we had lost his_ Shepherdesse, _a piece
Even and smooth, spun from a finer fleece,
Where softnesse raignes, where passions passions greet,
Gentle and high, as floods of Balsam meet.
Where dressed in white expressions, sit bright Loves,
Drawne, like their fairest Queen, by milkie Doves;
A piece, which_ Johnson _in a rapture bid
Come up a glorifi'd Worke, and so it did.
Else had his Muse set with his friend; the Stage
Had missed those Poems, which yet take the Age;
The world had lost those rich exemplars, where
Art, Language, Wit, sit ruling in one Spheare,
Where the fresh matters soare above old Theames,
As Prophets Raptures do above our Dreames;
Where in a worthy scorne he dares refuse
All other Gods, and makes the thing his Muse;
Where he calls passions up, and layes them so,
As spirits, aw'd by him to come and go;
Where the free Author did what e're he would,
And nothing will'd, but what a Poet should.
No vast uncivill bulke swells any Scene,
The strength's ingenious, a[n]d the vigour cleane;
None can prevent the Fancy, and see through
At the first opening; all stand wondring how
The thing will be untill it is; which thence
With fresh delight still cheats, still takes the sence;
The whole designe, the shadowes, the lights such
That none can say he shelves or hides too much:_
_Businesse growes up, ripened by just encrease,
And by as just degrees againe doth cease,
The heats and minutes of affaires are watcht,
And the nice points of time are met, and snatcht:
Nought later then it should, nought comes before,
Chymists, and Calculators doe erre more:
Sex, age, degree, affections, country, place,
The inward substance, and the outward face;
All kept precisely, all exactly fit,
What he would write, he was before he writ.
'Twixt_ Johnsons _grave, and_ Shakespeares _lighter sound
His muse so steer'd that something still was found,
Nor this, nor that, nor both, but so his owne,
That 'twas his marke, and he was by it knowne.
Hence did he take true judgements, hence did strike,
All pallates some way, though not all alike:
The god of numbers might his numbers crowne,
And listning to them wish they were his owne.
Thus welcome forth, what ease, or wine, or wit
Durst yet produce, that is, what_ Fletcher _writ._

Another.

Fletcher, _though some call it thy fault, that wit
So overflow'd thy scenes, that ere 'twas fi