I Oppianus am: when I did speake,Poets in place, did thinke their wits too weake.Me, cruell and inhumane Fate enuy'd,Which was the cause, before my time I dy'd.Homer in his eighth Odyss. speakes to this purpose: Among all other men, Poets are most worthy to participate honour and reue∣rence, because the Muses themselues teach them their songs, and are enamoured both of their profession and them. But I had al∣most forgot my self: for in proceeding further, I might haue fore∣stalled a Worke, which hereafter (I hope) by Gods assistance, to commit to the publick view; namely, the Liues of all the Poets, Forreine and Moderne, from the first before Homer, to the Novis∣simi and last, of what Nation or Language soeuer; so farre as any Historie or Chronologie will giue me warrant. Therefore here in good time I breake off: yet cannot chuse but remember you' what Ovid speaketh in his last Elegie: Ergo cum silices, — &c.When Flints shall faile, and I'on by age decay,The Muse shall liue, confin'd to Time nor day.Kings, and Kings glorious Triumphs must giue way;And Tagus blest sands vnto them obay.Thus much to shew you in what honour Poets haue been. But now (and hence Illae Lachrimae) to shew you in what respect they are; and not onely in the Times present, but what an heauy Fate hath heretofore (as now) been impending ouer the Muses. De dura & misera sorte Poetarum, thus far heare me: Heu miseram sortem, durâmque à sidere vitam,Quam dat docti loquis vatibus ipse Deus!'Lasse for the poore and wretched statePoetr. miseria:That either Phoebus, or sad FateInflicts on learned Poets! whetherThey, or their wills with them, togetherConspire; all these we wretched find,Who euer by their Wits haue shyn'd.Homer, to whom Apollo gaueHomer.The Palme, scarce (dying) found a Graue:And he that was the Muses Grace,Begg'd with his Harpe from place to place.Poore injur'd Virgil was bereftVirgil.Of those faire fields his Father left;0