e and Stage.
I will not yeeld thy Workes so meane a Prayse;
More pure, more chaste, more sainted then are Playes,
Nor with that dull supinenesse to be read,
To passe a fire, or laugh an houre in bed.
How doe the Muses suffer every where,
Taken in such mouthes censure, in such eares,
That twixt a whiffe, a Line or two rehearse,
And with their Rheume together spaule a Verse?
This all a Poems leisure after Play,
Drinke or Tabacco, it may keep the Day.
Whilst even their very idlenesse they thinke
Is lost in these, that lose their time in drinkt._
_Pity then dull we, we that better know,
Will a more serious houre on thee bestow,
Why should not_ Beaumont _in the Morning please,
As well as_ Plautus, Aristophanes?
_Who if my Pen may as my thoughts be free,
Were scurrill Wits and Buffons both to Thee;
Yet these our Learned of severest brow
Will deigne to looke on, and to note them too,
That will defie our owne, tis English stuffe,
And th' Author is not rotten long enough.
Alas what flegme are they, compared to thee,
In thy_ Philaster, _and_ Maids-Tragedy?
_Where's such an humour as thy_ Bessus? _pray
Let them put all their_ Thrasoes _in one Play,
He shall out-bid them; their conceit was poore,
All in a Circle of a Bawd or Whore;
A cozning dance, take the foole away,
And not a good jest extant in a Play.
Yet these are Wits, because they'r old, and now
Being Greeke and Latine, they are Learning too:
But those their owne Times were content t' allow
A thirsty fame, and thine is lowest now.
But thou shalt live, and when thy Name is growne
Six Ages older, shall be better knowne,
When th' art of_ Chaucers _standing in the Tombe,
Thou shalt not share, but take up all his roome._

Joh. Earle.

UPON Mr FLETCHERS

Incomparable Playes.

_The Poet lives; wonder not how or why_
Fletcher _revives, but that he er'e could dye:
Safe_ Mirth, _full_ Language, _flow in ev'ry Page,
At once he doth both_ heighten _and_ aswage;
_All Innocence and Wit, pleasant and cleare,
Nor_ Church _nor_ Lawes _were ever Libel'd here;
But faire deductions drawn from his great Braine,
Enough to conquer all that's_ False _or_ Vaine;
_He scatters Wit, and Sence so freely flings
That very_ Citizens _speake handsome things,
Teaching their_ Wives _such unaffected grace,
Their_ Looks _are now