England's Mourning Garment, &c. 1603.

Nor doth the silver-tongued Melicert

Drop from his honied Muse one sable teare, To mourn her death that graced his desert, And to his laies open'd her royal eare.

Shepherd, remember our Elizabeth,

And sing her Rape, done by that Tarquin, Death.

A Remembrance of some English Poets at the end of a Collection of Poems, entitled, Lady Pecunia, or the Praise of Money. Caret titulo.

"And Shakspere, thou whose honey-flowing vaine " (Pleasing the world) thy praises doth containe, "Whose Venus and whose Lucrece (sweet and chast) "Thy name in fame's immortal book have plac't. "Live ever you, at least in fame live ever: "Well may the body die, but fame die never.”

The author of this Poem praises Spenser for his Fairy Queen, Daniel for his Rosamond and White Rose and Red, and Drayton for his Tragedies and Epistles. These, therefore, must all have been written at a time when Shakspere had produced only his Venus and Lucrece.

To

To Master W. SHAKSPERE.

Shakspere, that nimble Mercury thy braine
Lulls many hundred Argus-eyes asleepe,
So fit for all thou fashionest thy vaine,

At th' horse-foot fountaine thou hast drunk full deepe.

Vertue's or vice's theme to thee all one is ;

Who loves chaste life, there's Lucrece for a teacher: Who list read lust, there's Venus and Adonis,

The modell of a most lascivious leacher. Besides, in plaies thy wit winds like Meander, When needy new composers borrow more Than Terence doth from Plautus or Menander: But to praise thee aright, I want thy store. Then let thine owne works thine owne worth upraise, And help t'adorne thee with deserved baies.

Epigram 92, in an ancient collection, entitled Run and a great Cast, 4to. by Tho. Freeman, 1614.

An Epitaph on the admirable dramatick Poet, WILLIAM SHAPSPERE.

What needs my Shakspere for his honour'd bones, The labour of an age in piled stones;

Or that his hallow'd reliques should be hid

Under a star-ypointing pyramid ?

Dear

Dear son of memory, great heir of fame,

What need'st thou such weak witness of thy name? Thou, in our wonder and astonishment,

Hast built thyself a live-long monument :

For whilst, to the shame of slow-endeavouring art,
Thy easy numbers flow; and that each heart
Hath, from the leaves of thy unvalued book,
Those Delphick lines with deep impression took;
Then thou, our fancy of itself bereaving,
Dost make us marble with too much conceiving;
And, so sepulcher'd, in such pomp dost lie,
That kings, for such a tomb, would wish to die.
JOHN MILTON.

See, my lov'd Britons, see your Shakspere rise,
An awful ghost, confess'd to human eyes!
Unnam'd, methinks, distinguish'd I had been
From other shades, by this eternal green,
About whose wreaths the vulgar poets strive,
And with a touch their wither'd bays revive.
Untaught, unpractis'd, in a barbarous age,
I found not, but created first the stage:
And if I drain'd no Greek or Latin store,
'Twas, that my own abundance gave me more:
On foreign trade I needed not rely,

Like fruitful Britain rich without supply.

DRYDEN'S Prologue to his Alteration of Troilus and Cressida.

Shakspere,

Shakspere, who (taught by none) did first impart
To Fletcher wit, to labouring Jonson art:
He, monarch-like, gave those his subjects law,
And is that nature which they paint and draw.
Fletcher reach'd that which on his heights did grow,
Whilst Jonson crept, and gather'd all below.
This did his love, and this his mirth digest:
One imitates him most, the other best.
If they have since out-writ all other men,

"Tis with the drops that fell from Shakspere's pen. DRYDEN'S Prologue to his Alteration of the Tempest.

Our Shakspere wrote too in an age as blest,
The happiest poet of his time, and best;
A gracious prince's favour chear'd his muse,
A constant favour he ne'er fear'd to lose :
Therefore he wrote with fancy unconfin'd,
And thoughts that were immortal as his mind.
OTWAY'S Prologue to Caius Marius.

Shakspere, whose genius to itself a law.
Could men in every height of nature draw.

Rowe's Prologue to the Ambitious Stepmother

Shakspere (whom you and every play-house bill
Style the divine, the matchless, what you will)

For

For gain, not glory, wing'd his roving flight,
And grew immortal in his own despight,

POPE'S Imitation of Horace's Epistle to
Augustus.

Shakspere, the genius of our isle, whose mind
(The universal mirror of mankind)
Express'd all images, enrich'd the stage,
But sometimes stoop'd to please a barb'rous age.
When his immortal bays began to grow,
Rude was the language, and the humour low.
He, like the god of day, was always bright;
But rolling in its course, his orb of light
Was sully'd and obscur'd, tho' soaring high,
With spots contracted from the nether sky.
But whither is th' advent'rous Muse betray'd?
Forgive her rashness, venerable shade!

May Spring, with purple flow'rs, perfume thy urn,
And Avon with his greens thy grave adorn:

Be all thy faults, whatever faults there be,

Imputed to the times, and not to thee!

FENTON's Epistle to Southerne, 1711.

An Inscription for a Monument of SHAKSPERE.

O youths and virgins: O declining eld:
O pale misfortune's slaves: O ye who dwell
Unknown with humble quiet; ye who wait