BIBLIOGKAPHICAL PREFACE. Ixxiii 



reader to say Amen. Blessed is the man in whose 

 spirit there is no guile, Ps. xxxii., 2." 



His will, in which he declares himself to be in his 

 "neintyeth yeare" and "in perfect memory, for wich 

 praysed be God," was completed on the 24th of October, 

 1683, and on the 15th of the December following he died. 

 No account has been given of his last moments, but doubtless 

 the end of the perfect and upright man was peace. "The 

 morning sunshine," says Mr. Bowles, '* falls directly on the 

 marble slab which covers his remains, reminding us of the 

 mornings when he was for so many years up and abroad 

 with his angle on the banks of the neighboring stream," 

 and, we may add, of the cheerful piety which filled his 

 heart with love to God and man. 



It would be indeed unnecessary, and, therefore, imperti- 

 nent, to utter my weak praises of The Complete Angler ; 

 yet the reader will allow^ his attention to the fact, that it 

 was written during the times of fiercest commotion and 

 violent change in Church and State, yet contains scarcely 

 a remote allusion to the bitter polemics of the day, but 

 fiows on like a gentle brook, itself a parable of the quiet 

 spirit which it teaches ; nor should we overlook the proof 

 of the principal trait in Walton's character, as given by 

 his preservation of his own simple, home-bred English 

 style, notwithstanding his enlarged acquaintance with 

 books and learned men, which w^ould have tempted most 

 men of so slender an education originally, to become af- 

 fected and pedantic. His language has blemishes, no 

 doubt, but what would be awkwardness in others has in 

 him a graceful quaintness, nor could a fault be amended 

 without marring a beauty. As a piece of pastoral writing, 

 his Angler is in perfect keeping throughout, perhaps not 

 equalled, certainly never excelled, by poetry or prose, 

 ancient or modern. It is in every respect an original 

 work,* though it has been the pattern which many since 



* " This Art seems to have arrived at its highest Perfection at onre, and 



D 



