"I will not rake the dunghill of thy crimes,
For who would read thy life that reads thy rhymes?
But of King David's foes be this the doom,
May all be like the young man, Absalom.[1]
And for my foes, may this their blessing be,
To talk like Doeg,[2] and to write like thee."
The following is an extract from the Epilogue.
"Shadwell, the great support o' the comic stage,
Born to expose the follies of the age.
To whip prevailing vices, and unite
Mirth with Instruction, Profit with Delight.
For large ideas and a flowing pen,
First of our times, and second but to Ben.
Shadwell, who all his lines from Nature drew,
Copied her out and kept her still in view;
Who ne'er was bribed by Title or Estate,
To fawn and flatter with the Rich and Great.
To let a gilded vice or folly pass,
But always lash'd the villain and the ass.
"Crown you his last performance with applause,
Who love like him our liberties and laws.
Let but the 'honest' party do him right,
And their loud claps shall give him fame, in spite
Of the faint hiss of grumbling Jacobite."
