The Distrest Theatre

Health to the Muse!--and fill the glass,
Heaven grant her soon some better place,
Than earthen floor and fabric mean,
Where disappointment shades the scene:

There as I came, by rumour led,
I sighed and almost wished her dead;
Her visage stained with many a tear,
No Hallam and no Henry here!

But what could all their art attain?--
When pointed laws the stage restrain
The prudent Muse obedience pays
To sleepy squires, that damn all plays.

Like thieves they hang beyond the town,
They shove her off--to please the gown;--
Though Rome and Athens owned it true,
The stage might mend our morals too.

See, Mopsus all the evening sits
O'er bottled beer, that drowns his wits;
Were Plays allowed, he might at least
Blush--and no longer act the beast.

See, Marcia, now from guardian free,
Retailing scandal with her tea;--
Might she not come, nor danger fear
From Hamlet's sigh, or Juliet's tear.

The world but acts the player's part--
(So says the motto of their art)--
That world in vice great lengths is gone
That fears to see its picture drawn.

Mere vulgar actors cannot please;
The streets supply enough of these;
And what can wit or beauty gain
When sleepy dullness joins their train?

A State betrays a homely taste,
By which the stage is thus disgraced,
Where, drest in all the flowers of speech,
Dame virtue might her precepts teach.

Let but a dancing bear arrive,
A pig, that counts you four, or five--
And Cato, with his moral strain
May strive to mend the world in vain.