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AN ANSWER TO SOME VERSES MADE IN HIS PRAISE, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: The ancient poets and their learned rhymes
Last Line: Be well contented, since you do't with art.
Subject(s): Poetry & Poets


THE ancient poets and their learned rhymes
We still admire in these our later times,
And celebrate their fames. Thus, though they die,
Their names can never taste mortality:
Blind Homer's muse and Virgil's stately verse,
While any live, shall never need a hearse.
Since then to these such praise was justly due
For what they did, what shall be said to you?
These had their helps: they writ of gods and kings,
Of temples, battles, and such gallant things;
But you of nothing: how could you have writ,
Had you but chose a subject to your wit?
To praise Achilles or the Trojan crew,
Show'd little art, for praise was but their due.
To say she's fair that's fair, this is no pains:
He shows himself most poet, that most feigns.
To find out virtues strangely hid in me---
Ay, there's the art and learned poetry!
To make one striding of a barbed steed,
Prancing a stately round---I use indeed
To ride Bat Jewel's jade---this is the skill,
This shows the poet wants not wit at will.
I must admire aloof, and for my part
Be well contented, since you do't with art.





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