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Fine gentlemen in London vied with each other in the lowest ribaldry and the grossest profanity. The poets of the time, from Dryden to Durfey, ministered to the popular licentiousness. The most shameless indecency polluted their pages. The theatre and the brothel were in strict unison. The Church winked at the vice which opposed itself to the austere morality or hypocrisy of Puritanism.

But it may be ask'd, Cou'd he not have done that without exposing so many great Genius's? Had it not been better to have let Mr. Durfey alone? Tho' even this Method wou'd not have pleas'd every body; for whate'er Effect it has had on Mr. Vanbroug and Congreve; Motteux and Guildon resent it to the last degree. Is their nothing in their Works Illustrious, or that cou'd merit Censure?

But both Wycherley and Cromwell were wits and men of education, and it is not difficult to pardon that morbid, over-active mind for occasional vagrancy in its efforts after some congenial escape from the Tory fox-hunters of Berkshire and the ribald drinking songs of Durfey.

Congreve cou'd not be pleased with: And if the Town shou'd be so refin'd to admit of nothing but what is Natural, we can't expect that ever he will gratifie us with another Tragedy. Durfey and Motteux wou'd write no more Farces; Guildon and Tom. Brown, &c. wou'd be the Saints with wry Mouthes and scrue'd Faces: Mr.

Fine gentlemen in London vied with each other in the lowest ribaldry and the grossest profanity. The poets of the time, from Dryden to Durfey, ministered to the popular licentiousness. The most shameless indecency polluted their pages. The theatre and the brothel were in strict unison. The Church winked at the vice which opposed itself to the austere morality or hypocrisy of Puritanism.

This author cannot be well acquainted with Mrs. Behn's works, who makes a comparison between them and the productions of Durfey. There are marks of a fine understanding in the most unfinished piece of Mrs. Behn, and the very worst of this lady's compositions are preferable to Durfey's bell. It is unpleasing to have the merit of any of the Fair Sex lessened. Mrs.

Were a foreigner to form a notion of the merit of the English poets from reading Langbaine, they would be in raptures with Randolph and Durfey, and others of their class, while Dryden, and the first-rate wits, would be quite neglected; Langbaine is so far generous, that he does all he can to draw obscure men into light, but then he cannot be acquitted of envy, for endeavouring to shade the lustre of those whose genius has broke through obscurity without his means, and he does no service to his country while he confines his panegyric to mean versifiers, whom no body can read without a certain degree of contempt.

The Night-walker, or the Little Thief, a Comedy, revived since the Restoration with applause. The Noble Gentleman, a Comedy; this was revived by Mr. Durfey, and by him called The Fool's Preferment, at the Three Dukes of Dunstable. Philaster, or Love lies a Bleeding, a Tragi-Comedy. This was the first play that brought these fine writers into esteem.

I can remember the following as a portion of those who came to take part in the work of death which was so soon to follow, viz.: Brothers John M. Higbee, Chief of the Iron Danites, and also first Counselor to Brother Haight; Philip Klingensmith, Bishop of Cedar City; Ira Allen, of the High Council; Robert Wiley, of the High Council; Richard Harrison, of Pinto, also a member of the High Council; Samuel McMurdy, one of the Counselors of Klingensmith; Charles Hopkins, of the Counselors of Cedar City; Samuel Pollock; Daniel McFarland, a son-in-law of Haight; John Ure, of the City Council; George Hunter, of the City Council; Samuel Jukes; Nephi Johnson, with a number of Indians under his command; Irvin Jacobs; John Jacobs; E. Curtis, a Captain of Ten; Thomas Cartwright, of the City and High councils; William Bateman, who afterwards carried the flag of truce into the emigrant camp; Anthony Stratton; A. Loveridge; Joseph Clews; Jabez Durfey; Columbus Freeman.

Thus qualified and thus incited, he walked out to battle, and assailed at once most of the living writers, from Dryden to Durfey. His onset was violent; those passages, which, while they stood single, had passed with little notice, when they were accumulated and exposed together, excited horror.