Be kind, and make him in his wishes easy,
Who in your own despite has strove to please ye.
He scorn'd to borrow from the wits of yore,
But ever writ, as none e'er writ before.
You modern wits, should each man bring his claim,
Have desperate debentures on your fame;
And little would be left you, I'm afraid,
If all your debts to Greece and Rome were paid.
From this deep fund our author largely draws,
Nor sinks his credit lower than it was.
Though plays for honour in old time he made,
'Tis now for better reasons-to be paid.
Believe him, he has known the world too long,
And seen the death of much immortal song.
He says, poor poets lost, while players won,
As pimps grow rich, while gallants are undone.
Though Tom the poet writ with ease and pleasure,
The comic Tom abounds in other treasure.
Fame is at best an unperforming cheat;
But 'tis substantial happiness to eat.
Let ease, his last request, be of your giving,
Nor force him to be damn'd to get his living.
PROLOGUE TO THE THREE HOURS AFTER MARRIAGE.'
AUTHORS are judged by strange capricious rules;
The great ones are thought mad, the small ones fools:
Yet sure the best are most severely fated;
For fools are only laugh'd at, wits are hated.
Blockheads with reason men of sense abhor;
But fool 'gainst fool, is barbarous civil war,
Why on all authors, then, should critics fall?
Since some have writ, and shown no wit at all.
Condemn a play of theirs, and they evade it ;
Cry, 'Damn not us, but damn the French, who made it.'
By running goods these graceless owlers gain ;
Theirs are the rules of France, the plots of Spain;
But wit, like wine, from happier climates brought,
Dash'd by these rogues, turns English common draught.
They pall Molière's and Lopez' sprightly strain,
And teach dull harlequins to grin in vain.
How shall our author hope a gentler fate,
Who dares most impudently not translate?
It had been civil, in these ticklish times,
To fetch his fools and knaves from foreign climes; 20
Spaniards and French abuse to the world's end,
But spare old England, lest you hurt a friend.
If any fool is by our satire bit,
Let him hiss loud, to show you all he's hit.
Poets make characters, as salesmen clothes;
We take no measure of your fops and beaux;
But here all sizes and all shapes you meet,
And fit yourselves, like chaps in Monmouth Street.
Gallants, look here! this fool's cap1 has an air,
Goodly and smart, with ears of Issachar.
Let no one fool engross it, or confine
A common blessing: now 'tis yours, now mine.
But poets in all ages had the care
To keep this cap for such as will, to wear.
Our author has it now (for every wit
Of course resign'd it to the next that writ)
And thus upon the stage 'tis fairly thrown;2
Let him that takes it wear it as his own.
'Shows a cap with ears.- Flings down the cap, and exit.
PRODIGIOUS this! the frail one of our play
From her own sex should mercy find to-day!
You might have held the pretty head aside,
Peep'd in your fans, been serious thus, and cried-
The play may pass-but that strange creature,
Shore,
I can't-indeed now-I so hate a whore
Just as a blockhead rubs his thoughtless skull,
And thanks his stars he was not born a fool;
So from a sister sinner you shall hear,
'How strangely you expose yourself, my dear!'
But let me die, all raillery apart,
Our sex are still forgiving at their heart;
And, did not wicked custom so contrive,
We'd be the best good-natured things alive.
There are, 'tis true, who tell another tale,
That virtuous ladies envy while they rail;
Such rage without, betrays the fire within ;
In some close corner of the soul they sin
Still hoarding up, most scandalously nice,
Amidst their virtues a reserve of vice.
The godly dame, who fleshly failings damns,
Scolds with her maid, or with her chaplain crams.
Would
you enjoy soft nights and solid dinners?
Faith, gallants, board with saints, and bed with sinners. Well, if our author in the wife offends,
He has a husband that will make amends;
He draws him gentle, tender, and forgiving;
And sure such kind good creatures may be living.
In days of old, they pardon'd breach of vows,
Stern Cato's self was no relentless spouse:
Plu-Plutarch, what's his name that writes his life?
Tells us, that Cato dearly loved his wife :
Yet if a friend, a night or so, should need her,
He'd recommend her as a special breeder.
To lend a wife, few here would scruple make;
But, pray, which of you all would take her back?
Though with the Stoic chief our stage may ring,
The Stoic husband was the glorious thing.
The man had courage, was a sage, 'tis true,
And loved his country-but what's that to you ?
Those strange examples ne'er were made to fit ye,
But the kind cuckold might instruct the city:
There, many an honest man may copy Cato,
Who ne'er saw naked sword, or look'd in Plato.
If, after all, you think it a disgrace,
That Edward's miss thus perks it in your face;
To see a piece of failing flesh and blood,
In all the rest so impudently good;
Faith, let the modest matrons of the town
Come here in crowds, and stare the strumpet down. 50
THE basset-table spread, the tallier come;
Why stays Smilinda in the dressing-room?
Rise, pensive nymph, the tallier waits for you!
Ah, madam, since my Sharper is untrue,
I joyless make my once adored Alpeu.
I saw him stand behind Ombrelia's chair,
And whisper with that soft, deluding air,
And those feign'd sighs which cheat the listening fair.
Is this the cause of your romantic strains?
A mightier grief my heavy heart sustains.
The Basset-Table:' only this of all the Town Eclogues was Mr Pope's, and is here printed from a copy corrected by his own hand. The humour of it consists in this, that the one is in love with the game, and the other with the sharper-W.
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