PROLOGUE TO THE JEALOUS WIFE, SPOKEN BY MR. GARRICK. THE JEALOUS WIFE! a Comedy! poor man! scene, A king the husband, and the wife a queen! Then might Distraction rend her graceful hair, See sightless forms, and scream, and gape, and stare. Drawcansir Death had rag'd without controul, Here the drawn dagger, there the poison'd bowl. What eyes had stream'd at all the whining woe! What hands had thunder'd at each Hah! and Oh! But peace! the gentle prologue custom sends, Like drum and serjeant, to beat up for friends. At vice and folly, each a lawful game, Our author flies, but with no partial aim. If in his scenes an honest skill is shewn, And borrowing, little, much appears his own; If what a master's happy pencil drew He brings more forward, in dramatic view; To your decision he submits his cause, Secure of candour, anxious for applause. But if, all rude, his artless scenes deface The simple beauties which he meant to grace: If, an invader upon others' land, He spoil and plunder with a robber's hand, And give to Blockheads past one Blockhead more. PROLOGUE INTENDED TO HAVE BEEN SPOKEN AT DRURY-LANE THEATRE, ON HIS MAJESTY'S BIRTH-DAY, 1761. GENIUS, neglected, mourns his wither'd bays; And Nature spoke from her own Shakespeare's tongue. Her patriot smiles fell, like refreshing dews, To wake to life each pleasing useful Muse, While every virtue which the Queen profess'd, Beam'd on her subjects, but to make them blest. O glorious times!—O theme of praise divine! -Be happy, Briton, then-such times are thine Behold e'en now strong science imps her wing, And arts revive beneath a Patriot King. The Muses too burst forth with double light, To shed their lustre in a Monarch's sight. His cheering smiles alike to all extendPerhaps this spot may boast a Royal Friend. And when a Prince, with early judgment grac'd, Himself shall marshal out the way to taste, Caught with the flame perhaps e'en here may rise Some powerful genius of uncommou size; And, pleas'd with nature, nature's depths explore, And be what our great Shakespeare was before. PRINTED BY P. GEDGE, ODLE DOMININA ALLUME EIAN |