295. p. [The "Good-Natured Man" was first performed at Covent Garden Theatre on the 29th of January 1768, Goldsmith seems to have taken the hint of the character from whom the play is named from the lover of the unfortunate Miss Braddock, in his own Life of Beau Nash, see vol. iii. "Dr. Johnson," says Boswell," pronounced it to be the best comedy that had appeared since 'The Provoked Husband,' and declared that there had not been of late any such character exhibited on the stage as that of Croaker. I observed, it was the Suspirius of his Rambler. He said Goldsmith had owned he had borrowed it from thence."-See Life, ch. xvii.] PREFACE. WHEN I undertook to write a comedy, I confess I was strongly prepossessed in favour of the poets of the last age, and strove to imitate them. The term, genteel comedy, was then unknown amongst us, and little more was desired by an audience, than nature and humour, in whatever walks of life they were most conspicuous. The author of the following scenes never imagined that more would be expected of him, and therefore to delineate character has been his principal aim. Those who know any thing of composition, are sensible that, in pursuing humour, it will sometimes lead us into the recesses of the mean: I was even tempted to look for it in the master of a spunging-house; but in deference to the public taste, grown of late, perhaps, too delicate, the scene of the bailiffs was retrenched in the representation. (1) In deference also to the judgment of a few friends, who think in a particular way, the scene is here restored. The author submits it to the reader in his closet; and hopes that too much refinement will not banish humour and character from ours, as it has already done from the French theatre. Indeed, the French comedy is now become so very elevated and sentimental, that it has not only banished humour and (!) [The taste of the town had become sentimental, and the scene of the bailiffs in the opening of the third act appeared so broad in its humour, as to keep the fate of the piece some time in suspense; nor was its safety fully secured till the scene of the fourth act, where Shuter, in the character of Croaker, read the supposed incendiary letter.] |