As Plautus and Seneca are accounted the best for Comedy and Tragedy among the Latins, so Shakespeare among the English is the most excellent in both kinds for the stage; for Comedy, witness his “Gentlemen of Verona,” his “Errors,” his “Love’s Labour’s Lost,” his “Love’s Labour’s Wonne,” his “Midsummer Night’s Dream,” and his “Merchant of Venice”; for Tragedy, his “Richard the 2,” “Richard the 3,” “Henry the 4,” “King John,” “Titus Andronicus,” and his “Romeo and Juliet.”
As Epius Stolo said that the Muses would speak with Plautus’ tongue, if they would speak Latin; so I say that the Muses would speak with Shakespeare’s fine filed phrase, if they would speak English.
Palladis Tamia. Wits Treasury, Being the Second Part of Wits Commonwealth. 1598.
RICHARD BARNFIELD, 1598
(1574-1627)
“A Remembrance of some English Poets.”
And Shakespeare thou, whose honey-flowing Vein
(Pleasing the World), thy Praises doth obtain.
Whose Venus, and whose Lucrece (sweet, and chaste)
Thy Name in Fame’s immortal Book have placed.