Which you have justly gained from the Stage, By observation of those Comick Laws, Which I, your Master, first did teach the Age.
In the rest of his Poetry, (for he is not wholly Dramatick) as his _Underwoods_, _Epigrams_, &c. he is sometimes bold and strenuous, sometimes Magisterial, sometimes lepid and full enough of conceit, and sometimes a man as other men are.
It seems the issue of his brain was more lively and lasting than the issue of his body, having several Children, yet none living to survive him; This he bestowed as part of an Epitaph on his eldest Son, dying an Infant.
Rest in soft peace, and ask'd, say, Here doth lye _Ben Johnson_ his best piece of Poetry.
But tho' the immortal Memory still lives of him in his learned Works, yet his Body, subject to mortality, left this life, _Anno_ 1638. and was buried about the Belfrey in the Abbey-Church at _Westminster_, having only upon a Pavement over his Grave, this written:
Yet were not the Poets then so dull and dry, but that many expressed their affection to his Memory in Elegies and Epitaphs; amongst which this following may not be esteemed the worst.
The Muses fairest Light in no dark time, The Wonder of a learned Age; the line That none can pass: the most proportion'd Wit To Nature; the best Judge of what was fit: The deepest, plainest, highest, clearest Pen: The Voyce most eccho'd by consenting men; The Soul which answer'd best to all well said By others; and which most requital made: Tun'd to the highest Key of ancient _Rome_; Returning all her Musick with her own; In whom with Nature, Study claim'd a part, And yet who to himself ow'd all his Art; Here lies _Ben Johnson_, every Age will look With sorrow here, with Wonder on his Book.
These two joyned together, made one of the happy _Triumvirate_ (the other two being _Johnson_ and _Shakespear_) of the chief Dramatick Poets of our Nation, in the last foregoing Age; among whom there might be said to be a symmetry of perfection, while each excelled in his peculiar way: _Ben Johnson_ in his elaborate pains and knowledge of Authors, _Shakespear_ in his pure vein of wit, and natural Poetick height; _Fletcher_ in a Courtly Elegance and Gentile Familiarity of Style, and withal a Wit and Invention so overflowing, that the luxuriant Branches thereof were frequently thought convenient to be lopt off by Mr. _Beaumont_; which two joyned together, like _Castor_ and _Pollux_, (most happy when in conjunction) raised the _English_ to equal the _Athenian_ and _Roman_ Theaters; _Beaumont_ bringing the Ballast of Judgment, _Fletcher_ the Sail of Phantasie, both compounding a Poet to admiration.