At last, the Licentiousness of Persons assuming to themselves, in Defiance of the Royal Licence, the Erection and Management of Play-houses, has awaken’d the Attention of the British Legislature; and we may now hope for such Restraints being laid upon them, as have been long wished-for by the sober Part of the World, to make the Diversions and Entertainments exhibited on the Stage, both reasonable and useful, and to limit and restrain their increasing Number: And surely, never was the Legislative Interposition more seasonable than now, when Luxury, and a Taste for the lightest Amusements, have overspread the British World, and we find ourselves hastening apace into that Depravity of Manners, that prov’d the Ruin of the best constituted States and Commonwealths that ever were in Being.

No wonder, that this long-wish’d for and seasonable Animadversion of the Legislature, has alarm’d more particularly the Persons concern’d in Interest in one of the new-erected Theatres; The Proprietors and Managers of which have exhibited their respective Pretensions in a Stile so high and extraordinary, that they may be in a manner called their Demands upon the Legislature; and those, not for Toleration or Connivance, but for Countenance and Establishment.

But it is well known and remember’d, in what manner that Playhouse, for whose Existence and Establishment they sollicit, was set up and supported, in Defiance of the Prerogative of the Crown, which had always, till then, been allow’d to have an indisputable Right to license the Persons who pretended to act or perform Interludes, Plays, or other Entertainments of the Stage: And in Defiance of the City-Magistracy, to avoid whose Cognizance and Controul, it was contrived to be set up just without the Limits of the City.

We have also seen Sadler’s-Wells, Pancras-Wells, &c. (superadditionally to their customary Diversions) following this licentious Example, in order to invite and catch such of the City-Youth, who might, by taking the Diversion of Walking, escape the other; And not contented herewith, Projects were set on foot to augment the Number of Play-houses still nearer to the Heart of the City, as is express’d in an Advertisement publish’d several times in the publick Papers, to invite Subscribers, and to brave the City- Magistracy, after the laudable Example of Goodman’s-Fields;