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TO HIS INGENUOUS FRIEND, THE AUTHOR, CONCERNING HIS COMEDY, by                    
First Line: The muses, tom, thy jealous lovers be
Last Line: Will find sufficient welcome, credit, fame.
Subject(s): Plays & Playwrights ; Randolph, Thomas (1605-1634); Dramatists


THE Muses, Tom, thy Jealous Lovers be,
Striving which has the greatest share in thee.
Euterpe calls thee hers; such is thy skill
In pastoral sonnets and in rural quill.
Melpomene claims thee for her own, and cries,
Thou hast an excellent vein for elegies.
'Tis true; but then Calliope disdains,
Urging thy fancy in heroic strains,
Thus all the Nine: Apollo by his laws
Sits judge, in person to decide the cause:
Beholds thy comedy, approves thy art,
And so gives sentence on Thalia's part.
To her he dooms thee only of the Nine;
What though the rest with jealousy repine?
Then let thy comedy, Thalia's daughter,
Begin to know her mother Muse by laughter,
Out with't, I say, smother not this thy birth,
But publish to the world thy harmless mirth.
No fretting frontispiece, nor biting satire [nature.
Needs usher't forth: born tooth'd? fie! 'tis 'gainst
Thou hast th' applause of all: king, queen, and Court,
And University, all lik'd thy sport.
No blunt preamble in a cynic humour
Need quarrel at dislike, and (spite of rumour)
Force a more candid censure, and extort
An approbation, maugre all the Court.
Such rude and snarling prefaces suit not thee;
They are superfluous: for thy comedy,
Back't with its own worth and the author's name,
Will find sufficient welcome, credit, fame.





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