dBooks desire

Errors, like straws, upon the surface flow;
He who would search for pearls must dive below.
Fops may have leave to level all they can,
As pigmies would be glad to lop a man.
Half wits are fleas, so little and so light,
We scarce could know they live, but that they bite.
Another prologue begins--
They who write ill, and they who ne'er durst write,
Turn critics out of mere revenge and spite;
A playhouse gives them fame; and up then starts
From a mean fifth-rate wit, a man of parts.
The more important critics are described as--
A jury of the wits who still stay late,
And in their club decree the poor play's fate;
Their verdict back is to the boxes brought,
Thence all the town pronounces it their thought.
"The little Hectors of the pit" are also spoken of, and there is
mention of "Fop-corner," the prototype of "Fop's-alley" of later
years. Now, "a kind, hearty pit" is prayed for, and now, in a prologue
delivered before the University of Oxford, stress is laid upon the
advantages of "a learned pit.


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