 | Poems on Several Occasions |  |
On our Modern COMEDIES.
Shakespeare and Johnson, with the learned corpsOf poets, much admir'd in days of yore,
From Nature drew their characters like fools;
Our modern Play-wrights follow wiser rules:
Pictures from life they scorn to let you see;
Not Nature—but what Nature ought to be;
Your low-liv'd humour, wit, and such poor stuff,
In times of ignorance did well enough:—
In this refin'd, this novel-reading age,
They've banish'd all such nonsense from the stage;
No wonder Play-wrights swarm in those blest days,
Sermons, they find, are easier made than Plays.
| Poems on Several Occasions | |