THE BRITISH THEATRE. WRITTEN IN 1775.

When first was rear’d the British Stage, Rude was the scene and weak the lay; The Bard explored the sacred Page, And holy Mystery form’d his Play. Th’ affections of the mortal breast In simple Moral next he sung, Each Vice[17] in human shape he drest, And to each Virtue[17] gave a tongue. Then ’gan the Comic Muse unfold In coarser jests her homely art: Of Gammer Gurton’s[18] loss she told, And laugh’d at Hodge’s awkward smart. Come from thy wildly-winding stream, First-born of Genius, Shakspeare, come! The listening World attends thy theme, And bids each elder Bard[19] be dumb: For thou, within the human Mind Fix’d, as on thy peculiar throne, Sitt’st like a Deity inshrined; And either Muse is all thine own! Yet shall not Time’s rough hand destroy The scenes by learned Jonson writ; Nor shall Oblivion e’er enjoy The charms of Fletcher’s courtly wit: And still in matchless beauty live The numbers of that Lyric Strain Sung gayly to the Star of Eve By Comus and his jovial Train. Here sunk the Stage:—and dire alarms The Muse’s voice did overwhelm; For wounded Freedom call’d to arms, And Discord shook the embattled Realm. But Peace return’d; and with her came (Alas! how changed!) the tuneful Pair: Thalia’s eye should blench with shame, And her sad Sister weep to hear How the mask’d[20] Fair, in Charles’s reign, Her lewd and riotous Fancy fed At Killigrew’s debauchful scene, While hapless Otway pined for Bread. Thus the sweet Lark shall sing unheard, And Philomel sit silent by; While every vile and chattering bird Torments the grove with ribald cry. And see what witless Bards presume With buskin’d fools to rhyme and rage; While Mason’s idle Muse is dumb, And weary Garrick quits the Stage.