So many characters, so minutely described, lead us to suppose, that

some personal satire lay concealed under them; and, accordingly,

the Prologue seems to have been written with a view of deprecating

the resentment which this idea might have excited in the audience.

We learn, however, by the Preface, that the piece was unfavourably

received, "either through the calamity of the time (during the Popish

plot), which made people not care for diversions, or through the anger

of a great many who thought themselves concerned in the satire." The

piece is far from being devoid of merit; and the characters, though

drawn in Shadwell's coarse, harsh manner, are truly comic. That of

the jockey, since so popular, seems to have been brought upon the

stage for the first time in the "True Widow." It is remarkable, that,

though Dryden writes the Prologue, the piece contains a sly hit at

him. Maggot, finding himself married to a portionless jilt, says, "I

must e'en write hard for the play-house; I may get the reversion of

the poet-laureat's place." This, however, might be only meant as a

good-humoured pleasantry among friends.

After the deadly quarrel with Shadwell, our author seems to have

resumed his property in the Prologue, as it is prefixed to "The Widow

Ranter, or The History of Bacon in Virginia," a tragi-comedy by Mrs

Behn, acted in 1690.

PROLOGUE

TO

THE TRUE WIDOW.

BY

THOMAS SHADWELL, 1679.

Heaven save ye, gallants, and this hopeful age!

Y'are welcome to the downfall of the stage.

The fools have laboured long in their vocation,

And vice, the manufacture of the nation,

O'erstocks the town so much, and thrives so well,

That fops and knaves grow drugs, and will not sell.

In vain our wares on theatres are shown,

When each has a plantation of his own.

His cause ne'er fails; for whatsoe'er he spends,

There's still God's plenty for himself and friends.

Should men be rated by poetic rules,

Lord, what a poll would there be raised from fools!

Meantime poor wit prohibited must lie,

As if 'twere made some French commodity.

Fools you will have, and raised at vast expence;

And yet, as soon as seen, they give offence.

Time was, when none would cry,--That oaf was me;

But now you strive about your pedigree.

Bauble and cap[349] no sooner are thrown down,

But there's a muss[350] of more than half the town.

Each one will challenge a child's part at least;

A sign the family is well encreased.

Of foreign cattle there's no longer need,

When we're supplied so fast with English breed.

Well! flourish, countrymen; drink, swear, and roar;

Let every free-born subject keep his whore,

And wandering in the wilderness about,

At end of forty years not wear her out.

But when you see these pictures, let none dare

To own beyond a limb, or single share;

For where the punk is common, he's a sot,

Who needs will father what the parish got.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 349: The fool's cap and bauble, with which the ancient jester

was equipped.]

[Footnote 350: A scramble.]

PROLOGUE

TO

CÆSAR BORGIA.

BY MR N. LEE, 1680.

_This play of Nathaniel Lee's was first acted at the Duke's

theatre, in_ 1680. _It is founded on the history of the natural son

of Pope Alexander VI. The play fell soon into disrepute; for Cibber

tells us, that when Powel was jealous of his fine dress in Lord

Foppington, and complained bitterly, that he had not so good a suit

to play "Cæsar Borgia," this bouncing play could do little more

than pay candles and fiddles._--Apology.

The unhappy man, who once has trailed a pen,

Lives not to please himself, but other men;

Is always drudging, wastes his life and blood,

Yet only eats and drinks what you think good.

What praise soe'er the poetry deserve,

Yet every fool can bid the poet starve.

That fumbling letcher to revenge is bent,

Because he thinks himself, or whore, is meant:

Name but a cuckold, all the city swarms;

From Leadenhall to Ludgate is in arms.

Were there no fear of Antichrist, or France,

In the blest time poor poets live by chance.

Either you come not here, or, as you grace }

Some old acquaintance, drop into the place, }

Careless and qualmish with a yawning face: }

You sleep o'er wit,--and by my troth you may;

Most of your talents lie another way.

You love to hear of some prodigious tale,

The bell that tolled alone, or Irish whale.[351]

News is your food, and you enough provide,

Both for yourselves, and all the world beside.

One theatre there is, of vast resort,

Which whilome of Requests was called the Court[352];

But now the great exchange of news 'tis hight,

And full of hum and buzz from noon till night.

Up stairs and down you run, as for a race,

And each man wears three nations in his face.

So big you look, though claret you retrench,

That, armed with bottled ale, you huff the French.

But all your entertainment still is fed

By villains in your own dull island bred.

Would you return to us, we dare engage

To shew you better rogues upon the stage.

You know no poison but plain ratsbane here;

Death's more refined, and better bred elsewhere.

They have a civil way in Italy, }

By smelling a perfume to make you die; }

A trick would make you lay your snuff-box by. }

Murder's a trade, so known and practised there,

That 'tis infallible as is the chair.

But mark their feast, you shall behold such pranks!

The pope says grace, but 'tis the devil gives thanks.[353]

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 351: In Dryden's days, as in our own, there were provided

by the hawkers a plentiful assortment of wonders and prodigies to

captivate the people; with this difference, that, in that earlier

period, the readers and believers of these wonders were more numerous,

and of higher rank. I cannot point out the particular prodigies

referred to; but I suppose they were of the same description as "The

wonderful blazing star; with the dreadful apparition of two armies in

the air; the one out of the north, the other out of the south, seen on

the 17th December, 1680, betwixt four and five o'clock in the evening,

at Ottery, ten miles eastward of Exon;" or as "The strange and dreadful

relation of a horrible tempest of thunder and lightning, and of strange

apparitions in the air, accompanied with whirlwinds, gusts of hail and

rain, which happened the 10th of June, 1680, at a place near Weatherby,

in the county of York: with the account how the top of strong oak,

containing one load of wood, was taken off by a sheet of fire, wrapped

in a whirlwind, and carried through the air, half a mile distant from

the place, &c. As, likewise, another strange relation of a monstrous

child with two heads, four arms, four legs, and all things thereunto

belonging; born at a village, called Ill-Brewers, in the county of

Somerset, on the 19th of May last, with several other circumstances and

curious observations, to the wonder of all that have beheld it."]

[Footnote 352: The court of Requests was a general rendezvous for the

news-mongers, politicians, and busy bodies of the time. North says,

"It was observable of Oates, that while he had his liberty, as in King

Charles's time and King William's, especially the latter, he never

failed to give his attendance in the court of Requests, and in the

lobbies, to solicit hard in all points under deliberation that might

terminate in the prejudice of the church, crown, or of any gentlemen

of the loyal, or church of England party." Swift, in his journal to

Stella, makes frequent mention of the Court of Requests as a scene of

political bustle and intrigue.]

[Footnote 353: The Popish plot being now in full force and credit,

our author here, as in the "Spanish Friar," flatters the universal

prejudice entertained against the Catholics.]

PROLOGUE

TO

SOPHONISBA; SPOKEN AT OXFORD,

1680.

_Sophonisba was play of N. Lee, first acted about_ 1676. _It is in

the taste of the French stage, and of the romances of Calprenede

and Scuderi. Hannibal and Massinissa are introduced in the

character of whining love-sick adorers of relentless beauty. This

prevailing taste is admirably ridiculed by Boileau, in a dialogue

where a scene is laid in the infernal regions. In the prologue

spoken at Oxford, which was always famous for Tory principles, our

author ventures to ridicule the Popish Plot, and to predict the

consequences of the predominance of fanatical principles to the

studies cultivated in the University._

Thespis, the first professor of our art,

At country wakes, sung ballads from a cart.

To prove this true, if Latin be no trespass,

_Dicitur et plaustris vexisse poemata Thespis._

But Æschylus, says Horace in some page,

Was the first mountebank that trod the stage:

Yet Athens never knew your learned sport,

Of tossing poets in a tennis-court[354].

But 'tis the talent of our English nation,

Still to be plotting some new reformation;

And few years hence, if anarchy goes on,

Jack Presbyter shall here erect his throne,

Knock out a tub with preaching once a day,

And every prayer be longer than a play.

Then all your heathen wits shall go to pot,

For disbelieving of a Popish-plot;

Your poets shall be used like infidels,

And worst, the author of the Oxford bells;[355]

Nor should we 'scape the sentence, to depart,

Even in our first original, a cart;

No zealous brother there would want a stone,

To maul us cardinals, and pelt pope Joan.

Religion, learning, wit, would be supprest,

Rags of the whore, and trappings of the beast;

Scot, Suarez, Tom of Aquin,[356] must go down,

As chief supporters of the triple crown;

And Aristotle's for destruction ripe;

Some say, he called the soul an organ-pipe,

Which, by some little help of derivation,

Shall then be proved a pipe of inspiration.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 354: Apparently, a tennis-court was the place where the

temporary stage was erected at Oxford.]

[Footnote 355: Probably some pasquinade against the Whigs, then current

in the university.]

[Footnote 356: Noted school divines, whose works (the greater was the

pity) were then in high esteem in the university.]

A PROLOGUE.

_This Prologue was obviously spoken in_ 1680-1, _from its frequent

reference to the politics of that period: but upon what particular

occasion I have not discovered._

If yet there be a few that take delight }

In that which reasonable men should write, }

To them alone we dedicate this night. }

The rest may satisfy their curious itch

With city-gazettes, or some factious speech,[357]

Or whate'er libel, for the public good,

Stirs up the shrove-tide crew to fire and blood.

Remove your benches, you apostate pit,

And take, above, twelve pennyworth of wit;

Go back to your dear dancing on the rope,

Or see what's worse, the devil and the pope.[358]

The plays, that take on our corrupted stage,

Methinks, resemble the distracted age;

Noise, madness, all unreasonable things,

That strike at sense, as rebels do at kings.

The style of forty-one our poets write,

And you are grown to judge like forty-eight.[359]

Such censures our mistaking audience make,

That 'tis almost grown scandalous to take.

They talk of fevers that infect the brains;

But nonsense is the new disease that reigns.

Weak stomachs, with a long disease opprest,

Cannot the cordials of strong wit digest;

Therefore thin nourishment of farce ye choose,

Decoctions of a barley-water muse.

A meal of tragedy would make ye sick,

Unless it were a very tender chick.

Some scenes in sippets would be worth our time;

Those would go down; some love that's poached in rhime:

If these should fail----

We must lie down, and, after all our cost,

Keep holiday, like watermen in frost;

While you turn players on the world's great stage,

And act yourselves the farce of your own age.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 357: The City Gazettes were such publications as the Petition

of the City, Mayor, and Aldermen, for the sitting of parliament on the

13th January, 1680, which is printed with the city arms prefixed, by

a solemn order of the common council, and an appointment by the Lord

Mayor, that Samuel Roycroft, printer to the city, do print the same,

pursuant to order, and that no other person presume to do so. The

"factious speech" was probably that of Shaftesbury, which was burned by

the hands of the common hangman.]

[Footnote 358: The Pope-burning, so often mentioned.]

[Footnote 359: The meaning is, that the poets rebel against sense and

criticism, like the parliament, in 1641, against the king; and that the

audience judge as ill as those, who, in 1648, condemned Charles to the

block. The parallel between the political disputes in 1680, and 1681,

and those which preceded the great civil war, was fashionable among

the Tories. A Whig author, who undertakes "to answer the clamours of

the malicious, and to inform the ignorant on this subject," complains,

"It hath been all the clamour of late, _forty-one_, _forty-one_ is now

coming to be acted over again; we are running in the very same steps,

in the same path and road, to undo the nation, and to ruin kingly

government, as our predecessors did in _forty_, _and forty-one_. We

run the same courses, we take the same measures; _latet anguis in

herba_; beware of the Presbyterian serpent, who lurks in the affairs of

_eighty_, being the very same complexion, form, and shape, as that of

forty and forty one."--_The Disloyal Forty and Forty-one, and the Loyal

Eighty, presented to public view._ Folio 1680.]

EPILOGUE

SPOKEN AT

MITHRIDATES, KING OF PONTUS,

THE FIRST PLAY ACTED AT THE THEATRE ROYAL, 1681.

_This Epilogue, which occurs in Luttrell's collection with many

marginal corrections, seems to have been spoken by Goodman, who is

mentioned with great respect by Cibber in his "Apology." It is now

for the first time received into Dryden's poems._

Pox on this playhouse! 'tis an old tired jade,

'Twill do no longer, we must force a trade.

What if we all turn witnesses o' th' plot?--

That's overstockt, there's nothing to be got.

Shall we take orders?--That will parts require, }

And colleges give no degrees for hire; }

Would Salamanca were a little nigher! }

Will nothing do?--O, now 'tis found, I hope;

Have not you seen the dancing of the rope?

When André's[360] wit was clean run off the score,

And Jacob's capering tricks could do no more,

A damsel does to the ladder's top advance,

And with two heavy buckets drags a dance;

The yawning crowd perk up to see the sight,

And slaver'd at the mouth for vast delight.

Oh, friend, there's nothing, to enchant the mind,

Nothing like that sweet sex to draw mankind:

The foundered horse, that switching will not stir,

Trots to the mare afore, without a spur.

Faith, I'll go scour the scene-room, and engage

Some toy within to save the falling stage. [_Exit._

_Re-enters with Mrs_ Cox.

Who have we here again? what nymph's i' th' stocks?

Your most obedient slave, sweet madam Cox.

You'd best be coy, and blush for a pretence;

For shame! say something in your own defence!

_Mrs Cox._ What shall I say? I have been hence so long,

I've e'en almost forgot my mother-tongue;

If I can act, I wish I were ten fathom

Beneath----

_Goodman._ O Lord! pray, no swearing, madam!

_Mrs Cox._ If I had sworn, yet sure, to serve the nation,

I could find out some mental reservation.

Well, in plain terms, gallants, without a sham,

Will you be pleased to take me as I am?

Quite out of countenance, with a downcast look,

Just like a truant that returns to book:

Yet I'm not old; but, if I were, this place

Ne'er wanted art to piece a ruined face.

When greybeards governed, I forsook the stage;

You know 'tis piteous work to act with age.

Though there's no sense among these beardless boys,

There's what we women love, that's mirth and noise.

These young beginners may grow up in time,

And the devil's in't, if I am past my prime.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 360: Alluding to St André, the famous dancing master, and

Jacob Hall, the performer on the slack rope.]

EPILOGUE

TO A

TRAGEDY CALLED TAMERLANE, 1681.

BY CHARLES SAUNDERS.

_This play was highly applauded at its first representation.

Langbaine, following perhaps this epilogue, tells us, that the

genius of the author budded as early as that of the incomparable

Cowley; and adds, in evidence of farther sympathy, that Saunders

was, like him, a king's scholar. The play is said to be taken from

a novel called "Tamerlane and Asteria," and was complimented with

a copy of commendatory verses by Mr Banks. It does not appear that

Saunders wrote any thing else._

Ladies, the beardless author of this day

Commends to you the fortune of his play.

A woman-wit has often graced the stage,

But he's the first boy-poet of our age.

Early as is the year his fancies blow,

Like young Narcissus peeping through the snow.

Thus Cowley[361] blossomed soon, yet flourished long;

This is as forward, and may prove as strong.

Youth with the fair should always favour find,

Or we are damned dissemblers of our kind.

What's all this love they put into our parts?

'Tis but the pit-a-pat of two young hearts.

Should hag and grey-beard make such tender moan, }

Faith, you'd even trust them to themselves alone, }

And cry, "Let's go, here's nothing to be done." }

Since love's our business, as 'tis your delight,

The young, who best can practise, best can write.

What though he be not come to his full power?

He's mending and improving every hour.

You sly she-jockies of the box and pit,

Are pleased to find a hot unbroken wit;

By management he may in time be made,

But there's no hopes of an old battered jade;

Faint and unnerved, he runs into a sweat,

And always fails you at the second heat.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 361: Cowley published in his sixteenth year, a book called

"Poetical Blossoms."]

PROLOGUE

TO THE

UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD, 1681.

_This Prologue appears to have been spoken at Oxford shortly after

the dissolution of the famous Parliament held there, March, 1680-1.

From the following couplet, it would seem that the players had made

an unsuccessful attempt to draw houses during the short sitting of

that Parliament:_

We looked what representatives would bring,

But they served us just as they did the king.

_At that time a greater stage was opened for the public amusement,

and the mimic theatre could excite little interest._

_Dryden seems, though perhaps unconsciously, to have borrowed the

two first lines of this Prologue from Drayton:_

The Tuscan poet doth advance

The frantic Paladin of France.

_Nymphidia._

The famed Italian muse, whose rhimes advance

Orlando, and the Paladins of France,

Records, that, when our wit and sense is flown,

'Tis lodged within the circle of the moon,

In earthern jars, which one, who thither soared,

Set to his nose, snuffed up, and was restored.

Whate'er the story be, the moral's true;

The wit we lost in town, we find in you.

Our poets their fled parts may draw from hence,

And fill their windy heads with sober sense

When London votes[362] with Southwark's disagree,

Here may they find their long lost loyalty.

Here busy senates, to the old cause inclined,

May snuff the votes their fellows left behind;

Your country neighbours, when their grain grows dear,

May come, and find their last provision here;

Whereas we cannot much lament our loss,

Who neither carried back, nor brought one cross.

We looked what representatives would bring,

But they helped us--just as they did the king.

Yet we despair not; for we now lay forth

The Sibyl's books to those who know their worth;

And though the first was sacrificed before,

These volumes doubly will the price restore.

Our poet bade us hope this grace to find,

To whom by long prescription you are kind.

He, whose undaunted Muse, with loyal rage,

Has never spared the vices of the age,

Here finding nothing that his spleen can raise,

Is forced to turn his satire into praise.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 362: The city of London had now declared against petitioning

for parliament.]

PROLOGUE

TO THE

UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD.

_This Prologue must have been spoken at Oxford during the residence

of the Duke of York in Scotland, in 1681-2. The humour turns upon

a part of the company having attended the Duke to Scotland, where,

among other luxuries little known to my countrymen, he introduced,

during his residence at Holy Rood House, the amusements of the

theatre. I can say little about the actors commemorated in the

following verses, excepting, that their stage was erected in the

tennis-court of the palace, which was afterwards converted into

some sort of manufactory, and finally, burned down many years

ago. Besides these deserters, whom Dryden has described very

ludicrously, he mentions a sort of strolling company, composed, it

would seem, of Irishmen, who had lately acted at Oxford._

Discord, and plots, which have undone our age,

With the same ruin have o'erwhelmed the stage.

Our house has suffered in the common woe,

We have been troubled with Scotch rebels too.

Our brethren are from Thames to Tweed departed, }

And of our sisters, all the kinder-hearted }

To Edinburgh gone, or coached, or carted. }

With bonny bluecap there they act all night

For Scotch half-crown, in English three-pence hight.

One nymph, to whom fat Sir John Falstaff's lean,

There with her single person fills the scene.

Another, with long use and age decayed,

Dived here old woman, and rose there a maid.

Our trusty door-keepers of former time

There strut and swagger in heroic rhime.

Tack but a copper-lace to drugget suit,

And there's a hero made without dispute;

And that, which was a capon's tail before,

Becomes a plume for Indian emperor.

But all his subjects, to express the care

Of imitation go, like Indians, bare;

Laced linen there would be a dangerous thing; }

It might perhaps a new rebellion bring; }

The Scot, who wore it, would be chosen king. }

But why should I these renegades describe,

When you yourselves have seen a lewder tribe?

Teague has been here, and, to this learned pit,

With Irish action slandered English wit;

You have beheld such barbarous Macs appear,

As merited a second massacre;[363]

Such as, like Cain, were branded with disgrace,

And had their country stamped upon their face.

When strollers durst presume to pick your purse,

We humbly thought our broken troop not worse.

How ill soe'er our action may deserve,

Oxford's a place where wit can never starve.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 363: Alluding to the Irish massacre.]

AN

EPILOGUE

FOR

THE KING'S HOUSE

_From the date of the various circumstances referred to, this

Epilogue seems to have been spoken in 1681-2._

We act by fits and starts, like drowning men,

But just peep up, and then pop down again.

Let those who call us wicked change their sense,

For never men lived more on Providence.

Not lottery cavaliers[364] are half so poor,

Nor broken cits, nor a vacation whore;

Not courts, nor courtiers living on the rents

Of the three last ungiving parliaments;[365]

So wretched, that, if Pharaoh could divine, }

He might have spared his dream of seven lean kine, }

And changed his vision for the muses nine. }

The comet, that, they say, portends a dearth,

Was but a vapour drawn from playhouse earth;

Pent there since our last fire, and, Lilly says,[366]

Foreshows our change of state, and thin third-days.

'Tis not our want of wit that keeps us poor;

For then the printer's press would suffer more.

Their pamphleteers each day their venom spit;

They thrive by treason, and we starve by wit.

Confess the truth, which of you has not laid

Four farthings out to buy the Hatfield Maid?[367]

Or, which is duller yet, and more would spite us,

Democritus his wars with Heraclitus?[368]

Such are the authors, who have run us down,

And exercised you critics of the town.

Yet these are pearls to your lampooning rhimes,

Ye abuse yourselves more dully than the times.

Scandal, the glory of the English nation,

Is worn to rags, and scribbled out of fashion;

Such harmless thrusts, as if, like fencers wise,

They had agreed their play before their prize.

Faith, they may hang their harps upon their willows;

'Tis just like children when they box with pillows.

Then put an end to civil wars, for shame!

Let each knight-errant, who has wronged a dame,

Throw down his pen, and give her, as he can,

The satisfaction of a gentleman.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 364: The lottery cavaliers were the loyal indigent officers,

to whom the right of keeping lotteries was granted by patent in the

reign of Charles II. There are many proclamations in the gazettes of

the time against persons encroaching upon this exclusive privilege.]

[Footnote 365: The "three ungiving parliaments" were that convoked

in 1679, and dissolved on the 10th July in the same year; that which

was held at Westminster 21st October, 1680, and dissolved on the 18th

January following; and, finally, the Oxford parliament, assembled 21st

March, 1680-1, and dissolved on the 28th of the same month. All these

parliaments refused supplies to the crown, until they should obtain

security, as they termed it, for the Protestant religion.]

[Footnote 366: The famous astrologer Lilly is here mentioned

ironically. In his "Strange and wonderful prophecy, being a relation

of many universal accidents that will come to pass in the year 1681,

according to the prognostications of the celestial bodies, as well in

this our English nation, as in parts beyond the seas, with a sober

caution to all, by speedy repentance, to avert the judgments that are

impendent," I find "an account of the great stream of light, by some

termed a blazing star, which was seen in the south-west on Saturday

and Sunday, the 11th and 12th of this instant December, between

six and seven in the evening, with several judicial opinions and

conjectures on the same." But the comet, mentioned in the text, may

be that which is noticed in "A strange and wonderful Trinity, or a

Triplicity of Stupendous Prodigies, consisting of a wonderful eclipse,

as well as of a wonderful comet, and of a wonderful conjunction, now

in its second return; seeing all these three prodigious wonders do

jointly portend wonderful events, all meeting together in a strange

harmonious triangle, and are all the three royal heralds successively

sent from the King of Heaven, to sound succeeding alarms for awakening

a slumbering world. _Beware the third time._" 4to. London, 1683. This

comet is said to have appeared in October 1682. Various interpretations

were put upon these heavenly phenomena, by Gadbury, Lilly, Kirkby,

Whalley, and other Philo-maths, who were chiefly guided in their

predictions by their political attachments. Some insisted they meant

civil war, others foreign conquest; some that they presaged the

downfall of the Turk, others that of the Pope and French king; some

that they foretold dearth on the land, and others, the fertility of

the king's bed, by the birth of a son, to the exclusion of the Duke of

York.]

[Footnote 367: This was one of the numerous devices used by the

partizans of Monmouth to strengthen his interest: "A relation was

published, in the name of one Elizabeth Freeman, afterwards called the

Maid of Hatfield, setting forth, That, on the 24th of January, the

appearance of a woman all in white, with a white veil over her face,

accosted her with these words: 'Sweetheart, the 15th day of May is

appointed for the royal blood to be poisoned. Be not afraid, for I am

sent to tell thee.' That on the 25th, the same appearance stood before

her again, and she having then acquired courage enough to lay it under

the usual adjuration, in the name, &c. it assumed a more glorious

shape, and said in a harsher tone of voice: 'Tell King Charles from

me, and bid him not remove his parliament, and stand to his council:'

adding, 'do as I bid you.' That on the 26th it appeared to her a third

time, but said only, 'do your message.' And that on the next night,

when she saw it for the last time, it said nothing at all.

"Those who depend upon the people for support, must try all manners

of practices upon them; and such fooleries as these sometimes operate

more forcibly than expedients of a more rational kind. Care was,

besides, taken, to have this relation attested by Sir Joseph Jordan,

a justice of the peace, and the rector of Hatfield, Dr Lee, who was

one of the king's chaplains: Nay, the message was actually sent to his

majesty, and the whole forgery very officiously circulated all over the

kingdom."--RALPH'S _Review of the Reigns of Charles II. and James II._

Vol. I. p. 562.

The Tories, according to the custom of that time, endeavoured to

turn this apparition against those who invented it, and published an

ironical account of its appearance to Lady Gray, the supposed mistress

of the Duke of Monmouth.--See RALPH, _ibid._ and this Work, Vol. IX. p.

276.]

[Footnote 368: "Heraclitus Ridens" was a paper published weekly, by

L'Estrange, on the part of the court, and answered by one called

"Democritus" on that of the Whigs.]

PROLOGUE

TO HIS

ROYAL HIGHNESS,

UPON HIS

FIRST APPEARANCE AT THE DUKE'S THEATRE AFTER HIS RETURN FROM SCOTLAND.

SPOKEN BY MR SMITH, 21st APRIL, 1682.

_The Duke's return from Scotland, and the shock which it gave

to the schemes of Shaftesbury and the Exclusionists, has been

mentioned at length in the Notes to the Second Part of "Absalom and

Achitophel,"_ Vol. ix. p. 402. _The passage upon which the note

is given, agrees with this Prologue, in representing the secret

enemies of the Duke of York as anxiously pressing forwards to greet

his return:_

While those that sought his absence to betray,

Press first, their nauseous false respects to pay;

Him still the officious hypocrites molest,

And with malicious duty break his rest.

Vol. ix. p. 344.

_The date of the Prologue, and the name of the speaker, are marked

on a copy in Mr Luttrell's collection._

In those cold regions which no summers cheer,

Where brooding darkness covers half the year,

To hollow caves the shivering natives go,

Bears range abroad, and hunt in tracks of snow.

But when the tedious twilight wears away,

And stars grow paler at the approach of day,

The longing crowds to frozen mountains run,

Happy who first can see the glimmering sun;

The surly savage offspring disappear,

And curse the bright successor of the year.

Yet, though rough bears in covert seek defence, }

White foxes stay, with seeming innocence; }

That crafty kind with day-light can dispense. }

Still we are thronged so full with Reynard's race,

That loyal subjects scarce can find a place;

Thus modest truth is cast behind the crowd,

Truth speaks too low, hypocrisy too loud.

Let them be first to flatter in success;

Duty can stay, but guilt has need to press.

Once, when true zeal the sons of God did call,

To make their solemn show at heaven's Whitehall,

The fawning Devil appeared among the rest,

And made as good a courtier as the best.

The friends of Job, who railed at him before,

Came cap in hand when he had three times more.

Yet late repentance may, perhaps, be true;

Kings can forgive, if rebels can but sue:

A tyrant's power in rigour is exprest;

The father yearns in the true prince's breast.

We grant, an o'ergrown Whig no grace can mend,

But most are babes, that know not they offend;

The crowd, to restless motion still inclined,

Are clouds, that rack according to the wind.

Driven by their chiefs, they storms of hailstones pour,

Then mourn, and soften to a silent shower.

O welcome to this much-offending land,

The prince that brings forgiveness in his hand!

Thus angels on glad messages appear,

Their first salute commands us not to fear;

Thus heaven, that could constrain us to obey, }

(With reverence if we might presume to say,) }

Seems to relax the rights of sovereign sway; }

Permits to man the choice of good and ill,

And makes us happy by our own free-will.

PROLOGUE

TO THE EARL OF ESSEX.

BY MR J. BANKS, 1682.

SPOKEN TO THE KING AND THE QUEEN AT THEIR COMING TO THE HOUSE.

When first the ark was landed on the shore,

And heaven had vowed to curse the ground no more;

When tops of hills the longing patriarch saw,

And the new scene of earth began to draw;

The dove was sent to view the waves decrease,

And first brought back to man the pledge of peace.

'Tis needless to apply, when those appear,

Who bring the olive, and who plant it here.

We have before our eyes the royal dove,

Still innocence is harbinger of love:

The ark is opened to dismiss the train,

And people with a better race the plain.

Tell me, ye powers, why should vain man pursue, }

With endless toil, each object that is new, }

And for the seeming substance leave the true? }

Why should he quit for hopes his certain good,

And loath the manna of his daily food?

Must England still the scene of changes be, }

Tost and tempestuous, like our ambient sea? }

Must still our weather and our wills agree? }

Without our blood our liberties we have;

Who, that is free, would fight to be a slave?

Or, what can wars to after-times assure,

Of which our present age is not secure?

All that our monarch would for us ordain,

Is but to enjoy the blessings of his reign.

Our land's an Eden, and the main's our fence,

While we preserve our state of innocence:

That lost, then beasts their brutal force employ,

And first their lord, and then themselves destroy.

What civil broils have cost, we know too well;

Oh! let it be enough that once we fell!

And every heart conspire, and every tongue,

Still to have such a king, and this king long.

PROLOGUE

TO THE

LOYAL BROTHER, OR THE PERSIAN PRINCE.

The "Loyal Brother, or the Persian Prince," was the first play of

Southerne, afterwards so deservedly famous as a tragic poet. It is said

to be borrowed from a novel, called, "Tachmas, Prince of Persia." The

character of the Loyal Brother is obviously designed as a compliment to

the Duke of York, whose adherents and opponents now divided the nation.

Southerne was at this time but three-and-twenty. It is said, that, upon

offering Dryden five guineas for the following prologue, which had

hitherto been the usual compliment made him for such favours, the bard

returned the money; and added, "not that I do so out of disrespect to

you, young man, but the players have had my goods too cheap. In future,

I must have ten guineas." Southerne was the first poet who drew large

profit from the author's nights; insomuch, that he is said to have

cleared by one play seven hundred pounds; a circumstance that greatly

surprised Dryden, who seldom gained by his best pieces more than a

seventh part of the sum. From these circumstances, Pope, in his verses

to Southerne on his birth-day, distinguishes him as

----Tom, whom heaven sent down to raise

The price of prologues and of plays.

The prologue, as might be expected, is very severe upon the Whigs; and

alludes to all the popular subjects of dispute between the factions.

The refusal of supplies, and the petition against the king's guards,

are slightly noticed, but the great pope-burning is particularly dwelt

upon; and probably the reader will be pleased with an opportunity of

comparing the account in the prologue with that given by Roger North,

who seems to have entertained the same fear with Dryden, that the

rabble might chuse to cry, God save the king, at Whitehall.

"But, to return to our tumults.--After it was found that there was to

be a reinforcement at the next anniversary, which was in 1682, it is

not to be thought that the court was asleep, or that the king would

not endeavour to put a stop to this brutal outrage. His majesty thought

fit to take the ordinary regular course; which was, to send for the

lord mayor, &c. and to charge him to prevent riots in the city. So

the lord mayor and sheriffs attended the king in council; and there

they were told, that dangerous tumults and disorders were designed

in the city upon the 17th of November next, at night, on pretence of

bonfires; and his majesty expected that they, who were entrusted with

the government of the city, for keeping the peace, should, by their

authority, prevent all such riotous disorders, which, permitted to

go on, was a misdemeanour of their whole body. Then one of them came

forward, and, in a whining tone, told the king, that they did not

apprehend any danger to his majesty, or the city, from these bonfires;

there was an ardour of the people against popery, which they delighted

to express in that manner, but meant no harm: And, if they should go

about to hinder them, it would be taken as if they favoured popery;

and, considering the great numbers, and their zeal, it might make them

outrageous, which, let alone, would not be; and perhaps they themselves

might not be secure in resisting them, no not in their own houses; and

they hoped his majesty would not have them so exposed, so long as they

could assure his majesty that care should be taken, that, if they went

about any ill thing, they should be prevented: or to this purpose, as

I had it from undoubted authority. This was the godly care they had of

the public peace, and the repose of the city; by which the king saw

plainly what they were, and what was to be expected from them. There

wanted not those who suggested the sending regiments into the city; but

the king (always witty) said, he did not love to play with his horse.

But his majesty ordered that a party of horse should be drawn up, and

make a strong guard on the outside of Temple-Bar; and all the other

guards were ordered to be in a posture at a minute's warning; and so he

took a middle, but secure and inoffensive way; and these guards did not

break up till all the rout was over.

"There were not a few in the court who either feared or favoured these

doings; it may be both; the former being the cause of the latter. This

puts me in mind of a passage told me by one present. It was of the Lord

Archbishop of York, Dolben, who was a goodly person, and corpulent; he

came to the Lord Chief-Justice North, and, my lord, said he, (clapping

his hand upon his great self,) what shall we do with these tumults

of the people? They will bear all down before them. My lord, said

the Chief Justice, fear God, and don't fear the people. A good hint

from a man of law to an archbishop. But when the day of execution was

come, all the show-fools of the town had made sure of places; and,

towards the evening, there was a great clutter in the street, with

taking down glass-windows, and faces began to show themselves thereat;

and the hubbub was great, with the shoals of people come there, to

take or seek accommodation. And, for the greater amazement of the

people, somebody had got up to the statue of Elizabeth, in the nich

of Temple-Bar, and set her out like an heathen idol. A bright shield

was hung upon her arm, and a spear put in, or leaned upon, the other

hand; and lamps, or candles, were put about, on the wall of the nich,

to enlighten her person, that the people might have a full view of the

deity that, like the goddess Pallas, stood there as the object of the

solemn sacrifice about to be made. There seemed to be an inscription

upon the shield, but I could not get near enough to discern what it

was, nor divers other decorations; but whatever they were, the eyes

of the rout were pointed at them, and lusty shouts were raised, which

was all the adoration could be paid before the grand procession came

up. I could fix in no nearer post than the Green-Dragon Tavern, below

in Fleet-Street; but, before I settled in my quarters, I rounded the

crowd, to observe, as well as I could, what was doing, and saw much,

but afterwards heard more of the hard battles and skirmishes, that were

maintained from windows and balconies of several parties with one and

the other, and with the floor, as the fancy of Whig and Tory incited.

All which were managed with the artillery of squibs, whereof thousands

of vollies went off, to the great expence of powder and paper, and

profit to the poor manufacturer; for the price of ammunition rose

continually, and the whole trade could not supply the consumption of an

hour or two.

"When we had posted ourselves at windows, expecting the play to begin,

it was very dark, but we could perceive the street to fill, and the hum

of the crowd grew louder and louder; and, at length, with help of some

lights below, we could discern, not only upwards towards the Bar, where

the squib war was maintained, but downwards towards Fleet-Bridge, the

whole street was crowded with people, which made that which followed

seem very strange; for, about eight at night, we heard a din from

below, which came up the street, continually increasing, till we could

perceive a motion; and that was a row of stout fellows, that came,

shouldered together, cross the street, from wall to wall, on each side.

How the people melted away, I cannot tell; but it was plain these

fellows made clear board, as if they had swept the street for what was

to come after. They went along like a wave; and it was wonderful to

see how the crowd made way: I suppose the good people were willing to

give obedience to lawful authority. Behind this wave (which, as all the

rest, had many lights attending) there was a vacancy, but it filled

a-pace, till another like wave came up; and so four or five of these

waves passed, one after another; and then we discerned more numerous

lights, and throats were opened with hoarse and tremendous noise; and,

with that, advanced a pageant, borne along above the heads of the

crowd, and upon it sat an huge Pope, in _pontificalibus_, in his chair,

with a reasonable attendance for state; but his premier minister,

that shared most of his ear, was, Il Signior Diavolo, a nimble little

fellow, in a proper dress, that had a strange dexterity in climbing and

winding about the chair, from one of the pope's ears to the other.

"The next pageant was of a parcel of Jesuits; and after that (for

there was always a decent space between them) came another, with some

ordinary persons with halters, as I took it, about their necks; and

one with a stenterophonic tube, sounded--Abhorrers! Abhorrers! most

infernally; and, lastly, came one, with a single person upon it,

which, some said, was the pamphleteer Sir Roger L'Estrange, some the

King of France, some the Duke of York; but, certainly, it was a very

complaisant civil gentleman, like the former, that was doing what

every body pleased to have him, and, taking all in good part, went on

his way to the fire; and however some, to gratify their fancy, might

debase his character, yet certainly he was a person of high quality,

because he came in the place of state, which is last of all. When

these were passed, our coast began to clear, but it thickened upwards,

and the noise increased; for, as we were afterwards informed, these

stately figures were planted in a demilune about an huge fire, that

shined upon them; and the balconies of the club were ready to crack

with their factious load, till the good people were satiated with the

fine show; and then the hieroglyphic monsters were brought condignly

to a new light of their own making, being, one after another, added

to increase the flames: all which was performed with fitting salvos

of the rabble, echoed from the club, which made a proper music to so

pompous a sacrifice. Were it not for the late attempts to have renewed

these barbarities,[369] it had been more reasonable to have forgot

the past, that such a stain might not have remained upon the credit

of human kind, whom we would not have thought obnoxious to any such;

but, as it is now otherwise, all persons, that mean humanely, ought

to discourage them; and one way is, to expose the factious brutality

of such unthinking rabble sports, by showing, as near as we can, how

really they were acted; the very knowledge of which, one would think,

should make them for ever to be abhorred and detested of all rational

beings."--NORTH'S _Examen_.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 369: Probably alluding to the pope-burning, meditated by the

Whigs during the administration of Harley. Swift, in his journal to

Stella, mentions the figures intended for the procession having been

seized by government.]

PROLOGUE

TO THE

LOYAL BROTHER, OR THE PERSIAN PRINCE.

BY MR SOUTHERNE, 1682.

Poets, like lawful monarchs, ruled the stage,

Till critics, like damned Whigs, debauched our age.

Mark how they jump! critics would regulate }

Our theatres, and Whigs reform our state; }

Both pretend love, and both (plague rot them!) hate.}

The critic humbly seems advice to bring,

The fawning Whig petitions to the king;

But one's advice into a satire slides,

T'other's petition a remonstrance hides.

These will no taxes give, and those no pence;

Critics would starve the poet, Whigs the prince.

The critic all our troops of friends discards;

Just so the Whig would fain pull down the guards.

Guards are illegal, that drive foes away,

As watchful shepherds, that fright beasts of prey.

Kings, who disband such needless aids as these,

Are safe--as long as e'er their subjects please;

And that would be till next Queen Bess's night,

Which thus grave penny chroniclers indite.[370]

Sir Edmondbury first, in woful wise,

Leads up the show, and milks their maudlin eyes.

There's not a butcher's wife but dribs her part,

And pities the poor pageant from her heart;

Who, to provoke revenge, rides round the fire,

And, with a civil congé, does retire:

But guiltless blood to ground must never fall;

There's Antichrist behind, to pay for all.

The punk of Babylon in pomp appears,

A lewd old gentleman of seventy years;

Whose age in vain our mercy would implore,

For few take pity on an old cast whore.

The devil, who brought him to the shame, takes part; }

Sits cheek by jowl, in black, to cheer his heart, }

Like thief and parson in a Tyburn-cart. }

The word is given, and with a loud huzza

The mitred poppet from his chair they draw:

On the slain corpse contending nations fall--

Alas! what's one poor pope among them all!

He burns; now all true hearts your triumphs ring;

And next, for fashion, cry, "God save the king!"

A needful cry in midst of such alarms,

When forty thousand men are up in arms.

But after he's once saved, to make amends, }

In each succeeding health they damn his friends: }

So God begins, but still the devil ends. }

What if some one, inspired with zeal, should call,

Come, let's go cry, "God save him at Whitehall?"

His best friends would not like this over-care,

Or think him e'er the safer for this prayer.

Five praying saints[371] are by an act allowed,

But not the whole church-militant in crowd;

Yet, should heaven all the true petitions drain }

Of Presbyterians, who would kings maintain, }

Of forty thousand, five would scarce remain. }

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 370: See a copy of the penny chronicle alluded to, containing

a minute account of this celebrated procession, with a cut illustrative

of the description, Vol. VI. p. 222.]

[Footnote 371: Only five dissenters were allowed to meet together by

the penal statutes.]

EPILOGUE

TO

THE SAME.

A virgin poet was served up to-day,

Who, till this hour, ne'er cackled for a play.

He's neither yet a Whig nor Tory boy; }

But, like a girl, whom several would enjoy, }

Begs leave to make the best of his own natural toy. }

Were I to play my callow author's game,

The King's House would instruct me by the name.[372]

There's loyalty to one; I wish no more:

A commonwealth sounds like a common whore.

Let husband or gallant be what they will,

One part of woman is true Tory still.

If any factious spirit should rebel,

Our sex, with ease, can every rising quell.

Then, as you hope we should your failings hide,

An honest jury for our play provide.

Whigs at their poets never take offence;

They save dull culprits, who have murdered sense.

Though nonsense is a nauseous heavy mass,

The vehicle called Faction makes it pass;

Faction in play's the commonwealth-man's bribe;

The leaden farthing of the canting tribe:

Though void in payment laws and statutes make it,

The neighbourhood, that knows the man, will take it.[373]

'Tis faction buys the votes of half the pit;

Their's is the pension-parliament[374] of wit.

In city-clubs their venom let them vent;

For there 'tis safe, in its own element.

Here, where their madness can have no pretence,

Let them forget themselves an hour of sense.

In one poor isle, why should two factions be? }

Small difference in your vices I can see: }

In drink and drabs both sides too well agree. }

Would there were more preferments in the land!

If places fell, the party could not stand.

Of this damned grievance every Whig complains,

They grunt like hogs till they have got their grains.

Mean time, you see what trade our plots advance;

We send each year good money into France;

And they that know what merchandize we need,

Send o'er true Protestants[375] to mend our breed.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 372: Where the play was acted.]

[Footnote 373: Alluding to the tokens issued by tradesmen in place of

copper money, which, though not a legal tender of payment, continued to

be current by the credit of the individual whose name they bore. Tom

Brown mentions Alderman Buncombe's leaden halfpence.]

[Footnote 374: The Parliament, which sat from the Restoration till

1678, bore this ignominious epithet among the Whigs.]

[Footnote 375: Alluding to the emigration of the French Huguenots,

which the intolerance of Louis XIV. and his ministers began to render

general. Many took refuge in England. See Vol. X. p. 264.]

PROLOGUE

TO

THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD,

SPOKEN BY MR HART

AT THE ACTING OF THE SILENT WOMAN.

What Greece, when learning flourished, only knew,

Athenian judges, you this day renew.

Here, too, are annual rites to Pallas done,

And here poetic prizes lost or won.

Methinks I see you, crowned with olives, sit,

And strike a sacred horror from the pit.

A day of doom is this of your decree, }

Where even the best are but by mercy free; }

A day, which none but Jonson durst have wished to see. }

Here they, who long have known the useful stage,

Come to be taught themselves to teach the age.

As your commissioners our poets go,

To cultivate the virtue which you sow;

In your Lycæum first themselves refined,

And delegated thence to human kind.

But as ambassadors, when long from home,

For new instructions to their princes come,

So poets, who your precepts have forgot,

Return, and beg they may be better taught:

Follies and faults elsewhere by them are shown,

But by your manners they correct their own.

The illiterate writer, emp'ric-like, applies

To minds diseased, unsafe chance remedies:

The learned in schools, where knowledge first began,

Studies with care the anatomy of man;

Sees virtue, vice, and passions in their cause,

And fame from science, not from fortune, draws;

So Poetry, which is in Oxford made

An art, in London only is a trade.

There haughty dunces, whose unlearned pen

Could ne'er spell grammar, would be reading men.[376]

Such build their poems the Lucretian way;

So many huddled atoms make a play;

And if they hit in order by some chance,

They call that nature, which is ignorance.

To such a fame let mere town-wits aspire,

And their gay nonsense their own cits admire.

Our poet, could he find forgiveness here,

Would wish it rather than a plaudit there.

He owns no crown from those Prætorian bands,[377]

But knows that right is in the senate's hands.

Not impudent enough to hope your praise, }

Low at the Muses' feet his wreath he lays, }

And, where he took it up, resigns his bays. }

Kings make their poets whom themselves think fit,

But 'tis your suffrage makes authentic wit.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 376: An allusion to Shadwell; who boasted, that he drew his

characters from nature, in contempt of regular criticism.]

[Footnote 377: Alluding to the mode in which the emperors were chosen

during the decline of the empire, when the soldiers of the Prætorian

guards were the electors, without regard to the legal rights of the

senate.]

EPILOGUE,

SPOKEN BY THE SAME.

No poor Dutch peasant, winged with all his fear,

Flies with more haste, when the French arms draw near,

Than we, with our poetic train, come down,

For refuge hither, from the infected town:

Heaven, for our sins, this summer has thought fit

To visit us with all the plagues of wit.

A French troop first swept all things in its way;

But those hot Monsieurs were too quick to stay:

Yet, to our cost, in that short time, we find

They left their itch of novelty behind.

The Italian merry-andrews took their place,

And quite debauched the stage with lewd grimace:

Instead of wit, and humours, your delight

Was there to see two hobby-horses fight;

Stout Scaramoucha with rush lance rode in,

And ran a tilt at centaur Arlequin.

For love you heard how amorous asses brayed,

And cats in gutters gave their serenade.

Nature was out of countenance, and each day

Some new-born monster shown you for a play.

But when all failed, to strike the stage quite dumb,

Those wicked engines, called machines, are come.

Thunder and lightning now for wit are played,

And shortly scenes in Lapland will be laid:

Art magic is for poetry profest,[378]

And cats and dogs, and each obscener beast,

To which Egyptian dotards once did bow,

Upon our English stage are worshipped now.

Witchcraft reigns there, and raises to renown

Macbeth[379] and Simon Magus of the town.

Fletcher's despised, your Jonson's out of fashion,

And wit the only drug in all the nation.

In this low ebb our wares to you are shown, }

By you those staple authors' worth is known, }

For wit's a manufacture of your own. }

When you, who only can, their scenes have praised,

We'll back, and boldly say, their price is raised.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 378: This and the following lines refer to the success of

Shadwell's comedy of "The Lancashire Witches," in which a great deal

of machinery is introduced; the witches flying away with the clown's

candles, and the priest's bottle of holy water, and converting a

country-fellow into a horse upon the stage. Not content with this, the

author has introduced upon the stage all that writers upon Dæmonology

have rehearsed of the Witches' Sabbath, or Festival, with their

infernal master; and has thus, very clumsily, mixed the horrible with

the ludicrous. As for the cats and dogs, we have, in one place,--"Enter

an Imp, in the shape of a black Shock;" and, in another,

"Enter Mother Hargrave, Mother Madge, and two Witches more; they mew,

and spit, like cats, and fly at them, and scratch them.

_Young Hartford._ What's this? we're set on by cats.

_Sir Timothy._ They're witches in the shape of cats; what shall we do?

_Priest._ Phaat will I do? cat, cat, cat! oh, oh! _Conjuro vobis!

fugite, fugite, Cacodæmones_; cats, cats! (They scratch all their

faces, till the blood runs about them.)

_Tom Shacklehead._ Have at ye all! (he cuts at them.) I ha' mauled some

of them, by the mass! they are fled, but I am plaguily scratched. (The

Witches shriek, and run away.)"

Besides the offence which Shadwell gave, in point of taste, by the

introduction of these pantomimical absurdities, Dryden was also

displeased by the whole tenor of the play, which was directed against

the High-Churchmen and Tories.--_See Dedication of the Duke of Guise_,

Vol. VII. p. 15.]

[Footnote 379: This has no reference to any recent representation of

the tragedy of "Macbeth." Shadwell, from the witchcraft introduced in

his play, is ironically termed, "Macbeth and Simon Magus."]

PROLOGUE

TO

THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD.

Though actors cannot much of learning boast,

Of all who want it, we admire it most:

We love the praises of a learned pit,

As we remotely are allied to wit.

We speak our poet's wit, and trade in ore,

Like those who touch upon the golden shore;

Betwixt our judges can distinction make,

Discern how much, and why our poems take;

Mark if the fools, or men of sense, rejoice;

Whether the applause be only sound or voice.

When our fop gallants, or our city folly,

Clap over loud, it makes us melancholy:

We doubt that scene which does their wonder raise,

And, for their ignorance, contemn their praise.

Judge, then, if we who act, and they who write,

Should not be proud of giving you delight.

London likes grossly; but this nicer pit

Examines, fathoms, all the depths of wit;

The ready finger lays on every blot;

Knows what should justly please, and what should not.

Nature herself lies open to your view;

You judge, by her, what draught of her is true,

Where outlines false, and colours seem too faint,

Where bunglers daub, and where true poets paint.

But by the sacred genius of this place,

By every muse, by each domestic grace,

Be kind to wit, which but endeavours well,

And, where you judge, presumes not to excel!

Our poets hither for adoption come,

As nations sued to be made free of Rome:

Not in the suffragating tribes[380] to stand,

But in your utmost, last, provincial band.

If his ambition may those hopes pursue,

Who, with religion, loves your arts and you,

Oxford to him a dearer name shall be

Than his own mother-university.

Thebes[381] did his green, unknowing, youth engage;

He chooses Athens in his riper age.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 380: Alluding to the Roman citizens, who had the right of

voting, denied to the lower, or provincial orders.]

[Footnote 381: Our author was educated at Cambridge. Whether the sons

of Cam relished this avowed preference of Oxford, may be doubted.]

EPILOGUE

TO

CONSTANTINE THE GREAT.

BY MR N. LEE, 1684.

_The play, to which this is the prologue, is but a second-rate

performance. It is founded on the story of Faustina and Crispus,

which the learned will find in Ammianus Marcellinus, and the

English reader in Gibbon. Arius, the heretic, is the villain of the

piece, which concludes fortunately._

Our hero's happy in the play's conclusion;

The holy rogue at last has met confusion:

Though Arius all along appeared a saint,

The last act showed him a True Protestant.[382]

Eusebius,--for you know I read Greek authors,--

Reports, that, after all these plots and slaughters,

The court of Constantine was full of glory,

And every Trimmer turned addressing Tory.

They followed him in herds as they were mad:

When Clause _was_ king, then all the world was glad.[383]

Whigs kept the places they possest before,

And most were in a way of getting more;

Which was as much as saying, Gentlemen,

Here's power and money to be rogues again.

Indeed, there were a sort of peaking tools,

Some call them modest, but I call them fools;

Men much more loyal, though not half so loud,

But these poor devils were cast behind the crowd;

For bold knaves thrive without one grain of sense,

But good men starve for want of impudence.

Besides all these, there were a sort of wights,

(I think my author calls them Tekelites,)

Such hearty rogues against the king and laws,

They favoured e'en a foreign rebel's cause,

When their own damned design was quashed and awed;

At least they gave it their good word abroad.

As many a man, who, for a quiet life,

Breeds out his bastard, not to noise his wife,

Thus, o'er their darling plot these Trimmers cry, }

And, though they cannot keep it in their eye, }

They bind it 'prentice to Count Tekely.[384] }

They believe not the last plot; may I be curst,

If I believe they e'er believed the first!

No wonder their own plot no plot they think,--

The man, that makes it, never smells the stink.

And, now it comes into my head, I'll tell

Why these damned Trimmers loved the Turks so well.

The original Trimmer,[385] though a friend to no man,

Yet in his heart adored a pretty woman;

He knew that Mahomet laid up for ever

Kind black-eyed rogues for every true believer;

And,--which was more than mortal man e'er tasted,--

One pleasure that for threescore twelvemonths lasted.

To turn for this, may surely be forgiven;

Who'd not be circumcised for such a heaven?

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 382: Alluding to the Whigs, who called themselves so. See

Vol. IX. p. 211.]

[Footnote 383: Alluding to the gratulating speech of Orator Higgins to

Clause, when elected King of the Beggars:

Who is he here that did not wish thee chosen,

Now thou _art_ chosen? Ask them; all will say so,

Nay, swear't--'tis for the king,--but let that pass.

_Beggars' Bush_, Act II. Scene I.

]

[Footnote 384: The severity of the Austrian government, in Hungary

particularly, towards those who dissented from the Roman Catholic

faith, occasioned several insurrections. The most memorable was headed

by Count Teckeli, who allied himself with the sultan, assumed the

crown of Transylvania, as a vassal of the Porte, and joined, with a

considerable force, the large army of Turks which besieged Vienna, and

threatened to annihilate the Austrian empire. A similarity of situation

and of interest induced the Whig party in England to look with a

favourable eye upon this Hungarian insurgent, as may be fully inferred

from the following passage in De Foe's "Appeal to Honour and Justice:"

"The first time I had the misfortune to differ with my friends, was

about the year 1683, when the Turks were besieging Vienna, and the

Whigs in England, generally speaking, were for the Turks taking it;

which I, having read the history of the cruelty and perfidious dealings

of the Turks in their wars, and how they had rooted out the name of

the Christian religion in above threescore and ten kingdoms, could by

no means agree with; and, though then but a young man, and a younger

author, I opposed it, and wrote against it, which was taken very

unkindly indeed."

The incongruity of the opinion combated by De Foe, with the high

pretences of religion set up by the Whigs, was the constant subject

of ridicule to the Tory wits. In a poem, entitled, "The Third Part of

Advice to the Painter," dated by Luttrell 28th May, 1684, we find the

following passage:

Paint me that mighty powerful state a shaking,

And their great prophet, Teckely, a quaking;

Who for religion made such bustling work,

That, to reform it, he brought in the Turk.

Next, paint our English muftis of the tub,

Those great promoters of the Teckelites' club.

Draw me them praying for the Turkish cause,

And for the overthrow of Christian laws.

Another Tory poet prophecies of the infant son of James II.,--

His conquering arm shall soon subdue

Teckelite Turks and home-bred Jew,

Such as our great forefathers never knew.

_Pindaric Ode on the Queen's Delivery, by Caleb Calle._

Another ballad, written shortly after the defeat of Monmouth, is

entitled, "A Song upon the Rendezvous on Hounsley-heath, with a

Parallel of the Destruction of our English Turks in the West, and the

Mahometans in Hungary." The expression occurs also in the Address of

the Carlisle Citizens on the Declaration of Indulgence, who "thank his

majesty for his royal army, which is really both the honour and safety

of the nation, let the Teckelites think and say what they will." An

indignant Whig commentator on this effusion of loyalty, says, "What the

good men of Carlisle mean by Teckelites, we know not any more than they

know themselves. However, the word has a pretty effect at a time when

the Protestant Hungarians, under Count Teckely, were well beaten by the

Popish standing army in Hungary." _History of Addresses_, p. 161.]

[Footnote 385: The _original Trimmer_ was probably meant for Lord

Shaftesbury, once a member of the Cabal, and a favourite minister,

though afterwards in such violent opposition. His lordship's turn

for gallantry was such as distinguished him even at the court of

Charles.--See Vol. IX. p. 446. The party of Trimmers, properly so

called, only comprehended the followers of Halifax; but our author

seems to include all those who, professing to be friends of monarchy,

were enemies of the Duke of York, and who were as odious to the

court as the fanatical republicans. Much wit, and more virulence,

was unchained against them. Among others, I find in Mr Luttrell's

Collection, a poem, entitled, "The Character of a Trimmer," beginning

thus:

Hang out your cloth, and let the trumpet sound,

Here's such a beast as Afric never owned:

A twisted brute, the satyr in the story,

That blows up the Whig heat, and cools the Tory;

A state hermaphrodite, whose doubtful lust

Salutes all parties with an equal gust.

Like Ireland shocks, he seems two natures joined;

Savage before, and all betrimmed behind;

And the well-tutored curs like him will strain,

Come over for the king, and back again, &c.

]

PROLOGUE

TO THE

DISAPPOINTMENT, OR THE MOTHER IN FASHION.

BY MR SOUTHERNE, 1684.

SPOKEN BY MR BETTERTON.

_This play is founded on the novel of the Impertinent Curiosity,

in Don Quixote. It possesses no extraordinary merit. The satire of

the Prologue, though grossly broad, is very forcibly expressed;

and describes what we may readily allow to have been the career of

many, who set up for persons of wit and honour about town._

How comes it, gentlemen, that, now a-days,

When all of you so shrewdly judge of plays,

Our poets tax you still with want of sense?

All prologues treat you at your own expence.

Sharp citizens a wiser way can go;

They make you fools, but never call you so.

They in good manners seldom make a slip,

But treat a common whore with--ladyship:

But here each saucy wit at random writes,

And uses ladies as he uses knights.

Our author, young and grateful in his nature,

Vows, that from him no nymph deserves a satire:

Nor will he ever draw--I mean his rhime,

Against the sweet partaker of his crime;

Nor is he yet so bold an undertaker,

To call men fools--'tis railing at their Maker.

Besides, he fears to split upon that shelf;

He's young enough to be a fop himself:

And, if his praise can bring you all a-bed,

He swears such hopeful youth no nation ever bred.

Your nurses, we presume, in such a case, }

Your father chose, because he liked the face, }

And often they supplied your mother's place. }

The dry nurse was your mother's ancient maid,

Who knew some former slip she ne'er betrayed.

Betwixt them both, for milk and sugar-candy,

Your sucking bottles were well stored with brandy.

Your father, to initiate your discourse, }

Meant to have taught you first to swear and curse, }

But was prevented by each careful nurse. }

For, leaving dad and mam, as names too common,

They taught you certain parts of man and woman.

I pass your schools; for there, when first you came,

You would be sure to learn the Latin name.

In colleges, you scorned the art of thinking,

But learned all moods and figures of good drinking;

Thence come to town, you practise play, to know

The virtues of the high dice, and the low.[386]

Each thinks himself a sharper most profound:

He cheats by pence; is cheated by the pound.

With these perfections, and what else he gleans, }

The spark sets up for love behind our scenes, }

Hot in pursuit of princesses and queens. }

There, if they know their man, with cunning carriage,

Twenty to one but it concludes in marriage.

He hires some homely room, love's fruits to gather,

And, garret high, rebels against his father:

But, he once dead----

Brings her in triumph, with her portion, down--

A toilet, dressing-box, and half-a-crown.[387]

Some marry first, and then they fall to scowering,

Which is refining marriage into whoring.

Our women batten well on their good nature;

All they can rap and rend for the dear creature.

But while abroad so liberal the dolt is,

Poor spouse at home as ragged as a colt is.

Last, some there are, who take their first degrees

Of lewdness in our middle galleries;

The doughty bullies enter bloody drunk,

Invade and grubble one another's punk:

They caterwaul, and make a dismal rout,

Call sons of whores, and strike, but ne'er lug out:

Thus, while for paltry punk they roar and stickle,

They make it bawdier than a conventicle.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 386: Loaded dice, contrived some for high, and others for low

throws.]

[Footnote 387: Our author seems to copy himself in this passage. "His

old father, in the country, would have given him but little thanks

for it, to see him bring down a fine-bred woman, with a lute and a

dressing-box, and a handful of money to her portion."--_The Wild

Gallant_, Vol. II. p. 66.]

PROLOGUE

TO

THE KING AND QUEEN,

UPON THE

UNION OF THE TWO COMPANIES, IN 1686.

_The two rival Companies, so long known by the names of the King's

and the Duke's players, after exhausting every effort, both of

poetry and machinery, to obtain a superiority over each other,

were, at length, by the expence of these exertions, and the

inconstancy of the public, reduced to the necessity of uniting

their forces, in order to maintain their ground. "Taste and

fashion," says Colley Cibber, "with us, have always had wings, and

fly from one public spectacle to another so wantonly, that I have

been informed, by those who remember it, that a famous puppet-show,

in Salisbury-change, then standing where Cecil-street now is, so

far distressed these two celebrated companies, that they were

reduced to petition the king for relief against it. Nor ought we,

perhaps, to think this strange, when, if I mistake not, Terence

himself reproaches the Roman auditors of his time with the like

fondness for the_ funambuli, _the rope-dancers. Not to dwell too

long, therefore, upon that part of my history, which I have only

collected from oral tradition, I shall content myself with telling

you, that Mohun and Hart now growing old, (for above thirty years

before this time, they had severally borne the king's commission

of major and captain in the civil wars,) and the younger actors,

as Goodman, Clark, and others, being impatient to get into their

parts, and growing intractable, the audiences too of both houses

then falling off, the patentees of each, by the king's advice,

(which, perhaps, amounted to a command,) united their interests,

and both companies into one, exclusive of all others, in the year_

1684. _This union was, however, so much in favour of the Duke's

company, that Hart left the stage upon it, and Mohun survived not

long after."_[388] Apology, p. 58.

_It appears, that the king and queen honoured with their presence

the first performance under the union they had recommended.

Dryden's prologue abounds with those violent expressions of loyalty

with which James loved to be greeted._

Since faction ebbs, and rogues grow out of fashion,

Their penny scribes take care t' inform the nation,

How well men thrive in this or that plantation:[389]

How Pennsylvania's air agrees with Quakers,

And Carolina's with Associators;

Both e'en too good for madmen and for traitors.[390]

Truth is, our land with saints is so run o'er,

And every age produces such a store,

That now there's need of two New Englands more.

What's this, you'll say, to us, and our vocation?

Only thus much, that we have left our station,

And made this theatre our new plantation.

The factious natives never could agree;

But aiming, as they called it, to be free,

Those play-house Whigs set up for property.[391]

Some say, they no obedience paid of late;

But would new tears and jealousies create,

Till topsy-turvy they had turned the state.

Plain sense, without the talent of foretelling,

Might guess 'twould end in downright knocks and quelling;

For seldom comes there better of rebelling.

When men will, needlessly, their freedom barter

For lawless power, sometimes they catch a Tartar;--

There's a damned word that rhimes to this, called Charter.[392]

But, since the victory with us remains,

You shall be called to twelve in all our gains,

If you'll not think us saucy for our pains.

Old men shall have good old plays to delight them;

And you, fair ladies and gallants, that slight them,

We'll treat with good new plays, if our new wits can write them.

We'll take no blundering verse, no fustain tumor,

No dribbling love, from this or that presumer;

No dull fat fool shammed on the stage for humour:[393]

For, faith, some of them such vile stuff have made,

As none but fools or fairies ever played;

But 'twas, as shopmen say, to force a trade.

We've given you tragedies, all sense defying,

And singing men, in woful metre dying;

This 'tis when heavy lubbers will be flying.

All these disasters we will hope to weather;

We bring you none of our old lumber hither;

Whig poets and Whig sheriffs[394] may hang together.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 388: In this last point Colley is, however, mistaken. See p.

328.]

[Footnote 389: The American colonies, from the time of the first

troubles in the reign of Charles I., continued to be the place of

refuge to all who were discontented with the government of the time,

or experienced oppression under it. The settlers did not fail to

excite their countrymen to emigration, by exaggerated accounts of

the fertility and advantages of their places of refuge, which were

circulated by the hawkers.]

[Footnote 390: The settlement of Pennsylvania, under the famous Penn,

had just taken place; and the design of a Scottish insurrection, at the

time of the Rye-house plot, was carried on by Baillie of Jerviswood,

under pretence of being agent for some gentlemen of the south of

Scotland, who proposed to leave their country, and make a settlement in

Carolina.]

[Footnote 391: This seems to allude to the mutiny of the younger actors

against Hart and Mohun, mentioned by Cibber. The performers were also

anxious to emancipate themselves from the thraldom of the patentees,

which they did not accomplish till after the Revolution. They were

emancipated by King William, who considered them, says Cibber, as the

only subjects he had not yet relieved from arbitrary power. Dryden

seems to allude to some ineffectual struggles made for this purpose,

which he compares to those of the Whigs in the latter end of the reign

of Charles II.]

[Footnote 392: Alluding to the forfeiture of the city charter, by the

process of _Quo Warranto_.]

[Footnote 393: Our author, who writes in all the exultation of

triumphant Toryism, does not forget to bestow a passing sarcasm upon

his political and personal enemy, Shadwell. In the observations on

"Mac-Flecnoe," and elsewhere, we have noticed Shadwell's affectation

of treading in the paths of Ben Jonson, by describing what he

calls _humours_; a word as great a favourite with the fat bard as

with Corporal Nym. The following passage in the dedication of "The

Virtuoso," may serve to explain what he means by the phrase:

"I have endeavoured in this play, at humour, wit, and satire, which

are the three things (however I may have fallen short in my attempt)

which your grace has often told me are the life of a comedy. Four

of the humours are entirely new; and, without vanity, I may say I

never produced a comedy that had not some natural humour in it, not

represented before, nor, I hope, ever shall. Nor do I count those

humours which a great many do; that is to say, such as consist in using

one or two by-words; or in having a fantastic extravagant dress, as

many pretended humours have; nor in the affectation of some French

words, which several plays have shown us. I say nothing of impossible,

unnatural, farce fools, which some intend for comical; who think it

the easiest thing in the world to write a comedy, and yet will sooner

grow rich upon their ill plays than write a good one: Nor is downright

silly folly a humour, as some take it to be, for it is a mere natural

imperfection; and they might as well call it a humour of blindness in a

blind man, or lameness in a lame one; or as a celebrated French farce

has the humour of one who speaks very fast, and of another who speaks

very slow: But natural imperfections are not fit subjects for comedy,

since they are not to be laughed at, but pitied. But the artificial

folly of those who are not coxcombs by nature, but, with great art and

industry, make themselves so, is a proper object of comedy; as I have

discoursed at large in the Preface to "The Humourists," written five

years since. Those slight circumstantial things, mentioned before, are

not enough to make a good comical humour; which ought to be such an

affectation as misguides men in knowledge, art, or science; or that

causes defection in manners and morality, or perverts their minds in

the main actions of their lives: And this kind of humour, I think, I

have not improperly described in the Epilogue to "The Humourists."

"But your grace understands humour too well not to know this, and much

more than I can say of it. All I have now to do, is, humbly to dedicate

this play to your grace, which has succeeded beyond my expectation; and

the humours of which have been approved by men of the best sense and

learning. Nor do I hear of any professed enemies to the play, but some

women, and some men of feminine understandings, who like slight plays

only that represent a little tattle-sort of conversation like their

own: but true humour is not liked or understood by them; and therefore

even my attempt towards it is condemned by them: but the same people,

to my great comfort, damn all Mr Jonson's plays, who was incomparably

the best dramatic poet that ever was, or, I believe, ever will be; and

I had rather be author of one scene in his best comedies, than of any

play this age has produced."]

[Footnote 394: This inhuman jest turns on the execution of Henry

Cornish, who, with Slingsby Bethel, was sheriff in 1680, and

distinguished himself in opposition to the court.--See Note on "Absalom

and Achitophel," Part I. vol. ix. p. 280. He was condemned as accessary

to the Rye-house plot, and executed accordingly on 23d October, 1685;

probably a short time before this prologue was spoken, which might be

in January 1686.]

EPILOGUE

ON

THE SAME OCCASION.

New ministers, when first they get in place,

Must have a care to please; and that's our case:

Some laws for public welfare we design,

If you, the power supreme, will please to join.

There are a sort of prattlers in the pit,

Who either have, or who pretend to wit;

These noisy sirs so loud their parts rehearse,

That oft the play is silenced by the farce.

Let such be dumb, this penalty to shun,

Each to be thought my lady's eldest son.

But stay; methinks some vizard mask I see,

Cast out her lure from the mid gallery:

About her all the fluttering sparks are ranged;

The noise continues, though the scene is changed:

Now growling, sputtering, wauling, such a clutter!

'Tis just like puss defendant in a gutter:

Fine love, no doubt; but ere two days are o'er ye,

The surgeon will be told a woful story.

Let vizard mask her naked face expose,

On pain of being thought to want a nose:

Then for your lacqueys, and your train beside,

By whate'er name or title dignified,

They roar so loud, you'd think behind the stairs

Tom Dove,[395] and all the brotherhood of bears:

They're grown a nuisance, beyond all disasters;

We've none so great but--their unpaying masters.

We beg you, Sirs, to beg your men, that they

Would please to give you leave to hear the play.

Next, in the play-house, spare your precious lives;

Think, like good Christians, on your bearns and wives:

Think on your souls; but, by your lugging forth,[396]

It seems you know how little they are worth.

If none of these will move the warlike mind,

Think on the helpless whore you leave behind.

We beg you, last, our scene-room to forbear,

And leave our goods and chattels to our care.

Alas! our women are but washy toys,

And wholly taken up in stage employs:

Poor willing tits they are; but yet, I doubt,

This double duty soon will wear them out.

Then you are watched besides with jealous care;

What if my lady's page should find you there?

My lady knows t' a tittle what there's in ye;

No passing your gilt shilling for a guinea.

Thus, gentlemen, we have summed up in short

Our grievances, from country, town, and court:

Which humbly we submit to your good pleasure;

But first vote money, then redress at leisure.[397]

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 395: A Bear so called, which was a favourite with the courtly

audience of the Bear Garden.]

[Footnote 396: See Note, p. 237.]

[Footnote 397: This was the course which Charles usually recommended to

Parliament, who generally followed that which was precisely opposite.]

PROLOGUE

TO

THE PRINCESS OF CLEVES.

BY MR N. LEE, 1689.

_This play is one of the coarsest which ever appeared upon the

stage. The author himself seems to be ashamed of it, and gives, for

the profligacy of his hero, the Duke of Nemours, the odd reason

of a former play on the subject of the Paris massacre having been

prohibited, at the request, I believe, of the French ambassador._

See Vol. VII. p. 188.

Ladies! (I hope there's none behind to hear)

I long to whisper something in your ear:

A secret, which does much my mind perplex,--

There's treason in the play against our sex.

A man that's false to love, that vows and cheats,

And kisses every living thing he meets;

A rogue in mode,--I dare not speak too broad,--

One that--does something to the very bawd.

Out on him, traitor, for a filthy beast!

Nay, and he's like the pack of all the rest:

None of them stick at mark; they all deceive. }

Some Jew has changed the text, I half believe; }

There Adam cozened our poor grandame Eve. }

To hide their faults they rap out oaths, and tear;

Now, though we lie, we're too well-bred to swear.

So we compound for half the sin we owe,

But men are dipt for soul and body too;

And, when found out, excuse themselves, pox cant them,

With Latin stuff, _Perjuria ridet Amantûm_.

I'm not book-learned, to know that word in vogue,

But I suspect 'tis Latin for a rogue.

I'm sure, I never heard that screech-owl hollowed

In my poor ears, but separation followed.

How can such perjured villains e'er be saved?

Achitophel's not half so false to David.[398]

With vows and soft expressions to allure,

They stand, like foremen of a shop, demure:

No sooner out of sight, but they are gadding,

And for the next new face ride out a padding.

Yet, by their favour, when they have been kissing,

We can perceive the ready money missing.

Well! we may rail; but 'tis as good e'en wink;

Something we find, and something they will sink.

But, since they're at renouncing, 'tis our parts

To trump their diamonds, as they trump our hearts.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 398: Alluding to Shaftesbury and Charles II. in his own

admirable satire.]

EPILOGUE

TO

THE SAME.

A qualm of conscience brings me back again,

To make amends to you bespattered men.

We women love like cats, that hide their joys,

By growling, squalling, and a hideous noise.

I railed at wild young sparks; but, without lying,

Never was man worse thought on for high-flying.

The prodigal of love gives each her part,

And, squandering, shows at least a noble heart.

I've heard of men, who, in some lewd lampoon,

Have hired a friend to make their valour known.

That accusation straight this question brings,--

What is the man that does such naughty things?

The spaniel lover, like a sneaking fop,

Lies at our feet:--he's scarce worth taking up.

'Tis true, such heroes in a play go far;

But chamber-practice is not like the bar.

When men such vile, such faint petitions make,

We fear to give, because they fear to take;

Since modesty's the virtue of our kind,

Pray let it be to our own sex confined.

When men usurp it from the female nation,

'Tis but a work of supererogation.

We shewed a princess in the play, 'tis true,

Who gave her Cæsar[399] more than all his due;

Told her own faults; but I should much abhor

To choose a husband for my confessor.

You see what fate followed the saint-like fool,

For telling tales from out the nuptial school.

Our play a merry comedy had proved,

Had she confessed so much to him she loved.

True Presbyterian wives the means would try;

But damned confessing is flat Popery.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 399: The Princess of Cleves, in the play, confesses to her

husband her love for Nemours.]

PROLOGUE

TO

ARVIRAGUS AND PHILICIA.

BY LODOWICK CARLELL, ESQ.

SPOKEN BY MR HART.

_Lodowick Carlell, according to Langbaine, was an ancient courtier,

being gentleman of the bows to King Charles I., groom of the king

and queen's privy chamber, and servant to the queen-mother many

years. His plays, the same author adds, were well esteemed of, and

acted chiefly at the private house in Blackfriars. They were seven

in number. "Arviragus and Philicia" consisted of two parts, and was

first printed in 8vo, 1639. The prologue, which was spoken upon

the revival of the piece, turns upon the caprice of the town, in

preferring, to the plays of their own poets, the performances of

a troop of French comedians, who, it seems, were then acting both

tragedies and comedies in their own language._

With sickly actors, and an old house too,

We're matched with glorious theatres, and new;

And with our alehouse scenes, and clothes bare worn,

Can neither raise old plays, nor new adorn.

If all these ills could not undo us quite,

A brisk French troop is grown your dear delight;

Who with broad bloody bills call you each day,

To laugh and break your buttons at their play;

Or see some serious piece, which, we presume,

Is fallen from some incomparable _plume_;

"And therefore, Messieurs, if you'll do us grace,

Send lacquies early to preserve your place."

We dare not on your privilege intrench,

Or ask you, why you like them?--they are French.

Therefore, some go with courtesy exceeding,

Neither to hear nor see, but show their breeding;

Each lady striving to outlaugh the rest,

To make it seem they understood the jest.

Their countrymen come in, and nothing pay,

To teach us English were to clap the play:

Civil, egad! our hospitable land

Bears all the charge for them to understand:

Mean time we languish, and neglected lie,

Like wives, while you keep better company;

And wish for your own sakes, without a satire,

You'd less good breeding, or had more good nature.

PROLOGUE