[35] Robert Gomersall was entered of Christ-Church, Oxford, in 1614, at the age of fourteen, where, in 1621, he proceeded M. A. In 1625 he took refuge from the plague at Flore in Northamptonshire, of which the editor of the Biographia Dramatica erroneously supposed he was rector. He was afterwards vicar of Thorncombe in Devonshire, and died in 1646. His poems, which are rather easy than correct, were published with Lodwick Sforza, a tragedy, in 1633 and 1638, from which the above epistle is transcribed. [36] Saint Paul’s cathedral was in Corbet’s time the resort of the idle and profligate of all classes: the author, _quisquis ille fuit_, of “A Sixefold Politycian,” 4to. 1609. attributed to _Milton’s father_, describes its frequenters as “superstitious idolaters of St. Paul (and yet they never think of Paul nor any apostle) and many of them have that famous monument in that account as Diogenes had _Jovis porticus_ in Athens; who to them which wondered that he had no house nor corner to eat his meat in, pointing at the gallerie or walking-place that was called Jovis Porticus, said, that the people of Athens had builded that to his use, as a royal mansion for him, wherein he might dine and sup, and take his repast. “And soe these make Paules like Euclides or Platoes school, as Diogenes accounted it, κατατριβην, a mispending of much good labour and time, and worthily many times meet with Diogenes’ fare, and are faithful and frequent guests of Duke Humphray.” P. 8. [37] This was not the first censure of sir Christopher Hatton’s extravagant monument; as, according to Stowe, some poet had before complained on the part of Sydney and Walsingham, that “Philip and Francis have no tomb, For great Christopher takes all the room.” [38] “Coryate’s Crudities hastily gobbled up in five months travels in France, Savoy, Italy, Rhetia, Helvetia, some parts of High Germany, and the Netherlands.” 4to. 1611. Re-printed in 3 vols. 8vo. 1776. [39] Quia valde lutosa est Cantabrigia. [40] Ludus per spatium 6 horarum infra. [41] “A bushel of March dust is worth a king’s ransom.” [42] Coll. Eman. abundat puritanis. [43] The king entered Cambr. 7 Mar. 1614-5. [44] Samuel Harsnett, then bp. of Chichester. [45] Vestis indicat virum. [46] Nethersoli Cant. orator, qui per speculum seipsum solet ornari. [47] Orator hoc usus est vocabulo in oratione ad regem. [48] Actores omnes fuere theologi. [49] Ludus dicebatur “Ignoramus,” qui durabat per spatium sex horarum. [50] Idem quod Bocardo apud Oxon. [51] Insigniss. stultus. [52] Paulus Tompsonus, qui nuper laesæ majest. reus ob aurum decurtat. [53] Decorum quia Coll. est puritanorum plenum: scil. Emanuel. [54] The former is Taylor, the celebrated water-poet: the latter, William Fenner, a puritanical poet and pamphleteer of that period, was educated at Pembroke-hall, Oxford. He was preferred to the rectory of Rochford, in Essex, by the earl of Warwick. He died about 1640.