The Works of the English Poets: Congreve and Fenton

PROLOGUE

ΤΟ

SOUTHERNE'S SPARTAN DAM E.

HEN realms are ravag'd with invafive foes,
Each bofom with heroic ardour glows;

Old chiefs, reflecting on their former deeds,

Difdain to ruft with batter'd invalids;

But active in the foremost ranks appear,

And leave young fmock-fac'd beaux to guard the rear.
So, to repel the Vandals of the stage,

Our veteran bard refumes his tragic ragé :
He throws the gauntlet Ötway us'd to wield,
And calls for Englifhmen to judge the field:
Thus arm'd, to rescue Nature from difgrace,
Meffieurs! lay down your minstrels and grimace :
The brawniest youths of Troy the combat fear'd,
When old Etellus in the lifts appear❜d.
Yet what avails the champion's giant fize,
When pigmies are made umpires of the prize?
Your fathers (men of fenfe, and honest bowlers)
Difdain'd the mummery of foreign strollers:
By their examples would you form your taste,
The prefent age might emulate the past.
We hop'd that art and genius had fecur'd you;
But foon facetious Harlequin allur'd you :

The

The Mufes blush'd, to fee their friends exalting
Those elegant delights of jig and vaulting:
So charm'd you were, you ceas'd awhile to dote
On nonsense, gargled in an eunuch's throat :
All pleas'd to hear the chattering monsters speak,
As old wives wonder at the parfon's Greek.
Such light ragoûts and mushrooms may be good,
To whet your appetites for wholfome food:
But the bold Briton ne'er in earnest dines
Without fubftantial haunches and furloins.
In wit, as well as war, they give us vigour ;
Creffy was loft by kickshaws and soup-meagre.
Instead of light deserts and luscious froth,
Our poet treats to-night with Spartan broth;
To which, as well as all his former feasts,
The ladies are the chief-invited guests.
Crown'd with a kind of Glastonbury bays,
That bloom amid the winter of his days;
He comes, ambitious in his green decline,
To confecrate his wreath at beauty's fhrine.
His Oroonoko never fail'd t' engage
The radiant circles of the former age:
Each bofom heav'd, all eyes were feen to flow,
And fympathize with Ifabella's woe: