Manent Lancaster, and Chief Justice. Lan. I like this fair proceeding of the King's. He hath intent, his wonted followers Shall all be very well provided for; But they are banish'd, till their converfations Lan. The King hath call'd his Parliament, my Lord. Ch. Juft. He hath. Lan. I will lay odds, that ere this year expire, We bear our civil fwords and native fire As far as France. I heard a bird fo fing, Whose musick, to my thinking, pleas'd the King. I fancy every reader, when he ends this play, cries out with Desdemona, O moft lame and impotent conclufion! As this play was not, to our knowledge, divided into acts by the authour, I could be content to conclude it with the death of Henry the fourth. In that Jerufalem hall Harry dye. Thefe fcenes which now make the fifth act of Henry the fourth, might then be the first of Henry the fifth; but the truth is, that they do unite very commodiously to either play. When these plays were reprefented, I believe they ended as they are now ended in the books; but Shakespeare seems to have de figned that the whole feries of action from the beginning of Richard the fecond, to the end of Henry the fifth, fhould be confidered by the reader as one work, upon one plan, only broken into parts by the neceffity of exhibition. [Exeunt. EPI None of Shakespeare's plays are more read than the first and second parts of Henry the fourth. Perhaps no authour has ever in two plays afforded fo much delight. The great events are interefting, for the fate of kingdoms depends upon them; the flighter occurrences are diverting, and, except one or two, fufficiently probable; the incidents are multiplied with wonderful fertility of invention, and the characters diverfified with the utmost nicety of difcernment, and the profoundest skill in the nature of man. The prince, who is the hero both of the comick and tragick part, is a young man of great abilitics and violent paffions, whofe fentiments are right, though his actions are wrong; whofe virtues are obfcured by negligence, and whofe understanding is diffipated by levity. In his idle hours he is rather loofe than wicked, and when the occafion forces out his latent qualities, he is great withA a 2 out effort, and brave without tumult. The trifler is roufed into a hero, and the hero again repoles in the trifier. This character is great, original, and juft. Piercy is a rugged foldier, cho Jerick, and quarrelsome, and has only the foldier's virtues, generofity and courage. But Falstaff unimitated. unimitable Fuiftoff, how fhall I defcribe thee? Thou compound of fense and vice; of ferfe which may be admired but not esteemed, of vice which may be defpifed, but hardly detefled. Falstaff is a cha racter loaded with faults, and with thofe faults which naturally produce contempt.. He is a thief, and a glutton, a coward, and a boaster, always ready to cheat the weak, and prey upon the poor; to terrify the timorous and infult the defenceless. At once obfequious and malignant, he fatiriles in their abfence thofe whom he lives by flattering. He is familiar with the prince only as an agent of vice, but of this familiarity he is fo proud as not only to be fupercilious and haughty with common men, but to think his interest of importance to the duke of Lancaster. Yet the man thus corrupt, thus defpicable, makes himself neceffary to the prince that defpifes him, by the moft pleafing of all qualities, perpetual gaiety, by an unfailing power of exciting laughter, which is the more freely indulged, as his wit is not of the fplendid or ambitious kind, but confifts in eafy efcapes and fallies of levity, which make fport but raise no envy. It must be obferved that he is flained with no enormous or fanguinary crimes, fo that his licen tiousness is not fo offenfive but that it may be borne for his mirth. The moral to be drawn from this reprefentation is, that no man is more dangerous than he that with a will to corrupt, hath the power to please; and that neither wit nor honefty ought to think themselves fafe with fuch a com panion when they fee Henry fe duced by Falfag. EPI EPILOGUE.* F Spoken by a DANCER. IRST my fear; then, my court'fy; laft, my speech. my fear is your difpleafure; my court'fy, my duty; and my speech, to beg your pardons. If you look for a good speech now, you undo me; for what I have to say is of mine own making, and what, indeed, I should say, will, I doubt, prove mine own marring. But to the purpose, and fo to the venture. Be it known to you, (as it is very well) I was lately here in the end of a dil-· pleafing Play, to pray your patience for it, and to promife you a better. I did mean, indeed, to pay you with this; which if, like an ill venture, it come unluckily home, I break; and you, my gentle creditors, lofe. Here, I promifed you, I would be, and here I commit my body to your mercies: bate me fome, and I will pay you fome, and, as most debtors do, promife you infini.ely. If my tongue cannot entreat you to acquit me, will you command me to use my legs? and yet that were but light payment, to dance out of your debt. But a good confcience will make any poffible fatisfaction, and fo will I. All the gentlewomen here have forgiven me; if the gentlemen will not, then the gentlemen do not agree with the gentlewomen, which was never seen before in fuch an affembly. One word more, I beseech you; if you be not too much cloy'd with fat meat, our humble author will continue the story with Sir John in it, and make you merry with This epilogue was merely occafional, and alludes to fome theatrical transaction. one part of the audience by the favour of the other, has been played already in the epilogue to As you like it. A a 3 This trick of influencing fair 1 fair Catharine of France; where, for any thing I know, Falstaff hall die of a Sweat, unless already he be kill'd with your hard opinions; for Oldcastle died a martyr, and this is not the man. My tongue is weary: when my legs are too, I will bid you good night, and so kneel down before you: but, indeed, to pray for the Queen. for Oldcastle died a martyr,] Sir John Oldcastle was put for This alludes to a play in which Falaf POPE. THE |