In right of the many quotations it has supplied to literature and conversation, Dr. Johnson’s prologue spoken by Garrick upon the opening of Drury Lane Theatre, in 1747, may claim to be considered the most famous production of its class.  It is not, in truth, however, a prologue as prologues are ordinarily understood, but rather an address, written to suit special circumstances, and having no connection with any particular play.  Boswell describes it as “unrivalled for just and manly criticism on the whole range of the English stage, as well as for poetic excellence,” and records that it was during the season often called for by the audience.  Johnson’s prologue to his friend Goldsmith’s comedy of “The Good-natured Man” was certainly open to the charge brought against it of undue solemnity.  The first lines—­

    Press’d with the load of life the weary mind
    Surveys the general toil of human kind—­

when enunciated in the sepulchral tones of Bensley, the tragedian, were judged to have a depressing effect upon the audience—­a conclusion which seems reasonable and probable enough, although Boswell suggested that “the dark ground might make Goldsmith’s humour shine the more.”  Goldsmith himself was chiefly disturbed at the line describing him as “our little bard,” which he thought likely to diminish his dignity, by calling attention to the lowness of his stature.  “Little bard” was therefore altered to “anxious bard.”  Johnson also supplied a prologue to Kelly’s posthumous comedy of “A Word to the Wise” (represented in 1770, for the benefit of the author’s widow and children), although he spoke contemptuously of the departed dramatist as “a dead staymaker,” and confessed that he hated to give away literary performances, or even to sell them too cheaply.  “The next generation,” he said, “shall not accuse me of beating down the price of literature; one hates, besides, to give what one is accustomed to sell.  Would not you, now”—­and here he turned to his brewer friend, Mr. Thrale—­“rather give away money than porter?” To his own tragedy of “Irene,” Johnson supplied a spirited prologue, which “awed” the house, as Boswell believed.  In the concluding lines he deprecated all effort to win applause by other than legitimate means: 

    Be this at least his praise, be this his pride: 
    To force applause no modern arts are tried;
    Should partial catcalls all his hopes confound,
    He bids no trumpet quell the fatal sound;
    Should welcome sleep relieve the weary wit,
    He rolls no thunders o’er the drowsy pit;
    No snares to captivate the judgment spreads,
    Nor bribes your eyes to prejudice your heads. 
    Unmoved, though witlings sneer and rivals rail,
    Studious to please, yet not ashamed to fail. 
    He scorns the meek address, the suppliant strain;
    With merit needless, and without it vain. 
    In Reason, Nature, Truth he dares to trust: 
    Ye fops be silent, and ye wits be just!