or, Beauty the best advocate as it is acted at the theatre in Lincolns-Inn-Fields: written originally by Mr. Shakespear, and now very much alter’d, with additions of several entertainments of musick
Charles Gildon
London: Printed for D. Brown at the Black Swan without Temple-Bar and R. Parker at the Unicorn under the Royal Ex-change in Cornhill, 1700
The “very much alter’d” production of Measure for Measure, includes an epilogue “spoken by Mr. Verbruggen” (the actor John Verbruggen) as the ghost of Shakespeare. Here we have Shakespeare the Critic, commenting on contemporary theatre. Interestingly, the Ghost does not complain about the altering of his text, but rather that only a few actors—Mr. Verbruggen among them, we assume—are worthy of acting in his plays. —VH