A small body of verse will hold much life; for the poet gives us a
concentrated essence, an elixir, a skillful confection of humanity, which,
diluted with the commonplaces of every-day thought and living, may cover
whole shelves of libraries. The secret of the whole of one life may be
expressed in a song or a sonnet. The little books of the world are not the
least.
Crashaw, also, was a scholar. The son of a clergy-man, he was educated at
the famed Charter-house and afterward at Cambridge. The Revolution, too,
overtook him. He refused the oath of the covenant, was ejected from his
fellowship, became a Roman Catholic, and took refuge in Paris, where he
ate the bread of exile with Cowley and others, cheered by the noble
sympathy--it could not be much more--of Queen Henrietta Maria. She
recommended him to Rome, and the sensitive poet carried his joys and
sorrows to the bosom of the church. He lived a few years, and died canon
of Loretto, at the age of thirty-four.
Though the son of a zealous opponent of the Roman church, Crashaw was born
with an instinct and heart for its service. There runs through all his
poetry that sensuousness of feeling which seeks the repose and luxury of
faith which Rome always offers to her ardent votaries.
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