of love,
With beawtie kindled and with pleasure fed,
Which ye now in securitie possesse,
Forgetfull of your former heavinesse:
With which ye use your loves to deifie,
And blazon foorth an earthlie beauties praise
Above the compasse of the arched skie:
Now change your praises into piteous cries,
And eulogies turne into elegies.
Of raging love first gan you to torment,
And launch your hearts with lamentable wounds
Of secret sorrow and sad languishment,
Before your loves did take you unto grace;
Those now renew, as fitter for this place.
The tempest of that stormie passion,
And use to paint in rimes the troublous state
Of lovers life in likest fashion,
Am put from practise of my kindlie skill,
Banisht by those that love with leawdnes fill.
And the devicefull matter of my song;
Sweete love devoyd of villanie or ill,
But pure and spotles, as at first he sprong
Out of th’ Almighties bosome, where he nests;
From thence infused into mortall brests.
The base-borne brood of Blindnes cannot gesse,
Ne ever dare their dunghill thoughts aspire
Unto so loftie pitch of perfectnesse,
But rime at riot, and doo rage in love;
Yet little wote what doth thereto behove.
And queene of beautie, now thou maist go pack;
For lo! thy kingdome is defaced quight,
Thy scepter rent, and power put to wrack;
And thy gay sonne, that winged God of Love,
May now goe prune his plumes like ruffed dove.
The sweete companions of the Muses late,
From whom what ever thing is goodly thought
Doth borrow grace, the fancie to aggrate,
Go beg with us, and be companions still,
As heretofore of good, so now of ill.
Finde entertainment, or in court or schoole:
For that which was accounted heretofore
The learneds meed is now lent to the foole;
He sings of love, and maketh loving layes,
And they him heare, and they him highly prayse.
Of bitter teares, and made exceeding mone;
And all her sisters, seeing her sad mood,
With lowd laments her answered all at one.
So ended she: and then the next in rew
Began her grievous plaint, as doth ensew.
Or tell the anguish of my inward smart,
Sith none is left to remedie my paine,
Or deignes to pitie a perplexed hart;
But rather seekes my sorrow to augment
With fowle reproach, and cruell banishment?
The faithfull service of my learned skill,
The goodly off-spring of Joves progenie,
That wont the world with famous acts to fill;
Whose living praises in heroïck style,
It is my chiefe profession to compyle;
That doth all fairest things on earth deface,
Or through unnoble sloth, or sinfull crime,
That doth degenerate the noble race,
Have both desire of worthie deeds forlorne,
And name of learning utterly doo scorne.
Of th’ old heroës memorizde anew;
Ne doo they care that late posteritie
Should know their names, or speak their praises dew:
But die forgot from whence at first they sprong,
As they themselves shalbe forgot ere long.
Forefathers, or to have been nobly bredd?
What oddes twixt Irus and old Inachus,
Twixt best and worst, when both alike are dedd,
If none of neither mention should make,
Nor out of dust their memories awake?
Or strive in vertue others to excell,
If none should yeeld him his deserved meed,
Due praise, that is the spur of dooing well?
For if good were not praised more than ill,
None would choose goodnes of his owne freewill.
And golden trompet of eternitie,
That lowly thoughts lift up to heavens hight,
And mortall men have powre to deifie:
Bacchus and Hercules I raised to heaven,
And Charlemaine, amongst the starris seaven.
And will henceforth immortalize no more,
Sith I no more finde worthie to commend
For prize of value, or for learned lore:
For noble peeres, whom I was wont to raise,
Now onely seeke for pleasure, nought for praise.
They spend, that nought to learning they may spare;
And the rich fee which poets wont divide
Now parasites and sycophants doo share:
Therefore I mourne and endlesse sorrow make,
Both for my selfe and for my sisters sake.
And from her eyes a sea of teares did powre,
And all her sisters, with compassion like,
Did more increase the sharpnes of her showre.
So ended she: and then the next in rew
Began her plaint, as doth herein ensew.
Of starres conspiring wretched men t’ afflict,
Hath powrd on earth this noyous pestilence,
That mortall mindes doth inwardly infect
With love of blindnesse and of ignorance,
To dwell in darkenesse without sovenance?
When th’ heavenlie light of knowledge is put out,
And th’ ornaments of wisdome are bereft?
Then wandreth he in error and in doubt,
Unweeting of the danger hee is in,
Through fleshes frailtie and deceipt of sin.
It is the onelie comfort which they have,
It is their light, their loadstarre and their day;
But hell and darkenesse and the grislie grave
Is ignorance, the enemie of grace,
That mindes of men borne heavenlie doth debace.
How in his cradle first he fostred was;
And judge of Natures cunning operation,
How things she formed of a formelesse mas:
By knowledge wee do learne our selves to knowe,
And what to man, and what to God, wee owe.
And looke into the christall firmament;
There we behold the heavens great hierarchie,
The starres pure light, the spheres swift movement,
The spirites and intelligences fayre,
And angels waighting on th’ Almighties chayre.
Th’ eternall Makers majestie wee viewe,
His love, his truth, his glorie, and his might,
And mercie more than mortall men can vew.
O soveraigne Lord, O soveraigne happinesse,
To see thee, and thy mercie measurelesse!
The precepts of my heavenlie discipline;
But shame and sorrow and accursed case
Have they that scorne the schoole of arts divine,
And banish me, which do professe the skill
To make men heavenly wise through humbled will.
I feede on sweet contentment of my thought,
And please my selfe with mine owne selfe-delight,
In contemplation of things heavenlie wrought:
So loathing earth, I looke up to the sky,
And being driven hence, I thether fly.
Which want the blis that wisedom would them breed,
And like brute beasts doo lie in loathsome den
Of ghostly darkenes, and of gastlie dreed:
For whom I mourne, and for my selfe complaine,
And for my sisters eake, whom they disdaine.
As if her eyes had beene two springing wells:
And all the rest, her sorrow to supplie,
Did throw forth shrieks and cries and dreery yells.
So ended shee: and then the next in rew
Began her mournfull plaint, as doth ensew.
Without vaine art or curious complements,
And squallid fortune, into basenes flong,
Doth scorne the pride of wonted ornaments.
Then fittest are these ragged rimes for mee,
To tell my sorrowes that exceeding bee.
With which I wont the winged words to tie,
And make a tunefull diapase of pleasures,
Now being let to runne at libertie
By those which have no skill to rule them right,
Have now quite lost their naturall delight.
With horrid sound, though having little sence,
They thinke to be chiefe praise of poëtry;
And thereby wanting due intelligence,
Have mard the face of goodly poësie,
And made a monster of their fantasie.
But princes and high priests, that secret skill;
The sacred lawes therein they wont expresse,
And with deepe oracles their verses fill:
Then was shee held in soveraigne dignitie,
And made the noursling of nobilitie.
But suffer her prophaned for to bee
Of the base vulgar, that with hands uncleane
Dares to pollute her hidden mysterie;
And treadeth under foote hir holie things,
Which was the care of kesars and of kings.
And myrrour of her Makers majestie;
That with rich bountie and deare cherishment
Supports the praise of noble poësie:
Ne onelie favours them which it professe,
But is her selfe a peereles poëtresse.
The true Pandora of all heavenly graces,
Divine Elisa, sacred Emperesse:
Live she for ever, and her royall p’laces
Be fild with praises of divinest wits,
That her eternize with their heavenlie writs.
Admirers of her glorious excellence,
Which being lightned with her beawties beme,
Are thereby fild with happie influence,
And lifted up above the worldes gaze,
To sing with angels her immortall praize.
And having beene with acorns alwaies fed,
Can no whit savour this celestiall food,
But with base thoughts are into blindnesse led,
And kept from looking on the lightsome day:
For whome I waile and weepe all that I may.
As if shee all to water would have gone;
And all her sisters, seeing her sad stowre,
Did weep and waile and made exceeding mone;
And all their learned instruments did breake:
The rest untold no living tongue can speake.