Prologue To Caesar Borgia Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: AABCDEFFGHIIJJJKKLLM MNNOOJJPPQQRRSTUVVTT WW| The unhappy man who once has trailed a pen | A |
| Lives not to please himself but other men | A |
| Is always drudging wastes his life and blood | B |
| Yet only eats and drinks what you think good | C |
| What praise soe'er the poetry deserve | D |
| Yet every fool can bid the poet starve | E |
| That fumbling lecher to revenge is bent | F |
| Because he thinks himself or whore is meant | F |
| Name but a cuckold all the city swarms | G |
| From Leadenhall to Ludgate is in arms | H |
| Were there no fear of Antichrist or France | I |
| In the best time poor poets live by chance | I |
| Either you come not here or as you grace | J |
| Some old acquaintance drop into the place | J |
| Careless and qualmish with a yawning face | J |
| You sleep o'er wit and by my troth you may | K |
| Most of your talents lie another way | K |
| You love to hear of some prodigious tale | L |
| The bell that tolled alone or Irish whale | L |
| News is your food and you enough provide | M |
| Both for yourselves and all the world beside | M |
| One theatre there is of vast resort | N |
| Which whilome of Requests was called the Court | N |
| But now the great exchange of news 'tis hight | O |
| And full of hum and buzz from noon till night | O |
| Up stairs and down you run as for a race | J |
| And each man wears three nations in his face | J |
| So big you look though claret you retrench | P |
| That armed with bottled ale you huff the French | P |
| But all your entertainment still is fed | Q |
| By villains in our own dull island bred | Q |
| Would you return to us we dare engage | R |
| To show you better rogues upon the stage | R |
| You know no poison but plain ratsbane here | S |
| Death's more refined and better bred elsewhere | T |
| They have a civil way in Italy | U |
| By smelling a perfume to make you die | V |
| A trick would make you lay your snuff box by | V |
| Murder's a trade so known and practised there | T |
| That 'tis infallible as is the chair | T |
| But mark their feasts you shall behold such pranks | W |
| The Pope says grace but 'tis the devil gives thanks | W |
John Dryden
(1)
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