Henry Vaughan

“ It is always better to explain than to refute an error; and the nature of the Luciferian tradition of Thomas Vaughan is pretty clearly shown by the fact that it is not corroborated in a single particular by any of the new facts about him that have come to light since this probable date of its composition. [36] The fabricator put Thomas Vaughan's birth-place in Monmouth instead of Brecon, because he had never seen Dr. Grosart's Fuller Worthies Edition of Henry Vaughan. He makes no mention of any of the facts contained in Sloane MS. 1741, because that MS. was still unknown. ”

“ VAUGHAN, RICE (fl. 1650) , legal writer, was the son and heir of Henry Vaughan of Machynlleth, Montgomeryshire. He was admitted to Gray's Inn on 13 Aug. 1638 (Foster, Register of Admissions to Gray's Inn) . ”

“ Henry Vaughan, commonly known by his assumed name of the Silurist, was born at Newton, in Brecknockshire, in the year 1621. He received his academical education at Jesus College, Oxford, and afterwards settled in his native country, where he practised medicine, although he does not appear to have taken any degree in arts or medicine at the University. ”

“ The will of this Charles Vaughan has been abstracted by Mr. W. B. Rye (Genealogist, iii. 33) from the Hereford Will Office. It was made 9th April, 1707, and proved 29th May, 1707. The testator is described as of Skellrog, Llansanffread, and mention is made of his wife Margaret Powell, and of a son William. This William, therefore, and not a grandson of Henry Vaughan, may be the William Vaughan of Llansantffread, who married Mary Games of Tregaer (p. xxi) . Skellrog appears to have passed to another and probably elder son, Charles. ”

“ No English poet, unless it be Spenser, has a piety so simple and manly, so colored with mild thought, so free from emotional consciousness. The elect given over to continual polemics do not count Henry Vaughan as one of themselves. His double purpose is to make life pleasant to others and to praise God; and he considers that he is accomplishing it when he pens a compliment to the valley grass, or, like Coleridge, caresses in some affectionate strophes the much-abused little ass. ”

“ VAUGHAN, HENRY, ‘Silurist’ (1622–1695) , poet, was born at Newton-by-Usk in the parish of Llansaintffraed, Brecknockshire (Anthony à Wood MSS. Ff. 39, f. 216) . He and his twin-brother Thomas [q. v.] were born on 17 April 1622 (Sloane MS. 1741) . Their father, Thomas Vaughan (d. August 1658) , was the representative of an ancient and honourable Welsh family, the Vaughans of Tretower Castle, descended from Sir Roger Vaughan of Bredwardine, who had fallen at Agincourt. Vaughan's mother was Denys Gwillims, heiress of Newton. ”

“ Vaughan does not describe himself on any title-page as of Jesus College; nor does he ever speak of himself as an Oxford man. This omission is the more noticeable as he would naturally have done so in the lines Ad Posteros (vol. ii., p. 51) , and might well have done so in those On Sir Thomas Bodley's Library, the Author being then in Oxford (vol. ii., p. 197) .
(3) Anthony à Wood cannot be depended on. He describes Thomas Carew, for instance, as of C.C.C., whereas he was a most certainly of Merton. And there was another Henry Vaughan of Jesus, who may have been confused with the poet. ”

“ That title only fits a saint,
Whose free thoughts, far above restraint
And weighty cares, can gladly part
With house and lands, and leave the smart,
Litigious troubles and loud strife
Of this world for a better life.
He fears no cold nor heat to blast
His corn, for his accounts are cast;
He sues no man, nor stands in awe
Of the devouring courts of law ”

“ For each birth of thy Muse to after-times
Shall expiate for all this Age's crimes.
First shines thy Amoret, twice crown'd by thee,
Once by thy love, next by thy poetry;
Where thou the best of unions dost dispense,
Truth cloth'd in wit, and Love in innocence;
So that the muddy lover may learn here,
No fountains can be sweet that are not clear.
There Juvenal, by thee reviv'd, declares
How flat man's joys are, and how mean his cares ”

“ We do not know that Thomas Vaughan was ever in America, and there is the strong evidence of Anthony à Wood, who distinguishes between Eirenaeus and Eugenius, and who appears to have had information from Henry Vaughan himself. Mr. A. E. Waite argues against the identification on the ground that Eirenaeus Philalethes was a [lvi] "physical alchemist," whereas Thomas Vaughan's alchemy was spiritual and mystical. But we have Vaughan's authority for saying that he had pursued the physical alchemy also. [41] And he was clearly doing so when he wrote Sloane MS. 1741. ”

“ It seems likely that he fought on the king’s side in the Welsh campaign of 1645, and was present at the battle of Rowton Heath. In 1646 appeared Poems, with the Tenth Satyre of Juvenal Englished, by Henry Vaughan, Gent. The poems in this volume are chiefly addressed to “Amoret,” and the last is on Priory Grove, the home of the “matchless Orinda,” Mrs Katharine Philips. A second volume of secular verse, Olor Iscanus, which takes its name from the opening verses addressed to the Isca (Usk) , was published by a friend, probably Thomas Vaughan, without the author’s consent, in 1651. ”

“ This event is vouched for, not only by a written statement of Henry Vaughan (p. 114) , but also by the existence in a masonic triangle at Valetta of a magical talisman into which, when properly evoked, the spirit of Philalethes enters and records his glorious end for the edification of the Luciferians present [33] (p. 243) .
I fear that I have taken Miss Vaughan with undue seriousness. Her account of Thomas Vaughan is not only unsupported by direct evidence, [34] but much of it [xlviii] is of a character which we should not be justified in accepting, even were direct evidence forthcoming. ”

“ All cares; for they things competent and fit
For us foresee; besides, man is more dear
To them than to himself; we blindly here,
Led by the world and lust, in vain assay
To get us portions, wives and sons; but they
Already know all that we can intend,
And of our children's children see the end.
Yet that thou may'st have something to commend
[48] With thanks unto the gods for what they send;
Pray for a wise and knowing soul; a sad,
Discreet, true valour, that will scorn to add
A needless horror to thy death; that knows
'Tis but a debt which man to nature owes ”

“ But kick this dross: Parnassus' flow'ry brow
I'll give thee with my Tempe, and to boot
That horse which struck a fountain with his foot.
A bed of roses I'll provide for thee,
And crystal springs shall drop thee melody.
The breathing shades we'll haunt, where ev'ry leaf
Shall whisper us asleep, though thou art deaf.
Those waggish nymphs, too, which none ever yet
Durst make love to, we'll teach the loving fit ”

“ Wit's last edition is now i' th' press.
For thou hast drain'd invention, and he
That writes hereafter, doth but pillage thee.
But thou hast plots; and will not the Kirk strain
At the designs of such a tragic brain?
Will they themselves think safe, when they shall see
Thy most abominable policy?
Will not the Ears assemble, and think't fit
Their Synod fast and pray against thy wit?
But they'll not tire in such an idle quest;
Thou dost but kill, and circumvent in jest;
And when thy anger'd Muse swells to a blow
'Tis but for Field's, or Swansted's overthrow. ”

“ Oxon. iii. 725) he says that "Olor Iscanus sent me a catalogue of his brother's works." [xvii]
(a) THE VAUGHAN GENEALOGY.
Henry Vaughan's descent from the Vaughans of Tretower, County Brecon, has been accurately traced by Dr. Grosart and others. Little has been hitherto known about his immediate family. Theophilus Jones, in his History of Brecknockshire (1805-9) , ii. 544, says: "Henry Vaughan died in 1695, aged 75, [2] leaving by his first wife two sons and three daughters, and by his second a daughter Rachel, who married John Turberville. ”

“ All this is uncritical, but useful and proper on the part of the clerical brother, who writes very much as Lord Edward Herbert might be supposed to write for George under like conditions; for he knew, according to an ancient adage, that there is great folly in pointing out the shortcomings of a work of art to eyes uneducated to its beauties. It was just as well to insist disproportionately upon the principle at stake, that Henry Vaughan’s least book was unique and precious. ”

“ I hold it no man's prerogative to fire his own house. Thou seest how saucy I am grown, and it thou dost expect I should commend what is published, I must tell thee, I cry no Seville oranges. I will not say, Here is fine or cheap: that were an [56] injury to the verse itself, and to the effects it can produce. Read on, and thou wilt find thy spirit engaged: not by the deserts of what we call tolerable, but by the commands of a pen that is above it.
[57]
UPON THE MOST INGENIOUS PAIR OF TWINS, EUGENIUS PHILALETHES, AND THE AUTHOR OF THESE POEMS.
What planet rul'd your birth? ”

“ Of enlarg'd spirits, kind Heav'n's white decoys!
Who lives with you, lives like those knowing flow'rs,
Which in commerce with light spend all their hours:
Which shut to clouds, and shadows nicely shun,
But with glad haste unveil to kiss the sun.
Beneath you, all is dark, and a dead night,
Which whoso lives in, wants both health and sight.
By sucking you, the wise—like bees—do grow
Healing and rich, though this they do most slow,
Because most choicely ”

“ The second girl, Lucy, married Jenkin Jones of Trebinshwn, a cousin of Colonel Jenkin Jones, the local Parliamentary leader. Her daughter, Denise Jones, died single in 1780, as Theophilus Jones states, and her tombstone in the Priory church records her descent. The third girl, Rachel, married John Turberville, one of the Turbervilles of Llangattock, who claimed kinship with the Elizabethan poet of that name. The following pedigree shows the descendants of the three daughters of Henry Vaughan's second marriage, so far as they can be traced. ”

“ Most writers have erroneously assumed the existence of only one Sir Henry Vaughan, while some (cf. Williams, Parl. Hist. of Wales, pp. 45, 52–3) have still further confounded them with a Henry Vaughan of Cilcennin, Cardiganshire, who was sheriff of that county in 1642, and was described shortly afterwards as ‘being anything for money, a proselyte, and favorite to all the changes of tymes ... ”

“ William Vaughan's 'age 20' in 1668 represents 1648 as the birth-date, [xviii] and that fits in with the love-verse of the Poems of 1646."
Mr. G. T. Clark, in his Genealogies of Glamorgan, p. 240, gives the following account:—
Henry [Vaughan] , ob. 1695, æt. 75, father by first wife of (1) a son, s. p.; (2) Lucy ob. 29 Aug., 1780, æt. 92, [4] m. Jenkin Jones of Trebinshwn. Their d. Denise Jones, died single, 1780, æt. 92. By second wife (3) Rachel, m. John Turberville; (4) Edmund; (5) Alexander, ob. 1622 [!] , s. p.; (6) Catharine, m. Wm. Harris; (7) Mary, m. John Walbeoffe of Llanhamlach ”

“ He was free to confess his own failings, and could feel for a man who was tempted. Deeply thankful I am that, before his white beard was laid low, I acknowledged to him my offence, and obtained his hearty forgiveness. Little Henry was on his lap, going off into smiles of sleep, with his mother's soft finger in his mouth. At first my confession quite took the poor Signor aback; for I did not attempt to gloss the dishonour of what I had done; but I told him truly that the meanness was not in my nature, and although I had won my pet Lily, the road ran through hemlock and wormwood. ”

“ Which prove, it springs; though all in blood 'tis drown'd;
The doves above it show with one consent,
Heaven opens only to the innocent.
13. [PAULINUS. CARM. XXVII. 387-92.]
You see what splendour through the spacious aisle,
As if the Church were glorified, doth smile.
The ivory-wrought beams seem to the sight
Engraven, while the carv'd roof looks curl'd and bright.
On brass hoops to the upmost vaults we tie
The hovering lamps, which nod and tremble by
The yielding cords; fresh oil doth still repair
The waving flames, vex'd with the fleeting air. ”

“ English poet and mystic, was born of an ancient Welsh family at Newton St Briget near Scethrog by Usk, Brecknockshire, on the 17th of April 1622. His grandfather, Thomas Vaughan, was the son of Charles Vaughan of Tretower Castle, and had acquired the farm of Newton by marriage. ”

“ The traditional accounts of Thomas Vaughan, says Miss Vaughan, contain serious errors. The dates of his birth and of his death, and the pseudonym under which he wrote are all incorrectly stated [24] (p. 110) . He was born in Monmouth in 1612, being two years the elder of his brother Henry. The two boys were brought up at Oxford, after [xlii] their father's death, by their uncle, Robert Vaughan the antiquary, [25] and entered at Jesus College (p. 114) . ”

“ What could he care for the property in Gloisterio? However, he made us promise that if the present remarkable baby, Master Henry Vaughan, should ever enjoy the property in the unpronounceable county, Lily's second child, if she had one, should take the Corsican lordships; for his great fear was, that the Malaspina and Della Croce estates should become a servient tenement to the frozen fields of the North. To express and ensure his wishes, he had a deed-poll prepared according to his own fancy, read it to us and some witnesses, then signed, sealed, and enrolled it. ”

“ Lyte and Dr. Grosart. I have, however, been enabled to put together a few notes on this somewhat obscure subject, which may be taken as supplementary to Mr. Beeching's Introduction in Vol. I. It will be well to preface them by reprinting the account of Anthony à Wood, our chief original authority (Ath. Oxon., ed. Bliss, 1817, iv. 425) :
"Henry Vaughan, called the Silurist from that part of Wales whose inhabitants were in ancient times called Silures, brother twin (but elder) [1] to Eugenius Philalethes, alias Tho. Vaughan ... ”