The lives of the most famous English poets, or, The honour of Parnassus in a brief essay of the works and writings of above two hundred of them, from the time of K. William the Conqueror to the reign of His present Majesty, King James II / written by William Winstanley, author of The English worthies ...

GEOFFERY CHAƲCER.

THree several Places contend for the Birth of that famous Poet. 1. Berkshire, from the words of Leland, that he was born in Barocensi spro∣vincia; and Mr. Cambden avoweth that Dunington-Castle nigh unto Newbery, was anciently his Inhe∣ritance. 2. Oxfordshire, where J. Pits is positive that his Father was a Knight, and that he was born at Woodstock. 3. The Author of his Life, set forth 1602. proveth him born in London, out of these his own words in the Testament of Love.

Also in the City of London, that is to me so dear and sweet, in which I was forth grown, and more kindly loue haue I to that place, than any other in yerth, as euery kindely creature hath full appetite to that place of his kindly ingendure, and to wilne rest and peace in that stede to abide, thilke peace should thus there haue been broken, which of all wise▪ men is commened and desired.

For his Parentage, although Bale writes, he termeth himself Galfridus Chaucer nobili loco natus, & summae spei juvenis; yet is the opinion of some Heralds (otherwise than his Virtues and Learning commemded him) he descended not of any great House, which they gather by his Arms: And in∣deed both in respect of the Name, which is French, as also by other Conjectures, it may be gathered, that his Progenitors were Stranngers; but whe∣ther they were Merchants (for that in places

where they have dwelled, the Arms of the Mer∣chants of the Staple have been seen in the Glass-windows) or whether they were of other Cal∣lings, it is not much necessary to search; but weal∣thy no doubt they were, and of good account in the Commonwealth, who brought up their Sons in such sort, that both he was thought fit for the Court at home, and to be employed for Matters of State in Foreign Countries.

His Education, as Leland writes, was in both the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, as ap∣peareth by his own words, in his Book Entituled The Court of Love: And in Oxford by all likeli∣hood, in Canterbury or in Merton Colledge, im∣proving his Time in the University, he became a witty Logician, a sweet Rhetorician, a grave Philosopher, a holy Divine, a skilful Mathema∣tician, and a pleasant Poet; of whom, for the Sweetness of his Poetry, may be said that which is reported of Stesicho••••us; and as Cethegus was called Suadae Medulla, so may Chaucer be rightly called the Pith and Sinews of Eloquence, and the very Life it self of all Mirth and pleasant Wri∣ting. Besides, one Gift he had above other Au∣thors, and that is, by the Excellencies of his De∣scriptions to possess his Readers with a stronger imagination of seeing that done before their eyes which they read, than any other that ever writ in any Tongue. But above all, his Book of Can∣terbury-Tales, is most recommended to Posterity, which he maketh to be spoken by certain Pilgrims who lay at the Tabard-Inn in Southwark, as he de∣clareth in the beginning of his said Book.

It befell in that season, on a day, In Southwark, at the Tabert as I lay, Ready to wend on my pilgrimage To Canterbury, with full devout courage; That night was comen into the Hosterie, Well nine and twenty in a companie, Of sundry folke, by aduenture yfall In fellowship, and Pilgrims were they all, That toward Canterbury woulden ride; The Stables and Chambers weren wide, And well wee were eased at the best, &c.

By his Travel also in France and Flanders, where he spent much time in his young years, but more in the latter end of the Reign of King Richard the Second; he attained to a great perfection in all kind of Learning, as Bale and Leland report of him: Circa postremos Richardi Secundi annos, Galliis floruit, magnamque illic ex assidua in Literis exercita∣tione gloriam sibi comparavit. Domum reversus Fo∣rum Londinense, & Collegia Leguleiorum, qui ibi∣dem Patria Jura interpretantur frequentavit, &c. About the latter end of King Richard the Second's Days, he flourished in France, and got himself into high esteem there by his diligent exercise in Learning: After his return home, he frequented the Court at London, and the Colledges of the Lawyers, which there interpreted the Laws of the Land. Amongst whom was John Gower, his great familiar Friend, whose Life we wrote before. This Gower, in his Book entituled Confessio Amantis, termeth Chaucer a worthy Poet, and maketh him as it were the Judge of his Works.

This our Chaucer had always an earnest desire to enrich and beautifie our English Tongue, which

in those days was very rude and barren; and this he did, following the example of Dantes and Pe∣trarch, who had done the same for the Italian Tongue▪ Alanus for the French, and Johannes Mea for the Spanish: Neither was Chaucer inferior to any of them in the performance hereof; and Eng∣land in this respect is much beholding to him; as Leland well noteth:

Anglia Chaucerum veneratur nostra Poetam; Cui veneris debet Patria Lingua suas.

Our England honoureth Chaucer Poet, as prin∣cipal; To whom her Country-Tongue doth owe her Beauties all.

He departed out of this world the 25th. day of October, 1400, after he had lived about seventy two years. Thus writeth Bale out of Leland, Chaucerus ad Canos devenit, sensitque Senectutem mor∣bum esse; & dum Causas suas Londini curaret, &c. Chaucer lived till he was an old man, and found old Age to be grievous; and whilst he followed his Causes at London, he died, and was buried at Westminster.

The old Verses which were written on his Grave at the first, were these;

Galfridus Chaucer, Vates & Fama Poesis, Maternae haec sacra sum tumulatus humo.

Thomas Occleue, or Okelefe, of the Office of the Privy Seal, sometime Chaucer's Scholar, for the

love he bore to the said Geoffrey his Master, caused his Picture to be truly drawn in his Book, De Re∣gimine Principis, dedicated to Henry the Fifth; ac∣cording to which, that his Picture drawn upon his Monument was made, as also the Monument it self, at the Cost and Charges of Nicolas Brigham Gentleman, Anno 1555. who buried his Daughter Rachel, a Child of four years of Age, near to the Tomb of this old Poet, the 21th. of June 1557. Such was his Love to the Muses; and on his Tomb these Verses were inscribed:

Qui fuit Anglorum Vates ter maximus olim, Galfridus Chaucer, conditur hoc Tumulo, Annum si quaer as Domini, si tempor a Mortis, Ecce notae subsunt, quae tibi cuncta notant; 25 Octobris 1400.

Aerumnarum requies Mors. N. Brigham hos fecit Musarum nomine sumptus.

About the Ledge of the Tomb these Verses were written;

Si rogitas quis eram, forsante Fama docebit, Quod si Fama negat, Mundi quia Gloria transit, Haec Monumenta lege.

The foresaid Thomas Occleve, under the Picture of Chaucer, had these Verses:

Although his Life be queint, the resemblance Of him that hath in me so fresh liveliness, That to put other men in remembrance Of his Person I have here the likeness Do make, to the end in Soothfastness,

That they that of him have lost thought and mind, By this peniture may again him find.

In his foresaid Book, De Regimine Principis, he thus writes of him:

But welaway is mine heart wo, That the honour of English Tongue is dead; Of which I wont was counsaile haue and reed: O Master dere, and Fadre reuerent: My Master Chaucer Floure of Eloquence, Mirror of fructuous entendement: O vniuersal fadre of Science: Alas that thou thine excellent Prudence In thy Bed mortal mightest not bequeath. What eyl'd Death, alas why would she the sle? O Death, thou didst not harm singler in slaugh∣ter of him, But all the Land it smerteth; But natheless yet hast thou no power his name slee, But his vertue asterteth Unslain fro thee; which ay us lifely herteth, With Books of his ornat enditing, That is to all this Land enlumining.

In another place of his said Book, he writes thus;

Alas my worthy Maister honourable, This Land's very Treasure and Richess! Death by thy Death hath harm irreparable Unto us done: her vengeable duress Dispoiled hath this Land of the sweetness Of Rhetorige; for unto Tullius Was never man so like among us:

Also who was here in Philosophy To Aristotle, in our Tongue, but thee? The Steps of Virgil in Poesie, Thou suedst eken men know well enough, What combre world that thee my Master slough Would I slaine were.

John Lidgate likewise in his Prologue of Bocchas, of the Fall of Princes, by him translated, saith thus in his Commendation:

My Master Chaucer, with his fresh Comedies, Is dead alas, chief Poet of Brittaine, That whilom made full pitous Tradgedies, The faule of Princes he did complaine, As he that was of making Soveraine; Whom all this Land should of right preferre Sith of our Language he was the load-sterre.

Also in his Book which he writeth of the Birth of the Virgin Mary, he hath these Verses.

And eke my Master Chaucer now is in grave, The noble Rhetore, Poet of Britaine, That worthy was the Laurel to have Of Poetry, and the Palm attaine, That made first to distill and raine The Gold dew drops of Speech and Eloquence, Into our Tongue through his Eloquence.

That excellent and learned Scottish Poet Gawyne Dowglas, Bishop of Dunkold, in the Preface of Vir∣gil's Eneados, turned into Scottish Verse, doth thus speak of Chaucer;

Venerable Chaucer, principal Poet without pere, Heavenly Trumpet, orloge, and regulere, In Eloquence, Baulme, Conduct, and Dyal, Milkie Fountaine, Cleare Strand, and Rose Ryal, Of fresh endite through Albion Island brayed In his Legend of Noble Ladies sayed.

And as for men of latter time, Mr. Ascham and Mr. Spenser have delivered most worthy Testimo∣nies of their approving of him. Mr. Ascham, in one place calleth him English Homer, and makes no doubt to say, that he valueth his Authority of as high estimation as he did either Sophocles or Eu∣ripides in Greek. And in another place, where he declareth his Opinion of English Versifying, he useth these Words; Chaucer and Petrark those two worthy Wits, deserve just praise. And last of all, in his Discourse of Germany, he putteth him nothing behind either Thucydides or Homer, for his lively Descriptions of Site of Places, and Na∣ture of Persons, both in outward Shape of Body, and inward Disposition of Mind; adding this withal, That not the proudest that hath written in any Tongue whatsoever, for his time hath out∣stript him.

Mr. Spenser in his first Eglogue of his Shepherds Kalendar, calleth him Tityrus, the God of Shep∣herds, comparing him to the worthiness of the Roman Tityrus, Virgil. In his Fairy Queen, in his Discourse of Friendship, as thinking himself most worthy to be Chaucer's friend, for his like natural disposition that Chaucer had; he writes, That none that lived with him, nor none that came after

him, durst presume to revive Chaucer's lost labours in that imperfect Tale of the Squire, but only himself: which he had not done, had he not felt (as he saith) the infusion of Chaucer's own sweet Spirit surviving within him. And a little before, he calls him the most Renowned and Heroical Poet, and his Writings the Works of Heaven∣ly Wit; concluding his commendation in this manner:

Dan Chaucer well of English undefiled, On Fames eternal Bead-roll worthy to be filed; I follow here the footing of thy feet, That with thy meaning so I may the rather meet.

Mr. Cambden, reaching one hand to Mr. Ascham, and the other to Mr. Spenser, and so drawing them together, uttereth of him these words, De Homero nostro Anglico illud vere asseram, quod de Homero eru∣ditus ille Italus dixit.

—Hic ille est, cujus de gurgite sacro, Combibit arcanos vatum omnis turba furores.

The deservingly honoured Sir Philip Sidney, in his Defence Poesie, thus writeth of him, Chau∣cer undoubtedly did excellently in his Troylus and Crescid, of whom truly I know not whether to marvel more, either that he in that misty time could see so clearly, or we in this clear age walk so stumblingly after him. And Doctor Heylin, in his elaborate Description of the World, ranketh him in the first place of our chiefest Poets. Seeing there∣fore

that both old and new Writers have carried this reverend conceit of him, and openly declared the same by writing, let us conclude with Horace in the eighth Ode of his fourth Book;

Dignum Laudi causa vetat mori.

The Works of this famous Poet, were partly published in Print by William Caxton, Mercer, that first brought the incomparable Art of Printing into England, which was in the Reign of King Henry the Sixth. Afterward encreased by William Thinne, Esq in the time of King Henry the Eighth. Afterwards, in the year 1561. in the Reign of Queen Elizabeth, Corrected and En∣creased by John Stow; And a fourth time, with many Amendments, and an Explanation of the old and obscure Words, by Mr. Thomas Speight, in Anno 1597. Yet is he said to have written many considerable Poems, which are not in his publish'd Works, besides the Squires Tale, which is said to be compleat in Arundel-house Library.