_Bayes._ Ay, sir, that's my position. And I do here aver that no man yet the sun e'er shone upon has parts sufficient to furnish out a stage, except it were by the help of these my rules.[2] _Johns._ What are those rules, I pray? _Bayes._ Why, sir, my first rule is the rule of transversion, or Regula Duplex; changing verse into prose, or prose into verse, _alternativè_ as you please. _Smith._ Well; but how is this done by a rule, sir? _Bayes._ Why thus, sir; nothing so easy when understood. I take a book in my hand, either at home or elsewhere, for that's all one; if there be any wit in't, as there is no book but has some, I transverse it; that is, if it be prose, put it into verse (but that takes up some time), and if it be verse, put it into prose. _Johns._ Methinks, Mr. Bayes, that putting verse into prose should be called transprosing. _Bayes._ By my troth, sir, 'tis a very good notion; and hereafter it shall be so. _Smith._ Well, sir, and what d'ye do with it then? _Bayes._ Make it my own. 'Tis so changed that no man can know it. My next rule is the rule of record, by way of table-book. Pray observe. _Johns._ We hear you, sir; go on. _Bayes._ As thus. I come into a coffee-house, or some other place where witty men resort, I make as if I minded nothing; do you mark? but as soon as any one speaks, pop I slap it down, and make that too my own. _Johns._ But, Mr. Bayes, are you not sometimes in danger of their making you restore, by force, what you have gotten thus by art? _Bayes._ No, sir; the world's unmindful: they never take notice of these things. _Smith._ But pray, Mr. Bayes, among all your other rules, have you no one rule for invention? _Bayes._ Yes, sir, that's my third rule that I have here in my pocket. _Smith._ What rule can that be, I wonder? _Bayes._ Why, sir, when I have anything to invent, I never trouble my head about it, as other men do; but presently turn over this book, and there I have, at one view, all that Persius, Montaigne, Seneca's Tragedies, Horace, Juvenal, Claudian, Pliny, Plutarch's Lives, and the rest, have ever thought upon this subject: and so, in a trice, by leaving out a few words, or putting in others of my own, the business is done. _Johns._ Indeed, Mr. Bayes, this is as sure and compendious a way of wit as ever I heard of. _Bayes._ Sir, if you make the least scruples of the efficacy of these my rules, do but come to the playhouse, and you shall judge of 'em by the effects. _Smith._ We'll follow you, sir. [_Exeunt._ _Enter three_ PLAYERS _on the stage_. _1st Play._ Have you your part perfect? _2nd Play._ Yes, I have it without book; but I don't understand how it is to be spoken. _3rd Play._ And mine is such a one, as I can't guess for my life what humour I'm to be in; whether angry, melancholy, merry, or in love. I don't know what to make on't.