aching than the English clergy had yet reached.
The change of scene from Ireland to the centre of English interests,
must have been, as Spenser describes it, very impressive. England was
alive with aspiration and effort; imaginations were inflamed and hearts
stirred by the deeds of men who described with the same energy with
which they acted. Amid such influences, and with such a friend as
Ralegh, Spenser may naturally have been tempted by some of the dreams of
advancement of which Ralegh's soul was full. There is strong
probability, from the language of his later poems, that he indulged such
hopes, and that they were disappointed. A year after the entry in the
Stationers' Register of the _Faery Queen_ (29 Dec., 1590), Ponsonby, his
publisher, entered a volume of "_Complaints, containing sundry small
poems of the World's Vanity_," to which he prefixed the following
notice.

THE PRINTER TO THE GENTLE READER.

SINCE my late setting foorth of the _Faerie Queene_, finding
that it hath found a favourable passage amongst you, I have
sithence endevoured by all good meanes (for the better
encrease and accomplishment of your delights,) to get into my
handes such smale Poemes of the same Authors, as I heard were
disperst abroad in sundrie hands, and not easie to bee come
by, by himselfe; some of them having bene diverslie imbeziled
and purloyned from him since his departure over Sea. Of the
which I have, by good meanes, gathered togeather these fewe
parcels present, which I have caused to bee imprinted
altogeather, for that they al seeme to containe like matter of
argument in them; being all complaints and meditations of the
worlds vanitie, verie grave and profitable. To which effect I
understand that he besides wrote sundrie others, namelie
_Ecclesiastes_ and _Canticum canticorum_ translated, _A
senights slumber_, _The hell of lovers_, _his Purgatorie_,
being all dedicated to Ladies; so as it may seeme he ment them
all to one volume. Besides some other Pamphlets looselie
scattered abroad, as _The dying Pellican_, _The howers of the
Lord_, _The sacrifice of a sinner_, _The seven Psalmes_, &c.,
which when I can, either by himselfe or otherwise, attaine
too, I meane likewise for your favour sake to set foorth. In
the meane time, praying you gentlie to accept of these, and
graciouslie to entertaine the new