or at least wise a witnes, is no little griefe and infelicity.  Therfore nature and ciuility haue ordained (besides the priuate solaces) publike reioisings for the comfort and recreation of many.  And they be of diuerse sorts and vpon diuerse occasions growne:  one & the chiefe was for the publike peace of a countrie the greatest of any other ciuill good.  And wherein your Maiestie (my most gracious Soueraigne) haue shewed your selfe to all the world for this one and thirty yeares space of your glorious raigne, aboue all other Princes of Christendome, not onely fortunate, but also most sufficient vertuous and worthy of Empire.  An other is for iust & honourable victory atchieued against the forraine enemy.  A third at solemne feasts and pompes of coronations and enstallments of honourable orders.  An other for iollity at weddings and marriages.  An other at the births of Princes children.  An other for priuate entertainements in Court, or other secret disports in chamber, and such solitary places.  And as these reioysings tend to diuers effects, so do they also carry diuerse formes and nominations:  for those of victorie and peace are called Triumphall, whereof we our selues haue heretofore giuen some example by our Triumphals written in honour of her Maiesties long peace.  And they were vsed by the auncients in like manner, as we do our generall processions or Letanies with bankets and bonefires and all manner of ioyes.  Those that were to honour the persons of great Princes or to solemnise the pompe of any installment were called Encomia, we may call them carols of honour.  Those to celebrate marriages were called songs nuptiall or Epithalamies, but in a certaine misticall sense as shall be said hereafter.  Others for magnificence at the natiuities of Princes children, or by custome vsed yearely vpon the same dayes, are called songs natall or Genethliaca.  Others for secret recreation and pastime in chambers with company or alone were the ordinary Musickes amorous, such as might be song with voice or to the Lute, Citheron or Harpe, or daunced by measures as the Italian Pauan and galliard are at these daies in Princes Courts and other places of honourable of ciuill assembly, and of all these we will speake in order and very briefly.

  CHAP.  XXIIII.

The forme of Poeticall lamentations.

Lamenting is altogether contrary to reioising, euery man saith so, and yet is it a peece of ioy to be able to lament with ease, and freely to poure forth a mans inward sorrowes and the greefs wherewith his minde is surcharged.  This was a very necessary deuise of the Poet and a fine, besides his poetrie to play also the Phisitian, and not onely by applying a medicine to the ordinary sicknes of mankind, but by making the very greef it selfe (in part) cure of the disease.  Nowe are the causes of mans sorrowes many:  the death of his parents, friends, allies, and children:  (though many of the barbarous nations do reioyce at