 | The Andrian Woman |  |
The Prologue.
Ovr Poet first setting his mind to write,Deemd this the sole maine charge vpon him laid,
To please the people with the playes he made:
For, that he cannot (Prologue wise) now lay
The argument of this his play aright,
Is causd by an old rank'rous Poets spite;
Who driues him to cleare faultes, leaue the meant way.
Now pray obserue their cauellings: those playes
Andria and Perinthia, which Menander wrote,
(Know one, know both) not much vnlike in plot,
Are different yet both in their stile and phrase.
He not denies that from Perinthia
Those things which seemd conuenient in the same,
He (as his owne) hath drawne into the frame,
And course of this presented Andria.
This is the thing they challenge: and they braule
That in such sort a cleanely Comedie
Should not be hotch-potchd. These men verily
While much they seeme, shew they know nought at all:
Who him accusing draw his presidents
Næuius, Plautus, Ennius, in like crime;
To whose mistakings he would rather climbe,
Then follow these mens obscure diligence.
I further wish'hem hencefoorth keepe'hem still;
And cease with euill language him to sting;
Lest their ill doing in their eares do ring.
Spectators kind, of you we craue good will;
In silence shewne and kinde attention;
That without preiudice our play y'ould heare:
Thence you may fully know, if it rest cleare,
That all our future purposd action
Of new made playes be to be banisht quite;
Without aduentring your hereafter sight:
| The Andrian Woman | |