If tragedies might any prologue have,
All thofe he made would fcarce make one to this;
Where fame, now that he gone is to the grave,
(Death's publick tyring-house) the Nuntius is:
For, though his line of life went soon about,
The life yet of his lines shall never out.
the deceased Author, Mafter W. SHAKESPEAR E.
Shakespeare, at length thy pious fellows give The world thy works; thy works, by which outlive
Upon Ben Jonson, and his Zany, Tom Randolph. "Quoth Ben to Tom, the Lover's stole,
"Tis Shakespeare's every word;
"Indeed, fays Tom, upon the whole,
"'Tis much too good for Ford.
"Thus Ben and Tom the dead ftill praise,
"The living to decry;
"For none must dare to wear the bays,
"Till Ben and Tom both die.
Even Avon's fwan could not escape.
"These letter-tyrant elves;
"They on his fame contriv'd a rape,
"To raise their pedant selves.
"But after times with full confent
"This truth will all acknowledge,
"Shakespeare and Ford from heaven were fent,
"But Ben and Tom from college.
Mr. Macklin the comedian was the author of this letter; but the pamphlet which furnished his materials, was loft in its paffage from Ireland.
The following stanza, from a copy of verfes by Shirley, prefixed to Ford's Love's Sacrifice, 1633, alludes to the fame difpute, and is apparently addreffed to Ben Jonfon.
"Look here thou that haft malice to the stage,
"And impudence enough for the whole age;
"Voluminously ignorant! be vext
"To read this tragedy, and thy owne be next."
• See Wood's Athenæ Oxon. edit. 1721, vol. I. p. 583.
Thy tomb, thy name must: when that stone is rent,
And time diffolves thy Stratford monument,
Here we alive fhall view thee ftill; this book,
When brafs and marble fade, shall make thee look
Fresh to all ages; when pofterity
Shall loath what's new, think all is prodigy
That is not Shakespeare's, every line, each verfe,
Here shall revive, redeem thee from thy herfe.
Nor fire, nor cank'ring age-as Naso faid
Of his, thy wit-fraught book fhall once invade:
Nor fhall I e'er believe or think thee dead,
Though mift, until our bankrout ftage be sped
(Impoffible) with fome new ftrain to out-do
Paffions of Juliet, and her Romeo;
Or till I hear a scene more nobly take,
Than when thy half-fword parlying Romans fpake:
Till thefe, till any of thy volume's reft,
Shall with more fire more feeling be exprefs'd,
Be fure, our Shakespeare, thou canst never die,
But, crown'd with laurel, live eternally.
To the Memory of Mafter W. SHAKESPEARE.
We wonder'd, Shakespeare, that thou went'ft fo foon
From the world's ftage to the grave's tyring-room:
We thought thee dead; but this thy printed worth
Tells thy fpectators, that thou went but forth
To enter with applaufe: an actor's art
Can die, and live to act a fecond part, pour
That's but an exit of mortality,
This a re-entrance to a plaudite...
See Wood's Athene Oxonienfes, vol. I. p. 599, and 600, edit. 1721.
Distant a thousand years, and reprefent
Them in their lively colours, juft extent:
To outrun hafty time, retrieve the fates,
Rowl back the heavens, blow ope the iron gates
Of death and Lethe, where confufed lie
Great heaps of ruinous mortality:
In that deep dusky dungeon, to discern
A royal ghoft from churls; by art to learn
The phyfiognomy of fhades, and give
Them fudden birth, wond'ring how oft they live;
What story coldly tells, what poets feign
At fecond hand, and picture without brain,
Senfelefs and foul-lefs fhews: To give a stage,-
Ample, and true with life, - voice, action, age,
As Plato's year, and new scene of the world,
Them unto us, or us to them had hurl'd:
To raise our ancient fovereigns from their herfe,
Make kings his fubjects; by exchanging verse
Enlive their pale trunks, that the prefent age
Joys in their joy, and trembles at their rage:
Yet fo to temper paffion, that our ears
Take pleasure in their pain, and eyes in tears
Both fmile and weep; fearful at plots fo fad,
Then laughing at our fear; abus'd, and glad
To be abus'd; affected with that truth.
Which we perceive is falfe, pleas'd in that ruth
At which we ftart, and, by elaborate play,
Tortur'd and tickl'd; by a crab-like way
Time paft made paftime, and in ugly fort
Difgorging up his ravin for our fport:-
-While the plebeian imp, from lofty throne,
Creates and rules a world, and works upon
Mankind by fecret engines; now to move
A chilling pity, then a rigorous love;
To ftrike up and ftroak down, both joy and ire;
To fteer the affections; and by heavenly fire
Mold us anew, ftoln from ourselves:-
This, and much more, which cannot be exprefs'd
But by himself, his tongue, and his own breaft,-
Was Shakespear's freehold; which his cunning brain
Improv'd by favour of the nine-fold train;-
The bufkin'd mufe, the comick queen, the grand
And louder tone of Clio, nimble hand
And nimbler foot of the melodious pair,
The filver-voiced lady, the most fair
Calliope, whofe fpeaking filence daunts,
And the whofe praise the heavenly body chants.
Thefe jointly woo'd him, envying one another;-
Obey'd by all as fpoufe, but lov'd as brother;-
And wrought a curious robe, of fable grave,
Fresh green, and pleafant yellow, red most brave,
And conftant blue, rich purple, guiltlefs white,
The lowly ruffet, and the fcarlet bright:
Branch'd and embroider d like the painted fpring;
Each leaf match'd with a flower, and each ftring
Of golden wire, each line of filk: there run
Italian works, whofe thread the fifters fpun;
And there did fing, or feem to fing, the choice
Birds of a foreign note and various voice:
Here hangs a moffy rock; there plays a fair
But chiding fountain, purled: not the air,
Nor clouds, nor thunder, but were living drawn;
Not out of common tiffany or lawn,
But fine materials, which the mufes know,
And only know the countries where they grow.
Now, when they could no longer him enjoy,
In mortal garments pent,-death may deftroy,'
They fay, his body; but his verfe fhall live,
And more than nature takes our hands fhall give:
In a lefs volume, but more ftrongly bound,
Shakespeare fhall breathe and fpeak; with laurel crown'd,
Which never fades; fed with ambrofial meat,
In a well-lined vefture, rich, and neat:
So with this robe they cloath him, bid him wear it;
For time shall never ftain, nor envy tear it.
The friendly Admirer of his Endowments,
Part of Shirley's Prologue to The Sifters.
And if you leave us too, we cannot thrive,
I'll promife neither play nor poet live
ye come back; think what you do, you fee Whi audience we have, what company
To hakespeare comes, whofe mirth did once beguile
Dull hours, and bufkin'd, made even forrow fmile:
VOL. I.
[P]
So lovely were the wounds, that men would fay
They could endure the bleeding a whole day.
Extract from Michael Drayton's "Elegy to Henry Reynolds, Efq. of Poets and Poefy."
Shakespear, thou hadft as smooth a comic vein,
Fitting the fock, and in thy natural brain
As ftrong conception, and as clear a rage
As any one that traffick'd with the stage.
To Mafter W. SHAKESPEARE.
Shakespeare, that nimble Mercury thy braine
Lulls many hundred Argus-eyes afleepe,
So fit for all thou fafhioneft thy vaine,
At th' horfe-foot fountaine thou haft drunk full deepe, Vertue's or vice's theme to thee all one is;
Who loves chafte life, there's Lucrece for a teacher:
Who lift read luft, there's Venus and Adonis,
The modell of a moft lafcivious leacher.
Befides, in plaies thy wit winds like Meander,
When needy new compofers borrow more
Than Terence doth from Plautus or Menander:
But to praise thee aright, I want thy flore.
Then let thine owne works thine owne worth upraise,
And help t'adorne thee with deferved baies.
Epigram 92, in an ancient collection, entitled Run and a great Caf, 4to. by Tho. Freeman, 1614.
admirable dramatick Poct, W. SHAKESPEARE,
What needs my Shakespeare for his honour'd bones, The labour of an age in piled ftones;
Or that his hallow'd reliques should be hid
Under a ftar-ypointing pyramid?
Dear fon of memory, great heir of fame,
What need'ft thou fuch weak witness of thy name?
Thou, in our wonder and aftonishment,
Haft built thyfelf a live-long monument;
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