Thomas Otway. Thomas Otway

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Thomas Otway - Thomas Otway


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hath shut up her gate:

       Where day and night in vain good writers knock,

       And for their labour oft have but a mock.

      FOOTNOTES:

       Table of Contents

       [5]

      To gain by honourable ways

       A great man's favour is no vulgar praise.—Conington.

       Table of Contents

      When first our author took this play in hand,

       He doubted much, and long was at a stand.

       He knew the fame and memory of kings

       Were to be treated of as sacred things,

       Not as they're represented in this age,

       Where they appear the lumber of the stage;

       Used only just for reconciling tools,

       Or what is worse, made villains all, or fools.

       Besides, the characters he shows to-night,

       He found were very difficult to write:

       He found the fame of France and Spain at stake,

       Therefore long paused, and feared which part to take;

       Till this his judgment safest understood,

       To make them both heroic as he could.

       But now the greatest stop was yet unpassed;

       He found himself, alas! confined too fast.

       He is a man of pleasure, sirs, like you,

       And therefore hardly could to business bow;

       Till at the last he did this conquest get,

       To make his pleasure whetstone to his wit;

       So sometimes for variety he writ.

       But as those blockheads, who discourse by rote,

       Sometimes speak sense, although they rarely know't;

       So he scarce knew to what his work would grow,

       But 'twas a play, because it would be so:

       Yet well he knows this is a weak pretence,

       For idleness is the worst want of sense.

       Let him not now of carelessness be taxed,

       He'll write in earnest, when he writes the next:

       Meanwhile—

       Prune his superfluous branches, never spare;

       Yet do it kindly, be not too severe:

       He may bear better fruit another year.

      DRAMATIS PERSONÆ.

       Table of Contents

       Philip II., King of Spain.

       Don Carlos, his Son.

       Don John of Austria.

       Marquis of Posa, the Prince's Confidant.

       Ruy-Gomez.

       Officer of the Guards.

       Queen


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