The Works of Ben Jonson/Volume 4/The Alchemist/Prologue

by Ben Jonson

For works with similar titles, see Prologue.

PROLOGUE.

Fortune, that favours fools,^[1] these two short hours,We wish away, both for your sakes and ours,Judging spectators; and desire, in place,To th' author justice, to ourselves but grace.Our scene is London, 'cause we would make known,No country's mirth is better than our own:No clime breeds better matter for your whore,Bawd, squire, impostor, many persons more,Whose manners, now call'd humours, feed the stage;And which have still been subject for the rageOr spleen of comic writers. Though this penDid never aim to grieve, but better men;Howe'er the age^[2] he lives in doth endureThe vices that she breeds, above their cure.But when the wholesome remedies are sweet,And in their working gain and profit meet,He hopes to find no spirit so much diseased,But will with such fair correctives be pleased:For here he doth not fear who can apply.If there be any that will sit so nighUnto the stream, to look what it doth run,They shall find things, they'd think or wish were done;They are so natural follies, but so shewn,As even the doers may see, and yet not own.

1. Fortune that favours fools, &c.] We had this expression in Every Man out of his Humour. Jonson seems conscious of the surpassing attractions of this drama: he could not well, indeed, be ignorant of them; and if great merit could justify boasting, (which it cannot,) would need little apology for his bold appeal to the judgment, instead of the candour, of his audience
2. Howe'er the age &c.] From Livy's preface to his history: Ad hœc tempora, quibus nec vitia nostra, nec remedia pati possumus, perventum est.