Now all is come out; the scandal of the story turns at last upon the government:  that patronizes popish plays, and forbids protestant[37].  Ours is to be a popish play; why?  Because it exposes the villainy of sectaries and rebels.  Prove them first to be protestants, and see what you will get by it when you have done.  Your party are certainly the men whom the play attacks, and so far I will help you; the designs and actions, represented in the play, are such as you have copied from the League; for though you have wickedness enough, yet you wanted the wit to make a new contrivance.  But for shame, while you are carrying on such palpable villainy, do not assume the name of protestants.  You will tell us, you are friends to the government, and the king’s best subjects; but all the while you are aspersing both it and him.  Who shall be judges, whether you are friends or not?  The government or you?  Have not all rebels always sung the same song?  Was ever thief or murderer fool enough to plead guilty?  For your love and loyalty to the king, they, who mean him best among you, are no better subjects than Duke Trinculo; they would be content he should be viceroy, so they may be viceroys over him[38].

The next accusation is particular to me,—­“that I, the said Bayes, would falsely and feloniously have robbed Nat.  Lee of his share in the representation of OEdipus.”  Now I am culprit; I writ the first and third acts of OEdipus, and drew the scenery of the whole play:  whenever I have owned a farther proportion, let my accusers speak:  this was meant mischievously, to set us two at variance.  Who is the old serpent and Satan now?  When my friends help my barren fancy, I am thankful for it:  I do not use to receive assistance, and afterwards ungratefully disown it.

Not long after, “exemplary punishment” is due to me for this most “devilish parallel.”  It is a devilish one indeed; but who can help it?  If I draw devils like one another, the fault is in themselves for being so:  I neither made their horns nor claws, nor cloven feet.  I know not what I should have done, unless I had drawn the devil a handsome proper gentleman, like the painter in the fable, to have made a friend of him[39]; but I ought to be exemplarily punished for it:  when the devil gets uppermost, I shall expect it.  “In the mean time, let magistrates (that respect their oaths and office)”—­which words, you see, are put into a parenthesis, as if (God help us) we had none such now,—­let them put the law in execution against lewd scribblers; the mark will be too fair upon a pillory, for a turnip or a rotten egg to miss it.  But, for my part, I have not malice enough to wish him so much harm,—­not so much as to have a hair of his head perish, much less that one whole side of it should be dismantled.  I am no informer, who writ such a song, or such a libel; if the dulness betrays him not, he is safe for me.  And may the same dulness preserve him ever from public justice; it is a sufficient thick