As some strong churl would, brandishing, advance
  The monumental sword that conquered France;
  So you, by judging this, your judgment teach,
  Thus far you like, that is, thus far you reach. 
  Since then the vote of full two thousand years
  Has crowned this plot, and all the dead are theirs,
  Think it a debt you pay, not alms you give,
  And, in your own defence, let this play live. 
  Think them not vain, when Sophocles is shown,
  To praise his worth they humbly doubt their own. 
  Yet as weak states each other’s power assure,
  Weak poets by conjunction are secure. 
  Their treat is what your palates relish most,
  Charm! song! and show! a murder and a ghost! 
  We know not what you can desire or hope,
  To please you more, but burning of a Pope.[1]

Footnote: 
1.  The burning a Pope in effigy, was a ceremony performed upon the
   anniversary of queen Elizabeth’s coronation.  When parties ran high
   betwixt the courtiers and opposition, in the latter part of Charles
   the II. reign, these anti-papal solemnities were conducted by the
   latter, with great state and expence, and employed as engines to
   excite the popular resentment against the duke of York, and his
   religion.  The following curious description of one of these
   tumultuary processions, in 1679, was extracted by Ralph, from a
   very scarce pamphlet; it is the ceremony referred to in the
   epilogue; and it shall be given at length, as the subject is
   frequently alluded to by Dryden.

   [Illustration: 
    The Solemn Mock Procession of the POPE, Cardinals, Jesuits,
      Friars, &c. 
    Through the CITY OF LONDON November 17.th 1679.

    London Published January 1808 by William Miller, Albemarle Street. 
    Dryden Works to face Vol 6th page 223]

“On the said 17th of November, 1679, the bells, generally, about the town, began to ring at three o’clock in the morning.  At the approach of the evening, (all things being in readiness) the solemn procession began, setting forth from Moregate, and so passed, first to Aldgate, and thence through Leadenhall-street, by the Royal Exchange, through Cheapside, and so to Temple-bar in the ensuing order, viz.

   “1.  Came six whifflers, to clear the way, in pioneer caps, and red
       waistcoats.

   “2.  A bellman ringing, and with a loud (but doleful) voice, crying
       out all the way, remember Justice Godfrey.

   “3.  A dead body, representing justice Godfrey, in a decent black
       habit, carried before a jesuit, in black, on horse-back, in
       like manner as he was carried by the assassins to Primrose
       Hill.

   “4.  Next after Sir Edmonbury, so mounted, came a priest in a
       surplice, with a cope embroidered with dead bones, skeletons,
       skulls, and the like, giving pardons very plentifully to all
       those who should murder protestants; and proclaiming it
       meritorious.