Here, wrapt in th' arms of quiet let me lie;
Quiet, companion of obfcurity!
Here let my life with as much filence flide,

As time, that measures it, does glide.
Nor let the breath of infamy, or fame,
From town to town-echo about my name.
Nor let my homely death embroider'd be
With fcutcheon or with elegy.

An old plebeian let me die,
Alas! all then are fuch as well as I.

To him, alas, to him, I fear,
The face of death will terrible appear;
Who, in his life flattering his fenfelefs pride,
By being known to all the world befide,
Does not himfelf, when he is dying, know,
Nor what he is, nor whither he's to go.

THE

IV.

OF AGRICULTURE.

HE first wish of Virgil (as you will find anon by his verfes) was to be a good philofopher; the fecond a good hufbandman: and God (whom he seemed to underftand better than most of the moft learned heathens) dealt with him, juft as he did with Solomon; because he prayed for wifdom in the first place, he added all things elfe, which were fubordinately to be defired. He made him one of the best philofophers, and beft hufbandmen; and, to adorn and communicate both thofe faculties, the beft poet: he made him, befides all this, a rich man, and a man who defired to be no richer

“O fortunatus nimium, & bona qui fua novit !"

To be a husbandman, is but a retreat from the city; to be a philofopher, from the world; or rather, a retreat from the world, as it is man's, into the world, as it is God's.]

But, fince nature denies to molt men the capacity or appetite, and fortune allows but to a very few the opportunities or poffibility, of applying themfelves wholly to philofophy, the best mixture of human affairs that we can make, are the employments of a country life. It is, as Columella calls it, "Res fine dubitatione proxima, & quafi confanguinea fapientiæ," the nearest neighbour, or rather next in kindred, to philofophy. Varro fays, the principles of it are the fame which Eius made to be the principles of all nature, Earth, Water, Air, and the Sun. It does certainly comprehend more parts of philofophy, than any one profeflion, art, or fcience, in the world befides: and therefore Cicero fays +, the pleafures of a hufbandman, "mihi ad fapientis vitam "proxime videntur accedere," come very nigh to thofe of a philofopher. There is no other fort of life that affords fo many branches of praife to a panegyrift: The utility of it to a man's felf; the ufefulness, or rather neceffity, of it to all the reft of mankind; the innocence, the pleasure, the antiquity, the dignity.

The Utility (I mean plainly the lucre of it) is not fo great, now in our nation, as arifes from merchandise and the trading of the city, from whence many of the beft eftates and chief honours of the kingdom are derived: we have no men now fetched from the plough to be made lords, as they were in Rome to I made confuls and dictators; the reafon of which I conceive to be from an evil cuftom, now grown as strong

among us as if it were a law, which is, that no men put their children to be bred-up apprentices in agriculture, as in other trades, but fuch who are fo poor, that when they come to be men, they have not wherewithal to fet up in it, and fo can only farm some imall parcel of ground, the rent of which devours all but the bare fubfiftence of the tenant: whilft they who are proprietors of the land are either too proud, or, for want of that kind of education, too ignorant, to improve their eftates, though the means of doing it be as cafy and certain in this, as in any other track of commerce. If there were always two or three thoufand youths, for feven or eight years, bound to this profeffion, that they might learn the whole art of it, and afterwards be enabled to be mafters in it, by a moderate ftock; I cannot doubt but that we fhould fee as many aldermen's eftates made in the country, as now we do out of all kind of merchandizing in the city. There are as many ways to be rich, and, which is better, there is no poffibility to be poor, without fuch negligence as can neither have excufe nor pity; for a little ground will without question feed a little family, and the fuperfluities of life (which are now in fome cafes by custom made almoft neceflary) must be fupplied out of the fuperabundance of ar and induftry, or contemned by as great a degree of philofophy.

As for the Neceffry or this art, it is evident enough, fince this can live without all others, and no one other without this. This is like fpeech, without which the fociety of men cannot be preferved: the others like figures and tropes of speech, which ferve only to adorn it. Many nations have lived, and fome do ftill, without any art but this: not fo elegantly, I confefs, but ftill they live; and almost all the other arts, which are here practifed, are beholden to this for most of their materials.

The Innocence of this life is the next thing for which I commend it; and if hufbandmen preferve not that, they are much to blame, for no men are fo free from the ten ptations of iniquity. They live by what they can get by induftry from the earth; and others, by what they can catch by craft from men. They live upon an estate given them by their mother; and others, upon an eftate cheated from their brethren. They live, like theep and kine, by the allowances of nature; and others, like wolves and foxes, by the acquisitions of rapine. And, I hope, I may affirm (without any offence to the great) that sheep and kine are very ufeful, and that wolves and foxes are pernicious creatures. They are, without difpute, of all men the moft quiet, and least apt to be inflamed to the disturbance of the commonwealth: their manner of life inclines them, and intereft binds them, to love peace: in our late mad and miferable civil wars, all other trades, even to the meancit, fet forth whole troops, and raised up fome great commanders, who became famous and mighty for the mischiefs they had done: but I do not remember the name of any one hufbandman, who had fo confiderable a fhare in the twenty years ruin of his country, as to deferve the curfes of his countrymen.

And if great delights be joined with fo much innocence, I think it is ill done of men, not to take them here, where they are fo tame, and ready at hand, rather than hunt for them in courts and cities, where they are fo wild, and the chace so troublesome and dangerous.

We are here among the vaft and noble scenes of nature; we are there among the pitiful fhifts of policy: we walk here in the light and open ways of the divine bounty; we grope there in the dark and confufed labyrinths of human malice: our fenfes are here feafted with the clear and genuine taste of their objects; which are all fophifticated there, and for the moft part overwhelmed with their contraries. Here pleasure looks, methinks, like a beautiful, conftant, and modeft wife; it is there an impudent, fickle, and painted harlot. Here is harmlefs and cheap plenty; there guilty and expenceful luxury.

I hall only instance in one delight more, the most natural and beft-natured of all others, a perpetual companion of the hufbandman; and that is, the fatisfaction of look. ing round about him, and feeing nothing but the effects and improvements of his own art and diligence; to be always gathering of fome fruits of it, and at the fame time to behold others ripening, and others budding: to fee all his fields and gardens

covered with the beanteous creatures of his own induftry; and to fee, like God, that all his works are good:

men

"Hinc atque hinc glomerantur Oreades; ipfi
"Agricolæ tacitum pertentant gaudia pectus ."

On his heart-strings a fecret joy does strike.

The Antiquity of his art is certainly not to be contested by any other. The three first the world, were a gardener, a ploughman, and a grazier, and if any man objec that the fecond of thefe was a murtherer, I detire he would confider, that as foon as he was fo, he quitted our profeffion, and turned builder. It is for this reafon, I fuppofe, that Ecclefiafticus forbids us to hate hufbandry; becaufe," fays he, "the Moft High "has created it." We are all born to this art, and taught by nature to nourish our bodies by the fame earth out of which they were made, and to which they must return, and pay at last for their fuftenance.

*

Behold the original and primitive nobility of all thofe great perfons, who are too proud now, not only to till the ground, but almost to tread upon it. We may talk what we pleafe of lilies, and lions rampant, and fpread-eagles, in fields d'or or d'argent; but, if heraldry were guided by reafon, a plough in a field arable would be the moit noble and

ancient arms.

All thefe confiderations make me fall into the wonder and complaint of Columella, how it should come to pass that all arts or fciences (for the difpute, which is an art, and which a fcience, does not belong to the curiofity of us hufbandmen) metaphyfic, phyfic, morality, mathematics, logic, rhetoric, &c. which are all, I grant, good and ufeful faculties (except only metaphyfic, which I do not know whether it be any thing or no) but even vaulting, fencing, dancing, attiring, cookery, carving, and fuchlike vanities, fhould all have public fchools and mafters; and yet that we should never fee or hear of any man, who took upon him the profeffion of teaching this fo pleasant, fo virtuous, fo profitable, fo honourable, fo neceffary art.

A man would think, when he is in ferious humour, that it were but a vain, irrational, and ridiculous thing for a great company of men and women to run up and down in a room together, in a hundred feveral poftures and figures, to no purpofe, and with no defign; and therefore dancing was invented firft, and only practifed anciently, in the ceremonies of the heathen religion, which confifted all in mommery and madaefs; the latter being the chief glory of the worthip, and accounted diviae infpiration: this, I fay, a fevere man would think; though I dare not determine fo far against fo cultomary a part, now, of good-breeding. And yet, who is there among our gentry, that does not entertain a dancing-mafter for his children, as foon as they are able to walk? But, did ever any father provide a tutor for his fon, to inftruct him betimes in the nature and improvements of that land which he intended to leave him? That is at leaft a fuperfluity, and this a defect, in our manner of education; and therefore I could wish (but cannot in thefe times much hope to fee it) that one college in each univerfity were erected, and appropriated to this ftudy, as well as there are to medicine and the civil law: there would be no need of making a body of fcholars and fellows, with certain endowments, as in other colleges; it would fuffice, if, after the manner of halls in Oxford, there were only four profeffors conftituted (for it would be too much work for only one mafter, or principal, as they call him there) to teach thefe four parts of it: Firit, Aration, and ali things relating to it. Secondly, Pafturage. Thirdly, Gardens, Orchards, Vineyards, and Woods Fourthly, all parts of Rural Oeconomy; which would contain the government of Bees, Swine, Poultry, Decoys, Ponds, &c. and all that which Varro calls "villaticas paftiones," together with the fports of the field (which ought to be looked upon not only as pleasures, but as parts of houfe-keeping), and the domeftical confervation and ufes of all that is brought in by induftry abroad. The bufinefs of thefe profeffors should not be, as is commonly practifed in other arts, only to read. pompous and + Chap. vii. 15.

Virg. Æn. i. 504, &c.

fuperficial lectures, cut of Virgil's Georgics, Pliny, Varro, or Columella; but to inftruc their pupils in the whole method and courfe of this ftudy, which might be run through perhaps with diligence in a year or two; and the continual fucceffion of scholars, upon a moderate taxation for their diet, lodging, and learning, would be a fufficient conftant revenue for maintenance of the house and the profeffors, who should be men not chofen for the oftentation of critical literatare, but for folid and experimental knowledge of the things they teach; fuch men, fo induftrious and public-fpirited, as I conceive Mr. Hartlib to be, if the gentleman be yet alive: but it is needlefs to fpeak further of my thoughts of this defign, unless the prefent difpofition of the age allowed more probability of bringing it into execution. What I have further to fay of the country life, shall be borrowed from the poets, who were always the moft faithful and affectionate friends to it. Poetry was born among the shepherds.

"Nefcio quâ natale folum dulcedine Mufas

"Ducit, & immemores non finit effe fui †.”
The Mufes ftill love their own native place;
"T has fecret charms, which nothing can deface.

The truth is, no other place is proper for their work; one might as well undertake to dance in a crowd, as to make good verfes in the midst of noife and tumult.

As well might corn, as verfe, in cities grow;
In vain the thanklefs glebe we plow and fow:
Against th' unnatural foil in vain we strive;

'Tis not a ground, in which thefe plants will thrive.

It will bear nothing but the nettles or thorns of fatire, which grow most naturally in the worst earth; and therefore almoft all poets, except thofe who were not able to cat bread without the bounty of great men, that is, without what they could get by flattering of them, have not only withdrawn themfelves from the vices and vanities of the grand world,

pariter vitiifque jocífque Altius humanis exeruere caput ‡,

into the innocent happinefs of a retired life; but have commended and adorned nothing fo much by their ever-living poems. Hefiod was the first or fecond poet in the world that remains yet extant (if Homer, as fome think, preceded him, but I rather believe they were contemporaries); and he is the first writer too of the art of husbandry: "he "has contributed (fays Columella) not a little to our profeffion;" I fuppofe, he means not a little honour, for the matter of his inftruétions is not very important; his great antiquity is visible through the gravity and fimplicity of his ftyle. The moft acute of all his fayings concerns our purpofe very much, and is couched in the reverend obfcurity of an oracle. In abe, The half is more than the whole. The occafion of the fpeech is this; his brother Perfeus had, by corrupting fome great men, (Basis Sweopayer, great bribe-eaters he calls them, gotten from him the half of his eftate. It is no matter (fays he); they have not done me fo much prejudice as they imagine: Nim, leaon, Y. T. 7.

Unhappy they, to whom God has not reveal'd,
By a trong light which mult their fenie controle,
That half a great eflate's more than the whole:
Unhappy, from whom ftill conceal'd does lie
Of roots and herbs the wholefome luxury.

* A gentleman, of whom it may be enough to fay, that he had the honour to live in the friendship of Mede and Mion. The former of the great men addreffed fome letters to him, and the latter, his

"Tractate on Education." HURD.

Ovid. 1 Ep. cx Pont. iii. 35.

Ovid. Faft. i. 300.

This I conceive to have been honeft Hefiod's meaning. From Homer we must not expect much concerning our affairs. He was blind, and could neither work in the country, nor enjoy the pleasures of it; his helpless poverty was likelieft to be fuftained in the richest places; he was to delight the Grecians with fine tales of the wars, and adventures of their ancestors; his fubject removed him from all commerce with us, and yet, methinks, he made a fhift to fhew his good-will a little. For, though he could do us no honour in the perfon of his hero Ulyffes (much lefs of Achilles), because his whole time was confumed in wars and voyages; yet he makes his father Laertes a gardener all that while, and feeking his confolation for the absence of his fon in the pleasure of planting and even dunging his own grounds. Ye fee he did not contemn us peafants; nay, fo far was he from that infolence, that he always ftyles Eumæus, who kept the hogs, with wonderful respect, dar pogor, the divine fwineherd: he could have no more for Menelaus or Agamemnon. And Theocritus (a very ancient poet, but he was one of our own tribe, for he wrote nothing but paftorals) gave the fame epithet to an husbandman,

done

ἀμείβεῖο δῖος ἀγρώτης *

These were

The divine hufbandman replied to Herculs, who was but os, himself. civil Greeks, and who understood the dignity of our calling! Among the Romans we have, in the first place, our truly-divine Virgil, who, though by the favour of Mecenas and Auguftus he might have been one of the chief men of Rome, yet chofe rather to employ much of his time in the exercife, and much of his immortal wit in the praife and inftructions, of a ruftic life; who, though he had written before whole books of paftorals and georgics, could not abftain in his great and imperial poem from defcribing Evander, one of his belt princes, as living juft after the homely manner of an ordinary countryman. He feats him in a throne of maple, and lays him but upon a bear's-fkin; the kine and oxen ate lowing in his court-yard; the birds under the eaves of his window call him up in the morning; and when he goes abroad, only two dogs go along with him for his guard; at laft, when he brings Eneas into his royal cottage, he makes him fay this memorable compliment, greater than ever yet was fpoken at the Efcurial, the Louvre, or our Whitehall:

"Hæc (inquit) limina victor

"Alcides fubiit, hæc illum regia cepit:

"Aude, hofpes, contemnere opes: & te quoque dignum
"Finge Deo, rebúfque veni non afper egenis t."

This humble roof, this ruftic court (said he)

Receiv'd Alcides, crown'd with victory:

Scorn not, great gueft, the fteps where he has trod;
But contemn wealth, and imitate a God.

The rext man, whom we are much obliged to, both for his doctrine and example, is the next beft poet in the world to Virgil, his dear friend Horace; who, when Auguftus had defred Macenas to perfuade him to come and live domeftically and at the fame table with him, and to be fecretary of flate of the whole world under him, or rather jointly with him, for he fays, "ut nos in epiftolis fcribendis adjuvet," could not be tempted to forfake his Sabin, or Tiburtin manor, for fo rich and fo glorious a trouble. There was never, I think, fuch an example as this in the world, that he fhould have fo much moderation and courage as to refufe an offer of fuch greatnefs, and the emperor fo much generofity and good nature as not to be at all offended with his refufal, but to retain ftill the fame kindnefs, and exprefs it often to him in most friendly' and familiar letters, part of which are still extant. If I fhould produce all the paffages of this excellent author upon the feveral fubjects which I treat of in this book, I must