COME leave this saucy way Of baiting those that pay

Dear for the sight of your declining wit:
'Tis known it is not fit,

That a sale poet, just contempt once thrown,
Should cry up thus his own.

I wonder by what dower,

Or patent, you had power

From all to rape a judgment. Let 't suffice,
Had you been modest, you'd been granted wise.

'Tis known you can do well,
And that you do excell,

As a Translator: But when things require
A genius, and fire,

Not kindled heretofore by others pains;
As oft you've wanted brains

And art to strike the white,
As you have levell'd right:

Yet if men vouch not things apocryphal,

You bellow, rave, and spatter round your gall.

Jug, Pierce, Peck, Fly, and all

Your jests so nominal,

Are things so far beneath an able brain,

As they do throw a stain

Through all th' unlikely plot, and do displease
As deep as Pericles,

Where, yet, there is not laid
Before a chambermaid

Discourse so weigh'd as might have serv'd of old
For schools, when they of love and valour told.

Ere taught so bold assuming of the bays,
When they deserv'd no praise.

To rail men into approbation,

Is new to yours alone;
And prospers not: for know,
Fame is as coy, as you

Can be disdainful; and who dares to prove
A rape on her, shall gather scorn, not love.

Leave then this humour vain,
And this more humorous strain,
Where self-conceit, and choler of the blood
Eclipse what else is good:

Then if you please those raptures high to touch,
Whereof you boast so much;

And but forbear your crown,
Till the world puts it on:

No doubt from all you may amazement draw,
Since braver theme no Phoebus ever saw.

BEN, do not leave the stage,
'Cause 'tis a loathsome age:

For pride and impudence will grow too bold,
When they shall hear it told

They frighted thee; stand high as is thy cause,
Their hiss is thy applause:
More just were thy disdain,
Had they approved thy vein :

So thou for them, and they for thee were born,
They to incense. and thou as much to scorn,

Will't thou engross thy store
Of wheat, and pour no more,

Because their bacon-brains have such a taste,
As more delight in mast:

No! set them forth a board of dainties, full
As thy best Muse can cull;
Whilst they the while do pine
And thirst, midst all their wine.
What greater plague can hell itself devise,
Than to be willing thus to tantalize?

Thou canst not find them stuff,
That will be bad enough

To please their palates: let 'em them refuse,

For some Pye-Corner Muse;

She is too fair an hostess, 'twere a sin

For them to like thine Inn:

'Twas made to entertain

Guests of a nobler strain ;

Yet if they will have any of thy store,

Why should the scene be mute,

'Cause thou canst touch thy lute, And string thy Horace? let each Muse of nine Claim thee, and say, Thou'rt mine.

'Twere fond to let all other flames expire, To sit by Pindar's fire:

For by so strange neglect,

I should myself suspect,

The palsy were as well thy brain's disease,

'Tis true, dear Ben, thy just chastizing hand
Hath fix'd upon the sotted age a brand
To their swoln pride, and empty scribbling due;
It can nor judge, nor write: and yet 'tis true,
Thy comic Muse from the exalted line
Touch'd by the Alchemist, doth since decline
From that her zenith, and foretels a red
And blushing evening, when she goes to bed;
Yet such, as shall outshine the glimmering light,
With which all stars shall gild the following
night.

Nor think it much (since all thy eaglets may
Endure the sunny trial) if we say

This hath the stronger wing, or that doth shine,
Trick'd up in fairer plumes, since all are thine :
Who hath his flock of cackling geese compared
With thy tuned quire of swans? or else who
dared

To call thy births deform'd? but if thou bind,
By city custom, or by gavel-kind,

In equal shares thy love on all thy race,
We may distinguish of their sex, and place;
Though one hand form them, and though one brain
strike

Souls into all, they are not all alike.
Why should the follies then of this dull age

Draw from thy pen such an immodest rage,

As seems to blast thy else-immortal bays,
When thine own tongue proclaims thy itch of
praise ?

Such thirst will argue drought. No, let be hurl'd
Upon thy works, by the detracting world,
What malice can suggest: let the rout say,
"The running sands, that, ere thou make a play,
Count the slow minutes, might a Godwin frame,
To swallow, when thou hast done, thy shipwreck'd
Let them the dear expense of oil upbraid, [name."
Suck'd by thy watchful lamp, " that hath betray'd
To theft the blood of martyr'd authors, spilt
Into thy ink, whilst thou grow'st pale with guilt."
Repine not at the taper's thrifty waste,
That sleeks thy terser poems; nor is haste
Praise, but excuse; and if thou overcome
A knotty writer, bring the booty home:
Nor think it theft if the rich spoils, so torn
From conquer'd authors, be as trophies worn.
Let others glut on the extorted praise

Of vulgar breath, trust thou to after days:
Thy labour'd works shall live, when Time devours
The abortive offspring of their hasty hours.
Thou art not of their rank; the quarrel lies
Within thine own verge: then let this suffice,
The wiser world doth greater thee confess
Than all men cise, than thyself only less.

FF2

PROCEED in thy brave rage, Which hath rais'd up our stage

Unto that height, as Rome in all her state,
Or Greece might emulate;

Whose greatest senators did silent sit,
Hear and applaud the wit,
Which those more temperate times,
Used when it tax'd their crimes:
Socrates stood, and heard with true delight,
All that the sharp Athenian Muse could write

Against his supposed fault;

And did digest the salt

That from that full vein did so freely flow:
And though that we do know

The Graces jointly strove to make that breast
A temple for their rest,

We must not make thee less

Than Aristophanes :

He got the start of thee in time and place,
But thou hast gain'd the goal in art and grace.

But if thou make thy feasts
For the high-relish'd guests,

And that a cloud of shadows shall break in,
It were almost a sin

To think that thou shouldst equally delight
Each several appetite;
Though Art and Nature strive
Thy banquets to contrive :

Thou art our whole Menander, and dost look
Like the old Greek; think, then, but on his Cook.

If thou thy full cups bring

Out of the Muses' spring,

And there are sonie foul mouths had rather drink

Out of the common sink;

Till the swoln humour burst.

What the best Poet sung of the best King.

Enter Master PROBEE and Master DAMPLAY, met by a Boy of the house.

Boy. What do you lack, gentlemen, what is't you lack any fine fancies, figures, humours, characters, ideas, definitions of lords and ladies ? Waiting-women, parasites, knights, captains, courtiers, lawyers ? what do you lack ?

Pro. A pretty prompt boy for the poetic shop! Dam. And a bold! Where's one of your masters, sirrah, the poet ?

Boy. Which of them, sir ? we have divers that drive that trade, now; poets, poetaccios, poetasters, poetitos

Dam. And all haberdashers of small wit, I presume; we would speak with the poet of the day, boy.

Boy. Sir, he is not here. But I have the dominion of the shop, for this time, under him, and can shew you all the variety the stage will afford for the present.

Pro. Therein you will express your own good parts, boy.

Dam. And tie us two to you for the gentle office. Pro. We are a pair of public persons (this gentleman and myself) that are sent thus coupled unto you, upon state-business.

Boy. It concerns but the state of the stage, I hope. Dam. O, you shall know that by degrees, boy. No man leaps into a business of state, without fording first the state of the business.

Pro. We are sent unto you, indeed, from the people.

Boy. The people which side of the people? Dam. The venison side, if you know it, boy. Boy. That's the left side. I had rather they had been the right.

Pro. So they are. Not the faces, or grounds of your people, that sit in the oblique caves and

:

wedges of your house, your sinful siapenny mechanics

Dam. But the better and braver sort of your people, plush and velvet outsides! that stick your house round like so many eminences

Boy. Of clothes, not understandings! they are at pawn. Well, I take these as a part of your people though; what bring you to me from these people?

Dam. You have heard, boy, the ancient poets had it in their purpose, still to please this people. Pro. Ay, their chief aim was

Dam. Populo ut placerent: if he understands, so much.

Boy. Quas fecissent fabulas.-I understand that since I learn'd Terence, in the third form at Westminster: go on, sir.

Pro. Now, these people have employed us to you, in all their names, to entreat an excellent play from you.

Dam. For they have had very mean ones from this shop of late, the stage as you call it.

Boy. Troth, gentlemen, I have no wares which I dare thrust upon the people with praise. But this, such as it is, I will venture with your people, your gay gallant people: so as you, again, will undertake for them, that they shall know a good play when they hear it; and will have the conscience and ingenuity beside to confess it.

Pro. We'll pass our words for that; you shall have a brace of us to engage ourselves.

Boy. You'll tender your names, gentlemen, to our book then?

Dam. Yes; here's master Probee, a man of most powerful speech. and parts to persuade.

Pro. And master Damplay will make good all he undertakes.