He was born in 1570, was bred a barrister, and rose to high position through the favour of James I .-- gained, it is said, by the poem which the author called _Nosce Teipsum_,[71] but which is generally entitled _On the Immortality of the Soul_, intending by _immortality_ the spiritual nature of the soul, resulting in continuity of existence.

It is a wonderful instance of what can be done for metaphysics in verse, and by means of imagination or poetic embodiment generally.

Argumentation cannot of course naturally belong to the region of poetry, however well it may comport itself when there naturalized; and consequently, although there are most poetic no less than profound passages in the treatise, a light scruple arises whether its constituent matter can properly be called poetry.

At all events, however, certain of the more prosaic measures and stanzas lend themselves readily, and with much favour, to some of the more complex of logical necessities.

And it must be remembered that in human speech, as in the human mind, there are no absolute divisions: power shades off into feeling; and the driest logic may find the heroic couplet render it good service.
Sir John Davies's treatise is not only far more poetic in image and utterance than that of Lord Brooke, but is far more clear in argument and firm in expression as well.