Elijah Fenton, 1711 (1683-1730)
Shakespeare, 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 barbarous 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 sullied, and obscur’d, though soaring high,
With spots contracted from the nether sky.
But whither is th’ adventurous Muse betray’d?
Forgive her rashness, venerable shade!
May Spring with purple flowers 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.
Some scions shot from this immortal root,
Their tops much lower, and less fair the fruit,
Jonson the tribute of my verse might claim,
Had he not strove to blemish Shakespeare’s name.
But, like the radiant twins that gild the sphere,
Fletcher and Beaumont next in pomp appear:
The first a fruitful vine, in blooming pride,
Had been by superfluity destroy’d,
But that his friend, judiciously severe,
Prun’d the luxuriant boughs with artful care;
On various sounding harps the Muses play’d,
And sung, and quaff’d their nectar in the shade.
Few moderns in the lists with these may stand,
For in those days were giants in the land:
Suffice it now by lineal right to claim,
And bow with filial awe to Shakespeare’s fame;
The second honours are a glorious name.
Achilles dead, they found no equal lord
To wear his armour, and to wield his sword.
An Epistle to Mr. Southerne, from Kent. January 28, 1710-11.