Comfort thee then, and think it no disgrace
From that great height a little to decline,
Since all must grant the reason of it was,
Her too great excellence and no want of thine.
He seems to have imitated the manner of his friend Davenant's versification in these lines: but he has likewise followed the evil fashion just then introduced, of degrading our written language by the use of colloquial contractions.
Be the other merits of his verses what they may, he has this rare merit (if the little volume of his epigrams which I possess may be considered as a sample of his other works) that he is never in the slightest degree an immoral writer himself, and that he expresses a due abhorrence of the mischievous and disgraceful writings of his contemporaries.
This is from his divine epigrams.
Do good with pain, the pleasure in't you find,
The pain's soon past, the good remains behind:
Do ill with pleasure, this y'ave for your pains,
The pleasure passes soon, the ill remains.
