Thomas Humphry Ward, ed. The English Poets. 1880–1918.rnVol. II. The Seventeenth Century: Ben Jonson to Dryden

Samuel Butler (1612–1680)

Extracts from Hudibras: ‘New Light’

[From Part I.]

’TIS a dark lantern of the spirit,

Which none see by but those that bear it;

A light that falls down from on high,

For spiritual trades to cozen by;

An ignis fatuus that bewitches

And leads men into pools and ditches,

To make them dip themselves, and sound

For Christendom in dirty pond;

To dive like wildfowl for salvation,

And fish to catch regeneration.