This play, I dare assure the reader, is none of those; it may want beauties, but the faults are neither gross, nor many. Perfection in any art is not suddenly obtained: the author of this, to his misfortune, left his country at a time when he was to have learned the language. The story he has treated, was an accident which happened at Rome, though he has transferred the scene to England. If it shall please God to restore him to me, I may perhaps inform him better of the rules of writing; and if I am not partial, he has already shewn that a genius is not wanting to him. All that I can reasonably fear is, that the perpetual good success of ill plays may make him endeavour to please by writing worse, and by accommodating himself to the wretched capacity and liking of the present audience, from which heaven defend any of my progeny! A poet, indeed, must live by the many; but a good poet will make it his business to please the few. I will not proceed farther on a subject which arraigns so many of the readers. For what remains, both my son and I are extremely obliged to my dear friend, Mr Congreve, whose excellent Prologue was one of the greatest ornaments of the play. Neither is my Epilogue the worst which I have written; though it seems, at the first sight, to expose our young clergy with too much freedom. It was on that consideration that I had once begun it otherwise, and delivered the copy of it to be spoken, in case the first part of it had given offence. This I will give you, partly in my own justification, and partly too because I think it not unworthy of your sight; only remembering you, that the last line connects the sense to the ensuing part of it.--Farewell, reader: if you are a father, you will forgive me; if not, you will when you are a father. Time was, when none could preach without degrees, And seven-years toil at Universities; But when the canting saints came once in play, The spirit did their business in a day: A zealous cobler, with the gift of tongue, If he could pray six hours, might preach as long. Thus, in the primitive times of poetry, The stage to none but men of sense was free; But thanks to your judicious taste, my masters, It lies in common, now, to poetasters. You set them up, and till you dare condemn, The satire lies on you, and not on them. When mountebanks their drugs at market cry, Is it their fault to sell, or yours to buy? 'Tis true, they write with ease, and well they may; } Fly-blows are gotten every summer's day; } The poet does but buz, and there's a play. } Wit's not his business, &c. FOOTNOTE: [Footnote 167: Probably, Southerne and Congreve.] END OF THE FIFTEENTH VOLUME. Edinburgh, Printed by James Ballantyne & Co. * * * * *