Prologue at the Black-Fryers

[The prologue laments that the town is empty and the playhouses neglected.]

And if you leave us too, we cannot thrive,
I'l promise neither Play nor Poet live
Till ye come back, think what you do, you see
What audience we have, what Company
'To Shakespear comes, whose mirth did once beguile
'Dull hours, and buskind, made even sorrow smile,
'So lovely were the Wounds, that men would say
'They could endure the bleeding a whole day:
He has but few friends lately, think o'that,
Hee'l come no more, and others have his fate.
'Fletcher the Muses darling, and choice love
'Of Phoebus, the delight of every Grove;
'Upon whose head the Laurel grew, whose wit
'Was the Times wonder, and example yet,
'Tis within memory, Trees did not throng,
As once the Story said to Orpheus song.
Jonson, t'whose name, wise Art did bow, and Wit
'Is only justified by honouring it:
'To hear whose touch, how would the learned Quire
'With silence stoop? and when he took his Lyre,
'Apollo dropt his Lute, asham'd to see
'A Rival to the God of Harmonie.
You do forsake him too, we must deplore
This fate, for we do know it by our door.
How must this Author fear then, with his guilt
Of weakness to thrive here, where late was spilt
The Muses own blood, if being but a few,
You not conspire, and meet more frequent too?
There are not now nine Muses, and you may
Be kind to ours, if not, he bad me say,

Though while you careless kill the rest, and laugh,
Yet he may live to write your Epitaph.

(lines 15-47; sig. A3)