To Ben Jonson Upon Occasion Of His Ode Of Defiance Annexed

'Tis true, dear Ben, thy just chastising hand

    Hath fix'd upon the sotted age a brand

    To their swoll'n pride and empty scribbling due;

    It can nor judge, nor write, and yet 'tis true

    Thy comic muse, from the exalted line

    Touch'd by thy Alchemist, doth since decline

    From that her zenith, and foretells a red

    And blushing evening, when she goes to bed;

    Yet such as shall outshine the glimmering light

  With which all stars shall gild the following night.

  Nor think it much, since all thy eaglets may

  Endure the sunny trial, if we say

  This hath the stronger wing, or that doth shine

  Trick'd up in fairer plumes, since all are thine.

  Who hath his flock of cackling geese compar'd

  With thy tun'd choir of swans? or else who dar'd

  To call thy births deform'd? But if thou bind

  By city-custom,  or by gavelkind,

  In equal shares thy love on all thy race,

  We may distinguish of their sex, and place;

  Though one hand form them, and though one brain strike

  Souls into all, they are not all alike.

  Why should the follies then of this dull age

  Draw from thy pen such an immodest rage

  As seems to blast thy else-immorta l bays,

  When thine own tongue proclaims thy itch of praise?

  Such thirst will argue drouth. No, let be hurl'd

  Upon thy works by the detracting world

  What malice can suggest; let the rout say,

  The running sands, that, ere thou make a play,

  Count the slow minutes, might a Goodwin frame

  To swallow, when th' hast done, thy shipwreck'd name;

  Let them the dear expense of oil upbraid,

  Suck'd by thy watchful lamp, that hath betray'd

  To theft the blood of martyr'd authors, spilt

  Into thy ink, whilst thou growest pale with guilt.

  Repine not at the taper's thrifty waste,

  That sleeks thy terser poems; nor is haste

  Praise, but excuse; and if thou overcome

  A knotty writer, bring the booty home;

  Nor think it theft if the rich spoils so torn

  From conquer'd authors be as trophies worn.

  Let others glut on the extorted praise

  Of vulgar breath, trust thou to after-days;

  Thy labour'd works shall live when time devours

  Th' abortive offspring of their hasty hours.

  Thou are not of their rank, the quarrel lies

  Within thine own verge; then let this suffice,

  The wiser world doth greater thee confess

  Than all men else, than thyself only less.

NOTESForm: couplets18. the custom of dividing a man's property equally among his sons. 31. Goodwin: the notoriously dangerous Goodwin sands, off the coast of Kent. 48. verge: jurisdiction .