, and it gave beyond
doubt--though Gascoigne had, as we have seen, set the example in drama--no
small impetus to the use and perfectioning of that medium. For Lyly's
dramatic prose, though sometimes showing the same faults, is often better
than _Euphues_, as here:--

_End._ "O fair Cynthia, why do others term thee unconstant, whom
I have ever found immovable? Injurious time, corrupt manners,
unkind men, who finding a constancy not to be matched in my sweet
mistress, have christened her with the name of wavering, waxing,
and waning. Is she inconstant that keepeth a settled course,
which since her first creation altereth not one minute in her
moving? There is nothing thought more admirable, or commendable
in the sea, than the ebbing and flowing; and shall the moon, from
whom the sea taketh this virtue, be accounted fickle for
increasing and decreasing? Flowers in their buds are nothing
worth till they be blown; nor blossoms accounted till they be
ripe fruit; and shall we then say they be changeable, for that
they grow from seeds to leaves, from leaves to buds, from buds to
their perfection? then, why be not twigs that become trees,
children that become men, and mornings that grow to evenings,
termed wavering, for that they continue not at one stay? Ay, but
Cynthia being in her fulness decayeth, as not delighting in her
greatest beauty, or withering when she should be most honoured.
When malice cannot object anything, folly will; making that a
vice which is the greatest virtue. What thing (my mistress
excepted) being in the pride of her beauty, and latter minute of
her age, that waxeth young again? Tell me, Eumenides, what is he
that having a mistress of ripe years, and infinite virtues, great
honours, and unspeakable beauty, but would wish that she might
grow tender again? getting youth by years, and never-decaying
beauty by time; whose fair face, neither the summer's blaze can
scorch, nor winter's blast chap, nor the numbering of years breed
altering of colours. Such is my sweet Cynthia, whom time cannot
touch, because she is divine, nor will offend because she is
delicate. O Cynthia, if thou shouldest always continue at thy
fulness, both gods and men would conspire to ravish thee. But
thou, to abate the pride of our affections, dost detract from thy
perfect