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PROLOGUE

ΤΟ

Mr. ADDISON'S Tragedy

OF

САТО.

T

o wake the foul by tender ftrokes of art,

To raife the genius, and to mend the

heart;

To make mankind, in conscious virtue bold,

Live o'er each scene, and be what they behold:
For this the Tragic Muse first trod the stage,
Commanding tears to stream thro' ev'ry age;
Tyrants no more their favage nature kept,
And foes to virtue wonder'd how they wept.

Our

Our author fhuns by vulgar fprings to move,
The hero's glory, or the virgin's love;
In pitying love we but our weakness show,
And wild ambition well deferves its woe.
Here tears fhall flow from a more gen'rous caufe,
Such tears as patriots fhed for dying laws:

He bids your breafts with ancient ardour rise,
And calls forth Roman drops from British eyes.
Virtue confefs'd in human shape he draws,
What Plato thought, and godlike Cato was:
No common object to your fight displays,
But what with pleasure heav'n itself surveys;
A brave man ftruggling in the ftorms of fate,
And greatly falling with a falling ftate!
While Cato gives his little fenate laws,

What bofom beats not in his countrey's caufe?
Who fees him act, but envies ev'ry deed?

Who hears him groan, and does not wish to bleed?
Ev'n when proud Cafar 'midft triumphal cars,
The spoils of nations, and the pomp of wars,
Ignobly vain, and impotently great,
Show'd Rome her Cato's figure drawn in state;
As her dead father's rev'rend image past,
The pomp was darken'd, and the day o'ercaft,

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The triumph ceas'd-Tears gufh'd from ev'ry eye;
The world's great victor pafs'd unheeded by ;
Her last good man dejected Rome ador'd,
And honour'd Cafar's lefs than Cato's fword.
Britains attend: Be worth like this approv'd,
And show, you have the virtue to be mov'd.
With honeft fcorn the firft fam'd Cato view'd
Rome learning arts from Greece, whom she fubdu'd;
Our scene precarioufly fubfifts too long

On French tranflation, and Italian fong."

Dare to have sense your felves; affert the ftage,
Be juftly warm'd with your own native rage..
Such plays alone fhould please a British ear,
As Cato's felf had not disdain'd to hear.

EPI

EPILOGUE

то

JANE SHORE.

Design'd for Mrs. OLDFIELD.

Rodigious this! the frail one of our play
From her own fex fhould mercy find to day!
You might have held the pretty head afide,

Peep'd in your fans, been ferious, thus, and cry'd,
The play may pass-but that strange creature, Shore,
I can't

indeed now- -I fo hate a whore

Juft as a blockhead rubs his thoughtless skull,
And thanks his ftars he was not born a fool;;
So from a fifter finner you fhall hear,

"How ftrangely you expofe your felf, my dear?

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But let me die, all raillery apart,

Our fex are still forgiving at their heart;
And did not wicked custom fo contrive,
We'd be the best, good-natur'd 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 fome close corner of the foul, they fin:
Still hoarding up, moft fcandalously nice,
Amidst their virtues, a reserve of vice.
The godly dame who fleshly failings damns,
Scolds with her maid, or with her chaplain crams,
Wou'd you enjoy foft nights and folid dinners?
Faith, gallants, board with faints, and bed with finners.
Well, if our author in the wife offends,

He has a husband that will make amends.
He draws him gentle, tender, and forgiving;
And fure fuch kind good creatures may be living.
In days of old they pardon'd breach of vows,
Stern Cato's felf was no relentless spouse:
Plu-Plutarch, what's his name that writes his life?
Tells us, that Cato dearly lov'd his wife:

Yet if a friend a night, or fo, fhould need her,

He'd recommend her as a fpecial breeder.

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