We doubt that scene which does their wonder raise,

Examines, fathoms, all the depths of wit;

The ready finger lays on every blot ;

Knows what should justly please, and what should not.
Nature her self lies open to your view,

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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,

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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 :

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Not in the suffragating tribes to stand,
But in your utmost, last, provincial band.

If his ambition may those hopes pursue,
Who with religion loves your arts and you,

* Printed sterve in the "Miscellany Poems," 1684.

↑ The date and occasion of this Prologue are not known. It was printed in the "Miscellany Poems," 1684, immediately after the preceding Prologue, and it may be conjectured that it was also delivered at Oxford in 1681.

"Grossly," in the gross, ir, the general.

Oxford to him a dearer name shall be,

Than his own mother-university.

Thebes did his green unknowing youth engage,
He chooses Athens in his riper age.

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EPILOGUE TO "THE UNHAPPY FAVOURITE,
OR THE EARL OF ESSEX.":

1682.

WE act by fits and starts, like drowning men,
But just peep up, and then dop+ down again.
Let those who call us wicked change their sense,
For never men lived more on Providence.
Not lottery cavaliers 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; §
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 play-house earth,||
Pent there since our last fire, and, Lilly says,
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 their venom daily spit ;)
They thrive by treason, and we starve by wit.

**

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IO

15

This Epilogue, which has not been assigned by any previous editor to the play for which it was written, was composed by Dryden for Banks's play of "The Unhappy Favourite," produced at the King's Theatre in the early part of 1682. The King and Queen attended an early representation of this play and on the occasion of their visit a new Prologue written by Dryden was produced, which has been printed as a Political Prologue at p. 136, where see the note. This Epilogue was published in the "Miscellany Poems" of 1684, with the title, "An Epilogue for the King's House;" and it was published with Banks's play in 1685. The text as printed in 1685 is here followed it has several small variations from the text of the "Miscellany Poems," 1684.

+ The word dop was changed by Broughton into pop, which has been generally followed. Pap appears in Scott's, R. Bell's, and Aldine editions. Dop is clearly the right word. To dop is to make a low bow or curtsey. "The Venetian dop this" (Ben Jonson, "Cynthia's Revels," iv. 2). The word "dopping," for bowing, occurs in one of Barrow's Sermons, 27 (quoted by Latham in his new edition of Johnson's Dictionary).

"Lottery cavaliers" are poor loyal officers, to whom the right of keeping lotteries was granted by patent in Charles II.'s reign.

§"The three last ungiving parliaments" were those of 1679 and 1680, and the parliament held at Oxford, March 1681, and immediately dissolved: these had all refused supplies. || Compare in "Absalom and Achitophel," line 636:

"Comets rise

From earthy vapours, ere they shine in skies."

The "third day" was the benefit-day for the author of a play.

** In the "Miscellany Poems," 1684, this line is printed,

"Their pamphleteers each day their venom spit."

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To the Upper
Gallery.

Confess the truth, which of you has not laid
Four farthings out to buy the Hatfield Maid?*
Or, what is duller yet and more does spite us,
Democritus his wars with Heraclitus?+
These are the authors that have run us down,
And exercise you critics of the town.
Yet these are pearls to your lampooning rhymes,
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,
You had agreed your play before their prize.
Faith, you may hang your harps upon the 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, if he can,
The satisfaction of a gentleman.

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PROLOGUE AND EPILOGUE TO "THE LOYAL BROTHER,, OR THE PERSIAN PRINCE." +

1682.

PROLOGUE.

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 'em !) 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.

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"The Hatfield Maid" was a printed story of an apparition professed to be seen on four Occasions in January 1632 by Elizabeth Freeman of Hatfield, which was circulated by the Monmouth party. The story was attested by Mr. Joseph Jordan, a Hertfordshire magistrate, and Dr. Lee, rector of Hatfield. The marginal invocation "To the Upper Gallery" is printed with the Epilogue in the edition of the play, quarto, 1685: in the "Miscellany Poems,” 1684, it is "Looking above."

+ "Democritus" and "Heraclitus Ridens" were the names of two newspapers; the former a Whig paper, the latter edited by Roger L'Estrange and supported by the Court.

"The Loyal Brother," Southern's first play, and a very great success, appeared at the King's House in 1682, and Dryden wrote the Prologue and Epilogue. The story of Dryden's raising the price of the Prologue on this occasion has been told in the General Introduction, p. 388. This was a political play, directed against the Whigs: the Duke of York was "the loyal brother,' and the conspirator in the play was Shaftesbury. Southern was only twenty-three when Le produced this play.

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.
Sir Edmond-berry + 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 congee 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,

IÙ

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A lewd old gentleman of seventy years;

Whose age in vain our mercy would implore,

30

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 huzzaw

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The mitred moppet from his chair they draw:
On the slain corps 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 that prayer.
Five praying saints 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.

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50

The 17th of November, the anniversary of Queen Elizabeth's accession. Dryden proceeds to describe the annual pope-burning procession of that night.

Sir Edmund Berry or Edmond Bury Godfrey. He had, what was unusual at that time, two Christian names; Bury and Berry were two different modes of spelling the same name.

The word poppet was substituted for moppet by Broughton, and has since remained in all editions. Moppet is here restored from the original broad sheet, of which there is a copy in the British Museum

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:
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 commonwealths-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.
"Tis faction buys the votes of half the pit ;
Theirs is the pension-parliament of wit.
In city-clubs their venom let them vent;

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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?

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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.
Meantime you see what trade our plots advance:
We send each year good money into France;
And they that know what merchandise we need,
Send o'er true Protestants to mend our breed.§

*This coarse Epilogue was spoken by a lady, Mrs. (Miss Sarah Cook.

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+ Leaden farthings issued by tradesmen and taken among those who knew them, on the credit of the issuers.

The parliament which had been dissolved in 1678, after an existence of eighteen years from the Restoration, had got the name of the Pension Parliament.

§ The French Huguenots who took refuge in England from persecution.