"Formerly _Poets_ made _Players_, but now adays 'tis generally the _Player_ that makes the _Poet_. How many Plays would have expired the very first Night of their appearing upon the Stage, but for _Betterton_, _Barry_, _Bracegirdle_, or _Wilks_'s inimitable Performance. "Who ever goes about to expose the Follies of others upon the Stage, runs great hazard of exposing himself first; and of being made Ridiculous to those very People he endeavours to make so. "I doubt whether a Man of Sense would ever give himself the trouble of writing for the Stage, if he had before his Eyes the fatigue of Rehearsals, the Pangs and Agonies of the first day his Play is Acted, the Disappointments of the third, and the Scandal of a Damn'd Poet. "The reason why in _Shakespear_ and _Ben. Johnson_'s Time Plays had so good Success, and that we see now so many of 'em miscarry, is because then the Poets _wrote better_ than the Audience _Judg'd_; whereas now-a-days the _Audience_ judge _better than the Poets write_." * He that pretends to confine a Damsel of the Theatre to his own Use, who by her Character is a Person of an extended Qualification, acts as unrighteous, at least as unnatural, a Part, as he that would Debauch a Nun. But after all, such a Spark rather consults his _Vanity_, than his _Love_, and would be thought to ingross what all the young Coxcombs of the Town admire and covet. "Is it not a kind of Prodigy, that in this wicked and censorious Age, the shining _Daphne_ should preserve her Reputation in a Play-House?" The Character of a Player was Infamous amongst the _Romans_, but with the _Greeks_ Honourable: What is our Opinion? We think of them like the _Romans_, and live with them like the _Greeks_. "Nothing so powerfully excites Love in us Men, as the view of those Limbs of Women's Bodies, which the Establish'd Rules of Modesty bid 'em keep from our Sight. No wonder then if _Aglaura_, _Cæsonia_, _Floria_, and in general all the Women on our Stages, are so fond of acting in Men's Cloaths. "_Cæsonia_ is Young, I own it: But then _Cæsonia_ has an _African_ Nose, hollow Eyes, and a _French_ Complexion; so that all the time she acted in her Sex's Habit, her Conquests never extended further than one of her Fellow-Players, or a Cast-Poet. Mark the Miracles of Fancy: _Cæsonia_ acts a _Boy_'s Part, and _Tallus_, one of the first _Patricians_, falls desperately in Love with her, and presents her with two Hundred great _Sesterces_ (a Gentlewoman's Portion) for a Night's Lodging. "One would imagine our Matrons should be mighty Jealous of their Husbands Intriguing with Players: But no, they bear it with a Christian Patience. How is that possible? Why, they Intrigue themselves, either with _Roscius_ the Tragedian, _Flagillus_, the Comedian, or _Bathillus_, the Dancer."