To the Memory of my beloved, the Author Mr. William Shakespeare, and what he hath left us.
To draw no envy, Shakespeare, on thy name,
Am I thus ample to thy book, and fame;
While I confess thy writings to be such,
As neither man, nor muse, can praise too much;
'Tis true, and all men's suffrage: but these ways
Were not the paths I meant unto thy praise:
For seeliest ignorance on these may light,
Which, when it sounds at best, but echoes right;
Or blind affection, which doth ne'er advance
The truth, but gropes, and urgeth all by chance;
Or crafty malice might pretend this praise,
And think to ruin where it seem'd to raise:
These are as some infamous bawd, or whore,
Should praise a matron; What could hurt her more?
But thou art proof against them; and, indeed,
Above the ill fortune of them, or the need:
I, therefore, will begin:—Soul of the age,
The applause, delight, the wonder of our stage,
My Shakespeare, rise! I will not lodge thee by
Chaucer, or Spencer; or bid Beaumont lye
A little further, to make thee a room:
Thou art a monument, without a tomb;
And art alive still, while thy book doth live,
And we have wits to read, and praise to give.
That I not mix thee so, my brain excuses;
I mean, with great but disproportion'd muses:
For, if I thought my judgment were of years,
I should commit thee surely with thy peers;

And tell—how far thou didst our Lilly outshine,
Or sporting Kyd, or Marlow's mighty line.
And though thou hadst small Latin, and less Greek,—
From thence to honour thee, I would not seek
For names; but call forth thundring Æschylus,
Euripides, and Sophocles, to us,
Pacuvius, Accius, him of Cordova dead;
To live again, to hear thy buskin tread
And shake a stage: or, when thy socks were on,
Leave thee alone; for the comparison
Of all, that insolent Greece, or haughty Rome,
Sent forth, or since did from their ashes come.
Triumph, my Britain! thou hast one to show,
To whom all scenes of Europe homage owe.
He was not of an age, but for all time;
And all the Muses still were in their prime,
When like Apollo he came forth to warm
Our ears, or like a Mercury to charm.
Nature herself was proud of his designs,
And joy'd to wear the dressing of his lines;
Which were so richly spun, and woven so fit,
As, since, she will vouchsafe no other wit:
The merry Greek, tart Aristophanes,
Neat Terence, witty Plautus, now not please;
But antiquated and deserted lye,
As they were not of Nature's family.
Yet must I not give nature all; thy art,
My gentle Shakespeare, must enjoy a part:—
For, though the poet's matter nature be,
His art doth give the fashion: and that he,
Who casts to write a living line, must sweat,
(Such as thine are) and strike a second beat

Upon the Muses' anvil; turn the same,
(And himself with it) that he thinks to frame;
Or, for the laurel, he may gain a scorn,—
For a good poet's made, as well as born:
And such wert thou:—Look, how the father's face
Lives in his issue; even so the race
Of Shakespeare's mind, and manners, brightly shines
In his well-torned and true-filed lines;
In each of which he seems to shake a lance,
As brandish'd at the eyes of ignorance.
Sweet swan of Avon, what a sight it were,—
To see thee in our waters yet appear;
And make those flights upon the banks of Thames,
That so did take Eliza, and our James!
But stay; I see thee in the hemisphere
Advanc'd, and made a constellation there:—
Shine forth, thou star of poets; and with rage,
Or influence, chide, or cheer, the drooping stage;
Which, since thy flight from hence, hath mourn'd like night,
And despairs day, but by thy volume's light! Ben. Jonson.

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