COMEDY. BY WILLIAM CONGREVE, ESQ. ADAPTED FOR THEATRICAL REPRESENTATION, AS PERFORMED AT THE THEATRES-ROYAL, DRURY-LANE AND COVENT-GARDEN. REGULATED FROM THE PROMPT-BOOKS, "The Lines distinguished by inverted Commas, are omitted in the Representation." LONDON: Printed for the Proprietors, under the Direction of JOHN BELL, British Library, STRAND, Bookseller to His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales. M DCC XCI. LOVE FOR LOVE. WITH this excellent Play the new Theatre and Company opened at Lincolns-Inn-Fields. Its success was so great that Betterton and his brother Managers, it is recorded, offered the Author in consequence, a whole share in their profits upon the sole condition of furnishing them annually with a new Play. Or this piece it may be remarked, that it has stronger diversities of character than any other written by CONGREVE, and those characters have a closer approximation to life-That the manners are well opposed and their effect irresistible -FORESIGHT who refers "Man's goatish disposition to the charge of a star," then could not excite the laughter he does now, as a great majority of his hearers, it may be presumed, relied upon the same influence and confided in similar predictions. The FORESIGHT of our inimitable PARSONS may be recorded as perfection. THEY who are conversant with Nautical language, find the conversation of BEN either illsuited or obsolete, yet he excites much laughter and keeps it; but the common impression now generally received |