Prologue To The University Of Oxford, 1674.

SPOKEN BY MR HART.


    Poets, your subjects have their parts assign'd
    To unbend, and to divert their sovereign's mind:
    When tired with following nature, you think fit
    To seek repose in the cool shades of wit,
    And, from the sweet retreat, with joy survey
    What rests, and what is conquer'd, of the way.
    Here, free yourselves from envy, care, and strife
    You view the various turns of human life:
    Safe in our scene, through 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 you set,
    As once the sphere^[1] of crystal show'd the great.
    Blest, sure, are you above all mortal kind,
    If to your fortunes you can suit your mind:
    Content to see, and shun, those ills we show,
    And crimes on theatres alone to know.
    With joy we bring what our dead authors writ,
    And beg from you the value of their wit:
    That Shakspeare's, Fletcher's, and great Jonson's claim,
    May be renew'd from those who gave them fame.
    None of our living poets dare appear;
    For Muses so severe are worshipp'd here,
    That, conscious of their faults, they shun the eye,
    And, as profane, from sacred places fly,
    Rather than see the offended God, and die.
    We bring no imperfections but our own;
    Such faults as made are by the makers shown:
    And you have been so kind, that we may boast,
    The greatest judges still can pardon most.
    Poets must stoop, when they would please our pit,
    Debased even to the level of their wit;
    Disdaining that, which yet they know will take,
    Hating themselves what their applause must make.
    But when to praise from you they would aspire,
    Though they like eagles mount, your Jove is higher.
    So far your knowledge all their power transcends,
    As what should be beyond what is extends.

John Dryden

John Dryden was an influential English poet, literary critic, translator, and playwright who was made England’s first Poet Laureate in 1668. His work dominated the literary life of Restoration England and he is seen as a major figure in the literary history of the period. Dryden's notable works include the satirical poem 'Absalom and Achitophel' and the mock-heroic 'Mac Flecknoe.'

John Dryden

Prologue To Sir Martin Marr-All.

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Song. Farewell, Fair Armida.

John Dryden, Simple Poetry

Prologue To "Aurengzebe."

John Dryden, Simple Poetry

To The Duchess Of York, On Her Return From Scotland In The Year 1682.

John Dryden, Simple Poetry

English

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Prologue To The University Of Oxford.

    Though actors cannot much of learning boast,
    Of all who want it, we admire it most:
    We love the praises of a learned pit,
    As we remotely are allied to wit.
    We speak our poet's wit, and trade in ore,
    Like those who touch upon the golden shore:
    Betwixt our judges can destinction make,
    Discern how much, and why, our poems take:
    Mark if the fools, or men of sense, rejoice;
    Whether the applause be only sound or voice.
    When our fop gallants, or our city folly,
    Clap over-loud, it makes us melancholy:
    We doubt that scene which does their wonder raise,
    And, for their ignorance, contemn their praise.
    Judge then, if we who act, and they who write,
    Should not be proud of giving you delight.
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Prologue To The University Of Oxford, Spoken By Mr Hart, At The Acting Of "The Silent Woman."

    What Greece, when learning flourish'd, only knew,
    Athenian judges, you this day renew;
    Here too are annual rites to Pallas done,
    And here poetic prizes lost or won.
    Methinks I see you, crown'd with olives, sit,
    And strike a sacred horror from the pit.
    A day of doom is this of your decree,
    Where even the best are but by mercy free:
    A day, which none but Jonson durst have wish'd to see.
    Here they, who long have known the useful stage,
    Come to be taught themselves to teach the age.
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    To cultivate the virtue which you sow;
    In your Lycaeum first themselves refined,
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Prologue[1] To The University Of Oxford, 1681.

    The famed Italian Muse, whose rhymes advance
    Orlando and the Paladins of France,
    Records, that, when our wit and sense is flown,
    'Tis lodged within the circle of the moon,
    In earthen jars, which one, who thither soar'd,
    Set to his nose, snuff'd up, and was restored.
    Whate'er the story be, the moral's true;
    The wit we lost in town, we find in you.
    Our poets their fled parts may draw from hence,
    And fill their windy heads with sober sense.
    When London votes with Southwark's disagree,
    Here may they find their long-lost loyalty.
    Here busy senates, to the old cause inclined,
    May snuff the votes their fellows left behind:
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    May come, and find their last pro...

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Epilogue, Spoken By The Same.

(Prologue To The University Of Oxford, Spoken By Mr Hart, At The Acting Of "The Silent Woman.")


    No poor Dutch peasant, wing'd with all his fear,
    Flies with more haste, when the French arms draw near,
    Than we with our poetic train come down,
    For refuge hither, from the infected town:
    Heaven, for our sins, this summer has thought fit
    To visit us with all the plagues of wit.
    A French troop first swept all things in its way;
    But those hot Monsieurs were too quick to stay:
    Yet, to our cost, in that short time, we find
    They left their itch of novelty behind.
    The Italian Merry-Andrews took their place,
    And quite debauch'd the stage with lewd grimace:
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    Was there to see tw...

John Dryden

Prologue To The University Of Oxford.

    Discord and plots, which have undone our age,
    With the same ruin have o'erwhelm'd the stage.
    Our house has suffer'd in the common woe,
    We have been troubled with Scotch rebels too.
    Our brethren are from Thames to Tweed departed,
    And of our sisters, all the kinder-hearted,
    To Edinburgh gone, or coach'd, or carted.
    With bonny bluecap there they act all night
    For Scotch half-crown, in English three-pence hight.
    One nymph, to whom fat Sir John Falstaff's lean,
    There with her single person fills the scene.
    Another, with long use and age decay'd,
    Dived here old woman, and rose there a maid.
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To My Dear Friend Mr Congreve, On His Comedy Called "The Double-Dealer."

    Well, then, the promised hour is come at last,
    The present age of wit obscures the past:
    Strong were our sires, and as they fought they writ,
    Conquering with force of arms, and dint of wit:
    Theirs was the giant race, before the flood;
    And thus, when Charles return'd, our empire stood.
    Like Janus he the stubborn soil manured,
    With rules of husbandry the rankness cured;
    Tamed us to manners, when the stage was rude;
    And boisterous English wit with art endued.
    Our age was cultivated thus at length;
    But what we gain'd in skill we lost in strength.
    Our builders were with want of genius cursed;
    The second temple was not like the first:
    Till you, the best Vitruvius, come at length;
    Our beauties equal, but exce...

John Dryden