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George Wither in Prison

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 December 2020

J. Milton French
J. Milton French*
Affiliation:
Dartmouth College
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Extract

George Wither was first imprisoned in 1614 for his Abuses Stript and Whipt. But he had barely escaped a similar fate a few years before as a result of an earlier edition of the same work. While in prison in 1614, he expressed his gratitude to the Princess Elizabeth for her intervention in his behalf on that earlier occasion:

      For once I stood accus'd for this before,
      As I remember I so long agon,
      Snng [sic] Thame, and Rhynes Epithalamion.
      When SHE that from thy Royal selfe deriues,
      Those gracious vertues that best Title giues.
      ........................................
      Daign'd in her great-good nature to encline
      Her gentle eare to such a cause as mine;
      And which is more, vouchsaf't her word to cleare
      Me from all dangers (if there any were).

Type
Research Article
Information
PMLA , Volume 45 , Issue 4 , December 1930 , pp. 959 - 966
Copyright
Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1930

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References

1 In support of 1611 as the date of the first edition, see Frank Sidgwick, Poetry of George Wither, London, 1902, II, 216–7; and J. M. French, George Wither (an unpublished dissertation in the Harvard College Library), 1928, pp. 30–35.

2 Wither, Satyre, 1614, sigs. E8v-F.

3 Acts of the Privy Council of England, 1613–14, London, 1921, pp. 391, 491, 498, 521.

4 Taylor, Aqua-Musae, 1644, p. 8.

5 Emblems, 1634–5, bk. IV, dedication to Philip, Earl of Pembroke.

6 Wither's own dating of it as 1618 (Ecchoes from the Sixth Trumpet, 1666, p. 47) probably refers to the composition rather than the publication of the poem.

7 Calendar of State Papers, Domestic Series, 1619–23, p. 268.

8 Willmott's Lives of the Sacred Poets, 1834, p. 342, taken on the authority of J. P. Collier from the Register of the Privy Council.

9 Motto, 1621, sig. E.

10 Court and Times of James I, London, 1849, II, 266.

11 Calendar of State Papers, Domestic Series, 1619–23, pp. 274–5.

12 Scholar's Purgatory, n. d., p. 3.

13 Lives of the Sacred Poets, p. 342.

14 Britain's Remembrancer, 1628, Conclusion.

15 William Browne's Poems [ed. Goodwin in the “Muses Library”], London, n.d., II, 3, 12.

16 Journals of the House of Commons, I, 792 (22 May, 1624).

17 Calendar of State Papers, Domestic Series, 1623–5, p. 143.

18 Cf. his Se Defendendo (n.d.) and Mercurius Rusticus (n.d.), passim.

19 A Catalogue of the Pamphlets .... collected by George Thomason, London, 1908, under date 13 April, 1646.

20 Journals, IV, 505 (10 April, 1646); and IV, 639–640 (7 August, 1646).

21 Ibid., V, 337.

22 Proclamation, 1662, p. 5.

23 Memorandum to London, 1665, p. 35.

24 Prisoner's Plea, 1661, p. 14.

25 Triple Paradox, 1661, p. 9.

26 Seasonable Memorandum, 1665, p. 33. See also Prisoner's Plea, 1661, pp. 5–8; Proclamation, 1662, pp. 34–37.

27 Improvement of Imprisonment, 1661, p. 10.

28 Calendar of State Papers, Domestic Series, 1661–2, p. 64.

29 Improvement of Imprisonment, 1661, pp. 11, 26, 27, 59, 62, 95, 107, 116, 120; Three Private Meditations, 1661, pp. 17, 19; Verses to the King's Majesty (dated 22 March, 1662).

30 Journals, VIII, 394.

31 Ibid., 395.

32 Proclamation, 1662, p. 71.

33 Journals, VIII, 469.

34 Ibid., VIII, 533 (27 July, 1663).

35 Calendar of State Papers, Domestic Series, 1665–6, p. 569.