If, then, I read Herrick’s life at Dean Prior aright, he is not the genial parson, moving light-heartedly among the people, drinking in the soft air of Devonshire and pouring it out in spontaneous song, passing from his sermon to the Maypole, blending Paganism with Christianity and ribaldry with religion, without sense of harm or incongruity—writing, in fact, the _Hesperides_ on weekdays and the _Noble Numbers_ on Sundays. Rather it was by the Cam and the Thames that he imbibed his inspiration, made love to his half-imaginary mistresses, and learnt— How roses first grew red and lilies white. In Devonshire he is a changed man, sobered partly by isolation and partly by clerical responsibility. He has, no doubt, his light-hearted and even wanton moods, and often writes poetry in the old vein; but he feels that the old lyrical effusiveness is going or gone, and finds his main occupation in writing sacred poetry. At any rate he did not write gross or indecent verse during this period. This all too plentiful element of the _Hesperides_ need not be fathered on Dean Prior. He himself calls it— Unbaptised rhymes Writ in my wild, unhallowed times. There is surely no reason why these words should not be taken in their literal sense, which is that they were written in Herrick’s youth and before he took orders, and the pilgrim to Dean Prior need not harrow his imagination with the revolting picture of this elderly bachelor sitting in the little vicarage spinning out these miserable and often pointless indecencies. No doubt it may be asked why, if these were poems of Herrick’s youth, condemned by his better judgment, he published them in 1648. Two answers may be given to this question, though I do not say that either of them is an excuse. In the first place he had been turned out of his living and probably wanted money. In the second place, the fact that he describes himself on the title page as Robert Herrick, Esq., seems to indicate that he considered his clerical profession had gone with his incumbency, and if so, he very probably had deluded himself into the idea that clerical responsibility had gone also.