The Cambridge Edition of the Works of Ben Jonson

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From Thomas Palmer, The Sprite of Trees and Herbs (1599)

[From Thomas Palmer,  The Sprite of Trees and Herbs]

When late, grave Palmer, these thy  grafts and flowers,

So well disposed by thy  auspicious hand,

Were made the objects to my weaker powers,

I could not but in  admiration stand.

First, thy success did strike my sense with wonder, 5

That, ’mongst so many plants transplanted  hither,

Not one but thrives, in spite of  storms and thunder,

 Unseasoned frosts, or the most  envious weather.

Then I admired the rare and precious use

Thy skill hath made of  rank despisèd weeds, 10

Whilst other souls convert to base abuse

The sweetest  simples, and most  sovereign seeds.

Next that which rapt me  was I might behold

How like the  carbuncle in Aaron’s breast

The  sevenfold flower of art (more rich than gold) 15

Did sparkle forth in centre of the rest.

Thus, as a  ponderous thing in water cast

Extendeth circles into infinites,

Still making that the greatest that is last

Till th’one hath drowned the other in our sights, 20

So in my brain the strong impression

Of thy rich labours worlds of thoughts created,

Which thoughts, being   circumvolved in  gyre-like motion,

Were spent with wonder as they were dilated;

Till giddy with amazement I fell down 25

 In a deep trance ∗ ∗ ∗ ∗

∗ ∗ ∗ ∗ ∗

When, lo, to crown thy worth

I struggled with this passion that did drown

My abler faculties, and thus brake forth:

Palmer, thy   travails well become thy name 30

And thou in them shalt live as long as fame.

 Dignum laude virum musa vetat mori.

The Sprite of Trees and Herbs From Thomas Palmer’s manuscript treatise on the ‘Spirit of trees and herbs’ (BL MS Add. 18,040 fol. 10); first printed by W. D. Briggs (1915b), 226–7. Palmer’s treatise is not known to have been printed, and the MS appears to have been intended as a presentation copy. It contains a dedication to Robert Cecil, which records that the work was originally intended to be dedicated to Cecil’s father, before his death, and a Latin dedication to Robert’s father, William. This dates the work to c. 1598, when the elder Cecil died. It contains dedicatory poems by Thomas Fryer, Richard Foster, Nicholas Hill, Nicholas Rosecarrot, John Keepes, and Michael Drayton, of whom five, including Jonson at this date, were Catholics. Jonson’s piece is the last. This became the usual position for his dedicatory verses. The work consists of coloured illustrations of plants, accompanied by allegorical verses on their properties (so mustard seed symbolizes Christian faith, since it grows to a large size from tiny beginnings, fol. 74v). Palmer compiled two other MS emblem-books, the first in English (‘Two hundred poosees’, British Library, Sloane MS 3794; see Palmer, Emblems, and J. Manning, 1990) and Bodleian MS Ashmole 767. Wood (1815), 1.150 records that he was a committed Catholic who lost his fellowship at St John’s College, Oxford, as a result of his religion. There is no evidence to support this. He lost his fellowship when he inherited his father’s estate in 1564 and for ‘just causes’ (Stevenson and Salter, 1939, 325), whereupon he retired to his estates in Essex. Wood also notes that he collected materials from Cicero, which Camden (see Epigr. 14.1n.) considered worthy of publication. It is likely that Camden was the link between Jonson and Palmer. [Editor: Colin Burrow]
1 grafts grafted shoots (alluding to the illustrations in the MS).
2 auspicious fortunate, promising success (predates first cited usage in OED by fifteen years).
4 admiration stunned wonder.
6 hither] JnB 555 (hether)
7 storms and thunder Alludes to the English climate and perhaps also to some persecution Palmer suffered for his religion in the 1590s.
8 Unseasoned Unseasonable.
8 envious malicious (OED, †2).
10 rank vigorous (often used of weeds; OED, 5).
12 simples medicine made only of one constituent; hence herb or plant used medicinally.
12 sovereign efficacious (OED, 3). Frequently used of herbal remedies.
13 was I might was the fact that I might.
14 carbuncle Exodus, 28.17: ‘And thou shalt set in it [i.e. Aaron’s breastplate] settings of stones, even four rows of stones: the first row shall be a sardius, a topaz, and a carbuncle: this shall be the first row.’
15 sevenfold . . . art The seven liberal arts, consisting of the ‘trivium’ (grammar, logic, and rhetoric) and ‘quadrivium’ (arithmetic, geometry, music, and astronomy).
17 ponderous heavy.
23 circumvolved This should mean ‘whirled on its axis’; the preceding comparison with the circles created by dropping a stone in water suggests also ‘encircled each in each’.
23 circumvolved] H&S subst.; circumvold JnB 555
23 gyre-like like spiral turns.
26–7 This is the earliest example of Jonson deliberately exploiting the effect of a fragmentary poem. For later examples, see Forest 12 and Und. 84 headnote.
30 travails (1) labours; (2) travels. A ‘palmer’ is a pilgrim who has returned from the holy land bearing a palm, which may here allude to Palmer’s Catholicism.
32 ‘It is the muse which forbids the hero worthy of praise to die’, Horace, Odes, 4.8.28. Cf. Forest 12.43–8. The same tag is used as an epigraph to the dedicatory verses appended to Robert Chester’s Love’s Martyr; see Forest 10 and 11 and ‘Phoenix’ headnote.