None of his poems was published during his lifetime. On his death-bed he gave to a friend the manuscript of _The Temple_, a collection of religious poems in various meters. The poems, of a high quality, are inspired with a devout piety which is often fantastically expressed and quaintly figured. His poetry is not so “metaphysical” as that of some others of his group; but neither does it rise to the great heights that they sometimes achieve. (_c_) =Richard Crashaw (1613–50)=, the son of a clergyman, was born in London, and educated at the Charterhouse and at Cambridge. During the Civil War, in which he was a strong Royalist, he was compelled to escape to France, where he became a Roman Catholic. At a later stage he went to Rome and to Loretto. At the latter place he died and was buried. Crashaw represents the best and the worst of the Metaphysical poets. At his best he has an energy and triumphant rapture that, outside the poems of Shelley, are rarely equaled in English; at his worst he is shrill, frothy, and conceited. His style at its best is harmonious, precise, and nobly elevated; at its worst it is disfigured by obscurity, perversity, and unseemly images. His chief work is _Steps to the Temple_ (1646). We quote an extract to show the exalted mood to which his poetry can ascend: Live in these conquering leaves; live all the same; And walk through all tongues one triumphant flame; Live here, great heart;[124] and love, and die, and kill; And bleed, and wound, and yield, and conquer still. Let this immortal life where’er it comes Walk in a crowd of loves and martyrdoms. Let mystic deaths wait on’t; and wise souls be The love-slain witnesses of this life of thee. O sweet incendiary! show here thy art, Upon this carcase of a hard cold heart.... Oh thou undaunted daughter of desires! By all thy power of lights and fires;... By all thy brim-filled bowls of fierce desire; By thy last morning’s draught of liquid fire; By the full kingdom of that final kiss That seized thy parting soul, and sealed thee his;... Leave nothing of myself in me. _The Flaming Heart_ (_d_) =Henry Vaughan (1622–95)= was born in Wales, and was descended from an ancient family. He went to London to study law, then turned to medicine, and practiced at Brecon. His books include _Poems_ (1646), _Olor Iscanus_ (1647), _Silex Scintillans_ (1650), and _Thalia Rediviva_ (1678). Vaughan’s love-poems, though they are often prettily and sometimes beautifully phrased, are inferior to his religious pieces, especially those in _Silex Scintillans_. His religious fervor is nobly imaginative, and strikes out lines and ideas of astonishing strength and beauty. His regard for nature, moreover, has a closeness and penetration that sometimes (for example, in _The Retreat_) suggests Wordsworth.