Now it would be of great benefit to the beaus of our age to carry this glass in their pocket, whereby they might learn to think rather than dress well. It would be of use also to the wits and virtuosoes to carry this antidote against the poison they have sucked in from Lucretius or Hobbes. This would acquaint them with some principles of religion; for in old times the poets were the divines, and exercised a kind of spiritual authority amongst the people. Verse in those days was the sacred style, the style of Oracles and Lawes. The vows and thanks of the people were recommended to their gods in songs and hymns. Why may they not retain this priviledge? for if prose should contend with verse, it would be upon unequal terms, and (as it were) on foot against the wings of Pegasus. With what delight are we touched in hearing the stories of Hercules, Achilles, Cyrus, and Æneas? Because in their characters we have wisdom, honour, fortitude and justice, set before our eyes. It was Plato's opinion, that if a man could see virtue, he would be strangely enamoured on her person. Which is the reason why Horace and Virgil have continued so long in reputation, because they have drawn her in all the charms of poetry. No man is so senseless of rational impressions, as not to be wonderfully affected with the pastorals of the ancients, when under the stories of wolves and sheep, they describe the misery of people under hard masters, and their happiness under good. So the bitter and wholesome Iambick was wont to make villainy blush; the Satire invited men to laugh at folly; the Comedian chastised the common errors of life; and the Tragedian made kings afraid to be tyrants, and tyrants to be their own tormentors. Wherefore, as Sir Philip Sidney said of Chaucer, that he knew not which he should most wonder at, either that he in his dark time should see so distinctly, or that we in this clear age should go so stumblingly after him; so may we marvel at and bewail the low condition of poetry now, when in our Plays scarce any one rule of decorum is observed, but in the space of two hours and a half we pass through all the fits of Bedlam; in one scene we are all in mirth, in the next we are all in sadness; whilst even the most laboured parts are starved for want of thought; a confused heap of words, and empty sound of rhyme.