Lady_, where one comes
out from dinner, and Relates the quarrels and disorders of it; to save
the indecent appearing of them on the Stage, and to abbreviate the story:
and this, in express imitation of TERENCE, who had done the same before
him, in his _Eunuch_; where _PYTHIAS_ makes the like Relation of what had
happened within, at the soldiers' entertainment.

"The Relations, likewise, of _SEFANUS_'s death and the prodigies before
it, are remarkable. The one of which, was hid from sight, to avoid the
horror and tumult of the Representation: the other, to shun the
introducing of things impossible to be believed.

"In that excellent Play, the _King and no King_, FLETCHER goes yet
farther. For the whole unravelling of the Plot is done by Narration in
the Fifth Act, after the manner of the Ancients: and it moves great
concernment in the audience; though it be only a Relation of what was
done many years before the Play.

"I could multiply other instances; but these are sufficient to prove,
that there is no error in chosing a subject which requires this sort of
Narration. In the ill managing of them, they may.

"But I find, I have been too long in this discourse; since the French
have many other excellencies, not common to us.

"As that, _you never see any of their Plays end with a Conversion, or
simple Change of Will_: which is the ordinary way our Poets use [_are
accustomed_] to end theirs.

"It shows little art in the conclusion of a Dramatic Poem, when they who
have hindered the felicity during the Four Acts, desist from it in the
Fifth, without some powerful cause to take them off: and though I deny
not but such reasons may be found; yet it is a path that is cautiously to
be trod, and the Poet is to be sure he convinces the audience, that the
motive is strong enough.

"As, for example, the conversion of the _Usurer_ in the _Scornful Lady_,
seems to me, a little forced. For, being a Usurer, which implies a Lover
of Money in the highest degree of covetousness (and such, the Poet has
represented him); the account he gives for the sudden change, is, that he
has been duped by the wild young fellow: which, in reason, might render
him more wary another time, and make him punish himself with harder fare
and coarser clothes, to get it up again. But that he should look upon it
as a judgement, and so repent; we may expect to hear of in a Sermon, but
I should never endure it in a Play.

"I pass by this. Neither will I ins