It might also be doubted whether it were
altogether zeal which prompted him to this rough manner of proceeding;
perhaps it became not one of his function to rake into the rubbish of
ancient and modern plays. A divine might have employed his pains to
better purpose than in the nastiness of Plautus and Aristophanes, whose
examples, as they excuse not me, so it might be possibly supposed that
he read them not without some pleasure. They who have written
commentaries on those poets, or on Horace, Juvenal, and Martial, have
explained some vices which, without their interpretation, had been
unknown to modern times. Neither has he judged impartially betwixt the
former age and us.
There is more bawdry in one play of Fletcher's, called the _Custom of
the Country_, than in all ours together. Yet this has been often acted
on the stage in my remembrance. Are the times so much more reformed
now than they were five and twenty years ago? If they are, I
congratulate the amendment of our morals. But I am not to prejudice
the cause of my fellow-poets, though I abandon my own defence; they
have some of them answered for themselves, and neither they nor I can
think Mr.
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