Читать книгу The Old Debauchees. A Comedy - Генри Филдинг, Henry Fielding - Страница 1

I Wish, with all my Heart, the Stage and Town

Would both agree to cry all Prologues down;

That we, no more oblig'd to say or sing,

Might drop this useless necessary Thing:

No more with aukward Strut, before the Curtain,

Chaunt out some Rhimes – there's neither good nor hurt in.

What is this Stuff the Poets make us deal in,

But some old worn-out Jokes of their Retailing:

From Sages of our own, or former Times,

Transvers'd from Prose, perhaps transpros'd from Rhimes.

Perhaps, for Change, you, now and then, by Fits,

Are told that Criticks are the Bane of Wits;

How they turn Vampyres, being dead and damn'd,

And with the Blood of living Bards are cramm'd:

That Poets thus tormented die, and then

The Devil gets in them, and they suck agen.

As something must be spoke, no matter what;

No Friends are now by Prologues lost or got;

By such Harangues we raise nor Spleen, nor Pity —

Thus ends this idle, but important Ditty.