EPILOLOGUE

TO THE

HUSBAND HIS OWN CUCKOLD.

L

IKE fome raw fophifter that mounts the pulpit,

So trembles a young Poet at a full pit. Unus'd to crowds, the Parfon quakes for fear, And wonders how the devil he durft come there; Wanting three talents needful for the place, Some beard, fome learning, and some little grace; Nor is the puny Poet void of care;

For authors, fuch as our new authors are,

Have not much learning, nor much wit to spare: And as for grace, to tell the truth, there's scarce

one,

But has as little as the very Parfon :

Both fay, they preach and write for your inftruc

tion:

But 'tis for a third day, and for induction.
The difference is, that tho you like the play,
The Poet's gain is ne'er beyond his day.

But with the Parfon 'tis another cafe,

He, without holiness, may

rife to grace i

The Poet has one difadvantage more,

That if his play be dull, he's damn'd all o'er, Not only a damn'd blockhead, but damn'd poor, But dulness well becomes the fable garment; I warrant that ne'er spoil'd a Priest's preferment : Wit's not his business, and as wit now goes, Sirs, 'tis not fo much yours as you fuppofe, For you like nothing now but naufeous beaux. You laugh not, gallants, as by proof appears, At what his beauship says, but what he wears; So 'tis your eyes are tickled, not your ears; The taylor and the furrier find the stuff, The wit lies in the dress, and monstrous muff. The truth on't is, the payment of the pit Is like for likę, clipt money for clipt wit. You cannot from our absent author hope He should equip the stage with fuch, a fop: Fools change in England, and new fools arife, For tho' the immortal fpecies never dies, Yet ev'ry year, new maggots make new flies. But where he lives abroad, he fcarce can find. One fool, for million that he left behind.

PROLOGUE

TO THE

PILGRI

M.

Revived for our Author's Benefit Anno 1700.

HOW

WOW wretched is the fate of those who write!
Brought muzzled to the ftage, for fear
they bite.

Where, like Tom Dove, they stand the common

foe;

Lugg'd by the critic, baited by the beau.
Yet worse, their brother Poets damn the play,
And roar the loudeft, tho they never pay.
The fops are proud of scandal, for they cry,
At every lewd, low character,----That's I.
He, who writes letters to himself, would swear,
The world forgot him, if he was not there.
What should a Poet do? "Tis hard for one

To pleasure all the fools that wou'd be shown:
And yet not two in ten will pass the town.
Most coxcombs are not of the laughing kind;
More goes to make a fop, than fops can find.

}

Quack Marus, tho he never took degrees
In either of our universities;

Yet to be shown by fome kind wit he looks,
Because he play'd the fool and writ three books.
But, if he wou'd be worth a Poet's
pen,
He must be more a fool, and write again :
For all the former fuftian stuff he wrote,
Was dead-born doggrel, or is quite forgot;
His man of Uz, ftript of his Hebrew robe,
Is just the proverb, and As poor as Job.
One wou'd have thought he cou'd no longer jog;
But Arthur was a level, Job's a bog.

There, tho he crept, yet still he kept in fight;
But here, he founders in, and finks down right,
Had he prepar'd us, and been dull by rule,
Tobit had first been turn'd to ridicule :
But our bold Briton, without fear or awe,
O'er-leaps at once the whole Apocrypha ;
Invades the Pfalms with rhymes, and leaves no

room

For any Vandal Hopkins yet to come.

But when, if after all, this godly geer
Is not fo fenfelefs as it wou'd appear;
Our mountebank has laid a deeper train,
His cant, like Merry Andrew's noble vein,
Cat-calls the fects to draw 'em in again.

}

At leisure hours, in epic fong he deals,
Writes to the rumbling of his coach's wheels,
Prescribes in hafte, and seldom kills by rule,
But rides triumphant between ftool and stool.
Well, let him go; 'tis yet too early day,
To get himself a place in farce or play.
We know not by what name we should arraign him,
For no one category can contain him ;

A pedant, canting preacher, and a quack,
Are load enough to break one afs's back:
At laft grown wanton, he prefum'd to write,
Traduc'd two kings, their kindness to requite;
One made the doctor, and one dubb'd the knight.

EPILOGUE

TO THE

PIL GRI M.

PE

fretch'd a

Erhaps the parfon stretch'd a point too far,
When with our Theatres he wag'd a war.
that this
you,

He tells

very

moral age

Receiv'd the first infection from the stage.