On Mr. Fletcher'S Works [1647].[8:1]

Fletcher, whose fame no age can ever waste, (Envy of ours, and glory of the last,) Is now alive again; and with his name His sacred ashes wak'd into a flame Such as before could[8:2] by a secret charm The wildest heart subdue, the coldest warm, And lend the ladies' eyes a power more bright, Dispensing thus, to either, heat and light. He to a sympathy those souls betray'd Whom love or beauty never could persuade; And in each mov'd spectator did[8:3] beget A real passion by a counterfeit. When first Bellario bled, what lady there Did not for every drop let fall a tear? And when Aspasia wept, not any eye But seem'd to wear the same sad livery; By him inspir'd, the feign'd Lucina drew More streams of melting sorrow than the true; But then The Scornful Lady did[8:4] beguile Their easy griefs, and teach them all to smile. Thus he affections could or raise or lay; Love, grief, and mirth thus did his charms obey: He Nature taught her passions to out-do, How to refine the old, and create new; Which such a happy likeness seem'd to bear, As if that Nature Art, Art Nature were. Yet all had nothing been, obscurely kept In the same urn wherein his dust hath slept; Nor had he risen[8:5] the Delphic wreath to claim, Had with[8:6] the dying scene expir'd his name. O the indulgent justice of this age, To grant the press what it denies the stage! Despair our joy hath doubled: he is come Twice welcome by this post liminium. His loss preserv'd him; they that silenc'd wit Are now the authors to eternize it. Thus poets are in spite of Fate reviv'd, And plays, by intermission, longer liv'd.