one instantly took up
the cudgels in a pamphlet entitled _Insolence and Impudence Triumphant_,
and the famous Dr. Owen also protested in _Truth and Innocence
Vindicated_. Parker replied to Owen in _A Defence and Continuation of
Ecclesiastical Politie_, and in the following year, 1672, reprinted a
treatise of Bishop Bramholl's with a preface "shewing what grounds there
are of Fears and Jealousies of Popery."

This was the state of the controversy when Marvell entered upon it with
his _Rehearsal Transprosed_, a fantastic title he borrowed for no very
good reasons from the farce of the hour, and a very good farce too, the
Duke of Buckingham's _Rehearsal_, which was performed for the first time
at the Theatre Royal on the 7th of November 1671, and printed early in
1672. Most of us have read Sheridan's _Critic_ before we read
Buckingham's _Rehearsal_, which is not the way to do justice to the
earlier piece. It is a matter of literary tradition that the duke had
much help in the composition of a farce it took ten years to make.
Butler, Sprat, and Clifford, the Master of Charterhouse, are said to be
co-authors. However this may be, the piece was a great success, and both
Marvell and Parker, I have no doubt, greatly enjoyed it, but I cannot
think the former was wise to stuff his plea for Liberty of Conscience so
full as he did with the details of a farce. His doing so should, at all
events, acquit him of the charge of being a sour Puritan. In the
_Rehearsal_ Bayes (Dryden), who is turned by Sheridan in his adaptation
of the piece into Mr. Puff, is made to produce out of his pocket his
book of _Drama Commonplaces_, and the play proceeds (_Johnson_ and
_Smith_ being _Sheridan's_ Dangle and Sneer):

"_Johnson._ _Drama Commonplaces_! pray what's that?

_Bayes._ Why, Sir, some certain helps, that we men of Art have found
it convenient to make use of.

_Johnson._ How, Sir, help for Wit?

_Bayes._ I, Sir, that's my position. And I do here averr, that no man
yet the Sun e'er shone upon, has parts sufficient to furnish out a
Stage, except it be with the help of these my rules.

_Johnson._ What are those Rules, I pray?

_Bayes._ Why, Sir, my first Rule is the Rule of Transversion, or
_Regula Duplex_, changing Verse into Prose, or Prose into Verse,
_alternative_ as you please.

_Smith._ How's that, Sir, by a Rule, I pray?

_Bayes._ Why, thus, Sir; nothing more easy when under