2.4. How many sorts of measures we use in our vulgar.
To returne from time to our measure againe, it hath bene sayd that
according to the number of the sillables contained in euery verse, the same
is sayd a long or short meeter, and his shortest proportion is of foure
sillables, and his longest of twelue, they that vse it aboue, passe the bounds
of good proportion. And euery meeter may be aswel in the odde as in the
euen sillable, but better in the euen, and one verse may begin in the euen,
& another follow in the odde, and so keepe a commendable proportion.
The verse that containeth but two silables, which may be in one word, is not
vsuall: therefore many do deny him to be a verse, saying that it is but a
foot, and that a meeter can haue no lesse then two feete at the least, but I
find it otherwise aswell among the best Italian Poets, as also with our
vulgar makers, and that two sillables serue wel for a short measure in the
first place, and midle, and end of a staffe: and also in diuerse scituations
and by sundry distances, and is very passionate and of good grace, as shalbe
declared more at large in the Chapter of proportion by scituation.
The next measure is of two feete or of foure sillables, and ten one word
tetrasillable diuided in the middest makes vp the whole meeter, as
thus
Reue rentlie
Or a trisillable and one monosillable thus. Soueraine God, or two
bisillables and that is plesant thus, Restore againe, or with foure
monosillables, and that is best of all thus, When I doe think, I finde no
fauour in a meetre of three sillables nor in effect in any odde, but they may
be vsed for varietie sake, and specially being enterlaced with others: the
meetre of six sillables is very sweete and dilicate as thus.
O God when I behold
This bright heauen so hye
By thine owne hands of old
Contriud so cunningly.
The meter of seuen sillables is not vsual, no more is that of nine and eleuen,
yet if they be well composed, that is, their Censure well-appointed,
and their last accent which makes the concord, they
[OMITTED]
[OMITTED]
[OMITTED]
[OMITTED]
[OMITTED]
[OMITTED]
[OMITTED]
[OMITTED]