Amongst these was the incomparable Mr.
_Edmond Spencer_, who speaks of him in his _Tears of the Muses_, not
only with the Praises due to a good Poet, but even lamenting his Absence
with the tenderness of a Friend. The Passage is in _Thalia's_ Complaint
for the Decay of Dramatick Poetry, and the Contempt the Stage then lay
under, amongst his Miscellaneous Works, _p._ 147.
_And he the Man, whom Nature's self had made
To mock her self, and Truth to imitate
With kindly Counter under mimick Shade,
Our pleasant _Willy_, ah! is dead of late:
With whom all Joy and jolly Merriment
Is also deaded, and in Dolour drent._
_Instead thereof, scoffing Scurrility
And scorning Folly with Contempt is crept,
Rolling in Rhimes of shameless Ribaudry,
Without Regard or due _Decorum_ kept;
Each idle Wit at will presumes to make,
And doth the Learned's Task upon him take._
_But that same gentle Spirit, from whose Pen
Large Streams of Honey and sweet _Nectar_ flow,
Scorning the Boldness such base-born Men,
Which dare their Follies forth so rashly throw;
Doth rather choose to sit in idle Cell,
Than so himself to Mockery to sell._
I know some People have been of Opinion, that _Shakespear_ is not meant
by _Willy_ in the first _Stanza_ of these Verses, because _Spencer's_
Death happen'd twenty Years before _Shakespear's_.
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