OCCASIONAL PROLOGUE TO THE FOUNDLING, ACTED AT THE THEATRE-ROYAL in YORK, FOR THE BENEFIT OF THE LUNATIC…

From the mild regions of her native sky, O'er BRITAIN'S Isle sweet Pity cast her eye— She cast—and Sorrow heav'd her melting breast, As to her view pale Sickness stood confest.

Here treach'rous Waste attains her end by stealth, And, flatt'ring, slowly saps the base of health. There Fevers shoot through ev'ry swelling vein, Now fire the lawless blood, now rack the brain.—

Daughter of Hell, a direr fiend than War, With hasty stride Plague rushes from afar!— Her savage pleasure grows on spreading death, And Parent Nations orphan'd by her breath.

Who sits on yonder stone with hollow eye And hand out-stretch'd, imploring charity? 'Tis hungry Famine—"Thou shalt ask no more," Cry'd one—"but die, and shame that rich man's door."— Who was't so cry'd?—The Monarch of the Dead, As from yon grave he rear'd his meagre head. Pity with smiles beheld his friendly blow, And hail'd him—Curer of a cureless woe.—

She spoke, and foaming Phrenzy darted by, Strength in his hand, and murder in his eye— Sadly she sigh'd, and as she turn'd away Heard calmer Melancholy's pensive lay— The love-lorn Virgin, wand'ring thro' the gloom Of yew-bound church-yards and the mould'ring tomb, Sung to the Moon of "Marg'ret's grimly ghost," Of Henry's broken vows, and Emma lost.

Here Pity wept—and from her tears arose A kind ASYLUM for the mad-one's woes.

Hail to the wond'rous art that can dispense The genial floods of renovated sense! And blessings crown your breasts who feel these woes, As far the heaviest human nature knows!