| |
| OLD Chaucer, like the morning star, | |
| To us discovers day from far; | |
| His light those mists and clouds dissolved; | |
| Which our dark nation long involved: | |
| But he descending to the shades, | 5 |
| Darkness again the age invades. | |
| Next, like Aurora, Spenser rose, | |
| Whose purple blush the day foreshows; | |
| The other three, with his own fires, | |
| Phoebus, the poets’ god, inspires; | 10 |
| By Shakespeare’s, Jonson’s, Fletcher’s lines, | |
| Our stage’s lustre Rome’s outshines: | |
| These poets near our princes sleep, | |
| And in one grave their mansion keep. | |
| They lived to see so many days, | 15 |
| Till time has blasted all their bays; | |
| But cursed be the fatal hour | |
| That pluck’d the fairest, sweetest flower | |
| That in the Muses’ garden grew, | |
| And amongst wither’d laurels threw. | 20 |
| Time, which made them their fame outlive, | |
| To Cowley scarce did ripeness give. | |
| Old mother-wit, and nature gave | |
| Shakespeare and Fletcher all they have; | |
| In Spenser, and in Jonson, art | 25 |
| Of slower nature got the start; | |
| But both in him so equal are, | |
| None knows which bears the happiest share; | |
| He melted not the ancient gold, | |
| Nor, with Ben Jonson, did make bold | 30 |
| To plunder all the Roman stores | |
| Of poets, and of orators. | |
| Horace’s wit, and Virgil’s state | |
| He did not steal, but emulate, | |
| And when he would like them appear, | 35 |
| Their garb, but not their clothes, did wear; | |
| He not from Rome alone, but Greece, | |
| Like Jason, brought the golden fleece; | |
| To him that language, though to none | |
| Of th’ others, as his own was known. | 40 |
| On a stiff gale, as Flaccus sings, | |
| The Theban swan extends his wings, | |
| When through the ethereal clouds he flies, | |
| To the same pitch our swan doth rise. | |
| Old Pindar’s flights by him are reached, | 45 |
| When on that gale his wings are stretched; | |
| His fancy and his judgment such, | |
| Each to the other seemed too much, | |
| His severe judgment, giving law, | |
| His modest fancy kept in awe, | 50 |
| As rigid husbands jealous are | |
| When they believe their wives too fair. | |
| His English streams so pure did flow, | |
| As all that saw and tasted know. | |
| And for his Latin vein, so clear, | 55 |
| Strong, full, and high it doth appear, | |
| That were immortal Virgil here, | |
| Him, for his judge, he would not fear; | |
| Of that great portraiture, so true | |
| A copy, pencil never drew. | 60 |
| My Muse her song had ended here, | |
| But both their Genii straight appear, | |
| Joy and amazement her did strike, | |
| Two twins she never saw so like. | |
| ’Twas taught by wise Pythagoras, | 65 |
| One soul might through more bodies pass. | |
| Seeing such transmigration there, | |
| She thought it not a fable here. | |
| Such a resemblance of all parts, | |
| Life, death, age, fortune, nature, arts; | 70 |
| Then lights her torch at theirs, to tell, | |
| And show the world this parallel; | |
| Fixt and contemplative their looks, | |
| Still turning over Nature’s books; | |
| Their works chaste, moral, and divine, | 75 |
| Where profit and delight combine; | |
| They, gilding dirt, in noble verse | |
| Rustic philosophy rehearse. | |
| When heroes, gods, or god-like things, | |
| They praise, on their exalted wings | 80 |
| To the celestial orbs they climb, | |
| And with th’ harmonious spheres keep time; | |
| Nor did their actions fall behind | |
| Their words, but with like candour shin’d; | |
| Each drew fair characters, yet none | 85 |
| Of these they feign’d, excels their own. | |
| Both by two generous princes loved, | |
| Who knew, and judged what they approved. | |
| Yet having each the same desire, | |
| Both from the busy throng retire. | 90 |
| Their bodies, to their minds resign’d, | |
| Cared not to propagate their kind; | |
| Yet though both fell before their hour, | |
| Time on their off-spring hath no power, | |
| Nor fire nor fate their bays shall blast, | 95 |
| Nor death’s dark veil their day o’ercast. | |
| |
