William Browne

Not to be confused with William Browne (physician).

William Browne (c. 1590 – c. 1645) was an English poet, born at Tavistock, Devon, educated at Oxford, after which he entered the Inner Temple. His chief works were the long poem Britannia's Pastorals (1613), and a contribution to The Shepheard's Pipe (1614).

Quotes

A rose as fair as ever saw the North,
Grew in a little garden all alone.

• Steer, hither steer your wingèd pines,
    All beaten mariners!
  Here lie Love’s undiscover’d mines,
    A prey to passengers.
  • "The Sirens' Song". St. 1. The Inner Temple Masque (1614) Scene 1

•    Come on shore,
  Where no joy dies till Love hath gotten more.
  • "The Sirens' Song". Refrain

• Underneath this sable hearse
  Lies the subject of all verse,
  Sidney's sister, Pembroke's mother;
  Death! ere thou hast slain another,
  Fair and learn'd, and good as she,
  Time shall throw a dart at thee.
  • "Epitaph on the Countess of Pembroke", first published with the poems of the countess's son William and Sir Benjamin Rudyerd (1660)

    Variant: 'marble' instead of sable'

Britannia's Pastorals (1613)

• Whose life is a bubble, and in length a span.
  • Book i. Song 2

    Compare: Bacon, The World (1629)

• And all the former causes of her moan
  Did therewith bury in oblivion.
  • Book i. Song 2

• Well-languaged Daniel.
  • Book ii. Song 2. L. 303

• A heavenly bevy of sweet English dames.
  • Book ii. Song 2

    Compare: Milton, Paradise Lost, bk. xi, l. 582

•    For those sacred powers
  Tread on oblivion; no desert odours
  Can be entombed in their celestial breasts.
  • Book iii. Song ii. St. 23

• A rose as fair as ever saw the North,
  Grew in a little garden all alone:
  A sweeter flower did Nature ne’er put forth,
  Nor fairer garden yet was never known.
  • "Visions". Sonnet 5

•     If heaven send no supplies,
  The fairest blossom of the garden dies.
  • "Visions". Sonnet 5

• I saw a mushroom stand in haughty pride,
  As if the lilies grew to be his slaves.
  • "Visions". Sonnet ?