averr, That no man yet the Sun e'er fhone upon, has parts fufficient to furnish out a Stage, except it be with the help of these my Rules.1

JOHNS. What are thofe Rules, I pray?

BAYES. Why, Sir, my first Rule is the Rule of Tranfverfion,2 or Regula Duplex: changing Verse into Profe, or Profe into verse, alternative as you please.

SMI. How's that, Sir, by a Rule, I pray?

BAYES. Why, thus, Sir; nothing more easie when understood: I take a Book in my hand, either at home, or elsewhere, for that's all one, if there be any Wit in't, as there is no Book but has fome, I Tranfverse it; that is, if it be Profe, put it into Verse, (but that takes up foine time) if it be Verse, put it into Profe.

JOHNS. Methinks, Mr. Bayes, that putting Verse into Profe should be call'd Transprosing.

BAYES. By my troth, a very good Notion, and hereafter it fhall be fo.

SMI. Well, Sir, and what d'ye do with it then? BAYES. Make it my own. 'Tis fo alter'd that no man can know it. My next Rule is the Rule of Record, and by way of Table-Book. Pray observe. JOHNS. Well, we hear you: go on.

BAYES. As thus. I come into a Coffee-house, or some other place where wittie men resort, I make as if I minded nothing; (do you mark ?) but as foon as any one speaks, pop I flap it down, and make that, too, my own.

JOHNS. But, Mr. Bayes, are not you sometimes in danger of their making you restore, by force, what you have gotten thus by Art?

BAYES. No, Sir; the world's unmindful: they never take notice of these things.

SMI. But pray, Mr. Bayes, among all your other Rules, have you no one Rule for Invention ?

BAYES. Yes, Sir; that's my third Rule that I have here in my pocket.

SMI. What Rule can that be?

Continued from page 26.

leave of him for that time, with an intent never to trouble him more, and without acquainting him with my business.

When next I saw the gentleman my friend, who recommended him to me, I told him how I was entertained by his cynical acquaintance. He laughed, but bid me not be discouraged; saying, that fit of railing would soon have been over, and when his just indignation had spent itself, you might have imparted your business to him, and received a more satisfactory account. However, said he, go to him again from me, take him to the Tavern, and mollify his asperity with a bottle; thwart not his discourse, but give him his own way; and I'll warrant you, he'll open his budget, and satisfy your expectation.

I followed my friend's directions, and found the event answerable to his prediction.

Not long after, I met him in Fleet Street, and carried him to the Old Devil; and ere we had emptied one bottle, I found him of a quite different humour from what I left him in the time before: he appeared in his discourse to be a very honest true Englishman, a hearty lover of his country, and the government thereof, both in church and state, a loyal subject to his sovereign, an enemy to popery and tyranny, idolatry and superstition, antimonarchical government and confusion, irreligion and enthusiasm. In short, I found him a person of a competent knowledge in the affair I went to him about, and one who understood the English Stage very well; and tho' somewhat positive, as I said before, yet I observed he always took care to have truth on his side, before he affirmed or denied anything with more than ordinary heat; and when he was so guarded, he was immoveable.

When I had discovered thus much, and called for the second bottle, I told him from whom I came, and the cause of my addressing to him. He desired my patience till he stept to his lodgings, which were near the tavern; and after a short space he returned, and brought with him the papers, which contain the following notes.

When he had read them to me, I liked them so well, that I desired the printing of them, provided they were genuine. He assured me they were, and told me farther:

That while this farce was composing and altering, he had frequent occasions of being with the author, of perusing his papers, and hearing him discourse of the several plays he exposed, and their authors; insomuch that few persons had the like opportunities of knowing his true meaning, as he himself had.

If any other persons had known the author's mind so exactly, in all the several particulars, 'tis more than probable they would have been made publick before now: but nothing of this nature having appeared these TWO AND THIRTY YEARS; (for so long has this farce flourished in print) we may reasonably and safely conclude, that there is no other such like copy in being; and that these remarks are genuine, and taken from the great Person's own mouth and papers.

I was very well satisfied with this account, and more desirous to print it than ever; only I told him, I thought it would be very advantageous to the sale of these Annotations, to have a Preface to them, under the Name of him, who was so well acquainted with the Author; but could not, by all the arguments I was master of, obtain his Consent, tho' we debated the point a pretty while.

He alledg'd for his excuse, that such an undertaking would be very improper for him, because he should be forced to name several persons, and some of great families, to whom he had been obliged; and he was very unwilling to offend any person of quality, or run the hazard of making such who are, or may be his friends, become his enemies; tho' he should only act the part of an historian, barely reciting the words he heard from our Author.

However, said he, if you think a preface of such absolute necessity, you may easily recollect matter enough from the discourse which hath passed be. tween us, on this subject, to enable yourself, or any other for you, to write one; especially if you consider there are but two topicks to be insisted on.

Continued at page 36.

BAYES. Why, Sir, when I have any thing to invent, I never trouble my head about it, as other men do; but presently turn o'er this Book, and there I have, at one view, all that Perfeus, Montaigne, Seneca's Tragedies, Horace, Juvenal, Claudian, Pliny, Plutarch's lives, and the reft, have ever thought, upon this fubject: and fo, in a trice, by leaving out a few words, or putting in others of my own, the business is done.

JOHNS. Indeed, Mr. Bayes, this is as fure, and compendious a way of Wit as ever I heard of.

BAYES. I, Sirs, when you come to write your felves, o' my word you'l find it fo. But, Gentlemen, if you make the least scruple of the efficacie of these my Rules, do but come to the Play-house, and you shalí judge of 'em by the effects.

SMI. We'l follow you, Sir.

Enter three Players upon the Stage.

1 Play. Have you your part perfect?

[Exeunt.

2 Flay. Yes, I have it without book; but I do not understand how it is to be spoken.

3 Play. And mine is such a one, as I can't ghefs for my life what humour I'm to be in: whether angry, melancholy, merry, or in love. I don't know what to make on't.

I [Play.] Phoo! the Author will be here presently, and he'l tell us all. You must know, this is the new way of writing; and these hard things please forty times better than the old plain way. For, look you, Sir, the grand design upon the Stage is to keep the Auditors in fufpence; for to ghefs presently at the plot, and the fence, tires 'em before the end of the first Act: now, here, every line furprises you, and brings in new matter. And, then, for Scenes, Cloaths and Dancing, we put 'em quite down, all that ever went before us and these are the things, you know, that are effential to a Play.

2 Play. Well, I am not of thy mind; but, so it gets us money, 'tis no great matter.

'The Part of Amaryllis was acted by Mrs. Ann Reeves, who, at that Time, was kept by Mr. Bayes. Key 1704.

The licentiousness of Dryden's plays admits of no palliation or defence. He wrote for a licentious stage in a profligate age, and supplied, much to his own disgrace, the kind of material the vicious taste of his audiences demanded. Nor will it serve his reputation to contrast his productions in this way with those of others. Shadwell alone transcended him in depravity. But there is some compensation for all his grossness in turning from his plays to his life, and marking the contrast. The morality of his life-the practical test of his heart and his understanding-was unimpeachable. The ingenuity of slander was exhausted in assailing his principles, and exposing his person to obloquy --but the morality of his life comes pure out of the furnace. The only hint of personal indiscretion ascribed to him is that of having eaten tarts with Mrs. Reeve, the actress, in the Mulberry garden, which, if true, amounts to nothing, but which, trivial as it is, must be regarded as apocryphal. To eat tarts with an actress did not necessarily involve any grave delinquency in a poet who was writing for the theatre; yet upon this slight foundation, for I have not been able to discover that it rests upon any other, a suspicion has been raised, that Mrs. Reeve was his mistress. By way, however, of mitigating the odium of this unwarrantable imputation, it is added, that after his marriage Dryden renounced all such associations. But his relations with Mrs. Reeve, if he ever had any, must have been formed after his marriage, as a reference to dates will show, so that the suppositious scandal, as it has been transmitted to us, conveys its own refutation.

R. BELL Life of Dryden, i. 91. Ed. 1854.

Two Kings of Brentford, fuppofed to be the two Brothers, the King and the Duke. [See note at p. 90.]

Key 1704

Enter BAYES, JOHNSON and SMITH.

BAYES. Come, come in, Gentlemen. welcome Mr.

1 Play. Yes, Sir.

Y'are very

a -Ha' you your Part ready?

BAYES. But do you understand the true humour of it? 1 Play. I, Sir, pretty well.

BAYES. And Amarillis, how does the do? Does not her Armor become her?

3 Play. O, admirably!

BAYES. I'l tell you, now, a pretty conceipt.

What

do you think I'l make 'em call her anon, in this Play? SMI. What, I pray?

BAYES. Why I'l make 'em call her Armarillis, because of her Armor: ha, ha, ha.

JOHNS. That will be very well, indeed.

BAYES, I, it's a pretty little rogue; fhe is my Miftrefs. I knew her face would set off Armor extreamly: and, to tell you true, I writ that Part only for her. Well, Gentlemen, I dare be bold to say, without vanity, I'l fhew you fomething, here, that's very ridiculous, I gad. [Exeunt Players JOHNS. Sir, that we do not doubt of. BAYES. Pray, Sir, let's fit down. Look you, Sir, the chief hindge of this Play, upon which the whole Plot moves and turns, and that causes the variety of all the several accidents, which, you know, are the thing in Nature that make up the grand refinement of a Play, is, that I suppose two Kings2 to be of the fame place: as, for example, at Brentford; for I love to write familiarly. Now the people having the same relations to 'em both, the fame affections, the fame duty, the fame obedience, and all that; are divided among themselves in point of devoir and intereft, how to behave themselves equally between 'em these Kings differing sometimes in particular; though, in the main, they agree. (I know not whether I make my felf well understood.)