Epilogue To The Second Part Of The Conquest Of Granada. Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: AABBCCDDEEFFEEGHIIJJ KKLLMMNNOPQQRR| They who have best succeeded on the stage | A |
| Have still conform'd their genius to their age | A |
| Thus Jonson did mechanic humour show | B |
| When men were dull and conversation low | B |
| Then comedy was faultless but 'twas coarse | C |
| Cobb's tankard was a jest and Otter's horse | C |
| And as their comedy their love was mean | D |
| Except by chance in some one labour'd scene | D |
| Which must atone for an ill written play | E |
| They rose but at their height could seldom stay | E |
| Fame then was cheap and the first comer sped | F |
| And they have kept it since by being dead | F |
| But were they now to write when critics weigh | E |
| Each line and every word throughout a play | E |
| None of them no not Jonson in his height | G |
| Could pass without allowing grains for weight | H |
| Think it not envy that these truths are told | I |
| Our poet's not malicious though he's bold | I |
| 'Tis not to brand them that their faults are shown | J |
| But by their errors to excuse his own | J |
| If love and honour now are higher raised | K |
| 'Tis not the poet but the age is praised | K |
| Wit's now arrived to a more high degree | L |
| Our native language more refined and free | L |
| Our ladies and our men now speak more wit | M |
| In conversation than those poets writ | M |
| Then one of these is consequently true | N |
| That what this poet writes comes short of you | N |
| And imitates you ill which most he fears | O |
| Or else his writing is not worse than theirs | P |
| Yet though you judge as sure the critics will | Q |
| That some before him writ with greater skill | Q |
| In this one praise he has their fame surpass'd | R |
| To please an age more gallant than the last | R |
John Dryden
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