esirous of
extending his fame, by producing a tragedy. It has been alledged, that
some, who were jealous of his growing reputation, put him upon this
task, in order, as they imagined, to diminish it, for he seemed to be
of too gay and lively a disposition for tragedy, and in all likelihood
would miscarry in the attempt. However,

In 1697, after the expectation of the town had been much raised, the
Mourning Bride appeared on the New Theatre in Lincoln's-Inn-Fields:
few plays ever excited so great an ardour of expectation as this,
and very few ever succeeded to such an extravagant degree. There is
something new in the management of the plot; after moving the passions
of the audience to the greatest commiseration, he brings off his
principal characters, punishes the guilty, and makes the play conclude
happily.

The controversy we have just now mentioned, was thought to have
occasioned a dislike in Mr. Congreve towards the stage; yet he
afterwards produced another comedy called The Way of the World, which
was so just a picture of the world, that, as an author prettily says,

The world could not bear it.

The reception this play met with, compleated our author's disgust to
the theatre; upon which Mr. Dennis, who was a warm friend to Congreve,
made this fine observation, 'that Mr. Congreve quitted the stage
early, and that comedy left it with him.'

It is said that when Congreve found his play met with but indifferent
success, he came in a passion on the stage, and desired the audience
to save themselves the trouble of shewing their dislike; for he never
intended to write again for the Theatre, nor submit his works to the
censure of impotent critics. In this particular he kept his word with
them, and as if he had foreseen the fate of his play, he took an ample
revenge, in his Epilogue, of the race of Little Snarlers, who excited
by envy, and supported by false ideas of their own importance, dared
to constitute themselves judges of wit, without any just pretensions
to it. This play has long ago triumphed over its enemies, and is now
in great esteem amongst the best judges of Theatrical Entertainments.

Though Mr. Congreve quitted the stage, yet did not he give up the
cause of poetry; for on the death of the marquis of Blandford, the
only son of the duke of Marlborough, which happened in 1705, we find
him composing a pastoral to soften the grief of that illustrious
family, which he addressed to the lord treasurer Godol