Page:The Works of Ben Jonson - Gifford - Volume 9.djvu/131

And care of getting, thus our minds hath stain'd;
Think we, or hope there can be verses feign'd
In juice of cedar worthy to be steep'd,
And in smooth cypress boxes to be keep'd?
Poets would either profit or delight;
Or mixing sweet and fit, teach life the right.
Orpheus, a priest, and speaker of the gods,
First frighted men, that wildly liv'd, at odds,
From slaughters, and foul life; and for the same
Was tigers said, and lions fierce to tame.
Amphion too, that built the Theban towers,
Was said to move the stones by his lute's powers,
And lead them with soft songs, where that he would.
This was the wisdom that they had of old,
Things sacred from profane to separate;
The public from the private, to abate
Wild raging lusts; prescribe the marriage good;
Build towns, and carve the laws in leaves of wood.
And thus at first, an honour, and a name
To divine poets, and their verses came.
Next these, great Homer and Tyrtseus set
On edge the masculine spirits, and did whet
Their minds to wars, and rhymes they did rehearse;
The oracles too were given out in verse;
All way of life was shewn; the grace of kings
Attempted by the muses tunes and strings;
Plays were found out, and rest, the end and crown
Of their long labours, was in verse set down:
All which I tell, lest when Apollo's nam'd,
Or muse, upon the lyre, thou chance b'asham'd.
Be brief in what thou wouldst command, that so
The docile mind might soon thy precepts know,
And hold them faithfully; for nothing rests,
But flows out, that o'erswelleth, in full breasts.