It is true that in a scarce work we find it is recorded that the expression originated with Richard III., but this is easily confuted by the examples we have given. The 'Comedy of Errors' contains one isolated allusion to it:--"_God damn me!_ that's as much as to say, God make me a light wench." Here the term is dearly interpolated as a kind of newly-coined catchword. We suspect that the true era of the oath being absorbed into common speech is indicated by a passage in the epigrams of Sir John Harrington. This work, which appeared in 1613, is much concerned at the abusive element that had at that time entered into English conversation. No longer, says Sir John, do men swear devoutly by the cross and mass, or by such innocent oaths as the pyx or the mousefoot. Now they invite damnation as their pledge of sincerity. "Goddamn-me," he repines, had then become the customary oath. This appears to us to be the first intimation of the fact that we find in English literature.[14] Neither was amusement neglected to be created out of this new word-sally. In one of the comedies which throw so much light upon the manners of the time, a piece called 'Amends for Ladies,' from the pen of Nat Field, we are introduced among a so-called society of roarers. The experiment had been already tried by Thomas Middleton, who, in his 'Faire Quarrel,' had initiated his audience into the exercises of a pretended roaring-school. The notion was simply that the young idlers about town met together to acquire perfection in the arts of bombast and exaggeration. In the former production, a Lord Feesimple is supposed to be enjoying the coveted distinction of being drilled into becoming a roarer. As was usual in these performances, the characters pass from one insolence to another, until at last swords are drawn and general uproar prevails. But what upon the present occasion has given rise to the misunderstanding, is the unlucky assumption by Feesimple of one of the roysterers' private and particular oaths. In an ill-omened moment he has presumed to exclaim, "Damn me!" whereupon a certain Tearchaps who has been noticeable through the play as the improprietor of the term, very loudly objects--"Use your own words, damn me is mine; I am known by it all the town o'er. D'ye hear?" Feesimple, although disposed to contest the other's title, is happily brought to order by the timely interference of one Welltried, whose knowledge of such matters enables him to bear out the truth of the assertion. This play, produced in 1618 and acted upon the stage of the Blackfriars, tallies in substance with Harrington's verses produced in the earlier year.