University of Virginia Library

PROLOGUE, WRITTEN BY CHARLES PHILLIPS, ESQ. SPOKEN BY MR. EGERTON.

When erst in Eden's solitary bowers,
The primal Man beheld his world of flowers,
Eternal sunshine tinged the glorious sky,
Alternate beauties wooed his wandering eye;
While infant Love, waving its odorous wing,
Woke the wild spirit of the breathing Spring.
Yet still through Paradise he restless strayed,
Its bower was songless, and its sun was shade;
E'en as the Bard of Albany has sung,
In strains that live for age, and yet are young,
Creation bloom'd, a decorated wild,—
It was not Paradise—till Woman smiled.
Fair on his view the Paragon arose,
Source of his bliss, and solace of his woes.
By bounteous Heaven ordain'd to sooth his fall,
And sole survive, a recompense for all.
Who has not felt her chaste and charmed power
Beguile his sad, and raise his raptur'd hour?
If such there be—Oh! let him bend his sight
Far from the hallowed vision of to-night.
To-night, our Bard, in lovely woman's cause,
Alone from manly bosoms asks applause;
From British bosoms asks, without a fear,
Assured that such a cause is sacred here.
And you, ye fair, see young Evadne prove
Her vestal honour, and her plighted love;
See her, the light and joy of every eye,
Veil all her charms in spotless chastity;
And, 'mid the fires and phantasies of youth,
Turn strong temptations to the cause of truth!
Oh! may each maid Evadne's virtue share,
With heart as faithful though with form less fair.
You, too, who hope ambition's height to climb,
Toiling to fortune through the maze of crime,
Behold, as in the daring “fool of Crete.”
Of such design, the lesson, and the fate:
Behold the wing that lifts it to the skies
Melt in the sun to which it sought to rise.
Such is the strain by which the moral bard
Seeks from a moral people his reward:
Seeks in simplicity, without one aid
From scenic pomp, or pasteboard cavalcade.
Britons, be just, and as our “Statue” stands,
Like Memnon's image from its master's hands,
With one bright ray illume the sculptured toil,
And bid it breathe—the creature of your smile.