THE PLAY!
On being solicited to attend a Theatre, by two young women, who urged their entreaties by the argument, “There is no harm in attending the Play!”
Ye daughters of Albion’s flourishing isle,
Come listen awhile to my lay;
Defending your morals, you say with a smile,
“There’s no harm in attending the Play!”
Ye Theatre gallants, and deep witted men,
Whose counsels so many obey,
Come lend a poor ignorant rustic a pen,
And he’ll help you to plead for the Play!
If you are not immortal, but end when you die,
As some have the courage to say,
Why need you look out for a mansion on high,
You’ve nothing to fear from the Play!
If you are immortal, yet free from the fall,
And never have wander’d astray;
If you have no sin to repent of at all,
You’ve nothing to fear from the Play!
If Christ in His word, has left no command,
For people to watch and to pray,
If an house cannot fall that is built on the sand,
There’s no harm in attending the Play!
Not calling in question your baptismal vow,
If life’s like a long summer’s day,
And you have not to reap such fruit as ye sow,
There’s no harm in attending the Play!
If the Christian’s creed from the truth be reverse,
And the fair crown of life can decay;
If the Bible be false, and Religion a farce,
There’s no harm in attending the Play!