Produced by Delphine Lettau, Joseph Cooper, David E. Brown and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net THE _Old DEBAUCHEES._ A COMEDY. As it is Acted at the THEATRE-ROYAL in DRURY-LANE. By His MAJESTY's Servants. By the Author of the MODERN HUSBAND. _LONDON_: Printed for J. W. And Sold by J. ROBERTS in _Warwick-Lane_, MDCCXXXII. [Price One Shilling.] PROLOGUE. Spoken by Mr. _William Mills_. _I Wish, with all my Heart, the Stage and Town Would both agree to cry all Prologues down; That we, no more oblig'd to say or sing, Might drop this useless necessary Thing: No more with aukward Strut, before the Curtain, Chaunt out some Rhimes--there's neither good nor hurt in._ _What is this Stuff the Poets make us deal in, But some old worn-out Jokes of their Retailing: From Sages of our own, or former Times, Transvers'd from Prose, perhaps transpros'd from Rhimes._ _How long the Tragick Muse her Station kept, } How Guilt was humbl'd, and how Tyrants wept, } Forgetting still how often Hearers slept._ } _Perhaps, for Change, you, now and then, by Fits, Are told that Criticks are the Bane of Wits; How they turn Vampyres, being dead and damn'd, And with the Blood of living Bards are cramm'd: That Poets thus tormented die, and then The Devil gets in them, and they suck agen._ _Thus modern Bards, like Bays, their Prologues frame, } For this, and that, and every Play the same, } Which you, most justly, neither praise nor blame._ } _As something must be spoke, no matter what; No Friends are now by Prologues lost or got; By such Harangues we raise nor Spleen, nor Pity-- Thus ends this idle, but important Ditty._ Dramatis Personæ. MEN. _Old Laroon._ Mr. _Shepard_. _Young Laroon._ Mr. _Mills_, Junior. _Father Martin._ Mr. _Cibber_, Junior. _Old Jourdain._ Mr. _Roberts_. WOMEN. _Isabel._ Miss _Raftor_. _Beatrice._ Miss _Williams_. SCENE _THOULON_. THE _Old DEBAUCHEES._ ACT I. SCENE I. SCENE, _Mr._ Jourdain'_s_. Isabel, Beatrice. ISABEL. A Nunnery! Ha, ha, ha! And is it possible, my dear _Beatrice_, you can intend to sacrifice your Youth and Beauty, to go out of the World as soon as you come into it! _Bea._ No one, my dear _Isabel_, can sacrifice too much or too soon to Heaven. _Isa._ Pshaw! Heaven regards Hearts and not Faces, and an old Woman will be as acceptable a Sacrifice as a young one. _Bea._ It is possible you may come to a better Understanding, and value the World as little as I do. _Isa._ As you say, it is possible when I can enjoy it no longer, I may; nay, I do not care if I promise you when I grow old and ugly, I'll come and keep you Company: But this I am positive, till the World is weary of me, I never shall be weary of the World. _Bea._ What can a Woman of Sense see in it worth her valuing?