or a dawcocke, a knave or an under ſhriefe, of what ſtamp ſoever you be, currant or counterfet, the ſtagelike time will bring you to moſt perfect light, and lay you open: neither are you to be hunted from thence though the ſcar-crowes in the yard hoot you, hiſſe at you, ſpit at you, yea throw dirt even in your teeth: ’tis moſt gentleman-like patience to endure all this, and to laugh at the ſilly animals. But if the rabble, with a full throat, crie away with the foole, you were worſe than a mad-man to tarry by it: for the gentleman and the foole ſhould never fit on the ſtage together.
Mary, let this obſervation go hand in hand with the reſt: or rather, like a country-ſerving man, ſome five yards before them. Preſent not your ſelfe on the ſtage (eſpecially at a new play) untill the quaking prologue hath (by rubbing) got cullor into his cheekes, and is ready to give the trumpets their cue that hees upon point to enter: for then it is time, as though you were one of the properties, or that you dropt of the hangings to creep from behind the arras, with your tripos or three-legged ſtoole in one hand, and a teſton mounted betweene a fore-finger and a thumbe, in the other: for if you ſhould beſtow your perſon upon the vulgar, when the belly of the houſe is but halfe full, your apparell is quite eaten up, the ſaſhion loſt, and the proportion of your body in more danger to be devoured, then if it were ſerved up in the Counter amongſt the Poultry: avoid that as you would the baſtome. It ſhall crowne you with rich commendation to laugh alowd in the middeſt of the moſt ſerious and ſaddeſt ſcene of the terribleſt tragedy: and to let that clapper (your tongue) be toſt ſo high that all the houſe may ring of it: your lords uſe it; your knights are apes to the lords, and dofo too: your inne-a-court-man is zany to the knights, and (many very ſcurvily) comes likewiſe limping after it: bee thou a beagle to them all, and never lin ſnuffing till you have ſented them: for by talking and laughing (like a ploughman in a morris) you heape Pelion upon Oſſa, glory upon glory: as firſt all the eyes in the galleries will leave walking after the players, and onely follow you: the ſimpleſt dolt in the houſe ſnatches up your name, and when he meetes you in the ſtreetes, or that you fall into his hands in the middle of a watch, his word ſhall be taken for you: heele cry, Hees ſuch a gallant, and you paſſe. Secondly you publiſh your temperance to the world, in that you ſeeme not to reſort thither to taſte vaine pleaſures with a hungrie appetite; but onely as a gentleman, to ſpend a ſooliſh houre or two,
becauſe
