FullReads

In places far or near,
Or famous, or obscure,
Where wholsom is the air,
Or where the most impure,
All times, and every where,
The muse is still in ure.

Drayton.

Of eight, which is the usual measure for short poems,

And may at last my weary age
Find out the peaceful hermitage,
The hairy gown, and mossy cell,
Where I may sit, and nightly spell
Of ev’ry star the sky doth shew,
And ev’ry herb that sips the dew.

Milton.

Of ten, which is the common measure of heroick and tragick poetry,

Full in the midst of this created space,
Betwixt heav’n, earth, and skies, there stands a place
Confining on all three; with triple bound;
Whence all things, though remote, are view’d around,
And thither bring their undulating sound.
The palace of loud Fame, her seat of pow’r,
Plac’d on the summit of a lofty tow’r;
A thousand winding entries long and wide
Receive of fresh reports a flowing tide.
A thousand crannies in the walls are made;
Nor gate nor bars exclude the busy trade.
Tis built of brass, the better to diffuse
The spreading sounds, and multiply the news;
Where echoes in repeated echoes play:
A mart for ever full; and open night and day.
Nor silence is within, nor voice express,
But a deaf noise of sounds that never cease;
Confus’d and chiding, like the hollow roar
Of tides, receding from th’ insulted shore;
Or like the broken thunder heard from far,
When Jove to distance drives the rolling war.
The courts are fill’d with a tumultuous din,
Of crouds, or issuing forth, or ent’ring in:
A thorough-fare of news; where some devise
Things never heard, some mingle truth with lies:
The troubled air with empty sounds they beat,
Intent to hear, and eager to repeat.

Dryden.

In all these measures the accents are to be placed on even syllables; and every line considered by itself is more harmonious, as this rule is more strictly observed. The variations necessary to pleasure belong to the art of poetry, not the rules of grammar.

Our trochaick measures are Of three syllables,

Here we may
Think and pray,
Before death
Stops our breath:
Other joys
Are but toys.

Walton’s Angler.

Of five,

In the days of old,
Stories plainly told,
Lovers felt annoy.

Old Ballad.

Of seven,

Fairest piece of well form’d earth,
Urge not thus your haughty birth.

Waller.

In these measures the accent is to be placed on the odd syllables.

These are the measures which are now in use, and above the rest those of seven, eight, and ten syllables. Our ancient poets wrote verses sometimes of twelve syllables, as Drayton’s Polyolbion.

Of all the Cambrian shires their heads that bear so high,
And farth’st survey their soils with an ambitious eye,
Mervinia for her hills, as for their matchless crouds,
The nearest that are said to kiss the wand’ring clouds,
Especial audience craves, offended with the throng,
That she of all the rest neglected was so long;
Alledging for herself, when, through the Saxons’ pride,
The godlike race of Brute to Severn’s setting side
Were cruelly inforc’d, her mountains did relieve
Those whom devouring war else every where did grieve.
And when all Wales beside (by fortune or by might)
Unto her ancient foe resign’d her ancient right,
A constant maiden still she only did remain,
The last her genuine laws which stoutly did retain.
And as each one is prais’d for her peculiar things;
So only she is rich, in mountains, meres and springs,
And holds herself as great in her superfluous waste,
As others by their towns, and fruitful tillage grac’d.