Classic Poem

My name is free, and my rich clothes commend
No deform'd bounty of a looser friend,
Nor am I warm i'th'sunshine of great men,
By gilding their dark sins; truth guides my pen.
Bright justice, therefore, bold by me, doth say
Man's understanding feels no such decay
But it may judge, and while the soul of wit
Lives bodied in the stage, spectator sit:
Old nature's ever young, and 'twere a crime
'Gainst reason, to aver our aged time
Is sick with dotage; which doth still impart
To' th' better'd world new miracles of art.
I must applaud thy scenes, and hope thy style
Will make Arabia, envious of our isle,
Confess us happy, since thou'st given a name
To the English Phœnix, which by thy great flame
Will live in spite of malice to delight
Our nation, doing art and nature right.
Go forward still, and when his Muse expires,
Whose English stains the Greek and Latin lyres,
Divinest Jonson, live to make us see
The glory of the stage reviv'd in thee.