Part 40

P. 224. Translations from Severinus.

Dr. Grosart hunted out an obscure Neapolitan, Marcus Aurelius Severino, and ascribed to him the originals of these translations. They are of course from the De Consolatione Philosophiae of Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius, and are a continuation of the pieces already printed in Olor Iscanus (pp. 125-143).

P. 245. Pious Thoughts and Ejaculations.

These are much in the vein of Silex Scintillans. They probably belong to various dates later than 1655, when the second part of that collection appeared. The Nativity (p. 259) is dated 1656, and The True Christmas (p. 261) was apparently written after the Restoration.

P. 261. The True Christmas.

Vaughan was no Puritan; cf. his lines on Christ's Nativity (vol. i., p. 107)--

"Alas, my God! Thy birth now here Must not be numbered in the year,"

but he was not much in sympathy with the ideals of the Restoration either; cf. the passage on "our unjust ways" in Daphnis (p. 284).

P. 267. De Salmone.

On Thomas Powell, cf. p. 57, note.

P. 272. The Bee.

Hilarion's servant, the sage crow. There seems to be some confusion between Hilarion, an obscure fourth-century Abbot, and Paul the Hermit, of whom it is related in his Life by S. Jerome that for sixty years he was daily provided with half a loaf of bread by a crow.

P. 278. Daphnis.

The subject of the Eclogue appears to be Vaughan's brother Thomas, who died 27th February, 1666. On him see the Biographical Note (vol. ii., p. xxxiii).

true black Moors; an allusion, perhaps, to Thomas Vaughan's controversy with Henry More.

Old Amphion; perhaps Matthew Herbert, on whom see note to p. 158.

The Isis and the prouder Thames. Thomas Vaughan was buried at Albury, near Oxford.

Noble Murray. Thomas Vaughan's patron, himself a poet and alchemist, Sir Robert Murray, Secretary of State for Scotland. His poems have been collected by the Hunterian Club.

FRAGMENTS AND TRANSLATIONS.

The larger number of the verses in this section are translated quotations scattered through Vaughan's prose-pamphlets. Dr. Grosart identified some of the originals; I have added a few others; but the larger number remain obscure and are hardly worth spending much labour upon. The title-pages of the pamphlets will be found in the Bibliography (vol. ii., p. lvii).

P. 289. From Eucharistica Oxoniensia.

I have already, in the Biographical Note (vol. ii., p. xxviii), given reasons for doubting whether this poem is by the Silurist. It was first printed as his by Dr. Grosart. Charles the First was in Scotland, trying to settle his differences with the Scots, during the closing months of 1641.

P. 291. Translations from Plutarch and Maximus Tyrius.

These, together with a translation of Guevara's De vitae rusticae laudibus, were appended to the Olor Iscanus. Vaughan did not translate directly from the Greek, but from a Latin version published in 1613-14 amongst some tracts by John Reynolds, Lecturer in Greek at, and afterwards President of Corpus Christi College, Oxford.

P. 294. From the Mount of Olives.

A volume of Devotions published by Vaughan in 1652. The preface, dated 1st October, 1651, is addressed to Sir Charles Egerton, Knight, and in it Vaughan speaks of "that near relation by which my dearest friend lays claim to your person." It is impossible to say who is the "dearest friend" referred to. The Flores Solitudinis (1654) is also dedicated to Sir Charles Egerton. He was probably of Staffordshire. Dr. Grosart (II. xxxiii) states that in Hanbury Church, co. Stafford, is a monument Caroli Egertoni Equitis Aurati, who died 1662. Perhaps therefore he was connected with Vaughan's wife's family, the Wises of Staffordshire.

P. 298. From Man in Glory.

This translation from a work attributed to St. Anselm and published as his in 1639 is appended to the Mount of Olives.