Etherege
and
Southerne.
Wycherly.
Tuned us to manners, when the stage was rude;
And boisterous English wit with art indued.
Our age was cultivated thus at length;
But what we gain'd in skill we lost in strength.
Our builders were with want of genius cursed;
The second temple was not like the first:
Till you, the best Vitruvius came at length;
Our beauties equal, but excel our strength.
Firm Doric pillars found your solid base :
The fair Corinthian crowns the higher space;
Thus all below is strength, and all above is grace.
In easy dialogue is Fletcher's praise;
He moved the mind, but had not power to raise.
Great Jonson did by strength of judgment please;
Yet doubling Fletcher's force, he wants his ease.
In differing talents both adorn'd their age;
One for the study, t' other for the stage.
But both to Congreve justly shall submit,
One match'd in judgment, both o'ermatched in
wit.
In him all beauties of this age we see,
Etherege his courtship, Southerne's purity,
The satire, wit, and strength of manly Wycherly.
All this in blooming youth you have achieved:
Nor are your foil'd contemporaries grieved.
So much the sweetness of your manners move,
We cannot envy you, because we love.
Fabius might joy in Scipio, when he saw
A beardless consul made against the law,
And join his suffrage to the votes of Rome;
Though he with Hannibal was overcome.
Thus old Romano bow'd to Raphael's fame,
And scholar to the youth he taught became.
O that your brows my laurel had sustain'd!
Well had I been deposed, if you had reign'd:
The father had descended like the son;
For only you are lineal to the throne.
Thus, when the state one Edward did depose,
A greater Edward in his room arose.
But now, not I, but poetry is cursed;
For Tom the second reigns like Tom the first.
But let them not mistake my patron's part,
Nor call his charity, their own desert.
Yet this I prophesy; thou shalt be seen,
(Though with some short parenthesis between)
High on the throne of wit, and seated there,
Not mine, that 's little, but thy laurel wear.
Thy first attempt an early promise made;
That early promise this has more than paid.
So bold, yet so judiciously you dare,
That your least praise is to be regular.
Time, place, and action, may with pains be
wrought;
But genius must be born, and never can be taught.
This is your portion; this your native store;
Heaven, that but once was prodigal before,
To Shakespeare gave as much; she could not give
Maintain your post: that's all the fame you need;
For 'tis impossible you should proceed.
Already I am worn with cares and age,
And just abandoning the ungrateful stage:
Unprofitably kept at heaven's expense,
I live a rent-charge on his providence :
But you whom every muse and grace adorn,
Whom I foresee to better fortune born,
Be kind to my remains; and O defend,
Against your judgment, your departed friend!
Let not the insulting foe my fame pursue,
But shade those laurels which descend to you :
And take for tribute what these lines express :
You merit more; nor could my love do less.
Jonson.
Beaumont and
Fletcher.
From An Allusion to the tenth Satire of the first book of Horace.
WELL, sir, 'tis granted; I said Dryden's rimes
Were stolen, unequal, nay dull, many times:
What foolish patron is there found of his,
So blindly partial to deny me this?
But that his plays, embroider'd up and down
With wit and learning, justly please the town,
In the same paper I as freely own.
Yet, having this allow'd, the heavy mass
That stuffs up his loose volumes must not pass;
For by that rule I might as well admit
Crown's tedious scenes for poetry and wit.
But to be just, 'twill to his praise be found,
His excellences more than faults abound:
Nor dare I from his sacred temples tear
The laurel, which he best deserves to wear.
But does not Dryden find even Jonson dull?
Beaumont and Fletcher incorrect, and full
Of lewd lines, as he calls them? Shakespeare's
Stiff and affected? to his own the while
Allowing all the justice that his pride
So arrogantly had to these denied?
And may not I have leave impartially
To search and censure Dryden's works, and try
If those gross faults his choice pen doth commit
Proceed from want of judgment, or of wit?
Or, if his lumpish fancy doth refuse
Spirit and grace to his loose slattern Muse?
Five hundred verses every morning writ,
Prove him no more a poet than a wit:
Such scribbling authors have been seen before;
Mustapha, the Island Princess, forty more,
Were things perhaps composed in half an hour.
A JEST in scorn points out and hits the thing
More home, than the remotest satire's sting.
Shakespeare and Jonson did in this excel,
And might herein be imitated well;
Whom refined Etherege copies not at all,
But is himself a sheer original.
Waller, by nature for the bays design'd,
With force, and fire, and fancy unconfined
In panegyric does excel mankind.
He best can turn, enforce, and soften things,
To praise great conquerors, and flatter kings.
For pointed satire I would Buckhurst choose,
The best good man, with the worst-natured Muse.
Shake
speare and Jonson. Etherege.
From A Satire dissuading from [1681
Poetry.
ON Butler, who can think without just rage,
The glory and the scandal of the age?
Fair stood his hopes, when first he came to town,
Met every where with welcomes of renown,
Courted, caress'd by all, with wonder read,
And promises of princely favour fed :
But what reward for all had he at last,
After a life in dull expectance past?
The wretch, at summing up his mis-spent days,
Found nothing left but poverty and praise.
Of all his gains by verse he could not save
Enough to purchase flannel and a grave :
Reduced to want, he in due time fell sick,
Was fain to die, and be interred on tick,
And well might bless the fever that was sent
To rid him hence, and his worse fate prevent.
|