And, from the sweet retreat, with joy survey
What rests, and what is conquer'd, of the way.
Here, free yourselves from envy, care, and strife,
You view the various turns of human life: [go,
Safe in our scene, through dangerous courts you
And, undebauch'd, the vice of cities know.
Your theories are here to practice brought,
As in mechanic operations wrought;
And man, the little world, before you set,
As once the sphere of chrystal show'd the great.
Blest sure are you above all mortal kind,
If to your fortunes you can suit your mind:
Content to see, and shun, those ills we show,
And crimes on theatres alone to know.
With joys we bring what our dead authors writ,
And beg from you the value of their wit:
That Shakespeare's, Fletcher's, and great
Jonson's claim
[fame.
May be renew'd from those who gave them
None of our living poets dare appear;
For muses so severe are worshipp'd here,
That, conscious of their faults, they shun the eye,
And, as profane, from sacred places fly,
Rather than see the offended God, and die.
We bring no imperfections but our own;
Such faults as made are by the makers shown
And you
have been so kind, that we may boast,
The greatest judges still can pardon most. [pit,
Poets must stoop, when they would please our
Debas'd e'en to the level of their wit;
Disdaining that, which yet they know will take,
Hating themselves what their applause must
make.

But when to praise from you they would aspire,
Though they like eagles mount, your Jove is
higher.
[scends,
So far your knowledge all their power tran
As what should be beyond what is extends.

PROLOGUE TO CIRCE.*

BY DR. DAVENANT, 1675.

WERE you but half so wise as you're severe,
Our youthful poet should not need to fear:
To his green years your censures you would
suit,

Not blast the blossom, but expect the fruit.
The
sex, that best does pleasure understand,
Will always choose to err on t' other hand.
They check him not that's awkward in delight,
But clap the young rogue's cheek, and set him
right.

Circe was an opera. Tragedy among an cients was throughout accompained with music. Dr. J. W

Thus hearten'd well, and flesh'd upon his prey,
The youth may prove a man another day.
Your Ben and Fletcher, in their first young
Did no Valpone, nor no Arbaces write; [flight,
But hopp'd about, and short excursions made
From bough to bough, as if they were afraid,
And each was guilty of some Slighted Maid.
Shakespear's own muse her Pericles first bore;
The prince of Tyre was elder than the Moor:
'Tis miracle to see a first good play;
All hawthorns do not bloom on Christmas-day.
A slender poet must have time to grow,
And spread and burnish as his brothers do.
Who still looks lean, sure with some pox is
But no man can be Falstaff-fat at first. [curst;
Then damn not, but indulge his rude essays,
Encourage him, and bloat him up with praise
That he may get more bulk before he dies:
He's not yet fed enough for sacrifice.
Perhaps, if now your grace you will not grudge,
He may grow up to write, and you to judge.

EPILOGUE,

INTENDED TO HAVE BEEN SPOKEN BY THE
LADY HEN. MAR. WENTWORTH, WHEN
CALISTO WAS ACTED AT COURT.

As Jupiter* I made my court in vain ;
I'll now asume my native shape again.
I'm weary to be so unkindly us'd,
And would not be a god, to be refus'd.
State grows uneasy when it hinders love,
A glorious burden, which the wise remove.
Now, as a nymph, I need not sue, nor try
The force of any lightning but the eye.
Beauty and youth more than a god command;
No Jove could e'er the force of these withstand.
'Tis here that sovereign power admits dispute;
Beauty sometimes is justly absolute.
Our sullen Catos, whatsoe'er they say,
E' en while they frown and dictate laws, obey.
You, mighty sir, our bonds more easy make,
And gracefully, what all must suffer, take:
Above those forms the grave affect to wear;
For 't is not to be wise to be severe.
True wisdom may some gallantry admit,
And soften business with the charms of wit.
These peaceful triumphs with your cares you
bought,

And from the midst of fighting nations brought.
You only hear it thunder from afar,
And sit in peace the arbiter of war:

As Jupiter] It was a sister of Duchess of the Mail borougli, a maid of honour, and afterwards Duchess of Tirconnel, celebrated by Grammont, that acted in the Masque of Calisto at court, 1675. Dr. J. V.

OUR author, by experience, finds it true, [you;
'Tis much more hard to please himself than
And out of no feign'd modesty, this day
Damns his laborious trifle of a play:

Not that it's worse than what before he writ,
But he has now another taste of wit;
And, to confess a truth, though out of time,
Grows weary of his long-lov'd mistress, Rhyme.
Passion's too fierce to be in fetters bound,
And nature flies him like enchanted ground:
What verse can do, he has perform'd in this,
Which he presumes the most correct of his;
But spite of all his pride, a secret shame
Invades his breast at Shakespeare's sacred

name:

Aw'd when he hears his godlike Romans rage,
He, in a just despair, would quit the stage;
And to an age less polish'd, more unskill'd,
Does, with disdain, the foremost honours
field,

As with the greater dead he dares not strive,
He would not match his verse with those who
Let him retire, betwixt two ages cast, [live:
The first of this, and hindmost of the last.
A losing gamester, let him sneak away;
He bears no ready money from the play.
The fate, which governs poets, thought it fit
He should not raise his fortunes by his wit.
The clergy thrive, and the litigious bar;
Dull heroes fatten with the spoils of war:
All southren vices, heaven be praised, are here;
But wit's a luxury you think too dear.
When you to cultivate the plant are loath,
'Tis

a shrewd sign' t was never of your
growth;

And wit in northern climates will not blow,
Except,like orange trees, 'tis hous'd from snow
There needs no care to put a playhouse down,
'Tis the most desert place of all the town:
We and our neighbours, to speak proudly, are,
Like monarchs, ruin'd with expensive war;
While, like wise English, unconcern'd you
And see us play the tragedy of wit.

[sit,

EPILOGUE TO THE MAN OF MODE;

OR, SIR FOPLING FLUTTER. BY SIR GEORGE ETHERIDGE, 1676.

Most modern wits such monstrous fools have
shown,
[own.

They seem not of heaven's making, but their
Those nauseous harlequins in farce may pass;
But there goes more to a substantial ass:
Something of man must be expos'd to view,
That, gallants, they may more resemble you.
Sir Fopling is a fool so nicely writ,
The ladies would mistake him for a wit;
And, when he sings, talks loud, and cocks,
would cry,

I vow, methinks he's pretty company:
So brisk, so gay, so travell'd, so refin'd,
As he took pains to graff upon his kind.
True fops help nature's work, and go to school,
To file and finish God Almighty's fool.
Yet none Sir Fopling him, or him can call;
He's knight o' the shire, and represents ye all.
From each he meets he culls whate'er he can,
Legion's his name, a people in a man.
His bulky folly gathers as it goes,
And, rolling o'er you, like a snowball grows.
His various modes from various fathers follow;
One taught the toss, and one the new French
wallow:

His swordknot this, his cravat that design'd;
And this, the yard-long snake he twirls behind.
From one the sacred periwig he gain'd,
Which wind ne'er blew, nor touch of hat pro-
Another's diving bow he did adore, [fan'd.
Which with a shog casts all the hair before,
Till he with full decorum brings it back,
And rises with a water-spaniel shake.
As for his songs, the ladies dear delight,
These sure he took from most of you who write,
Yet every man is safe from what he fear'd;
For no one fool is hunted from the herd.

EPILOGUE TO ALL FOR LOVE.

[pit;

POETS, like disputants, when reasons fail,
Have one sure refuge left-and that's to rail,
Fop, coxcomb, fool, are thunder'd through the
And this is all their equipage of wit.
We wonder how the devil this difference grows,
Betwixt our fools in verse, and yours in prose:
For, 'faith, the quarrel rightly understood,
"T is civil war with their own flesh and blood.
The threadbare author hates the gaudy coat;
And swears at the gilt coach, but swears afoot:

For 't is observ'd of every scribbling man,
He grows a fop as fast as e'er he can;
Prunes up, and asks his oracle, the glass,
If pink and purple best become his face.
For our poor wretch, he neither rails nor prays;
Nor likes your wit just as you like his plays;
He has not yet so much of Mr. Bayes.
He does his best; and if he cannot please,
Would quitely sue out his writ of ease.
Yet, if he might his own grand jury call,
By the fair sex he begs to stand or fall.
Let Cæsar's power the men's ambition move,
But grace you him who lost the world for love!
Yet if some antiquated lady say,
The last age is not copied in his play; [drudge
Heaven help the man who for that face must
Which only has the wrinkles of a judge.
Let not the young and beauteous join with
those;
[foes,
For should you raise such numerous hosts of
Young wits and sparks he to his aid must call;
'T is more than one man's work to please you
all.

PROLOGUE TO LIMBERHAM.

TRUE wit has seen its best days long ago;
It ne'er look'd up, since we were dipt in show;
When sense in doggerel rhymes and clouds
was lost,

And dulness flourish'd at the actor's cost.
Nor stop it here; when tragedy was done,
Satire and humour the same fate have run,
And comedy is sunk to trick and pun.
Now our machining lumber will not sell,
And you no longer care for heaven or hell;
What stuff can please you next, the Lord can
Let them, who the rebellion first began [tell.
To wit, restore the monarch, if they can;
Our author dares not be the first bold man.
He, like the prudent citizen, takes care
To keep for better marts his staple ware;
His toys are good enough for Sturbridge fair.
Tricks were the fashion; if it now be spent,
'Tis time enough at Easter to invent;
No man will make up a new suit for Lent.
If now and then he takes a small pretence,
To forage for a little wit and sense,
Pray pardon him, he meant you no offence.
Next summer, Nostradamus tells, they say,
That all the critics shall be shipp'd away,
And not enow be left to damn a play.

To every sail beside, good heaven, be kind;
But, drive away that swarm with such a wind,
That not one locust may be left behind!

EPILOGUE TO MITHRIDATES,

KING OF PONTUS. BY MR. N. LEE, 1678. You've seen a pair of faithful lovers die. And much you care; for most of you will cry 'T was a just judgment on their constancy. For, heaven be thank'd, we live in such an age When no man dies for love, but on the stage And e'en those martyrs are but rare in plays A cursed sign how much true faith decays, Love is no more a violent desire; 'Tis a mere metaphor, a painted fire. In all our sex, the name examin'd well, 'Tis pride to gain, and vanity to tell. In woman, 't is of subtle interest made : Curse on the one that made it first a trade! She first did wit's prerogative remove, And made a fool presume to prate of love. Let honour and preferment go for gold; But glorious beauty is not to be sold: Or, if it be, 't is at a rate so high,, That nothing but adoring it should buy. Yot the rich cullies may their boasting spare, They purchase but sophisticated ware. "T is prodigality that buys deceit,

Where both the giver and the taker cheat. Men but refine on the old half crown way; And woman fight, like Swissers, for their pay.

PROLOGUE TO CEDIPUS.

WHEN Athens all the Grecian state did guide,
And Greece gave laws to all the world beside
Then Sophocles with Socrates did sit,
Supreme in wisdom one, and one in wit:
And wit from wisdom differ'd not in those,
But as 't was sung in verse, or said in prose,
Then, Edipus, on crowded theatres,
Drew all admiring eyes and list'ning ears:
The pleas'd spectator shouted every line,
The noblest, manliest, and the best design!
And every critic of each learned age,
By this just model has reform'd the stage.
Now, should it fail, (as heaven avert our fear)
Damn it in silence, lest the world should hear.
For were it known this poem did not please,
You might set up for perfect savages:
Your neighbours would not look on you as men,
But think the nation all turn'd Picts again.
Faith, as you manage matters, 't is not fit
You should suspect yourselves of too much wit:
Drive not the jest too far, but spare this piece,
And, for this once, be not more wise than
Greece.

See twice! do not pellmell to damning fall,
Like true born Britons, who ne'er think at all:
Pray be advis'd; and though at Mons you won,
On pointed cannon do not always run.
With some respect to ancient wit proceed;
You take the four first councils for your creed:
But, when you lay tradition wholly by,
And on the private spirit alone rely,
You turn fanatics in your poetry.
If, notwithstanding all that we can say,
You needs will have your penn'orths of the play,
And come resolv'd to damn, because you pay,
Record it, in memorial of the fact,
The first play buried since the woollen act.

EPILOGUE TO EDIPUS.
WHAT Sophocles could undertake alone,
Our poets found a work for more than one;
And therefore two lay tugging at the piece,
With all their force, to draw the ponderous mass
from Greece ;-

A weight that bent e'en Seneca's strong muse,
And which Corneille's shoulders did refuse.
So hard it is the Athenian harp to string!
So much two consuls yield to one just king.
Terror and pity this whole poem sway
The mightiest machines that can mount a play.
How heavy will those vulgar souls be found,
Whom two such engines cannot move from
ground!
[birth,
When Greece and Rome have smil'd upon this
You can but damn for one poor spot of earth:
And when your children find your judgment
such,
[born Dutch;
They'll scorn their sires, and wish themselves
Each haughty poet will infer with ease,
How much his wit must underwrite to please.
As some strong churl would, brandishing ad-

vance

The monumental sword that conquer'd France; So you, by judging this, your judgment teach, Thus far you like, that is, thus far you reach. Since then the vote of full two thousand years Has crown'd this plot, and all the dead are theirs,

Think it a debt you pay, not alms you give, And, in your own defence, let this Play live. Think them not vain, when Sophocles is shown, To praise his worth they humbly doubt their

own.

Yet as weak states each other's power assure,
Weak poets by conjunction are secure.
Their treat is what your palates relish most,

Charm! song! and show! a murder and a ghost!
We know not what you can desire or hope,
To please you more, but burning of a Pope.

PROLOGUE TO TROILUS AND CRESSIDA.

SPOKEN BY MR. BETTERTON, REPRESENTING THE GHOST OF SHAKESPEARE.

SEE, my lov'd Britons, see your Shakespeare
An awful ghost confess'd to human eyes! [rise
Unnam'd, methinks, distinguish'd I had been
From other shades, by this eternal green,
About whose wreaths the vulgar poets strive,
And with a touch their wither'd bays revive.
Untaught, unpractis'd, in a barbarous age,
I found not, but created first the stage.
And, if I drain'd no Greek or Latin store,
'T was, that my own abundance gave me more
On foreign trade I needed not rely,
Like fruitful Britain, rich without supply.
In this my rough drawn play you shall behold
Some master strokes, so manly and so bold,
That he who meant to alter, found 'em such,
He shook, and thought it sacrilege to touch.
Now, where are the successors to my name
What bring they to fill out a poet's fame?
Weak, short liv'd issues of a feeble age;
Scarce living to be christen'd on the stage!
For humour farce, for love they rhyme dispense,
That tolls the knell for their departed sense.
Dullness might thrive in any trade but this:
'T would recommend to some fat benefice.
Dullness, that in a playhouse meets disgrace,
Might meet with reverence in its proper place.
The fulsome clench, that nauseates the town,
Would from a judge or alderman go down,
Such virtue is there in a robe and gown!
And that insipid stuff which here you hate,
Might somewhere else be call'd a grave debate;
Dullness is decent in the church and state.
But I forget that still 't is understood,
Bad plays are best decried by showing good.
Sit silent then, that my pleas'd soul may see
A judging audience once, and worthy me;
My faithful scene from true records shall tell,
How Trojan valour did the Greek excel;
Your great forefathers shall their fame regain,
And Homer's angry ghost repine in vain.

PROLOGUE TO CESAR BORGIA

BY MR. N. LEE, 1680. THE unhappy man,*who once has traiï'd a pen Lives not to please himself, but other men ;

• The unhappy man] Lee had so melodious a voice, and such pathetic elocution, that reading one of his own scenes to Major Mohun at a rehearsal, Mohun

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.
Teat fumbling lecher 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,
Caress 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 toll'd alone, or Irish whale.
News is your food and you enough provide,
Both for yourselves, and all the world beside.
One theatre there is of vast resort, [Court;
Which whilom of Requests was call'd the
But now the great Exchange of News 't is 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, arm'd with bottled ale, you huff the
But all your entertainment still is fed [French.
By villains in your own dull island bred.
Would you return to us, we dare engage
To show you better rogues upon the stage.
You know no poison but plain ratsbane here;
Death's more refin'd, 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 practis'd there,
That 't is infallible as is the chair. [pranks;
But, mark their feast, you shall behold such
The pope says grace, but 't is the devil gives
[thanks.

PROLOGUE TO SOPHONISBA, AT OXFORD, 1680.

THESPIS, the first professor of our art,
At country wakes sung ballads from a cart.

in the warmth of his admiration threw down his part and exclaimed, Unless I were able to play it as well as you read it, to what purpose should I undertake it." Yet it is a very remarkable circumstance, that Lee failed as an actor in attempting to: perform the character of Duncan in Macbeth, 1672. As did Otway, in a play of Mrs. Afra Behn, entitled the Jealous Bridegroom. After this failure, the first wrote his Alcibiades, and the last mentioned author his Nero. Dr. J. W.

To prove this true, if Latin be no trespass,
Dicitur et plaustris vexisse Poemata Thespis.
But Eschylus, 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.
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 us'd like infidels,
And worst, the author of the Oxford bells
Nor should we scape the sentence, to depart,
E'en 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 suppress'd,
Rags of the whore, and trappings of the beast:
Scot, Suarez, Tom of Aquin, must go down,
As chief supporters of the triple crown;
And Aristotle's for destruction ripe;
Some say, he call'd the soul an organ-pipe,
Which, by some little help of derivation,
Shall then be prov'd a pipe of inspiration.

A PROLOGUE.