e poet, the
patriot, and the prophet, vied with each other in his breast. His mind
appears to have held equal communion with the inspired writers, and with
the bards and sages of ancient Greece and Rome;--

"Blind Thamyris, and blind Maeonides,
And Tiresias, and Phineus, prophets old."

He had a high standard, with which he was always comparing himself,
nothing short of which could satisfy his jealous ambition. He thought of
nobler forms and nobler things than those he found about him. He lived
apart, in the solitude of his own thoughts, carefully excluding from his
mind whatever might distract its purposes, or alloy its purity, or damp
its zeal. "With darkness and with dangers compassed round," he had the
mighty models of antiquity always present to his thoughts, and determined
to raise a monument of equal height and glory, "piling up every stone of
lustre from the brook," for the delight and wonder of posterity. He had
girded himself up, and as it were, sanctified his genius to this service
from his youth. "For after," he says, "I had from my first years, by the
ceaseless diligence and care of my father, been exercised to the tongues,
and some sciences as my age could suffer, by sundry masters and teachers,
it was found that whether aught was imposed upon me by them, or betaken to
of my own choice, the style by certain vital signs it had, was likely to
live; but much latelier, in the private academies of Italy, perceiving
that some trifles which I had in memory, composed at under twenty or
thereabout, met with acceptance above what was looked for; I began thus
far to assent both to them and divers of my friends here at home, and not
less to an inward prompting which now grew daily upon me, that by labour
and intense study (which I take to be my portion in this life), joined
with the strong propensity of nature, I might perhaps leave something so
written to after-times as they should not willingly let it die. The
accomplishment of these intentions which have lived within me ever since I
could conceive myself anything worth to my country, lies not but in a
power above man's to promise; but that none hath by more studious ways
endeavoured, and with more unwearied spirit that none shall, that I dare
almost aver of myself, as far as life and free leisure will extend.
Neither do I think it shame to covenant with any knowing reader, that for
some few years yet, I may go on trust with him toward the payment of what
I am