T. Palmer of Ch. Ch. Oxon.
Upon the unparalelld Playes written by those Renowned Twinnes of Poetry BEAUMONT & FLETCHER.
What’s here? another Library
of prayse,
Met in a Troupe t’advance contemned Playes
And bring exploded Witt againe in fashion?
I can’t but wonder at this Reformation,
My skipping soule surfets with so much good,
To see my hopes into fruition budd.
A happy Chimistry! blest viper, joy!
That through thy mothers bowels gnawst thy way!
Witts flock in sholes, and clubb to re-erect
In spight of Ignorance the Architect
Of Occidentall Poesye; and turne
Godds, to recall witts ashes from their urne.
Like huge Collosses they’ve together
mett
Their shoulders, to support a world of Witt.
The tale of Atlas (though of truth it misse)
We plainely read Mythologiz’d in
this;
Orpheus and Amphion whose undying stories
Made Athens famous, are but Allegories.
Tis Poetry has pow’r to civilize
Men, worse then stones, more blockish then the Trees,
I cannot chuse but thinke (now things so fall)
That witt is past its Climactericall;
And though the Muses have beene dead and
gone
I know they’ll finde a Resurrection.
Tis vaine to prayse; they’re to themselves
a glory,
And silence is our sweetest Oratory.
For he that names but FLETCHER must needs
be
Found guilty of a loud hyperbole.
His fancy so transcendently aspires,
He showes himselfe a witt, who but admires.
Here are no volumes stuft with cheverle sence,
The very Anagrams of Eloquence,
Nor long-long-winded sentences that be,
Being rightly spelld, but Witts Stenographie.
Nor words, as voyd of Reason, as of Rithme,
Only cesura’d to spin out the time.
But heer’s a Magazine of purest sence
Cloathed in the newest Garbe of Eloquence.
Scenes that are quick and sprightly, in whose veines
Bubbles the quintessence of sweet-high straines.
Lines like their Authours, and each word
of it
Does say twas writ b’ a Gemini of Witt.
How happie is our age! how blest our men!
When such rare soules live themselves o’re