Wisdom and virtue, honour, wit, and sense, Were subject to buffooning insolence : Poets were publicly approv'd, and fought, That vice extoll'd, and virtue fet at nought! A Socrates himself, in that loose age, Was made the pastime of a scoffing stage. At last the public took in hand the cause, And cur'd this madness by the power of laws; Forbad at any time, or any place, To name the person, or describe the face. The stage its ancient fury thus let fall, And comedy diverted without gall : By mild reproofs recover'd minds diseas'd, And sparing persons innocently pleas'd. Each one was nicely shewn in this new glass, And smil'd to think he was not meant the afs : A miser oft would laugh at first, to find A faithful draught of his own fordid mind; And fops were with fuch care and cunning writ, They lik'd the piece for which themselves did fit, You then that would the comic laurels wear, To study nature be your only care : Whoe'er knows man, and by a curious art Difcerns the hidden secrets of the heart; He who observes, and naturally can paint The jealous fool, the fawning sycophant, A fober wit, an enterprising ass, A humorous Otter, or a Hudibras; May safely in those noble lifts engage, And make them act and speak upon the stage.

Strive to be natural in all you write,
And paint with colours that may please the fight,
Nature in various figures does abound;
And in each mind are different humours found:
A glance, a touch, discovers to the wife;
But every man has not difcerning eyes.
All-changing time does also change the mind;
And different ages different pleasures find :
Youth, hot and furious, cannot brook delay,
By flattering vice is easily led away;
Vain in difcourse, inconstant in defire,
In cenfure, rafh; in pleasures, all on fire.
The manly age does steadier thoughts enjoy;
Power and ambition do his foul employ :
Against the turns of fate he fets his mind;
And by the past the future hopes to find.
Decrepit age still adding to his stores,
For others heaps the treasure he adores,
In all his actions keeps a frozen pace;
Past times extols, the present to debase :
Incapable of pleasures youth abuse,
In others blames what age does him refuse.
Your actors must by reason be control'd;
Let young men speak like young, old men like old :
Observe the town, and study well the court:

For thither various characters refort:

Thus 'twas great Jonfon purchas'd his renown,
And in his art had born away the crown;
If, less defirous of the people's praise,

He had not with low farce debas'd his plays;

:

Mixing

Mixing dull buffoonry with wit refin'd,
And Harlequin with noble Terence join'd.
When in the Fox I fee the tortoise hift,
I lose the author of the Alchemist.
The comic wit, born with a smiling air,
Must tragic grief and pompous verse forbear;
Yet may he not, as on a market-place,
With baudy jefts ainuse the populace :
With well-bred converfation you must please,
And your intrigue unravel'd be with ease :
Your action ftill should reason's rules obey,
Nor in an empty scene may lose its way.
Your humble style must sometimes gently rise;
And your difcourse sententious be, and wife:
The paffions must to nature be confin'd;
And scenes to scenes with artful weaving join'd.
Your wit must not unseasonably play;
But follow bus'ness, never lead the way.
Observe how Terence does this error shun;
A careful father chides his amorous fon :
Then fee that son, whom no advice can move,
Forget those orders, and pursue his love :
'Tis not a well-drawn picture we discover:
'Tis a true son, a father, and a lover.
I like an author that reforms the age;

And keeps the right decorum of the stage;
That always pleases by just reason's rule :

But for a tedious droll, a quibbling fool,
Who with low nauseous baudry fills his plays;

Let him be gone, and on two tressels raise

VOL. I.

U

Some

Some Smithfield stage, where he may act his pranks, And make Jack-Puddings speak to mountebanks.

I

N Florence dwelt a doctor of renown,
The fcourge of God, and terror of the town,

Who all the cant of physic had by heart,
And never murder'd but by rules of art.
The public mischief was his private gain;
Children their slaughter'd parents fought in vain :
A brother here his poison'd brother wept;
Some bloodless dy'd, and some by opium flept.
Colds, at his presence, would to frenzies turn;
And agues, like malignant fevers, burn.
Hated, at last, his practice gives him o'er;
One friend, unkill'd by drugs, of all his store,
In his new country-house affords him place;
'Twas a rich abbot, and a building afs :
Here first the doctor's talent came in play,
He seems inspir'd, and talks like Wren or May:
Of this new portico condemns the face,
And turns the entrance to a better place;
Designs the stair-cafe at the other end,
His friend approves, does for his mason send.
He comes; the doctor's arguments prevail.
In short, to finish this our humorous tale,
He Galen's dangerous science does reject,
And from ill doctor turns good architect.
In this example we may have our part:
Rather be mason, 'tis a useful art!

Than

Than a dull poet; for that trade accurst,
Admits no mean betwixt the best and worst.
In other sciences, without disgrace,
A candidate may fill a second place;
But poetry no medium can admit,
No reader fuffers an indifferent wit:
The ruin'd stationers against him baul,
And Herringham degrades him from his stall.
Burlesque, at least, our laughter may excite :
But a cold writer never can delight.
The Counter-Scuffle has more wit and art,
Than the stiff formal style of Gondibert.
Be not affected with that empty praise
Which your vain flatterers will fometimes raise,
And when you read, with ecstasy will fay,
"The finish'd piece! the admirable play !"
Which, when expos'd to cenfure and to light,
Cannot endure a critic's piercing fight.
A hundred authors fates have been foretold,
And Shadwell's works are printed, but not fold.
Hear all the world; confider every thought;
A fool by chance may stumble on a fault:
Yet, when Apollo does your Muse infpire,
Be not impatient to expose your fire;
Nor imitate the Settles of our times,

Those tuneful readers of their own dull rhymes.
Who feize on all th' acquaintance they can meet,
And stop the passengers that walk the street:
There is no fanctuary you can chuse
For a defence from their pursuing Muse.