He to the meanest of mankind did go,
And took from gibbets such as he would show.
Both are so great that he must boldly dare,
Who both of ’em does judge and both compare.
If amongst poets, one more bold there be,
The man that dare attempt in either way, is he.
Covent Garden Drollery, or a Collection of all the Choice Songs, Poems, Prologues, and Epilogues (Sung and Spoken at Courts and Theaters), never in Print before. Written by the refined’st Witts of the Age, and collected by A. B. [? Alex. Brome]. 1672.
EDWARD PHILLIPS, 1675
(1630-1696?)
William Shakespeare, the glory of the English Stage; whose nativity at Stratford-upon-Avon is the highest honour that town can boast of: from an actor of tragedies and comedies, he became a maker; and such a maker, that though some others may perhaps pretend to a more exact decorum and economy, especially in tragedy, never any expressed a more lofty and tragic height, never any represented nature more purely to the life; and where the polishments of art are most wanting, as probably his learning was not extraordinary, he pleaseth with a certain wild and native elegance; and in all his writings hath an unvulgar style, as well in his Venus and Adonis, his Rape of Lucrece, and other various poems, as in his dramatics.