some sort when he went up to Cambridge. In the same
year in which he became an undergraduate there appeared
a work entitled, 'A Theatre wherein be represented as
well the Miseries and Calamities that follow the
Voluptuous Worldlings as also the greate Joyes and
Pleasures which the Faithful do enjoy. An Argument
both Profitable and Delectable to all that sincerely
loue the Word of God. Deuised by S. John Vander
Noodt.' Vander Noodt was a native of Brabant who had
sought refuge in England, 'as well for that I would not
beholde the abominations of the Romyshe Antechrist as
to escape the handes of the bloudthirsty.' 'In the
meane space,' he continues, 'for the avoyding of
idlenesse (the very mother and nourice of all vices) I
have among other my travayles bene occupied aboute thys
little Treatyse, wherein is sette forth the vilenesse
and basenesse of worldely things whiche commonly
withdrawe us from heavenly and spirituall matters.'
This work opens with six pieces in the form of sonnets
styled epigrams, which are in fact identical with the
first six of the _Visions of Petrarch_ subsequently
published among Spenser's works, in which publication
they are said to have been 'formerly translated'.
After these so-called epigrams come fifteen _Sonnets_,
eleven of which are easily recognisable amongst the
_Visions of Bellay_, published along with the _Visions
of Petrarch_. There is indeed as little difference
between the two sets of poems as is compatible with the
fact that the old series is written in blank verse, the
latter in rhyme. The sonnets which appear for the