Ben Jonson
Ben Jonson
Benjamin "Ben" Jonsonwas an English playwright, poet, actor and literary critic of the 17th century, whose artistry exerted a lasting impact upon English poetry and stage comedy. He popularised the comedy of humours. He is best known for the satirical plays Every Man in His Humour, Volpone, or The Foxe, The Alchemistand Bartholomew Fayre: A Comedyand for his lyric poetry; he is generally regarded as the second most important English dramatist, after William Shakespeare, during the reign of James I...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth11 June 1572
He that would have his virtue published, is not the servant of virtue, but glory.
Ramp up my genius, be not retrograde; But boldly nominate a spade a spade.
She is Venus when she smiles; / But she's Juno when she walks, / And Minerva when she talks.
If you be sick, your own thoughts will make you sick
Have you seen but a bright lily grow, / Before rude hands have touched it? / Have you marked but the fall o' the snow / Before the soil hath smutched it? . . . O so white! O so soft! O so sweet is she!
Slow, slow, fresh fount, keep time with my salt tears; / Yet slower yet, O faintly, gentle springs.
In his adversity I ever prayed, that God would give him strength; for greatness he could not want.
I have a humour, / I would not willingly be gulled.
Where it concerns himself, Who's angry at a slander, makes it true.
Queen and huntress, chaste and fair, / Now the sun is laid to sleep, / Seated in thy silver chair, / State in wonted manner keep: / Hesperus entreats thy light, / Goddess, excellently bright.
Have you a stool there to be melancholy upon?
It is not growing like a tree / In bulk, doth make men better be.
That for which all virtue now is sold, and almost every vice- almighty gold
Lady, it is to be presumed, / Though art's hid causes are not found, / All is not sweet, all is not sound.