vail and expences? Is this the scope and aim of thy ftudies? Are thefe the hopeful courfes, wherewith I have fo long flattered my expectation from thee? Verfes? Poetry? Ovid, whom I thought to fee the pleader, become Ovid the play-maker ?

Ovid ju. No, fir.

Ovid fe. Yes, fir; I hear of a tragedy of yours coming forth for the common players there, call'd Medea. By my houfhold-gods, if I come to the acting of it, I'll add one tragic part more than is yet expected to it ; believe me when I promise it. What? fhall I have my fon a stager now? an enghle for playcrs? a gull? a rook? a fhot-clog? to make fuppers, and be laugh'd at? Publius, I will fet thee on the funeral pile first.

Ovid ju. Sir, I beseech you to have patience.

Lup. Indeed, Marcus Ovid, thefe players are an idle generation, and do much harm in a state, corrupt young gentry very much, I know it: I have not been a tribune thus long and obferv'd nothing; befides, they will rob us, us, that are magiftrates, of our respect, bring us upon their stages, and make us ridiculous

culous to the plebeians; they will play you or me, the wifeft men they can come by ftill, only to bring us in contempt with the vulgar, and make us cheap.

Tuc. Th'art in the right, my venerable cropshin, they will indeed, the tongue of the oracle never twang'd truer. Your courtier cannot kifs his miftrefs's flippers in quiet for 'em; nor your white innocent gallant pawn his revelling fuit to make his punk a fupper. An honeft decay'd commander cannot skelder, cheat, nor be seen in a bawdy-house, but he shall be strait in one of their wormwood comedies. They are grown licentious, the rogues; libertines, flat libertines. They forget they are i' the ftatute, the rascals; they are blazon'd there; there they are trick'd, they and their pedigrees; they need no other heralds, I wifs.

Ovid fe. Methinks, if nothing elfe, yet this alone, the very reading of the public edicts, should fright thee from commerce with them, and give thee distaste enough of their actions. But this betrays what a

student you are, this argues your proficiency in the

Law.

Ovid ju. They wrong me, fir, and do abuse you

more,

That blow your ears with these untrue reports.

I am not known unto the open ftage,

Nor do I traffick in their theatres.

Indeed, I do acknowledge, at request

Of fome meer friends, and honourable Romans,

I have begun a poem of that nature.

Ovid fe. You have, fir, a poem ? and where is't? That's the Law you study.

Ovid ju. Cornelius Gallus borrowed it to read.

Ovid. fe. Cornelius Gallus; There's another gallant too hath drunk of the fame poison, and Tibullus and Propertius. But these are gentlemen of means and revenues now. Thou art a younger brother, and hast nothing but thy bare exhibition; which I protest shall be bare indeed, if thou forfake not these unprofitable by-courses, and that timely too. Name me a profest poet, that his poetry did ever afford him fo much as a competency. I, your god of poets there (whom all of

you

you admire and reverence fo much) Homer, he whole worm-eaten statue must not be spewed against, but with hallow'd lips and groveling adoration, what was he? what was he?

Tuc. Marry, I'll tell thee, old fwaggerer; he was a poor, blind, rhyming rascal, that liv'd obfcurely up and down in booths and tap-houses, and scarce ever made a good meal in his fleep, the whorefon hungry beggar.

Ovid fe. He fays well: Nay, I know this nettles you now; but answer me, is't not true? You'll tell me his name shall live; and that (now being dead) his works have eternis'd him, and made him divine; but could this divinity feed him while he liv'd? could his name feaft him?

Tuc. Or purchase him a senator's revenue? could it? Ovid fe. I, or give him place in the commonwealth? worship, or attendants? make him be carried in his litter?

Tuc. Thou speakest sentences, old Bias.

Lup. All this the Law will do, young fir, if you'll

follow it.

Ovid fe. If he be mine, he shall follow and obferve what I will apt him to, or I profess here openly and utterly to disclaim him.

Ovid ju. Sir, let me crave you will forego thefe

moods:

I will be any thing, or ftudy any thing;

I'll prove the unfashion'd body of the Law
Pure elegance, and make her rugged'ft ftrains
Run fmoothly as Propertius' elegies.

Ovid fe. Propertius' elegies? good!

Lup. Nay, you take him too quickly, Marcus. Ovid fe. Why, he cannot speak, he cannot think out of poetry; he is bewitch'd with it.

Lup. Come, do not mif-prise him.

Ovid fe. Mif-prize? I marry, I would have him use fome fuch words now; they have some touch, fome tafte of the Law. He fhould make himself a stile out of these, and let his Propertius' elegies go by.

Lup. Indeed, young Publius, he that will now hit the mark, must shoot through the Law; we have no other planet reigns, and in that sphere you may fit and fing with angels. Why, the Law makes a man happy,

without