Note 119 — AN ESSAY OF DRAMATIC POESY.
Reading edition
Dorset gave an instance of the honour in which he held Ben Jonson, by an excellent epilogue, upon the reviving of "Every Man in his Humour." When the speaker of the epilogue has proceeded a good way in the usual style of rallying the piece and author, he is interrupted by
Jonson's Ghost.
Hold, and give way, for I myself will speak: Can you encourage so much insolence, And add new faults still to the great offence Your ancestors so rashly did commit, Against the mighty powers of art and wit, When they condemned those noble works of mine, Sejanus, and my best loved Catiline? Repent, or on your guilty heads shall fall The curse of many a rhyming pastoral. The three bold Beauchamps shall revive again, And with the London-Prentice conquer Spain. All the dull follies of the former age Shall find applause on this corrupted stage. But if you pay the great arrears of praise, So long since due to my much injured plays, From all past crimes I first will set you free, And then inspire some one to write like me.