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THE

DRAMATIC WORKS.

Catherine Maria Dawson

1762

WILLIAM CONGREVE, Efq;

IN TWO VOLUME S.

VOLUME FIRST.

LONDON:
Printed for S. CROWDER, C WARE, and T. PAY:

M DCC.LXXIII.

THE

OLD BACHELOR.

A

COMEDY.

"Quem tulit ad fcenam ventofo gloria curru, "Exanimat lentus fpectator; fedulus inflat.

"Sic leve, fic parvum eft, animum quod laudis avarum "Subruit, aut reficit."

Horat. Epift. I. Lib. 2.

CH

To the Right Honourable

ARLES,

I

Lord CLIFFORD.

MY LORD,

:

T is with a great deal of pleasure that I lay hold on this firft occafion, which the accidents of my life have given me, of writing to your Lordfhip for fince, at the fame time, I write to all the world, it will be a means of publishing (what I would have every body know) the respect and duty which I owe and pay to you. I have fo much in clination to be yours, that I need no other engagement: but the particular ties by which I am bound to your Lordship and family, have put it out of my power to make you any compliment; fince all offers of myself will amount to no more than an honest acknowledgment, and only fhew a willingnefs in me to-be grateful.

I am very near wishing that it were not fo much my intereft to be your Lordship's fervant, that it might be more my merit; not that I would avoid being obliged to you, but I would have my own. choice to run me into the debt; that I might have it to boast, I had distinguished a man, to whom I would be glad to be obliged, even without the

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