"*
*Two Gentlemen of Verona.
He was buried in Stratford Parish Church, and on his grave was
placed a bust of the poet. That bust and an engraving in the
beginning of the first great edition of his works are the only
two real portraits of Shakespeare. Both were done after his
death, and yet perhaps there is no face more well known to us
than that of the greatest of all poets.
Beneath the bust are written these lines:
"Stay, passenger, why goest thou by so fast?
Read, if thou-canst, whom envious Death hath plast
Within this monument; Shakespeare with whome
Quick nature dide: whose name doth deck ys tombe,
Far more than cost, sith all yt he hath writt,
Leaves living art but page to serve his witt."
Upon a slab over the grave is carved:
"Good frend, for Jesus' sake forbeare
To digg the dust encloased heare;
Bleste be ye man yt spares thes stones,
And curst be he yt moves my bones."
And so our greatest poet lies not beneath the great arch of
Westminster but in the quiet church of the little country town in
which he was born.
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