THE COMPLETE ANGLER. 113 



What ! Prayer by the Book ? and Common 9 Yes ! why not ? 



The spirit of grace 

 And supplication 

 Is not left free alone 



For time and place, 



But manner too : to read or speak by rote, 

 Is all alike to him, that prays 

 In 's heart, what with his mouth he says. 



They that in private, by themselves alone, 



Do pray, may take 

 What liberty tliey please, 

 In choosing of the ways 



Wherein to make 



Their soul's most intimate affections known 

 To Him that sees in secret, when 

 They're most conceal'd from other men. 



But he that unto others leads the way 



In public prayer, 

 Should do it so 

 As all that hear may know 



They need not fear 



To tune their hearts unto his tongue, and say 

 Amen; not doubt they were betray 'd 

 To blaspheme, when they meant to have pray'd. 



Devotion will add life unto the letter : 



And why should not 

 That which authority 

 Prescribes, esteemed be 



Advantage got ? 



If the prayer be good, the commoner the better ; 

 Prayer in the Church's words, as well 

 As sense, of all prayers bears the bell. . Cii. HARVIE. 



And now, scholar, I think it will be time to repair to our 

 angle rods, which we left in the water to fish for themselves; 

 and you shall choose which shall be yours ; and it is an even 

 lay, one of them catches. 



And, let me tell you, this kind of fishing with a dead rod, 

 and laying night hooks, are like putting money to use ; for they 

 both work for the owners when they do nothing but sleep, or 

 eat, or rejoice, as you know we have done this last hour, and 

 sat as quietly and as free from cares under this sycamore, as 

 Virgil's Tityrus and his Melibceus did under their broad beech 

 tree. No life, my honest scholar, no life so happy and so pleasant 

 as the life of a well governed angler : for when the lawyer is 

 swallowed up with business, and the statesman is preventing or 

 contriving plots, then we sit on cowslip banks, hear the birds 



H 



