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PROLOGUE

ΤΟ

LIMBERHAM.

TRUE wit has seen its best days long ago; It ne'er look'd up, fince we were dipt in show; When fenfe in doggrel rhimes and clouds was loft,

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And dulnefs flourish'd at the actor's coft.
Nor ftopt it here; when tragedy was done,
Satire and humour the fame fate have run,
And comedy is funk to trick and pun.
Now our machining lumber will not fell,
And you no longer care for heaven or hell;
What stuff can please you next, the Lord can
tell.

Let them, who the rebellion firft began

To wit, reftore the monarch, if they can;
Our author dares not be the firft bold man.
He, like the prudent citizen, takes care,
To keep for better marts his ftaple ware;
His toys are good enough for Sturbridge fair.

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Tricks were the fashion; if it now be spent,
'Tis time enough at Easter to invent ;
No man will make up a new fuit 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 fummer, Noftradamus tells, they fay,
That all the critics fhall be shipped away,
And not enow be left to damn a play.
To every fail befide, good heaven, be kind;
But drive away that fwarm with fuch a wind,
That not one locuft may be left behind!

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EPILOGUE

ΤΟ

MITHRIDATES, KING OF PONTUS

DY MR. N. LEE, 1678.

YOU'VE feen a pair of faithful lovers die:
And much you care; for most of you will

cry,

"Twas a juft judgment on their conftancy.
For, heaven be thank'd, we live in such an age,
When no man dies for love, but on the stage: 5

Ver. 5. When no man dies for love,] One of the most remarkable differences betwixt ancient and modern tragedy arifes from the prevailing custom of defcribing only those diftreffes that are occafioned by the paffion of love: a paffion, which from the univerfality of its dominion, may justly claim a large share in reprefentations of human life: but which, by totally engroffing the theatre, hath contributed to degrade that noble fchool of virtue into an academy of effeminacy. When Racine perfuaded the celebrated Arnauld to read his Phædra, "Why," said that fevere critic to his friend, " have you falfified the manners of Hippolitus, and reprefented him in love?" "Alas!" replied the poet, "without that circumftance, how would the ladies and the beaux have received my piece ?" And it may well be imagined, that to gratify fo confiderable and important a part of his audience, was the powerful motive that induced Corneille to enervate even the matchlefs and affecting ftory of Edipus, by the frigid and impertinent epifode of Thefeus's paffion for Dirce. Shakspeare has thewn us, by his Hamlet, Macbeth, and Cæfar, and above all by his Lear, that very interefting tragedies may be

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And e'en thofe martyrs are but rare in plays;
A curfed fign how much true faith decays,
Love is no more a violent defire;
'Tis a meer metaphor, a painted fire.
In all our fex, the name examin'd well,
"Tis pride to gain, and vanity to tell,
In woman, 'tis of fubtle intereft made;
Curfe on the punk that made it first a trade!
She firft did wit's prerogative remove,

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And made a fool prefume to prate of love, 15
Let honour and preferment go for gold;
But glorious beauty is not to be fold;
Or, if it be, 'tis at a rate fo high,
That nothing but adoring it should buy.
Yet the rich cullies may their boasting spare ;
They purchase but sophisticated ware,
'Tis prodigality that buys deceit,

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Where both the giver and the taker cheat,
Men but refine on the old half-crown way; 24
And women fight, like Swiffers, for their pay,

written, that are not founded on gallantry and love; and that Boileau was mistaken, when he affirmed

Eft

de l'amour la fenfible peinture, pour aller au cœur la route la plus fure.

The finest pictures of love in all antiquity are the Phædra, Medea, Simætha, fecond Idyllium of Theocritus, and the Dido of Virgil; all of thefe pictures are of the effects of love in wo men; no defcription of it in men, fo capital and fo ftriking, has been given. The tenth eclogue of Virgil is but feeble in com parison of these mentioned above.

Dr. J. WARTON,

PROLOGUE

ΤΟ

CEDIPUS.

WHEN Athens all the Grecian state did

guide,

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And Greece gave laws to all the world befide;
Then Sophocles with Socrates did fit,
Supreme in wisdom one, and one in wit:
And wit from wifdom differed not in thofe,
But as 'twas fung in verfe, or faid in profe,
Then, Edipus, on crowded theatres,
Drew all admiring eyes and lift'ning ears:
The pleafed fpectator fhouted every line,
The nobleft, manlieft, and the best design! 10
And every critic of each learned age,

By this just model has reform'd the stage.
Now, fhould it fail, (as heaven avert our fear)
Damn it in filence, left the world should hear.
For were it known this poem did not please, 15
You might fet up for perfect favages:
Your neighbours would not look on you as men,
But think the nation all turned Picts again.
Faith, as you manage matters, 'tis not fit 19
You should fufpect yourselves of too much wit:

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