[441] This elegant phrase is the current catch-word of Sir Samuel Hearty in the "Virtuoso," described in the dramatis personæ as "a brisk, amorous, adventurous, unfortunate coxcomb; one that, by the help of humorous, nonsensical bye-words, takes himself to be a great wit."
[442] Alluding, probably, to the following vaunt of Shadwell, in the Dedication to the "Virtuoso:" "Four of the humours are entirely new; and, without vanity, I may say, I ne'er produced a comedy that had not some natural humour in it not represented before, and I hope I never shall."
[444] Bruce and Longvil are fine gentlemen in Shadwell's comedy of the "Virtuoso;" who, during a florid speech of Sir Formal Trifle, contrive to get rid of the orator, by letting go a trap-door, upon which he had placed himself during his declamation.
[445] An anonymous poet ascribes the estimation in which he was held to his poetical propensities:
Verse the famed Flecknoe raised, the muses' sport,
From drudging for the stage to drudge at court.