ent. He quitted London a disappointed man, and retired to the
country, where he died on the 28th of July, 1667.

His poems bear the impress of the age in a remarkable degree. His
_Mistress, or, Love Verses_, and his other Anacreontics or paraphrases of
Anacreon's odes, were eminently to the taste of the luxurious and immoral
court of Charles II. His _Davideis_ is an heroic poem on the troubles of
King David.

His _Poem on the Late Civil War_, which was not published until 1679,
twelve years after his death, is written in the interests of the monarchy.

His varied learning gave a wide range to his pen. In 1661 appeared his
_Proposition for the Advancement of Experimental Philosophy_, which was
followed in the next year by _Two Books of Plants_, which he increased to
six books afterward--devoting two to herbs, two to flowers, and two to
trees. If he does not appear in them to be profound in botanical
researches, it was justly said by Dr. Johnson that in his mind "botany
turned into poetry."

His prose pen was as ready, versatile, and charming as his poetic pencil.
He produced discourses or essays on commonplace topics of general
interest, such as _myself; the shortness of life; the uncertainty of
riches; the danger of procrastination_, etc. These are well written, in
easy-flowing language, evincing his poetic nature, and many of them are
more truly poetic than his metrical pieces.

HIS FAME.--Cowley had all his good things in his lifetime; he was the most
popular poet in England, and is the best illustration of the literary
taste of his age. His poetry is like water rippling in the sunlight,
brilliant but dazzling and painful: it bewilders with far-fetched and
witty conceits: varied but full of art, there is little of nature or real
passion to be found even in his amatory verses. He suited the taste of a
court which preferred an epigram to a proverb, and a repartee to an
apothegm; and, as a consequence, with the growth of a better culture and a
better taste, he has steadily declined in favor, so that at the present
day he is scarcely read at all. Two authoritative opinions mark the
history of this decline: Milton, in his own day, placed him with Spenser
and Shakspeare as one of the three greatest English poets; while Pope, not
much more than half a century later, asks:

Who now reads Cowley? If he pleases yet,
His moral pleases, not his pointed wit.

Still later, Dr. Johnson gives him the credit of having