A consistent target of Jonson’s satire throughout the play is the poetry of his day. Jonson lampoons the pretensions of contemporary poets, who he believes plagiarize more famous poets and produce very little good or original work themselves. At the end of the play, Justice Clement calls for the poetry of Matthew to be burned:
CLEMENT
Is all the rest, of this batch? Bring me a torch: lay it together, and give fire. Cleanse the air. Here was enough to have infected the whole City, if it had not been taken in time. See, see, how our poet's glory shines! Brighter and brighter! Still it increases! [...]KNOWELL
There's an emblem for you, son, and your studies!CLEMENT
Nay, no speech or act of mine be drawn against such as profess it worthily. They are not born every year, as an alderman. There goes more to the making of a good poet, than a sheriff, Master Kitely.
Having dismissed Matthew, blocking him from attending the wedding feast of Edward Knowell and his new bride Bridget, Clement calls for a torch to “give fire” and “cleanse the air” by burning Matthew’s poetry, which he claims is poor enough to have “infected the whole city, if it had not been taken in time.” Sarcastically, he praises the way the poetry “shines” as it burns. Knowell describes the scene as an “emblem” for his own son’s study of poetry, though Clement argues that not all poetry is bad, even if a good poet is rarer than a good officer of state.
