You, who each day can theatres behold,
Like Nero's palace, fhining all with gold,
Our mean ungilded ftage will scorn, we fear,
And, for the homely room, disdain the chear.
Yet now cheap druggets to a mode are grown,
And a plain suit, since we can make but one,
Is better than to be by tarnish'd gawdry known.
They, who are by your favors wealthy made,
With mighty fums may carry on the trade:
We, broken bankers, half destroy'd by fire,
With our small stock to humble roofs retire;
Pity our lofs, while you their pomp admire.
For fame and honor we no longer strive,
We yield in both, and only beg to live:
Unable to fupport their vast expence,
Who build and treat with fuch magnificence;
That, like th'ambitious monarchs of the age,
They give the law to our provincial stage.
Great neighbors enviously promote excess,
While they impose their splendor on the less.
But only fools, and they of vaft eftate,
Th'extremity of modes will imitate,
The dangling knee-fringe, and the bib-cravat.
Yet if fome pride with want may be allow'd,
We in our plainnefs may be justly proud:
Our royal master will'd it fhould be fo;
Whate'er he's pleas'd to own, can need no fhow:
That facred name gives ornament and grace,
And, like his ftamp, makes basest metals pass...
Twere folly now a stately pile to raise,
To build a playhoufe while you throw down plays,
While scenes, machines, and empty operas reign.
And for the pencil you the pen disdain:
While troops of famifh'd Frenchmen hither drive,
And laugh at those upon whose alms they live:
Old English authors vanish, and give place
To these new conqu'rors of the Norman race.
More tamely than your fathers you fubmit,
You're now grown vaffals to them in your wit.
Mark, when they play, how our fine fops advance,
The mighty merits of their men of France,
Keep time, cry Bon, and humor the cadence.
Well, please yourselves; but fure 'tis understood,
That French machines have ne'er done England
good.
I would not prophefy our house's fate :
But while vain fhows and fcenes you over-rate, 'Tis to be fear'd
That as a fire the former house o'erthrew,
Machines and tempefts will deftroy the new.
HO what our Prologue faid was fadly true,
Yet, gentlemen, our homely house is new,
A charm that feldom fails with, wicked, you.
A country lip may have the velvet touch;
Tho she's no lady, you may think her fuch :
A ftrong imagination may do much.
But you, loud firs, who thro your curls look big,
Critics in plume and white vallancy wig,
Who lolling on our foremost benches fit,
And still charge firft, the true forlorn of wit;
Whofe favors, like the fun, warm where you roll,
Yet you, like him, have neither heat nor foul;
So may your hats your foretops never press,
Untouch'd your ribbons, facred be
your drefs;
So may you flowly to old age advance,
And have th' excufe of youth for ignorance:
So may fop-corner full of noife remain,
And drive far off the dull attentive train;
So may your midnight fcowrings happy prove,
And morning batt'ries force your way to love;
So may not France your warlike hands recal,
But leave you by each other's fwords to fall:
As you come here to ruffle vizard punk,
When fober, rail, and roar when you are drunk.
But to the wits we can fome merit plead,
And
urge what by themselves has oft been said:
Our house relieves the ladies from the frights
Of ill-pav'd streets, and long dark winter nights;
The Flanders horfes from a cold bleak road,
Where bears in furs dare scarcely look abroad ;
The audience from worn plays and fustian stuff,
Of rhime, more naufeous than three boys in buff.
Tho in their house the poets heads appear,
We hope we may prefume their wits are here.
The best which they referv'd they now will play,
For, like kind cuckolds, tho w' have not the way
To please, we'll find you abler men who may.
If they should fail, for last recruits we breed
A troop of frifking Monfieurs to fucceed:
You know the French fure cards at time of need.
UNIVERSITY of OXFORD, 1674.
SPOKEN by Mr. HART.
POETS, your fubjects, have their parts affign'd
T'unbend, and to divert their fov'reign's mind:
When tir'd with following nature, you think fit
To seek repose in the cool fhades of wit,
And, from the sweet retreat, with joy furvey
What refts, and what is conquer'd, of the way.
Here, free yourselves from envy, care, and ftrife,
You view the various turns of human life:
Safe in our scene, thro dangerous courts you go,
And, undebauch'd, the vice of cities know.
Your theories are here to practice brought,
As in mechanic operations wrought;
And man, the little world, before
As once the sphere of chryftal fhew'd the great. Bleft fure are you above all mortal kind,
Content to fee, and fhun, thofe ills we fhow,
And crimes on theatres alone to know.
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