Complete Works of Edmund Spenser

by Edmund Spenser

  The circumstances of the publication are very oddly confused. In the opening address the credit for the whole enterprise is assumed by ‘the Printer,’ Ponsonby, who, we are told, hunted the poems out and made up and issued the volume by his own efforts. This work, we gather, was mainly prosecuted after the poet’s ‘departure over sea’ — his return, that is, to Ireland early in 1591. And the volume certainly was published after his ‘departure.’ Yet we know that it had been made ready for printing while he was still in England. It appears on the Stationers’ Register for December 29, 1590, as approved by one of the official censors: at that time, therefore, the copy must have been at least approximately complete. Three of the poems, moreover, ‘The Tears of the Muses,’ ‘Mother Hubberd’s Tale,’ and ‘Muiopotmos,’ the central poems of the volume, bear signs of having been prepared for the press by himself and issued individually— ‘Muiopotmos’ in 1590. The plausible address of ‘the Printer,’ in fine, is not wholly to be trusted. What, then, is to be made of it? According to Dr. Grosart, it was devised by the poet as a blind, in the manner of Swift. For such a device one seeks a reason. May this be that, as, in 1579 (by the first letter to Harvey), he was shy of ‘seeming to utter his writings for gaine and commoditie,’ so now, but a year after the issue of the Faery Queen. he was loth to accept the full responsibility of a second considerable volume? Any account of the publication, however, must be very largely conjectural.

  The chronology of the poems is less in doubt. Though two or three of them are somewhat hard to place, the majority can at least be grouped in certain main periods with reasonable probability. First of all is the group that belongs to his university days, 1570–1576, and his subsequent sojourn in Lancashire: ‘The Visions of Petrarch,’ ‘The Visions of Bellay,’ ‘Ruins of Rome,’ and, perhaps, ‘Visions of the World’s Vanity.’ Following upon these days is what may loosely be called his first London period, during which, until it ended with his departure for Ireland in 1580, his headquarters were probably in the capital. These three years were of marked literary activity. To them belong most, if not all, of the Calendar, and presumably the greater number of his so-called ‘lost works,’ besides the beginnings of the Faery Queen; to them belong also some of the most important ‘complaints,’ ‘Virgil’s Gnat,’ ‘Mother Hubberd’s Tale,’ and, less certainly, ‘The Tears of the Muses.’ Then follow the years of service in Ireland, till Raleigh brought him back in 1589. During this period he would seem to have given his leisure for poetry almost exclusively to the Faery Queen. Of the two remaining ‘complaints,’ ‘The Ruins of Time’ was written shortly after his return to England, and ‘Muiopotmos’ perhaps at about the same time. 5

  ‘The Ruins of Time’ and ‘Muiopotmos’ were composed not long before publication and probably needed no retouching. ‘Mother Hubberd’s Tale’ and ‘The Tears of the Muses,’ early poems, were to some extent revised for the press. The others, one may think, were allowed to appear as first finished, or were at most but casually retouched. For, from the general tenor of his output, one infers that Spenser was not very sedulous in the revision of work once completed, and these poems were relatively unimportant — all but one, translations. They are not, like their companions, dedicated to people alive and influential in 1590: their chief function, indeed, would seem to be to fill out the volume. If Ponsonby really had a share in the collecting of Complaints, it must have been these, or some of them, that he gathered. 6

  To the reader of Complaints one name recurs more frequently than others, that of Joachim Du Bellay, who, from 1549 to his early death in 1560, was one of the leaders of the new school of poetry in France. From him Spenser translated ‘The Visions of Bellay’ and ‘Ruins of Rome,’ and from him chiefly he must have acquired those poetic theories of the Pléiade which are the staple of ‘The Tears of the Muses.’ Du Bellay is a personality of great attractiveness. Not so distinguished an artist as his colleague Ronsard, he had qualities of mind and character that win us more: dignity untouched by arrogance, guarded from it by native sense of fitness, the distinction of a finely congruous nature; in especial, a singularly penetrating and human melancholy. On any Elizabethan author of a volume of ‘complaints’ his influence might be among the deepest of that day. It is noteworthy, however, that his really central work, the Regrets, does not seem to have touched Spenser at all. And indeed, the ‘life-long vein of melancholy’ which Dr. Grosart detects in ‘the newe poete’ must have been, at best, rather thin. His elegies are hardly convincing. When he strikes the note of personal disappointment, his verse occasionally betrays a feeling akin to sadness, but the bulk of his really characteristic and genuine work is anything but sad. In the Faery Queen one may search far and wide, in vain, for a touch of that peculiar feeling which pervades the romance-epic of the genuinely melancholy Tasso. His most constant mood would seem rather to have been a serenity neither sad nor cheerful. In any case, one will not infer his temperament from the professed melancholy of his earlier work. That much of the Calendar is gloomy, that he wrote a whole volume of ‘complaints,’ was to have been expected: work in that vein was a convention of the days into which he was born. The cosmopolitan pastoral invited, if it did not impose, a strain of lamentation, and in England, since the days of Sir Thomas Wyatt, love-poetry in the manner and tone of the plaintive Petrarch, meditations upon the vanity of life, elegies, stories of the falls of the mighty had formed, in good measure, the staple of serious poetry. Spenser’s early work but continues a convention already well established.

  CONTENTS

  The Ruines of Time

  The Teares of the Muses

  Virgils Gnat

  Prosopopoia, or Mother Hubberds Tale

  Ruines of Rome: by Bellay

  Muiopotmos, or the Fate of the Butterflie

  Visions of the Worlds Vanitie

  The Visions of Bellay

  The Visions of Petrarch

  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 pareels 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 gracious-lie to entertaine the ‘new poet,’ I take leave.

  The Ruines of Time

  DEDICATED TO THE RIGHT NOBLE AND BEAUTIFULL LADIE, THE LADIE MARIE COUNTESSE OF PEMBROOKE

  MOST honourable and bountifull Ladie, there bee long sithens deepe sowed in my brest the seede of most entire love and humble affection unto that most brave knight, your noble brother deceased; which taking roote began in his life time some-what to bud forth, and to shew themselves to him, as then in the weakenes of their first spring: and would in their riper strength (had it pleased High God till then to drawe out his daies) spired forth fruit of more perfection. But since God hath disdeigned the world of that most noble spirit, which was the hope of all learned men, and the patron of my young Muses; togeather with him both their hope of anie further fruit was cut off, and also the tender delight of th
ose their first blossoms nipped and quite dead. Yet sithens my late cumming into England, some frends of mine (which might much prevaile with me, and indeede commaund me) knowing with howe straight bandes of duetie I was tied to him, as also bound unto that noble house, (of which the chiefe hope then rested in him) have sought to revive them by upbraiding me, for that I have not shewed anie thankefull remembrance towards him or any of them, but suffer their names to sleep in silence and forgetfulnesse. Whome chieflie to satisfie, or els to avoide that fowle blot of unthankefulnesse, I have conceived this small poeme, intituled by a generall name of The Worlds Ruines: yet speciallie intended to the renowming of that noble race, from which both you and he sprong, and to the eternizing of some of the chiefe of them late deceased. The which I dedicate unto your Ladiship as whome it most speciallie concerneth, and to whome I acknowledge my selfe bounden, by manie singular favours and great graces. I pray for your honourable happinesse: and so humblie kisse your handes.

  Your Ladiships ever

  humblie at commaund,

  E. S.

  [‘The Ruins of Time’ is mainly official verse, melodious and uninspired. It is the one poem of the volume confessedly written to order — confessedly, in the frank and dignified letter of dedication. Had Sidney alone been Spenser’s theme, or Sidney and Leicester, both his early patrons, this poem might perhaps have been comparable with Daphnaïda, but the great house to which they belonged having recently lost other distinguished members besides, Spenser saw fit to undertake a sort of necrology of the Dudleys, and the issue was perfunctoriness. Perhaps he was busy with other matters. Perhaps, too, as some have inferred, he built his poem up in good part of earlier material. It certainly is composite and ill-digested, and the device of the ‘visions’ clearly harks back to the days of his artistic apprenticeship. If he did take recourse to his early manuscripts, he may possibly have helped himself with Stemmata Dudleiana, mentioned in the postscript of the second letter to Harvey. On these points, however, we have ground for nothing more definite than surmise.]

  THE RUINES OF TIME

  IT chaunced me on day beside the shore

  Of silver streaming Thamesis to bee,

  Nigh where the goodly Verlame stood of yore,

  Of which there now remaines no memorie,

  Nor anie little moniment to see, 5

  By which the travailer that fares that way

  This once was she may warned be to say.

  There on the other side, I did behold

  A woman sitting sorrowfullie wailing,

  Rending her yeolow locks, like wyrie golde 10

  About her shoulders careleslie downe trailing,

  And streames of teares from her faire eyes forth railing.

  In her right hand a broken rod she held,

  Which towards heaven shee seemd on high to weld.

  Whether she were one of that rivers nymphes, 15

  Which did the losse of some dere love lament,

  I doubt; or one of those three fatall impes

  Which draw the dayes of men forth in extent;

  Or th’ auncient genius of that citie brent;

  But seeing her so piteouslie perplexed, 20

  I (to her calling) askt what her so vexed.

  ‘Ah! what delight,’ quoth she, ‘in earthlie thing,

  Or comfort can I, wretched creature, have?

  Whose happines the heavens envying,

  From highest staire to lowest step me drave, 25

  And have in mine owne bowels made my grave,

  That of all nations now I am forlorne,

  The worlds sad spectacle, and Fortunes scorne.’

  Much was I mooved at her piteous plaint,

  And felt my heart nigh riven in my brest 30

  With tender ruth to see her sore constraint;

  That shedding teares a while I still did rest,

  And after did her name of her request.

  ‘Name have I none,’ quoth she, ‘nor anie being,

  Bereft of both by Fates unjust decreeing. 35

  ‘I was that citie which the garland wore

  Of Britaines pride, delivered unto me

  By Romane victors, which it wonne of yore;

  Though nought at all but ruines now I bee,

  And lye in mine owne ashes, as ye see: 40

  Verlame I was; what bootes it that I was,

  Sith now I am but weedes and wastfull gras?

  ‘O vaine worlds glorie, and unstedfast state

  Of all that lives on face of sinfull earth!

  Which from their first untill their utmost date 45

  Tast no one hower of happines or merth,

  But like as at the ingate of their berth

  They crying creep out of their mothers woomb,

  So wailing backe go to their wofull toomb.

  ‘Why then dooth flesh, a bubble glas of breath, 50

  Hunt after honour and advauncement vaine,

  And reare a trophee for devouring death

  With so great labour and long lasting paine,

  As if his daies for ever should remaine?

  Sith all that in this world is great or gaie 55

  Doth as a vapour vanish, and decaie.

  ‘Looke backe, who list, unto the former ages,

  And call to count, what is of them become:

  Where be those learned wits and antique sages,

  Which of all wisedome knew the perfect somme? 60

  Where those great warriors, which did overcomme

  The world with conquest of their might and maine,

  And made one meare of th’ earth and of their raine?

  ‘What nowe is of th’ Assyrian Lyonesse,

  Of whome no footing now on earth appeares? 65

  What of the Persian Beares outragiousnesse,

  Whose memorie is quite worne out with yeares?

  Who of the Grecian Libbard now ought heares,

  That overran the East with greedie powre,

  And left his whelps their kingdomes to devoure? 70

  ‘And where is that same great seven headded beast,

  That made all nations vassals of her pride,

  To fall before her feete at her beheast,

  And in the necke of all the world did ride?

  Where doth she all that wondrous welth nowe hide? 75

  With her own weight down pressed now shee lies,

  And by her heaps her hugenesse testifies.

  ‘O Rome, thy ruine I lament and rue,

  And in thy fall my fatall overthrowe,

  That whilom was, whilst heavens with equall vewe 80

  Deignd to behold me, and their gifts bestowe,

  The picture of thy pride in pompous shew:

  And of the whole world as thou wast the empresse,

  So I of this small Northerne world was princesse.

  ‘To tell the beawtie of my buildings fayre, 85

  Adornd with purest golde and precious stone,

  To tell my riches, and endowments rare,

  That by my foes are now all spent and gone,

  To tell my forces, matchable to none,

  Were but lost labour, that few would beleeve, 90

  And with rehearsing would me more agreeve.

  ‘High towers, faire temples, goodly theaters,

  Strong walls, rich porches, princelie pallaces,

  Large streetes, brave houses, sacred sepulchers,

  Sure gates, sweete gardens, stately galleries 95

  Wrought with faire pillours, and fine imageries,

  All those (O pitie!) now are turnd to dust,

  And overgrowen with blacke oblivions rust.

  ‘Theretoo, for warlike power and peoples store,

  In Britannie was none to match with mee, 100

  That manie often did abie full sore:

  Ne Troynovant, though elder sister shee,

  With my great forces might compared bee;

  That stout Pendragon to his perill felt,

  Who in a siege seaven yeres a
bout me dwelt. 105

  ‘But long ere this, Bunduca Britonnesse

  Her mightie hoast against my bulwarkes brought,

  Bunduca, that victorious conqueresse,

  That, lifting up her brave heroïck thought

  Bove womens weaknes, with the Romanes fought, 110

  Fought, and in field against them thrice prevailed:

  Yet was she foyld, when as she me assailed.

  ‘And though at last by force I conquered were

  Of hardie Saxons, and became their thrall,

  Yet was I with much bloodshed bought full deere, 115

  And prizde with slaughter of their generall:

  The moniment of whose sad funerall,

  For wonder of the world, long in me lasted;

  But now to nought, through spoyle of time, is wasted.

  ‘Wasted it is, as if it never were, 120

  And all the rest that me so honord made,

  And of the world admired ev’rie where,

  Is turnd to smoake, that doth to nothing fade;

  And of that brightnes now appeares no shade,

  But greislie shades, such as doo haunt in hell 125

  With fearfull fiends, that in deep darknes dwell.

  ‘Where my high steeples whilom usde to stand,

  On which the lordly faulcon wont to towre,

  There now is but an heap of lyme and sand,

  For the shriche-owle to build her balefull bowre: 130

  And where the nightingale wont forth to powre

  Her restles plaints, to comfort wakefull lovers,

  There now haunt yelling mewes and whining plovers.

  ‘And where the christall Thamis wont to slide

  In silver channell, downe along the lee, 135

  About whose flowrie bankes on either side

  A thousand nymphes, with mirthfull jollitee,

  Were wont to play, from all annoyance free,

  There now no rivers course is to be seene,

  But moorish fennes, and marshes ever greene. 140

  ‘Seemes that that gentle river, for great griefe

  Of my mishaps, which oft I to him plained,

  Or for to shunne the horrible mischiefe,

  With which he saw my cruell foes me pained,