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Jer. Sir, you're a Gentleman, and probably un derstand this fine Feeding: but, if you please, I had rather been at Board-Wages. Does your Epictetus, or your Seneca here, or any of these poor rich Rogues, teach you how to pay your debts without money? Will they shut up the mouths of your Creditors? Will Plato be Bail for you? Or Diogenes, because he understands Confinement, and liv'd in a Tub, go to Prison for you? 'Slife, Sir, what do you mean, to mew yourself up here with three or four mufty Books, in Commendation of Starving and Poverty?

Val. Why, Sirrah, I have no money, you know it; and therefore refolve to rail at all that havel, and in that I but follow the examples of the wifeft and wittiest Philosophers, whom you naturally hate, for just fuch another reafon, because they abound in Sense, and you are a Fool.

Jer. Ay, Sir, I am a Fool, I know it; and yet, Heav'n help ine, I'm poor enough to be a Wit. But I was always a Fool, when I told you, what your Expences would bring you to; your coaches and your liveries; your Treats and your Balls; your being in love with a Lady, that did not care a Farthing for you in your Profperity; and keeping company with Wits, that car'd for nothing but your Profperity; and now when you are poor, hate you as much as they do one another.

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Val. Well; and now I am poor, I have an onportunity to be reveng'd on them all; I'll purfue An-i gelica with more love than ever, and appear more notoriously, her Admirer in this Restraint, than when I openly rival'd the rich Fops, that made Court to her; fo fhall my Poverty be a Mortification to her Pride,! and perhaps make her compailienate the Love, which

has

has principally reduc'd me to this Lownels of Fortune. And for the Wits, l'in fure I am in a Condition to be even with them

Jer. Nay, your Condition is pretty even with theirs; that's the truth on't.

Val. I'll take fome of their Trade out of their hands.

Jer. Now Heav'n of Mercy continue the Tax apon Paper; you don't mind to write!

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Val. Yes, I do; I'll write a Play. Jer. Hem! Sir, if you please to give me à mall Certificate of three lines only to certify those whom it may concern; that the Bearer hereof, Jeremy Fetch by Name, has for the pace of seven years truly and faithfully ferved Valentine Legend Efq; and that he is not now turn'd away for Mifdemeanour; but does voluntarily difmifs his Mafter from any future Authority over him

Val. No, Sirrah, you shall live with me still.

Jer. Sir, it's impossible I may die with you, flarve with you, or be damn'd with your works: but to live, even three days, the Life of a Play, I no more expect it, than to be canoniz'd for a Muse, after my decease.

Val. You are witty, you Rogue, I fhall want your help I'll have you learn to make Couplets, to tag the ends of Acts. D'ye hear, get the Maids to Crambo in an Evening, and learn the knack of Rhiné ing; you may arrive at the height of a Song, fent by an unknown Hand, or the Chocolate-Houfe Lampoon.

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Jer. But, Sir, is this the way to recover your Father's favour? Why Sir Samfon will be irreconciHable. If your younger brother fhou'd come from the

Sear

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Sea, he'd never look upon you again. You're undone, Sirf you're ruin'd; you won't have a Friend left in the World, if you turn Poet. Ah Pox confound that Will's Coffee-Houfe, it has ruin'd more young Men than the Royal Oak Lottery. Nothing thrives that belongs to't. Tlie Man of the Houfe would have been an Alderman by this time with half the Trade, if he had fet up in the City. For my part, I never fit at the Door, that I don't get double the Stomach that I do at a Horfe-Race. The air upon BanfteadDowns is nothing to it for a Whetter; yet I never fee it, but the Spirit of Famine appears to me, fometimes like a decay'd Porter, worn out with Pimping, and carrying Billets- doux and Songs; not like other Porters for Hire, but for Jeft's lake. Now like a thin Chairman, melted down to half his Proportion, with carrying a Poet upon Tick, to vifit fome great Fortune; and his Fare to be paid him like the Wages of Sin, either at the day of Marriage, or the day of Death.

Val. Very well, Sir; can you proceed?

Jer. Sometimes like a bilk'd Bookfeller, with a meagre terrify'd Countenance, that looks as if he had written for himself; or were refolv'd to turn Author, and bring the Reft of his Brethren into the fame Condition. And laftly in the Form of a worn-out Punk, with Verfes in her Hand, which her Vanity had preferr'd to Settlements, without a whole Tatter to her Tail, but as ragged as one of the Mules; or as if she were carrying her Linnen to the Paper-Mill, to be converted into Folio-Books, of warning to all young Maids, no to prefer poetry to good Senfe, or lying in the Arms of a needy Wit, before the embraces of a wealthy Fool.

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Sir John Vanbrugh, aus einem alten, ursprünglich französischen, oder vielleicht flandrifchen, Geschlechtesin Cher shire. Sein Geburtsjahr ist nicht genau anzugeben; vers muthlich aber fiel es um die Mitte der Regierungszeit Karls II, Er starb zu London, 1726. Auch in der Baukunst besaß er vorzügliche Geschicklichkeiten; und als Dichter: wetteifèrte er mit Congreve, seinem Zeitgenossen und Freunde. Der Beis falk, densein erstes Lustspiel, The Relapfe, or Virtue in Danger; gleich bei der ersten Aufführung, im J. 1697, fand, ermunterte ihn, mehrere zu liefern; und diese sind: "The Provoked Wife →→ Aefop The Pilgrim The False Friend The Con federacy The Miftake. The Cuckold in Conceit →→→→ Squire Trelooby - The Country - Houfe A Jour ney to London. Einige diefer Stücke blieben ungedruckt. An Wiß und Erfindungsgabe mangelte es diesem Dichter ges wiß nicht; auch besaß er fruchtbare Einbildungskraft und Weltkunde, genug, um manchen Scenen und Charakteren Neuheit, Mannichfaltigkeit, Wahrheit und Leben zu ertheis len; aber die Schranken der Sittlichkeit überschritt er zu sehr, und noch ausgelassener, als die übrigen komischen Dichs ter seiner Zeit. Auch muß man in diesen Stücken so wenig, wie in den meisten Lustspielen der Engländer, keine strenge Regelmäßigkeit, und am wenigsten Einheit und Einfachheit der Handlung erwarten. Hanbrugh's Stücke haben såmts lich ein zwiefaches Subjekt zür Grundlage; und eins hat mit dem andern nicht gar viel gemein; indeß ist die Berflechtung meistens glücklich genug, und die Gruppirung der Charak tere, in deren Zeichnung dieser Dichter vorzüglich geschickt war, ist oft sehr unterhaltend. The Relapfe, or, Virtue in Danger, verdient wohl unstreitig den Vorzug vor den übrigen, und ist eigentlich eine Fortsehung von Cibber's R

Love's

Love's Last Shift, woraus hier alle die Hauptrollen beiber halten sind. Ein junges Ehepaar, welches einander zärtlich liebt, geråth durch einen Besuch der Stadt, und den långern Aufenthalt daselbst, in sachtheilige Verbindungen, die ihre Hers zen einander abwendig machen. Berinthia, eine junge Witwe, zieht den Loveleß durch ihre Reize und Eroberungssucht an sich, und macht seine Gattin, Amanda, selbst gegen ihn eifersüchs tig, indem sie ihr von seinem geheimen Verständnisse Nachricht giebt, ohne ihr den Gegenstand seiner Liebe zu nennen, und ihr auf einem maskirten Balle Gelegenheit schafft, Augenzeugin seis ner Bertraulichkeiten zu werden. Eben ist sie noch in der ersten Aufwallung ihres hiedurch erregten Unwillens, als Worthy, der die Liebe der Amanda zu gewinnen sucht, und in seinen Bewerbungen um dieselbe von der Berinthia unterstüşt wird, zu jener kommt. Und nun folgt zwischen ihnen beis den nachstehende Scene:

Worthy. You seem diforder'd, Madam; I hope there's no Misfortune happen'd to you. i.

Amanda. None that will long diforder me, I hope. Worthy. Whate'er it be disturbs you, I wou'd to Heaven 'twere in my power to bear the Pain, till T were able to remove the Caufe..

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Amanda. I hope, ere, long it will remove itself.

At least I have given it warning to be gone.

W. Wou'd I durft afk, where 'tis the Thorn

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Forgive me, if I grow inquifitive;

'Tis only with defire to give me ease.

A. Alas! 'tis in a tender part. It can't be drawn without a World of Pain; yet out it muft; for it begins to fester in my heart.

W. If 'tis the fting of unrequited Love, remove it instantly.

I have a Balni will quickly heal the Wound, ne

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