FINIS.
THE MARRIAGE OF WIT AND SCIENCE.
[The title of the old copy is: A new and Pleasaunt enterlude intituled the mariage of Witte and Science. Imprinted at London in Flete Streete, neare vnto sainct Dunstones churche by Thomas Marshe. 4°, black letter.
There is no date, but the size is a small 4to, and it probably appeared in 1570, having been licensed in 1569-70 to Marsh. Some further particulars of the play, now first reprinted from the only known copy in the Malone collection at Oxford, may be found in Hazlitt's "Handbook," 1867, p. 465; Collier's "Extr. from the Stat. Reg.," i. 204; and Collier's "Hist. Engl. Dram. Poetry," ii. 341-7, where there is a somewhat long review of the piece, with extracts. Mr Collier, who bestows considerable praise on this interlude, observes: —"The moral play of 'The Marriage of Wit and Science' contains a remarkable external feature not belonging to any other piece of this class that I remember to have met with: it is regularly divided into five acts, and each of the scenes is also marked." The anonymous author appears to have borrowed to some extent from the older performance by John Redford, printed from a MS. by the Shakespeare Society in 1848; but the two productions must, nevertheless, be regarded as distinct and independent.]
THE PLAYERS' NAMES.
NATURE.
WIT.
WILL.
STUDY.
DILIGENCE, with three other women singers.
SCIENCE.
REASON.
EXPERIENCE.
RECREATION.
SHAME.
IDLENESS.
IGNORANCE.
TEDIOUSNESS.
INSTRUCTION.
THE MARRIAGE OF WIT AND SCIENCE.
[ACT I.]
NATURE, WIT, and WILL.
Grand lady, mother of every mortal thing:
Nurse of the world, conservative of kind:
Cause of increase, of life and soul the spring;
At whose instinct the noble heaven doth wind,
To whose award all creatures are assigned,
I come in place to treat with this my son,
For his avail how he the path may find,
Whereby his race in honour he may run:
Come, tender child, unripe and green for age,
In whom the parent sets her chief delight,
Wit is thy name, but far from wisdom sage,
Till tract of time shall work and frame aright,
This peerless brain, not yet in perfect plight:
But when it shall be wrought, methinks I see,
As in a glass beforehand with my sight,
A certain perfect piece of work in thee,
And now so far as I [can] guess by signs,
Some great attempt is fixed in thy breast:
Speak on, my son, whereto thy heart inclines,
And let me deal to set thy heart at rest.
He salves the sore, that knows the patient best:
As I do thee, my son, my chiefest care,
In whom my special praise and joy doth rest;
To me therefore these thoughts of thine declare.