152 Review of the Temple, 8fc. by George Herbert. 



Soraetiraes he indulges in a conceit, as, respecting the third glass of wine, 



he says. 



It is most just to throw that on the ground 



Which would throw me there, if I keep the round.— p. 2. 



His conceits are occasionally forced, as. 



Since hlood is fittest, Lord, to write 

 Thy sorrows in, and bloody fight ; 

 My heart hath store ; write there, where in 

 One box doth lie both ink and sin. — p. 32. 



Or, 



The cross taught all wood to resound his name. 

 Or, 



They gave me vinegar mingled with gall. 

 But more with malice. — p. 27. 



Sometimes his conceits are mean, as, 



Arise, arise : 

 And with his burial linen dry thine eyes. 

 Christ left his grave-clothes, that we might, when grief 

 Draws tears, or blood, not want a handkerchief. — p. 114. 



Often, however, his conceits are better imagined and very well introduced, 



thus : 



The Sundays of man's life 



Threaded together on time's string, 

 Make bracelets to adorn the wife 



Of the eternal, glorious King. — p. 73. 



He does not, however, on the whole, make so much of these licences as he 

 might have done ; their management was perfected by Cowley, and very 

 happily carried on by some of the poets of the succeeding century. One 

 of the most beautiful instances of a conceit which we remember to have 

 met with occurs in the epitaph on Samuel Bolton, by Standish, 1654, and 

 is so little known that we are tempted to transcribe it. 



Stay, reader, and bestow a tear. 



On this dusty, fruitful bed. 

 The spring will then dwell always here. 



And violets ne'er hang the head. 

 Pray the earth may lightly press 



Her entrusted urn below. 

 May the same prayer thy reliques bless. 



When they rest as his do now.* 



Herbert sometimes compares things incomparable, which do not admit 

 of comparison, as, 



did the ointment prize, 



Not half so sweet as my sweet sacrifice. — p. 19. 



* Clark's Lives, p. 45, folio 1683. 



