Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, TO SIR WILLIAM JEPHSON, by BEN JONSON


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TO SIR WILLIAM JEPHSON, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: Jephson, thou man of men, to whose loved name
Last Line: A desperate solecism in truth and wit.
Subject(s): Jephson, Sir William (d. 1611)


Jephson, thou man of men, to whose loved name
All gentry, yet, owe part of their best flame!
So did thy virtue inform, thy wit sustain
That age, when thou stood'st up the master brain:
Thou wert the first, mad'st merit know her strength,
And those that lacked it, to suspect at length,
'Twas not entailed on title. That some word
Might be found out as good, and not 'my lord'.
That Nature no such difference had impressed
In men, but every bravest was the best:
That blood not minds, but minds did blood adorn:
And to live great, was better, than great born.
These were thy knowing arts: which who doth now
Virtuously practise must at least allow
Them in, if not from thee; or must commit
A desperate solecism in truth and wit.





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