PROLOGUE
TO
THE TRUE WIDOW.
BY
THOMAS SHADWELL, 1679.
Heaven save ye, gallants, and this hopeful age!
Y'are welcome to the downfall of the stage.
The fools have laboured long in their vocation,
And vice, the manufacture of the nation,
O'erstocks the town so much, and thrives so well,
That fops and knaves grow drugs, and will not sell.