Page:Poems of Anne Countess of Winchilsea 1903.djvu/31

 INTRODUCTION xxvii ���A Husband! echo'd all around: And to Parnassus sure that sound Had never yet been sent. �At least no such compromising request had been received at the sacred Mount "since Grizzel's Days," and it would have gone hard with Ardelia's poem had she not luckily found in her own breast so many tender memories that the aid of the Nine was superfluous. Domestic felicity of this idyllic sort was certainly not in harmony with the prevailing court standards. This age had defined courtship as a "witty pro- logue to a dull play;" marriage was but "an ecclesiastical mouse-trap," and all marriage was said "to end in repent- ance;" while the accepted similes for a wife were "a clog," "a tether-stake," "a yoke," "a galling load." In such a state of public opinion a home-life so unaffectedly good, so frankly happy, as that of this court-bred lady and gentleman was of itself a mark of distinction. �With the accession to the throne of James in February, 1685, Mr. Finch became more than ever occupied with pub- lic affairs. He was colonel in the army ; he was groom of the bedchamber to the king; he was three years deputy lieutenant for the county of Kent; and he sat one year as member of parliament for Hythe. During this period Mr. and Mrs. Finch lived in London with but occasional short visits in other parts of England. A brief stay in Somerset- shire in 1688 (probably in the summer) had, as its outcome, the following statement made by Lord Winchilsea August 12, 1722: �I do affirm that in the year 1688, Mrs. Mompesson (wife to Thomas Mompesson, esq. of Bruham, in Somersetshire, a worthy and a very good woman) told me and my wife, that Archbishop Juxon assured her, that to his certain knowledge the ElKfiN BASIAIKH was all composed and written by King Charles the First. Although in the following book the King's book is thoroughly vindicated, and ��� �