Noise, Madness, all unreasonable Things, That strike at Sense, as Rebels do at Kings! The stile of Forty One our Poets write, 16 And you are grown to judge like Forty Eight. Such Censures our mistaking Audience make, That 'tis almost grown scandalous to take. They talk of Feavours that infect the Brains; But Non-sence 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 Barly-water Muse:

24

DOUBLE

Now, Luck for us, and a kind hearty Pit, For he who pleases, never failes of Wit. Honour is yours:

And you, like Kings at City Treats, bestowit; The Writer kneels, and is bid rise a Poet. But you are fickle Sovereigns, to our Sorrow; You dubb to day, and hang aman tomorrow: You cry the same Sense up, and down again, Just like brass Money once a year in Spain: Take you i' th' mood, what e'er base metal 10

come,

You coin as fast as Groats at Bromingam; Though 'tis no more like Sense in ancient Plays

Than Rome's religion like St. Peter's days. In short, so swift your Judgments turn and wind,

You cast our fleetest Wits a mile behind. 'Twere well your Judgments but in Plays did range,

But ev'n your Follies and Debauches change With such a Whirl, the Poets of your Age Are tyr'd, and cannot score 'em on the Stage, Unless each Vice in short-hand they indite, 20 Ev'n as notcht Prentices whole Sermons write.

The heavy Hollanders no Vices know,

But what they us'd a hundred years ago; Like honest Plants, where they were stuck, they grow;

Now we set up for Tilting in the Pit, Where 'tis agreed by Bullies, chickenhearted,

To fright the Ladies first, and then be parted. A fair attempt has twice or thrice been made, To hire Night-murth'rers, and make Death a Trade.

When Murther's out, what Vice can we advance?

Unless the new-found Pois'ning Trick of France:

And when their art of Rats-bane we have got,

By way of thanks, we'll send 'em o'er our

Plot.

Shou'd Hag and Gray-beard make such tender moan,

Faith, you'd e'en trust 'em 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 Pow'r?
He's mending and improving every Hour.
You sly She-Jockies of the Box and Pit 20
Are pleas'd to find a hot unbroken Wit,
By management he may in time be made,
But there's no hopes of an old batter'd Jade;
Faint and unnerv'd he runs into a Sweat,
And always fails you at the Second Heat.

GALLANTS, a bashful Poet bids me say
He's come to lose his Maidenhead to-day.
Be not too fierce, for he's but green of Age,
And ne're till now debauch'd upon the
Stage.

He wants the suff'ring part of Resolution,
And comes with blushes to his Execution.
E're you deflow'r his Muse, he hopes the
Pit

Will make some Settlement upon his Wit.
Promise him well, before the Play begin;
For he wou'd fain be cozen'd into Sin.
'Tis not but that he knows you mean to fail;)
But, if you leave him after being frail,
He'll have, at least, a fair Pretence to rail;
To call you base, and swear you us'd him ill,
And put you in the new Deserters Bill:
Lord, what a Troop of perjur'd Men we see;
Enough to fill another Mercury!
But this the Ladies may with patience
brook ;

Their's are not the first Colours you forsook!
He wou'd be loth the Beauties to offend; 20
But if he shou'd, he's not too old to mend.

PROLOGUE.

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, Traytor, for a filthy Beast!
9
Nay, and he's like the pack of all the rest :
None of 'em stick at mark; They all deceive.)
Some Jew has changed the Text, I half
believe;

Their Adam cozen'd our poor Grandame Eve.)
To hide their Faults they rap out Oaths, and

tear;

advance

Orlando, and the Paladins of France, Records that, when our Wit and Sense is flown,

'Tis lodg'd within the Circle of the Moon In Earthen Jars, which one, who thither soar'd,

Set to his Nose, snufft up, and was restor'd. What e're 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 with Southwark's disagree, II Here may they find their long-lost Loyalty, Here busie Senates, to th' old Cause inclin'd, May snuff the Votes their Fellows left behind:

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 look'd what Representatives wou'd bring,

But they help'd us, just as they did the King. Yet we despair not; for we now lay forth 21 The Sybill's Books to those who know their Worth;

And tho the first was Sacrific'd 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 spar'd the Vices of the Age, Herefinding nothing that his Spleen can raise, Is forced to turn his Satire into Praise. 30

departed,

And of our Sisters all the kinder-hearted To Edenborough gone, or coached or carted.) With bonny Blewcap there they act all night For Scotch half-crown, in English Threepence hight.

One Nymph, to whom fat Sir John Falstaff's lean, 10 There with her single Person fills the Scene.

Another, with long Use and Age decay'd, Div'd here old Woman, and rose there a Maid.

Our trusty Door-keepers of former time There strut and swagger in Heroique Rhyme. Tack but a copper Lace to drugget Suit, And there's a Heroe made without Dispute;

FIRST PROLOGUE to the Univ. of Oxford, 1681. Text from the Miscellanies of 1693.

Becomes a plume for Indian emperor.
But all his Subjects, to express the Care
Of Imitation, go, like Indians, bare;
Lac'd Linen there would be a dangerous
Thing;

20

It might perhaps a new Rebellion bring;
The Scotwho wore it wou'd be chosen King.
But why should I these Renegades describe,
When you yourselves have seen a lewder
Tribe?

Teag 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;
Such as like Cain were branded with Dis-
grace,

30

And had their Country stampt 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 sterve.

SECOND PROLOGUE, 1681. Text from the Miscellanies of 1684.