To the author justice, to ourselves but grace.
Our scene is London, 'cause we would make known
No country's mirth is better than our own :
No clime breeds better matter, for your bore,

Shark, squire, impostor, many persons more,
Whose manners, now called humours, feed the stage;
And which have still been subject for the rage
Or spleen of comic writers. Though this pen
Did never aim to grieve, but better, men;
Howe'er the age he lives in doth endure

The vices that she breeds, above their cure.
But when the wholesome remedies are sweet,
And in their working gain and profit meet,
He hopes to find no spirit so much diseased

But will with such fair córrectives be pleased: For here he doth not fear who can apply.

If there be any that will sit so nigh

Unto the stream, to look what it doth run,

They shall find things they'd think or wish were done;

They are so natural follies, but so shown

As even the doers may see, and yet not own.

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ACT I.

SCENE I. -A Room in LOVEWIT'S House.

Enter FACE, in a captain's uniform, with his sword drawn, and SUBTLE with a vial, quarrelling, and followed by DOL COMMON.

Face. Believe't, I will.

Sub. Thy worst. I spit at thee.

Dol. Have you your wits? Why, gentlemen, for love
Face. Sirrah, I'll strip you

Dol. Nay, look ye, sovereign, general, are you madmen?

Sub. Oh, let the wild sheep loose. I'll gum your silks With good strong water, an you come.

Dol. Will you have

The neighbours hear you? will you betray all?

Hark! I hear somebody.

Face. Sirrah

Sub. I shall mar

All that the tailor has made, if you approach.

Face. You most notorious whelp, you insolent slave,

Dare you do this?

Sub. Yes, faith; yes, faith.

Face. Why, who

Am I, my mongrel? Who am I?

Sub. I'll tell you,

Since you know not yourself.

Face. Speak lower, rogue.

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Sub. Yes, you were once (time's not long past) the good,

Honest, plain, livery three pound thrum that kept

Your master's worship's house here in the Friars,

For the vacations

Face. Will you be so loud?

Sub. Since, by my means, translated suburb-captain.

Face. By your means, doctor dog!

Sub. Within man's memory,

All this I speak of.

Face. Why, I pray you, have I

Been countenanced by you, or you by me?

Do but collect, sir, where I met you first.

Sub. I do not hear well.

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Face. Not of this, I think it.

But I shall put you in mind, sir ; at Pie-corner,
Taking your meal of steam in from cooks' stalls,
Where, like the father of hunger, you did walk
Piteously costive, with your pinch'd horn-nose,
And your complexion of the Roman wash,
Stuck full of black and melancholic worms,
Like powder corns shot at the artillery yard.

Sub. I wish you could advance your voice a little.1
Face. When you went pinn'd up in the several rags
You had raked and pick'd from dunghills, before day;
Your feet in mouldy slippers, for your kibes 2:

A felt of rug, and a thin threaden cloak,

That scarce would cover your no buttocks

Sub. So, sir!

Face. When all your alchemy and your algebra,
Your minerals, vegetals, and animals,

Your conjuring, cozening, and your dozen of trades,
Could not relieve your corps with so much linen

4

Would make you tinder, but to see a fire,

I gave you countenance, credit for your coals,
Your stills, your glasses, your materials;
Built you a furnace, drew you customers,
Advanced all your black arts; lent you, beside,

A house to practise in

Sub. Your master's house!

Face. Where you have studied the more thriving skill

Of cozening since.

Sub. Yes, in your master's house.

You and the rats here kept possession.

1 A play on the word voice, which is used here for reputation.
2 Chilblains.

8 Hat of coarse woollen cloth.

4 Body.

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Make it not strange. I know you were one could keep
The buttery-hatch still lock'd, and save the chippings,
Sell the dole beer1 to aquavitæ men,

2

The which, together with your Christmas vails
At post-and-pair,3 your letting out of counters,*
Made you a pretty stock, some twenty marks,5
And gave you credit to converse with cobwebs,
Here, since your mistress' death hath broke up house.
Face. You might talk softlier, rascal.

Sub. No, you scarab,

I'll thunder you in pieces: I will teach you
How to beware to tempt a Fury again,

That carries tempest in his hand and voice.
Face. The place has made you valiant.
Sub. No, your clothes. --

Thou vermin, have I ta'en thee out of dung,

So poor, so wretched, when no living thing

Would keep thee company, but a spider, or worse?
Rais'd thee from brooms, and dust, and watering-pots,
Sublimed thee, and exalted thee, and fix'd thee
In the third region, call'd our state of grace?
Wrought thee to spirit, to quintessence, with pains
Would twice have won me the Philosopher's work!
Put thee in words and fashion, made thee fit
For more than ordinary fellowships?

Giv'n thee thy oaths, thy quarrelling dimensions,
Thy rules to cheat at horse-race, cockpit, cards, dice,
Or whatever gallant tincture else?

1 Beer furnished to the poor, from a rich man's buttery.
2 Perquisites.
3 A game at cards.

4 The servant received a small fee for furnishing counters.
5 A mark was worth 15s. 4d.

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Made thee a second in mine own great art?
And have I this for thanks! Do you rebel,
Do you fly out in the projection?1

Would you be gone now?

Dol. Gentlemen, what mean you? Will you mar all?

Sub. Slave, thou hadst no name

Dol. Will you undo yourselves with civil war?
Sub. Never been known, past equi clibanum,
The heat of horse-dung, under ground, in cellars,
Or an ale-house darker than deaf John's; been lost
To all mankind but laundresses and tapsters,
Had not I been.

Dol. Do you know who hears you, sovereign?
Face. Sirrah

Dol. Nay, general, I thought you were civil.

Face. I shall turn desperate if you grow thus loud.

Sub. And hang thyself, I care not.

Face. Hang thee, collier,

And all thy pots and pans, in picture, I will,

Since thou hast moved me

Dol. Oh, this will o'erthrow all.

Face. Write thee up bawd in Paul's, have all thy tricks,

Of cozening with a hollow coal, dust, scrapings,
Searching for things lost, with a sieve and shears,

Erecting figures in your rows of houses,2

And taking in of shadows with a glass,3

Told in red letters; and a face cut for thee

1 That is, fail at the last moment, when success is at hand.

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2 Each house, in astrology, corresponded to one of the twelve signs of the zodiac.

3 Method of divination.