The Poetical Works of Edmund Spenser, Volume 5Spenser, Edmund
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The Poetical Works of Edmund Spenser, Volume 5
Spenser, Edmund
English poetry -- Early modern, 1500-1700
I pray you bethinks you well hereof, good Maister G., and forth with
write me those two or three special points and caueats for the nonce;
_De quibus in superioribus illis mellitissimus longissimisque litteris
tuis._ Your desire to heare of my late beeing with hir Maiestie muste
dye in it selfe. As for the twoo worthy gentle men, Master Sidney and
Master Dyer, they haue me, I thanke them, in some vse of familiarity;
of whom and to whome what speache passeth for youre credite and
estimation I leaue your selfe to conceiue, hauing alwayes so well
conceiued of my vnfained affection and zeale towardes you. And nowe
they haue proclaimed in their [Greek: hareiophaga] a generall
surceasing and silence of balde rymers, and also of the verie beste to;
in steade whereof they haue, by authoritie of their whole senate,
prescribed certaine lawes and rules of quantities of English sillables
for English verse; hauing had thereof already greate practise, and
drawen mee to their faction. Newe bookes I heare of none, but only of
one* [* Stephen Gosson.], that writing a certaine booke called _The
Schoole of Abuse_, and dedicating it to Maister Sidney, was for hys
labor scorned; if, at leaste, it be in the goodnesse of that nature to
scorne. Such follie is it not to regard aforehande the inclination and
qualitie of him to whome wee dedicate oure bookes. Suche mighte I
happily incurre, entituling _My Slomber_, and the other pamphlets, vnto
his honor. I meant them rather to Maister Dyer. But I am of late more
in loue wyth my Englishe versifying than with ryming: whyche I should
haue done long since, if I would then haue followed your councell. _Sed
te solum iam tum suspicabar cum Aschamo sapere; nunc aulam video
egregios alere poetas Anglicos_. Maister E.K. hartily desireth to be
commended vnto your worshippe: of whome what accompte he maketh youre
selfe shall hereafter perceiue by hys paynefull and dutifull verses of
your selfe.
Thus muche was written at Westminster yesternight; but comming this
morning, beeyng the sixteenth of October [1579], to Mystresse Kerkes,
to haue it deliuered to the carrier, I receyued youre letter, sente me
the laste weeke; whereby I perceiue you otherwhiles continue your old
exercise of versifying in English,—whych glorie I had now thought
whoulde haue bene onely ours heere at London and the court.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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