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  THE
  INCONSTANT;

  A COMEDY,
  IN FIVE ACTS;


  BY GEORGE FARQUHAR, ESQ.


  AS PERFORMED AT THE
  THEATRE ROYAL, DRURY LANE.


  PRINTED UNDER THE AUTHORITY OF THE MANAGERS
  FROM THE PROMPT BOOK.

  WITH REMARKS
  BY MRS. INCHBALD.


  LONDON:
  PRINTED FOR LONGMAN, HURST, REES, AND ORME,
  PATERNOSTER ROW.




  WILLIAM SAVAGE, PRINTER,
  LONDON.




REMARKS.


This comedy, by a favourite writer, had a reception, on the first night
of its appearance, far inferior to that of his other productions. It
was, with difficulty, saved from condemnation; and the author, in his
preface, has boldly charged some secret enemies with having attempted
its destruction.

Dramatic authors have fewer enemies at the present period, or they
have more humility, than formerly. For now, when their works are
hissed from the stage, they acknowledge they have had a fair trial,
and deserve their fate. Wherefore should an author seek for remote
causes, to account for his failures, when to himself alone, he is
certain ever to impute all his success?

Neither the wit, humour, nor the imitation of nature, in this play,
are of that forcible kind, with which the audience had been usually
delighted by Farquhar; and, that the moral gave a degree of superiority
to this drama, was, in those days, of little consequence: