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I sweat. If anything comes easy to me I mistrust it.
I sweat. If anything comes easy to me I mistrust it.
Acting is a nice childish profession - pretending you're someone else and, at the same time, selling yourself.
Acting is a nice childish profession - pretending you're someone else and, at the same time, selling yourself.
The drama's laws, the drama's patrons give.
For we that live to please, must please to live.
The drama's laws, the drama's patrons give.
For we that live to please, must please to live.
Who teach the mind its proper face to scan,
And hold the faithful mirror up to man.
Who teach the mind its proper face to scan,
And hold the faithful mirror up to man.
And Tragedy should blush as much to stoop
To the low mimic follies of a farce,
As read more
And Tragedy should blush as much to stoop
To the low mimic follies of a farce,
As a grave matron would to dance with girls.
There still remains to mortify a wit
The many-headed monster of the pit.
There still remains to mortify a wit
The many-headed monster of the pit.
Like hungry guests, a sitting audience looks;
Plays are like suppers; poets are the cooks.
The founder's read more
Like hungry guests, a sitting audience looks;
Plays are like suppers; poets are the cooks.
The founder's you: the table is the place:
The carvers we: the prologue is the grace.
Each act, a course, each scene, a different dish,
Though we're in Lent, I doubt you're still for flesh.
Satire's the sauce, high-season'd, sharp and rough.
Kind masks and beaux, I hope you're pepperproof?
Wit is the wine; but 'tis so scarce the true
Poets, like vintners, balderdash and brew.
Your surly scenes, where rant and bloodshed join.
Are butcher's meat, a battle's sirloin:
Your scenes of love, so flowing, soft and chaste,
Are water-gruel without salt or taste.
Prologues like compliments are loss of time;
'Tis penning bows and making legs in rhyme.
Prologues like compliments are loss of time;
'Tis penning bows and making legs in rhyme.
If you took acting away from me, I'd stop breathing.
If you took acting away from me, I'd stop breathing.
