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DESIGNED TO BE SPOKEN IN THE BEAUX-STRATAGEM."
Ir to our play your judgment can't be kind,
Let its expiring author pity find:
Survey his mournful case with melting eyes,
Nor let the bard be damn'd before he dies.
Forbear, you fair, on his last scene to frown,
But his true exit with a plaudit crown;
Then shall the dying poet cease to fear
The dreadful knell, while your applause he hears.
At Leuctra so the conquering Theban died,
Claim'd his friends' praises, but their tears denied:
Pleased in the pangs of death he greatly thought
Conquest with loss of life but cheaply bought.
The difference this,-the Greek was one wo
fight,
As brave, though not so gay as serjeant Kite;
Ye sons of Will's, what's that to those w
write?
To Thebes alone the Grecian owed his bays,
You may the bard above the hero raise,
Since yours is greater than Athenian praise.
BRADBURY AND EVANS, PRINTERS, WHITEFRIARS.