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AN 
 
 ESSAY ON THE STAGE ; 
 
 WITH AN APPENDIX. 
 

 
 
&L*Cj£rr4-^J%~.s£~~r~'-. ^'I ' 
 
 AN 
 
 ESSAY 
 
 ©N THE 
 
 CHARACTER AND INFLUENCE 
 
 OF 
 
 THE STAGE 
 
 ON MORALS AND HAPPINESS. 
 
 BY JOHN STYLES. 
 
 " Shall Truth be silent because Folly frowns ?" 
 
 Young. 
 
 SECOND EDITION, 
 
 WITH AN APPENDIX. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 PRINTED FOR MESSRS. WILLIAMS AND SMITH, 
 STATIC NKR'S-COURT. 
 
 JR. Tilling, Printer, Newport, Ule of Wight. 
 
 1807. 
 

CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAP. I. 
 
 Page. 
 A brief Enquiry into the Origin and Progress of 
 
 the Stage - - - 1 
 
 CHAR II. 
 
 An Enquiry into the principal Causes which have 
 
 contributed to the suceess ofeke^Stage 1 1 . 
 
 CHAP. III. 
 
 The Effects produced by the Stage on Morals and on 
 
 Happiness - - - 20 
 
 CHAP. IV. 
 
 The Character of the Stage, as drawn by Historians, 
 
 Philosophers, Legislators, and Dici)ies 3/ 
 
 CHAP. V. 
 
 Whether the Stage is in a State of moral Improve- 
 ment considered - - 44 
 A3 
 
VI CONTENTS. 
 
 Page. 
 
 CHAP. VI. 
 
 Cursory Observations on the Writers for the Stage 9 
 on the Actors, and the Audience, illustrative 
 of its dangerous and immoral Tendency 51 
 
 CHAP. VII. 
 
 The Stage considered imth respect to its Influence in 
 
 retarding the Progress of vital Christianity 7& 
 
 CHAP. VIII. 
 
 The Stage considered as an Amusement only 1Q7' 
 
 Conclusion - - - - 115 
 
 Appendix - - - - 123 
 
 ERRATA. 
 
 Page 17, for a verecundiiisque," read w vcrecundusque." 
 Page 20, note, for " n© evidence of a tiling," read M no evi 
 
 d«:ncr' of the utility of a thing." 
 
 Pz?;e 49, for w Miss Eaille," read " Miss Baillie." 
 Page 133, for " Mrs. Moore," read" Mrs. More." 
 In two or three instances supply inverted commas at the end 
 
 ef quotations. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 Whatever different opinions may be 
 entertained, respecting the execution of 
 the following Work, the Author hopes 
 that, among the friends of morality and 
 religion, there will be but one as to its 
 object. It may, however, be justly 
 asked, Why is the subject of the Theatre 
 again agitated? Has it net of late espe- 
 cially been amply discussed ? That this 
 subject has excited considerable attention 
 must be acknowledged ; but it surely w r ill 
 not be seriously urged, that any work has 
 been recently written, which, separate 
 from personal alteration and local circum- 
 stances, has any claim to general circtila- 
 
Vlll PREFACE, 
 
 tion. In single sermons, and in a well; 
 written pamphlet * f strictures on the im- 
 morality and dangerous tendency of the 
 Stage have appeared; but there has been 
 no volume of modern publication which is 
 professedly and exclusively devoted to the 
 subject. 
 
 A remark in the Eclectic Review, which 
 declared it to be of no small practical 
 interest, induced me to undertake the 
 present Work : with what success I have 
 fulfilled my task the public must decide. 
 I offer no apology for inaccuracy ; the 
 general cant of authors, by which they 
 would disarm criticism : as I have always 
 despised it, * so I disdain to employ it. 
 Every man who prints should do his best : 
 but if he think to attain perfection, he 
 betrays a weakness which will ensure his 
 disappointment. However, without sup- 
 * Rev, Rowland Hall's " Warning to Professors." 
 
PREFACE. IX 
 
 posing that his production is faultless, an 
 author and his reader are not always 
 agreed as to its merit, It is natural for 
 the one to view his offspring with fond- 
 ness, to array it in imaginary charms : while 
 the other, feeling no kindred attachment, 
 may contemplate it with frigid indifference, 
 or expose its blemishes with cruel severity. 
 Like the sickly infant, many a literary 
 performance comes into the world to go 
 out of it again ; and stays no longer than 
 to gasp and die. Yet, surely no individual 
 ever wrote for the press, who was himself 
 persuaded, that obloquy would cover him 
 with shame ; or contempt be the reward 
 of his toil. 
 
 In the present instance, whatever may 
 be my fate, I have at least this conso- 
 lation, that I have endeavoured to give 
 " ardour to .virtue, and confidence to 
 truth." In this I may have failed ; but, it 
 
X PREFACE. 
 
 has been my object and my aim. Secure 
 in the appobation of my own conscience, 
 and of all good men, I court no other, 
 patronage, and I deprecate no censure. 
 
 Flattering compliments from a venal 
 pen may soothe the pride of greatness, 
 and there may be " golden reasons" for 
 employing the honeyed accents of praise, 
 to emblazon the generosity, and exalt the 
 taste of some distinguished lord of our 
 creation : but the man who will sacrifice 
 his dignity to his interest, dishonours 
 human nature, and has only to turn 
 player to complete the degradation of 
 his character. 
 
 From the severity of hyper-criticism I 
 have nothing to fear: a work possessing 
 inherent merit will make its way in spite 
 of opposition: but if it contain, in its 
 own bosom, the seeds of dissolution, the 
 kindness of friends will prolong its exist- 
 
PREFACE. XI 
 
 ence but a little while, and it needs not 
 the officious hand of criticism to dispatch 
 it to an untimely grave. 
 
 Fitzgerald's Cottage. West j # S # 
 
 Cow es y Isle of Wight. 
 
ADVERTISEMENT 
 
 TO THE SECOND EDITION. 
 
 The Author has availed himself in this edition 
 of several important extracts from celebrated 
 writers, in confirmation of the general design of 
 his work. He has also subjoined an Appendix, in 
 which the principles and observations contained in 
 the Essay are defended, against the strictures of 
 an article in the fifth volume of the Annual Review. 
 By these additions, the book is considerably en- 
 larged : — whether it is improved, is a question 
 which only a judicious public can decide. At the 
 hands of the Reviewers, as he has never received 
 so the Author does not expect mercy. He has 
 now attacked one of their tribe, and he doubts not 
 that, to avenge the insult, they will literally regard 
 a maxim, which they seldom forget, and which 
 is indeed the secret of all good reviewing, " ca- 
 lumniare for titer " 
 
AS 
 
 ESSAY ON THE STAGE, 
 
 CHAP, L 
 
 A BRIEF INQUIRY INTO THE ORIGIN AND 
 PROGRESS OF THE STAGE. 
 
 JLHE history of the Theatre from its com- 
 mencement to the present hour, furnishes us 
 with a melancholy picture of human folly and 
 degeneracy; and, if it be indeed the epitome of 
 man, how hard must be his heart, who, while 
 viewing his species through this medium, does 
 not weep over human nature! 
 
 But it is not the origin and progress of the 
 Stage in this view that I now mean to trace; all 
 I intend in this chapter, as introductory to the 
 principal object of my essay, is to inquire — 
 What gave rise to theatrical representation ; in 
 what nations the Theatre has been supported 
 and encouraged; and what has been its progress 
 in ancient and modern times. 
 
 B 
 
2 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 The Theatre, so injurious, so hostile to true 
 religion, owes its existence to the false religions 
 of Heathenism : its first inventors probably were 
 a superstitious or an interested priesthood. 
 
 The religion of the Heathens, as it was a 
 religion of extravagance and falsehood, acquired 
 and retained its influence by pomp and parade — 
 by dazzling the imagination and inflaming the 
 passions. To secure its votaries, it accom- 
 modated itself to their appetites and depravity ; 
 and the peace and welfare of society were 
 infinitely more preserved by the civil law, than 
 by the principles of piety, if indeed we may 
 dignify the blind homage of the multitude to 
 their execrable deities by this venerable name. 
 But though their religion did little for the Hea- 
 then world, either in promoting their virtue or 
 their happiness, as a potent charm it held them 
 in profound submission ; and perhaps the most 
 powerful spring, the grand talisman, which so 
 completely subdued and retained them, was the 
 theatrical vehicle which conveyed to them the 
 history of their absurd mythology. y 
 
 The knowledge of their gods and of their 
 divine exploits they received not in the dull 
 uninteresting method of lecture and discourse; 
 when they were instructed, the fascinating- 
 charms of gesture and action rivetted the 
 attention and captivated the soul. But the 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 3 
 
 tendency of all human things to degeneracy 
 produced what we now understand by the 
 Drama. That which first was solely appropri- 
 ated to the service of the gods, was soon divested 
 of its exclusive honours, and prostituted to pur* 
 poses the most ignoble and vile. The disgusting 
 mime and pantomime attracted the attention 
 of the multitude ; to these succeeded Comedy, 
 more regular perhaps, but little superior: and 
 at length Tragedy, stately in its manner, disci- 
 plined in its form, enriched with sentiment, and 
 adorned by the graces, gradually arose to its dis- 
 tinguished eminence. 
 
 Thus did the Theatre rear its head under the 
 reign of Paganism in ancient times; and the 
 modern history of its origin in Europe, among 
 Christians, since the establishment of Christi- 
 anity, traces it to religion. — In the earliest 
 and best ages of the church, the Theatre was 
 regarded with abhorrence by the Christian Fa- 
 thers ; and it was thought a crime little less than 
 apostasy, for a Christian to be a spectator at any 
 of the public shows. But, when Christianity 
 was transformed and united to a refined system 
 of worldly policy, the degraded priesthood, after 
 the example of their Pagan ancestors, in order to 
 render their religion palatable, and also to coun- 
 teract the influence of the Troubadours and 
 Minstrels (of whom they became exceedingly 
 B 2 
 
4 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 jealous), annexed to it Heathen pomp and cere- 
 mony ; they actually made the events of sacred 
 history the subjects of dramatic representation; 
 and the mock disciples of the Holy Jesus were 
 disciplined into a theatrical corps, who vainly 
 attempted to conceal their avarice and hypocrisy 
 under the transparent garb of grimace and show. 
 Thus we read of the " holy brotherhood of the 
 crucifixion," a tribe of vagrant robbers, who, like 
 locusts, overran those countries which groaned 
 beneath the Papal yoke. These were instru- 
 mental in sowing the seeds of the Drama, which 
 have issued in those fruits, fair in appearance, 
 " like that w T hich grew in paradise," but which 
 are in reality the produce of that grove, which 
 deceived the arch deceiver, when with hate- 
 fullest disrelish he 
 
 . " writh'd his jaws, 
 
 With soot and cinders fill'd." Milton. 
 
 Among the most distinguished countries 
 which supported and cherished the Stage, before 
 the diffusion of Christianity, we may reckon 
 Greece and Rome; indeed in this division we 
 include the then civilized world. Athens claims 
 the pre-eminence, and was the first city in which 
 was established a regular theatre. The Athenian 
 stage may be considered as the parent stock; 
 from thence it branched off as far as Rome, till it 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. O 
 
 became at last the elegant and favourite amuse- 
 ment, wherever poetry was admired and luxury 
 enjoyed. 
 
 In modern times, Italy, France, Germany, and 
 England have laboured to attain theatrical emi- 
 nence — they have each produced favourite dra- 
 matic writers, and each boasts the unrivalled 
 excellence of its performers. 
 
 The progress of the Stage among the ancients 
 and moderns has been various. By progress, I 
 do not mean its improvement as an art, but its 
 gradual advancement in favour and importance 
 in the estimation of mankind. At Athens it was 
 always cherished with enthusiasm by the people, 
 and a passion for the theatre became a national 
 characteristic. The Athenians, seized with a 
 theatrical phrensy, almost suspended the com- 
 mon occupations of life, to enjoy the amuse- 
 ments of the Stage. Dramatic writers among 
 them were men of the highest consideration : — 
 in their annals, legislators and statesmen appear 
 a sort of inferior beings, when brought in com- 
 petition with Aristophanes and Menander, with 
 Euripides and Sophocles. 
 
 Among the Romans, for a series of years, the 
 dramatic art was little cultivated. At the time 
 of its first introduction, the rigid features of the 
 old Roman character were strongly visible; but 
 as these wore away, the Stage advanced with 
 
 B3 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 rapid progress, extended more widely its influ- 
 ence, and became, as at Athens, the fashionable 
 resort of the idle, the dissolute, and the gay. 
 
 The history of the Stage is much more dis- 
 tinctly marked in modern times, and its steps 
 more easily traced. The Italians have been re- 
 markable for their Dramatic taste, for the num- 
 ber of their theatres, and the talents of their per- 
 formers. The French have devoted themselves 
 with enthusiasm to the pleasures of the stage; and 
 the horrors of the revolution, instead of checking 
 seemed to increase their rage for this destructive 
 amusement. The number of public theatres at 
 Paris is almost incredible. Germany has asto- 
 nished its neighbours by the multitude, variety, 
 and immorality of its dramatic compositions, the 
 fatal poison of which has spread its baneful influ- 
 ence through all Europe, and has even infected 
 the New World. England is rapidly following 
 the example of surrounding nations; and that she 
 lias not exceeded them is only to be attributed 
 to the spirit of her law r s, and the vigilance of her 
 government. 
 
 But in spite of these it is a melancholy fact, 
 that a rage for theatrical pleasures awfully cha- 
 racterizes our age and country. Not contented 
 with the principal theatres in the metropolis — 
 with the Opera, with Covent Garden, and Drury 
 Lane, we have our summer theatres in abund« 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. i 
 
 ance; and it is so contrived, that, for a consider- 
 ble period, they are all open at the same time, 
 In addition to these, we have our private theatri- 
 cals, and our school exhibitions. The fashion- 
 able world must have theatres of its own; and 
 inspired with a laudable ambition, they mix 
 with players that they may attain the proud dis- 
 tinction of histrionic fame. Our very children are 
 also instructed to consider the Stage as the prin- 
 cipal source of amusement. — Boys and girlsmust 
 be forced to an unnatural maturity in this hot-bed 
 of the passions : they are not only taken to the 
 theatre, but at school they must become actors 
 and actresses. To excel in the art of playing 
 is now considered a genteel accomplishment. 
 And a theatrical spirit is not confined to the 
 higher classes of society; in the lower walks 
 of life, and particularly in the metropolis, I am 
 informed, there are rooms hired on purpose for 
 theatrical representation : — 
 
 05 Whither the nrrwasVd artizan repairs,'' 
 
 to tear a passion to tatters, to rave in Lear, or to 
 whine in Romeo. In these private exhibitions, 
 merchant's clerks, mechanics, and apprentices 
 acquire habits fatal to the interests of sobriety 
 and happiness. The imaginary prince and hero 
 soon feels a sort of real dignity, which entirely 
 unfits him for the discharge of those important 
 B4 
 
8 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 duties' which are inseparable from his condition 
 in life. 
 
 Provincial theatres have also alarmingly in- 
 creased. In almost every country town w r e have 
 now a play-house, which is occasionally visited 
 by some strolling company, who are generally 
 the very offal of society, the vagrant apostles of 
 indecency and immorality, whose business is to 
 spread idleness and dissipation in every place 
 where they are permitted to open their commis- 
 sion. Poor, because they disdain the honourable 
 occupations of life, they submit to any meanness, 
 and mix with the very lowest of the people, that 
 they may obtain suffrage and support. The law, 
 indeed, considers them as vagabonds, and has laid 
 upon them some restraint; but, unfortunately, it 
 has left the exercise of this restraint to the dis- 
 cretion of justices of the peace, when it ought 
 to be invariable in its operation, and universal in 
 its extent. The mean compliances and wretched 
 expedients, to which these poor creatures resort 
 to gain a livelihood of infamy, is thus humour- 
 ously described by the satirist : — 
 
 " The strolling tribe, a despicable race, 
 
 Like wand'ring Arabs, shift from place to place ; 
 
 Vagrants by law, to justice open laid, 
 
 They tremble, of the beadle's lash afraid ; 
 
 And fawning, cringe, for wretched means of liie, 
 
 To madam mayoress, or his worship's wife. 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 9 
 
 The mighty monarch, in. theatric sack, 
 
 Carries his whole regalia at his back ; 
 
 His royal consort heads the female hand. 
 
 And leads the heir-apparent in her hand; 
 
 The pannier' d ass creeps on with conscious pride. 
 
 Bearing a future prince on either side : 
 
 No choice musicians in this troop are found 
 
 To varnish nonsense with the charms of sound ; 
 
 No swords, no daggers, not one poisoned bowl - y 
 
 No light'ning flashes here, no thunders roll ; 
 
 No guards to swell the monarch's train are shown- 
 
 The monarch here must be a host alone 5 
 
 No solemn pomp, no slow processions here, 
 
 No Amnion's entry, and no Juliet's bier/ 1 
 
 With a very little variation, allowing for the 
 change of times and manners, this description is 
 strictly accurate now. And creatures so vulgar, 
 so poor, so infamous, can do little injury to the 
 well-educated part of the community; they are 
 chiefly dangerous to the industrious poor, who, 
 allured by their buffoonery, relinquish their em- 
 ployments, and injure themselves and families by 
 a frequent and expensive attendance on the 
 ridiculous follies of a barn exhibition ; or w 7 hat 
 is quite as disreputable, a country theatre. It 
 is surprising that men of refinement and educa- 
 tion should suffer their taste and judgment to be 
 tortured by the bad acting, and worse speak- 
 ing of provincial players; and that, without 
 any motive, without even the chance of be; 
 Bd 
 
10 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 pleased, they should lend their example to en- 
 courage the lower orders of society to spend 
 their money and their time at the expense of 
 their morals., and their happiness. 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE, 11 
 
 CHAP. II. 
 
 AN INQUIRY INTO THE PRINCIPAL CAUSES 
 WHICH HAVE CONTRIBUTED TO THE SUC- 
 CESS OF THE STAGE. 
 
 jL O investigate the causes of things, to answer 
 the why and wherefore, with which curiosity 
 accosts us at every step, is the business of philo- 
 sophy: but it is often difficult, and sometimes 
 impossible, for the most comprehensive human 
 intellect to seize the link which binds together 
 cause and effect, principle and result. The 
 subject which this chapter is intended to dis- 
 cuss is happily unembarrassed, and within the 
 ken of moderate intelligence. — The causes 
 which have contributed, in ancient and mo- 
 dern times, to raise the Stage to the eminence 
 which it has ever maintained in all coun- 
 tries remarkably civilized, are to be found — in 
 the Dramatic Art itself, simply considered:- — in 
 the subjects which have uniformly employed the 
 Dramatic pen ; — in the character and moral state 
 of the nations, by which the Drama has been 
 welcomed and encouraged. 
 
 The Dramatic Art, simply considered, will 
 
12 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 account, in some measure, for the influence of 
 the Stage. 
 
 That fiction, like a charm, affects the mind, 
 touches the heart, and interests the passions, is 
 a truth which all acknowledge, which all have 
 felt. A tale whether founded on truth or not, 
 which presents to our view an interesting group 
 of fellow-beings struggling with difficulty, drink- 
 ing of the cup of sorrow, will draw forth the 
 sympathetic tear. The relation of ludicrous 
 incidents will produce laughter; and the repre- 
 sentation of virtue receiving its reward, after 
 numberless misfortunes, excites very lively emo- 
 tions of joy. By a fiction of the imagination 
 we easily persuade ourselves that all which w r e 
 read is actually passing before us: — the illusion 
 is, for the time, complete; ideal presence makes 
 us forget ourselves; — we are thrown into a kind 
 of reverie, and feel precisely as if we were eye- 
 witnesses of all that the w 7 riter describes. 
 
 This is true of fiction in general ; but one 
 peculiar species of it interests the feelings far 
 more exquisitely, and rouses emotions and pas- 
 sions in a much more sensible degree, and that 
 is — fiction assuming a Dramatic form. Here, 
 instead of being introduced to characters by 
 description, instead of learning their actions or 
 sufferings from another, we hear them tell their 
 own tale-— we are made confidents of their most 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 13 
 
 secret sentiments, and auditors and spectators 
 of their resolutions, their enterprises, and the 
 happy or unhappy events attending them. Thus 
 it is evident, that in simple Dramatic writing 
 there is something congenial with the frame and 
 constitution of the human mind; and it affords 
 in the hand of a master, when enlisted in the 
 cause of virtue, a refined and exquisite satisfac- 
 tion*. 
 
 It will not then excite surprise, when we con- 
 sider how wonderfully fiction, in this mode, is 
 calculated to please, that the Stage should have 
 so widely extended its influence; especially 
 when, superadded to this, we consider the sub- 
 jects which have uniformly employed the Dra- 
 matic pen : and these have always been adapted 
 to man as depraved; they have flattered the 
 prejudices of the world, and have often gratified 
 the worst dispositions of the heart. 
 
 Ancient Tragedy is certainly the most un- 
 exceptionable part of Dramatic history; but in 
 this a Christian finds enough to make him mourn 
 over the moral degradation of mankind. Pride, 
 ambition, and revenge are prominent features in 
 
 * I would here just observe, that Dramatic writing and the 
 Theatre are things essentially different. A Theatre indeed 
 necessarily supposes Dramatic writing ; hut there may be 
 Dramatic writing without a Theatre :— the establishment of a 
 Stage cannot be subservient to virtue, for reasons which I will 
 hereafter assign. 
 
14 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 ancient tragedy ; but in this the heathens were 
 consistent with themselves, and inculcated the 
 same lessons at the theatre which they heard in 
 their temples. The Drama was a sort of coad- 
 jutor to their religion; for, depraved as they 
 were, they would never have tolerated a theatre 
 which disseminated principles hostile to the esta- 
 blished religion ; this is an inconsistency pecu- 
 liar to Christian countries, and Christian legis- 
 latures. It was a part of Pagan worship, to 
 deify heroes; and the Theatre was the stage on 
 w r hich heroic actions were represented and ap- 
 plauded. 
 
 The aim of tragedy has been, in every age, 
 to rouse, what some have called, the greater 
 passions; that is, those passions which have been 
 the fruitful source of almost all the misery which 
 has deluged the world. Against the indulgence 
 of these, the Pagan religions, as it has been re- 
 marked, opposed no counteracting influence. It 
 is not therefore at all surprising, that the Dra- 
 matic art, employed on such subjects under such 
 circumstances, should rapidly advance the Stage 
 in public favour. But tragedy is chiefly suited 
 to men of literature, and to those who in under- 
 standing are raised above the common level. It 
 is Comedy, with wit, humour, ridicule, and 
 licentiousness in her train, which has contributed 
 more than any thing to the wide-spreading influ- 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 15 
 
 ence of a theatrical passion among the middling 
 and lower classes of society. Ancient Come- 
 dy was made up of buffoonery and satire; it 
 indulged in a liberty scarcely credible, in expos- 
 ing to ridicule the most illustrious and powerful 
 persons in the state : — it not only aimed its shafts 
 at folly and knavery, but actually brought fools 
 and knaves upon the Stage, and described them 
 with so much truth and accuracy, that it was im- 
 possible to misunderstand who the persons were 
 that became the objects of poetical censure; and 
 generals, magistrates, government, the very gods 
 were abandoned to the poet's satirical vein. 
 Thus, when comedy was represented, Envy en- 
 joyed a malignant feast; fell Discontent received 
 a delicious gratification, and 
 
 " Grinn'd horribly a ghastly smile," 
 
 while those who had no spleen to gratify, no 
 hatred to indulge, laughed inconsiderately at a 
 fellow-creature's expense. This sort of comedy 
 was abominably licentious, and was filled with 
 obscenities, " which denote (says Rollin) exces- 
 sive libertinism in the spectators, and depra- 
 vity in the poet." Formed of such materials, 
 the Stage secured the approbation of a de- 
 praved world:— what power could impede its 
 success when it became a pander to the lusts of 
 mankind ? 
 
16 ESSAY ON THE STAGE, 
 
 Middle Comedy differed little from the 
 former, except that the poet no longer dared to 
 satirize the great. 
 
 The New Comedy, established by A lexanJer, 
 was confined to private life, and is the model 
 which our modern writers profess to imitate: 
 this too was composed of ridicule and licentious- 
 ness. The moderns in this respect have followed 
 their predecessors — "passibus aequis :" and as their 
 professed object is, and must be, to please, they 
 accommodate themselves to public opinion and 
 to public taste ; they govern not the audience 
 but the audience governs them. This naturally 
 accounts for the progress which the Stage has 
 made both in former and later times. — But there 
 are other causes which have conspired with those 
 already stated to produce this effect, and these 
 are to be found in the character and moral state 
 of those countries by which the Theatre has been 
 encouraged. — In this view of the Subject, we 
 may denominate the causes of the success and 
 influence of the Stage to have been Civilization 
 advanced beyond its zenith, Wealth, Luxury, 
 and Idleness. 
 
 In all ages we must look for the lovers and 
 supporters of the Theatre, not among the nations 
 unsophisticated by the abuses which generally 
 accompany a high degree of civilization, but in 
 those countries where wealth and extensive em- 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 17 
 
 pire have poured in upon the capital the 
 abundance of luxury. 
 
 There is a certain point in civilization, beyond 
 which it contributes not to a nation's prosperity 
 or happiness, and that point is, the utmost limit 
 of refinement consistent with virtue. When once 
 the appearance of virtue is substituted in place of 
 the reality, it may be fairly said, the nation of 
 which it is characteristic is on the decline ; and 
 it is a remarkable fact, that the Theatre never 
 becomes a general or a favourite amusement in 
 any country till this is the case. When the 
 sinews of Roman and Athenian virtue were the 
 strongest, the people had neither time nor in- 
 clination to regard the diversions of the Stage. — 
 Horace, speaking of the Romans in reference to 
 their indifference to the Theatre, assigns for their 
 conduct the following reasons: 
 
 K Quo sane populus numerabilis utpote parvus, 
 Et frugi, castusque verecundiusque coibat." 
 
 They were few, they were wise, they were religi- 
 ous, and they were modest. White this was their 
 character the Theatre made no progress among 
 them ; and I am persuaded there is not a nation 
 under heaven of which this sentence is descrip- 
 tive, where the Stage would be tolerated, or could 
 possibly arrive at celebrity and general patronage. 
 A high degree of national virtue, an attention to 
 
18 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 the duties of social life, and the necessity of 
 industry, have ever militated against this dan- 
 gerous and destructive amusement. 
 
 At first, so jealous were the Romans of its in- 
 fluence, that it was found impossible to build 
 among them a permanent Theatre: the most 
 magnificent structures, which cost immense sums 
 in the erection, were only permitted to stand for 
 a few days. It was not till the Romans and 
 Athenians became emasculated by wealth and 
 by luxury, that they afforded countenance and 
 support to che Stage. 
 
 The Roman empire w r as rapidly on the decline 
 when Nero himself became a buffoon and a 
 comedian ; and while the Grecians were relaxing 
 the nerves of their strength by these effeminate 
 amusements for which their luxury and idleness 
 gave them a taste, they were gradually unfolding 
 the gates of their city to Philip of Macedon. 
 Let glory intoxicate, and ease effeminate a 
 people, — let wealth relax industry and furnish 
 the refinements of luxury, — let religion be neg- 
 lected and its sanctions despised,' — and the 
 Theatre will rise to the stature of a colossus, and 
 a nation will fall down and worship the idol of 
 its own creation. 
 
 These assertions require not arguments to 
 enforce them ; standing on the base of truth 
 I point to the column of Jiistory: there I see 
 
BSSA.Y ON THE STAGE. 19 
 
 national virtue, sobriety, industry, manly vigour 
 strongly contending every inch of ground with 
 the abettors of the stage, till at last over- 
 powered by wealth and its concomitant evils they 
 are constrained to yield, 
 
20 ESSAY ON THE STAGE, 
 
 CHAP. III. 
 
 THE EFFECTS PRODUCED BY THE STAGE ON 
 MORALS AND ON HAPPINESS. 
 
 JDY their fruits ye shall know them," is 
 equally applicable to things as to men; prac- 
 tical utility is an argument which refutes 
 a thousand objections against a theory or a 
 system *• If it can be proved that great and im- 
 portant advantages result from any thing, the 
 propriety and expediency of which are called in 
 question, nothing but the most incorrigible ob- 
 stinacy will persevere in hostility and say, "Hurl 
 it to the ground." 
 
 But some things may be presented to our view 
 in such a questionable shape, that the subtle 
 casuist, availing himself of the ambiguity in 
 which he has involved them, will confound truth 
 and perplex the clearest reasoning on the sub- 
 ject. — It is not always easy to decide the simple 
 question of utility, though that decision might 
 set an agitated subject for ever at rest. 
 
 * That is, supposing the question does not involve in it the 
 eternal principles of right : no evidence of a thing essentially 
 evil will change its nature and constitute it good. 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 21 
 
 The effects of the Stage on morals and on 
 happiness, if clearly pointed out, would, in my 
 opinion, go far towards establishing the conclu- 
 sion, that it is an evil of awful magnitude, the 
 abolition of which the well-being of society impe- 
 riously demands. But even on this ground the 
 Drama is not destitute of advocates; there are 
 not wanting theatrical enthusiasts, who with an 
 overflowing zeal for the cause boldly aver, that 
 the Stage has been a public blessing to the world, 
 " That it must float on public favour, the mirror 
 of a nation's virtue and the enlightened and po- 
 lished school of a free people." 
 
 But not one of its champions has advanced 
 fairly and openly into the field of contest ; they 
 have all intrenched themselves in some of those 
 plausible representations with which the Dra- 
 matic Art, abstractedly considered, has furnished 
 them. The Stage cannot boast one literary ad- 
 vocate who has viewed it impartially, who has 
 taken its just features and traced its moral influ- 
 ence. There is not one in fact who has defend- 
 ed the Stage as it is; a creature of their own 
 imagination, a Stage which never had existence 
 but in the regions of fancy, many have indeed 
 fervidly and successfully eulogized. They have 
 given just such a view of the Theatre as Con- 
 dorcet and Godwin in their wild and beautiful 
 theories, have given of man, which possess 
 
 ■ 
 
 Hi 
 
22 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 every thing to make them charming 1 — but 
 truth. 
 
 /we are not to reason a priori on what delight-\ 
 ful effects a perfect theatre, " A baseless fabric 
 of a vision/' might produce ; we have nothing to 
 do with those who would lead us on to the ut- 
 most verge of possibility, who refer us to some 
 distant golden age when this Leopard will change 
 his spots. The true foundation of all reasoning is t 
 knowledge. The great question is, What has 
 the real not an imaginary Theatre actually pro- 
 duced? And the point which is now before us, 
 is not what talents have been called forth by the 
 Drama, what improvement literature and taste 
 have derived from it, but what has been its in- I 
 fluence on the morals and the happiness of/ 
 mankind. 
 
 I am willing to allow the Stage all that its 
 warmest friends are disposed to claim on the 
 score of literary refinement and taste. But I am 
 by no means persuaded that these effects might 
 not have been otherwise produced. It is, strictly 
 speaking, but one branch of literature that has 
 received peculiar advantage from the Theatre ; 
 and perhaps I may be accused of vandalism, 
 when I declare, that if literary taste and the 
 fine arts connected with the Stage must be pur- 
 chased at the enormous expence of morals and 
 of happiness, it is our duty to preserve our virtue 
 
 #** 
 
 ** 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE, 23 
 
 let the fate of polite literature be what it 
 
 I am far from asserting that immorality and* 
 Dramatic writing are necessarily connected; 
 they clearly are not; for Dramatic writing is 
 perfectly distinct from virtue and from vice, and 
 may be made subservient to either; but I main- 
 tain, that immorality and the Theatre have 
 hitherto been inseparable,) And I fear not con- 
 tradiction when I assert, that since the promul- 
 gation and establishment of Christianity, the 
 Stage has never been for three months together, 
 what a wise Legislature, concerned for the morals 
 of the people, and consequently for their felicity, 
 could consistently tolerate : and from what is 
 known of human nature, there is no probability 
 of a change. Indeed from the nature and cir- 
 cumstances of a Theatre, which will afterwards 
 be considered, a radical improvement in this 
 respect is impossible. It is fair in arguing against 
 what we disapprove, to state those facts which 
 make the scale of reason preponderate in our 
 favour. 
 
 As a prosperous Stage is one of the effects of 
 Luxury, Idleness, and Dissipation, it is marked 
 with the features of its family, and to render their 
 progress more alarming, it lends to its progeni- 
 tors all its power. Aided by the Theatre, these 
 destroyers of virtue become more and more 
 
24 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 successful in the work of death. In the Stage 
 they have a powerful auxiliary, more particularly 
 i useful in enlarging the boundaries of their influ- 
 ence. The effeminacy of luxury, its idleness and 
 its vice, are at first confined to the wealthy and 
 the great : and while the body of the people re- 
 main uncontaminated, the cause of virtue, com- 
 paratively speaking, suffers little. The fruitful 
 parent of vice and misery is that which relaxes 
 the nerve of industry ; which transforms the citi- 
 zen, the tradesman, and the mechanic, into the 
 man of fashion, the lounger, and the libertine. 
 While dissipation moves in the narrow circle of 
 the exalted few, it is but an excrescence on the 
 tody — it affects not the constitution; but when 
 it widens its sphere, and embraces alike the poor 
 and the rich, with the intermediate space be- 
 tween, it is as if the whole mass of blood was 
 infected with deadly poison. And that channel, 
 through which the higher classes of society pour 
 forth their contaminating influence upon the 
 humbler walks of life, whatever it be, is perhaps 
 of all the evils that ever entered the world the 
 most baneful and destructive; — and I feel no 
 hesitation in declaring, that this evil is the Stage. 
 One fair way of judging whether a Theatre be 
 beneficial or injurious, is to suppose that it has 
 its full influence, and produces all the effect 
 which its principles are calculated to produce, 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. *.525 
 
 without any counteracting influence from Chris- 
 tianity. I will suppose a city, where the natu- 
 ral depravity of the human heart grows with no 
 more than common luxuriance, when aided by 
 companionship and example. — Let us conjec- 
 ture that it is entirely destitute of every thing- 
 like religion, but what man is able to disco^ 
 ver by his conscience, and the light of reason. 
 Imagine, if you can, that some benevolent com- 
 pany of players, touched with compassion at the 
 awful ignorance and wickedness of the inhabi- 
 tants of this city, should kindly undertake to 
 instruct them by amusement and theatrical re-* 
 presentation. — And to complete the fiction, sup- 
 pose they were to take with them a goodly num- 
 ber of the most popular dramatic pieces which 
 have received the sanction and applause of a 
 Christian audience; do you think that, after a 
 fair trial, the inhabitants would be the better, or 
 the w T orse for their instruction? Xow I main- 
 tain, that a theatre much more pure than any 
 Europe ever knew, was established in a city ex- 
 actly circumstanced as the imaginary one which 
 I have described; and the result was increasing 
 depravity, immoral refinement, effeminacy, and 
 destruction. The city to which I refer was 
 Athens, and the theatre that which Wit and 
 Genius did their utmost to support, and which 
 received the homage of every Muse. 
 
 C 
 
20 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 It is a remarkable fact, which the advocates of 
 toe Theatre, on the principle that it is the friend 
 of morals, must account for if they can, that the 
 Stage has flourished most in the most corrupt 
 and depraved state of society. How comes it to 
 pass, that in proportion as sound morality, in- 
 dustry, and religion, advance their influence, that 
 the Theatre is deserted and neglected, and that 
 it grows in favour in the same ratio as virtue and 
 religion decline? How has it happened too, if 
 the Stage be the school of virtue, that the most 
 dissolute and abandoned of mankind are its pas- 
 sionate admirers, and warmest advocates; that 
 those who trample on every moral obligation, 
 and despise the sanctions of religion, have, in 
 every age, afforded the Theatre their most 
 cordial support? " 'Tis strange, 'tis passing 
 strange," that those whose lives contradict almost 
 every injunction in the Decalogue should be 
 charmed with the beauty and excellence of vir- 
 tue on the Stage. But the truth is, the Stage is 
 the nursery of depravity, and the accomplice of 
 crime. The virtue (falsely so called) which it 
 inculcates, is vice softened and refined, or it 
 would not receive the voluntary suffrage of every 
 pupil of iniquity. 
 
 That the Theatre has widened the circle of 
 dissipation — that it has given a mortal stab to 
 the virtue and happiness of youth of both sexes 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. £'7 
 
 in the higher and middling classes of society, are 
 facts too notorious to be denied, and too awful not 
 to be deplored by every friend of human nature. 
 
 Dissipation and extravagance are fruitful 
 sources of wretchedness, and are often the fore- 
 runners of every vice : to the love of pleasure 
 the grave and necessary pursuits of life are made 
 to yield, and expense is a trivial consideration 
 when cupidity is to be gratified. But money is 
 not always within the grasp — it is not always 
 ready to administer to every rising wish; this ge- 
 nerates gloomy discontent, or something worse. 
 It not unfrequently leads to gambling among* 
 the higher, and to more unlicensed robbery 
 among the lower classes of society — examples of 
 w 7 hich are often exhibited on the Stage. And if 
 the hero be a man of spirit, his reputation suffers 
 by such expedients but little diminution. 
 
 Another dreadful effect which the Theatre 
 produces on morals is, that its votaries always 
 consider reason, and the dictates of virtue, to 
 be subordinate to Feeling. Feeling is para- 
 mount, and it is every thing; and because it is 
 natural, it must therefore be right: thus revenge 
 is often preferred to forgiveness, and the gratifi- 
 cation of the moment to the self-denial of virtue.. 
 The school' which teaches such a doctrine as 
 this, can never surely be recommended as 
 friendly to happiness, or to society. 
 C2 
 
28 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 It has indeed been urged, in defence of the 
 Theatre, that it cherishes in the bosom those 
 feelings which are called the charities of human 
 life. But the power of fiction to seize on the 
 affections, awakens- a kind of bastard sensibility 
 — a sensibility which leaves the heart a stranger 
 to compassion — a sensibility which led Sterne to 
 weep over a dead ass, while he could suffer a 
 living mother to mourn in poverty without 
 either sympathy or assistance. 
 
 A superficial glance around a Theatre, during 
 the representation of some moving spectacle, 
 might induce the reflection that the audience 
 was composed of the most amiable and com- 
 passionate beings in the world. Who that had 
 not known him but would have thought the 
 tyrant a mild and benevolent prince, when he 
 melted into tears at the public theatre at Athens : 
 alas! he was the most cruel and barbarous of 
 men. Feeling is an indifferent substitute for prin- 
 ciple, — it is capricious and uncertain ; and in 
 this view contributes nothing to our own, and 
 but little to the happiness of others. 
 
 At the Theatre likewise those romantic notions 
 are imbibed which disorder the imagination, 
 which give a high and fictitious colouring to 
 human life, and which lay the foundation for 
 perpetual error and incessant mistakes, From 
 the Theatre many a hapless young man has re- 
 
ESSAY OX THE STAGE, £9 
 
 turned to the world a Hero of romance, a wou'd- 
 be Poet, a brainless Wit, or a fancied Roscius. 
 Bloated with imaginary greatness, he arraigns 
 the Providence which would depress him in the 
 world, and spurns the advice which, to make him 
 happy, would confine him to his original station. 
 The spirit of prophecy is not necessary to foretel 
 that the future lot of such an one must be misery. 
 I have instances before me, the recollection of 
 which at this moment pains my heart, of the 
 horribly transforming influence of the Theatre. 
 It is there that vice steals upon the innocent and 
 unsuspecting in the garb of pleasure. And some 
 I have known who on visiting the Playhouse 
 experienced first a change of manners and then 
 of morals, till the character was depraved and 
 virtue annihilated. These are not solitary in- 
 stances; nor was the effect accidental. — it is 
 what every rational being would naturally ex- 
 pect to follow, on the supposition that the Stage 
 has any influence in the formation of character. 
 For I am afraid what Dr. Johnson said of the 
 plays of Congreve, is too applicable to the 
 greater part of the most popular dramatic 
 pieces of the present day — " It is acknow- 
 ledged with universal conviction, that the 
 perusal of his works will make no man better, 
 and that their ultimate effect is to represent 
 pleasure in alliance with vice, and to relax 
 C S 
 
Oii ESSAY OK THE STAGE, 
 
 e obligations by which life ought to be 
 regulated. " 
 
 I would by no means be thought to institute a 
 comparison between the plays of Congreve and 
 those of our modern writers. Their scenes are 
 not so luscious, nor is their language so indelicate 
 and unchaste; yet in general their tendency is 
 the same ; and I conceive the present age is 
 likely to sustain a far greater injury from its 
 theatrical productions, than even that for which 
 Congreve wrote. If our modern plays like his 
 were openly immodest and licentious, they 
 would then carry their own antidote Avith them, 
 and the sober part of mankind would remove 
 at a convenient distance from their contami- 
 nating influence. But as our writers for the 
 stage now manage it, " Vice loses half its evil 
 by losing all its grossness," and consequently is 
 more dangerous than the barefaced obscenities 
 of Dryden and his contemporary already men- 
 tioned. A double entendre and an arch 
 equivoque are well understood and applied 
 by a licentious audience; and the buzz ox 
 approbation which is heard through the whole 
 assembly furnishes abundant proof that the 
 effect is not lost. Modest impudence in a 
 female form will indeed pretend to blush behind 
 a fan, but with all her coyness the artful nymph 
 is rather gratified than offended. 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 31 
 
 I have no doubt in addition to the evils already 
 traced to the Theatre, that the alarming pro- 
 gress of 'Suicide, " our Island's shame," may be 
 ascribed in a great measure to its influence; for 
 there it is often represented, and in such a manner 
 as to excite the admiration or pity of the audience. 
 The case of Eustace Budgell, one of the writers 
 iu the Spectator, is strikingly in point, and proves 
 the dangerous influence of what is reckoned one 
 of the best moral plays in the English language. 
 Having involved himself by extravagance in the 
 deepest distress, he plunged into the Thames as 
 the oblivion of sorrow, leaving on his bureau 
 this justification of the fatal deed, " what Cato 
 did, and Addison approved, cannot be wrong." 
 That which is in its own nature evil, cannot by 
 its legitimate influence be productive of good: 
 that which has an immoral tendency will never 
 promote morality. 
 
 It cannot indeed be denied that some dramatic 
 pieces have been received with approbation t 
 which abound in just sentiments, and which 
 contain some good moral principles; but their 
 success must be attributed to other causes than 
 their moral tendency; for had they been filled 
 with the most obnoxious general sentiments, 
 their dramatic beauty and their construction for 
 stage effect, would have rendered them quite as 
 popular. The talents of the writer and not his 
 
 C4 
 
oZ ESSAY on the stage, 
 
 principles have secured him applause. This 1* 
 not an unfair conclusion, because the same 
 audience has bestowed praise on productions the 
 most immoral and licentious, on account of the 
 charms of poetry with which they were enriched, 
 avid their power to interest the passions. 
 
 But if it could even be established, that during 
 a century as many as fifty moral plays have 
 received the sanction of the public, this would 
 not affect the general character of the Stage ; and 
 I believe it would be impossible, w r ere we to 
 consult the literary and dramatic annals of the last 
 hundred years, to find ten plays that a Christian 
 ought to recommend, or the leading heroes 
 of which any man should consider as models 
 to be observed, or as examples to be followed. 
 
 There is one view of the moral influence of 
 the Theatre which I have not taken, and with 
 which I shall conclude this chapter, and that is, 
 its influence on Female Character. 
 
 The importance of woman in society has been 
 universally felt and acknowledged; her influence 
 is potent ; to her we are indebted for social 
 comfort and domestic joy. Woman, lovely 
 woman, is the sovereign of our happiness ; and 
 the virtue of the human race is committed to her 
 hands. She is the depository and the guardian 
 of the generation which is to adorn or disgrace 
 a future age ; and on her qualifications to 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE, 33 
 
 discharge the important trust, their destiny in 
 a great measure depends. It is the glory 
 of civilized man to pay this homage to the 
 sex ; and who would not with indignation 
 oppose that which would degrade woman from 
 her distinguished, important eminence? That 
 which would rob her of the peculiar features of 
 her character, which would unfit her for the per- 
 formance of the various duties which belong to 
 her station and her sex, is a dreadful evil which 
 policy, interest, and every thing which can 
 operate as a motive upon the human breast call 
 upon us to detest. Preserve her native modesty,- — 
 let her heart confine its wishes and its affections 
 within the circle of intellectual improvement — 
 domestic duties and domestic pleasures, and 
 woman becomes what her Creator designed, 
 " a help meet for man," the gentle friend of his 
 youth; the kind instructor as well as the mother 
 of his children; his counsellor in difficulties, the 
 soother of his sorrows in affliction ; and I may 
 almost add, the arbitress of his fate. But trans- 
 form her character: let modesty, the guardian 
 of every female virtue, retire; let the averted 
 eye which turns disgusted from the remotest 
 approach of evil grow confident; let that delicacy 
 of sentiment which feels a" stain like a wound" 
 give place to fashionable apathy; let the love of 
 home and a taste for the sweetly interesting em- 
 C5 
 
34 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 ployments of the domestic scene be exchanged 
 for the pursuits of theatrical entertainment, and 
 the vagrant disposition of a stylish belle, and 
 the picture is reversed ; the female is degraded, 
 and society has lost its most powerful, captivating 
 charm ; man is comfortless and alone; — he must 
 go abroad for pleasure — miserable wanderer! his 
 children clasp the knees of a menial stranger — 
 home has no attractions— he has no kindred 
 heart to partake of his joys and sorrows; the 
 world is before him ; it allures and intoxicates, 
 but it does not make him happy. Where is the 
 enemy that has done this? What has dashed 
 the cup of domestic enjoyment to the ground? — 
 The Stage. Let the theatrical passion once be 
 cherished in a female bosom, and farewel* 
 modesty: the taste is vitiated and domestic 
 happiness is gone. 
 
 " It is at the Theatre (says the Abbe Clement) 
 our daughters are taught the art of skilfully 
 conducting an intrigue, of concealing from their* 
 parents the secrets of their hearts, of cherishing < 
 a passion condemned by propriety and morality." 
 If a daughter of mine could visit the Theatre, 
 and tell me that she could view with pleasure : 
 the scenes in Pizarro, the Stranger, the Virgin 
 of the Sun, John Bull, and twenty other popular ; 
 dramatic pieces I could name, I should clasp \ 
 my lost child to my bosom, weep at the thought 1 " 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 35 
 
 of innocence for ever fled, and mourn the day 
 that made me a parent: — her soul is polluted, 
 and that is the essence of prostitution ; the 
 dignity of virtue is lost — and what remains ? If 
 the mother of my children could spend her 
 evenings at the Theatre, and be gratified with 
 what is passing there, she would lose my con- 
 fidence and forfeit my regard ; for I should be 
 sure she had lost the best qualifications of a wife. 
 There is a charm in native modesty, which 
 when wanting only in appearance, renders the 
 conversation even of a sensible woman insipid 
 and disgusting. But I know not how the ap- 
 pearance of modesty can be retained, when the 
 eye must be accustomed to scenes which inge- 
 nuous youth of the other sex can scarcely behold 
 without horror. The world may call a woman 
 virtuous, who with a countenance of brass can 
 sit unmoved when heaven is insulted by profane- 
 ness, and the audience by oaths ; when modesty- 
 is trampled on, and licentiousness indulged; — 
 and this may be the current virtue of a depraved ^ 
 age : but give me the innocence which shrinks 
 at the touch of vice. When the outworks of 
 modesty are demolished, the conquest of the 
 citadel is comparatively easy. The Stage has 
 contributed a dreadful share to the immodesty of 
 dress and manners which characterize the fashion- 
 able females of the day. It is there that Rustic 
 
 C 6 
 
36 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 Simplicity has learnt to cast off its decent robe, 
 and Rural Innocence has changed its modest 
 blush, its retiring mien, for the theatrical stare, 
 and the imposing, dauntless front of the actress. 
 Upon the whole I am persuaded, that the 
 Theatre is a principal source from whence have 
 flowed those contaminating streams, which have 
 had so fatal an influence in depraving the female 
 character in the higher classes of society. It is 
 to this I fear we may trace the adulteries and 
 the crimes of fashionable life ; it is this too which 
 has rendered the helpless female the easy prey of 
 a false seducer. When once a woman is brought 
 to consider the delirium of a heart abandoned to 
 the disorder of the senses, to be virtue, and the 
 indulgence of vitiated feelings, to be happiness,-— 
 persuasion may complete her ruin, and passion . 
 may be the harbinger of infamy. It is on the 
 Stage " that passion is identified with virtue :" 
 teach a female this, and where is the safeguard 
 of honour ; where the security of happiness ? It 
 is gone — it is fled for ever. 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 37 
 
 CHAP. IV. 
 
 THE CHARACTER OF THE STAGE AS BRAWN 
 BY HISTORIANS, PHILOSOPHERS, LEGISLA- 
 TORS, AND DIVINES. 
 
 'Ould I summon into one interesting group 
 the venerable men who have, in every age, in- 
 structed and astonished the world by their wis- 
 dom and their virtue, and collect their aggre- 
 gate opinion on the character and moral influ- 
 ence of the Stage, the decision, were it uniform, 
 would demand some consideration; and from it 
 Presumption itself would not venture to appeal. 
 But this is not practicable, nor is it necessary; 
 their sentiments on this subject are upon record. 
 There is scarcely a distinguished name among 
 the philosophers, legislators, and moralists of 
 the world but is hostile to the Theatre; and they 
 have left, by their historians, or in their writings, 
 an imperishable monument inscribed with their 
 protest against the Stage, 
 
 " It is an invariable fact in the history of all 
 nations (says Clement), a fact which has been 
 carefully recorded by historians, that the refine- 
 ment and increase of public spectacles has essen- 
 
53 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 tially contributed to that universal depravation 
 of public and private morality, which has almost 
 always been either the secret or obvious cause 
 of the fall of empires." " What caused the ruin 
 of the flourishing republic of Greece? Ask the 
 wisest of her philosophers, ask the most elo- 
 quent of her orators — the games, the Theatres; 
 these excited a fondness for the magnificent and 
 marvellous, and a disgust for simplicity and pro- 
 priety. It was complained that the magistrates 
 and people neglected the care of public affairs; 
 the young men abandoned their salutary exer- 
 cises to frequent the Theatres; the indolence 
 and effeminacy of one sex produced delicacy and 
 morbid sensibility in the other, and the disso- 
 luteness of Greece became a proverb in his»- 
 tory*." 
 
 Rome was long virtuous; and she remained 
 so while the Theatre was unknown. Augustine 
 beautifully remarks, that " Theatricas artes vir- 
 tus Romana non noverat." " But (observes a 
 Roman author) when conquered Greece taught 
 her this fatal art — she taught her, at the same : 
 time, all her vices. The wisest of the Roma .s 
 foresaw this: he had strenuously opposed the 
 establishment of a regular Theatre, asserting, 
 that it would be to Rome a more dangerous 
 Carthage than that which they had just de- 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 39 
 
 stroyed. He then succeeded in his opposition, 
 but unfortunately he succeeded but for a short 
 time; and the event showed that Cato was not 
 deceived*.'' Livy unites his testimony with that 
 of Justin, and condemns the Theatre. Philoso- 
 phers follow in the same train: — " Plays (says 
 Plato) raise the passions, and pervert the use of 
 them, and are of course dangerous to morality." 
 Again :. " The diversions of the Stage are dan- 
 gerous to temper and sobriety; they swell anger 
 and desire too much. Tragedy is apt to make 
 men boisterous, and comedy buffoons. Those 
 passions are cherished Which ought to be check- 
 ed : Virtue loses ground, and Reason grows 
 precarious: Vice makes an insensible approach, 
 and steals upon us in the disguise of pleasure." 
 Legislators have joined their protest to Histori- 
 ans and Philosophers. The wisest legislators of 
 Greece and Rome did their utmost to damp a 
 theatrical spirit, but in vain. Thespis, the first 
 improver of the Dramatic art, lived in the time 
 of Solon; " That wise legislator (says Rollin), 
 upon seeing his pieces performed, expressed his 
 dislike by striking his stall against the gfc^ttftd?* 
 I might fatigue the reader with quotations 
 from names of the most distinguished eminence: 
 it would be tedious, it would be useless. It is 
 
 * See an excellent Sermon, entitled. The Stage, by the Abhe 
 Clement. 
 
40 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 enough to remark, that Plato, Xenophon, Aris- 
 totle, Cicero, Livy, Valerius Maximus, Solon 
 and Cato, Seneca and Tacitus,, the most venera- 
 ble men of antiquity; a constellation of talents 
 and virtues, the greatest that ever shone, have 
 all condemned the Stage. We may add to these, 
 the Fathers of the Church. 
 
 Augustine confesses, with a noble frankness 
 worthy of a true penitent, that at the Theatre 
 he imbibed all the venom which corrupted his 
 heart. " Yes (said Tertullian), I will grant that 
 your theatrical representations are simple, fasci- 
 nating, and even respectable: but does he who 
 prepares a poisonous draught mix gall and 
 wormwood in the bowl? No: he conceals its 
 deadly qualities by infusing sweet and aromatic 
 ingredients." " Even (observes St. Augustine) 
 if there were no other objection to the Theatre 
 than the public intercourse of the sexes, not to 
 speak of the criminal behaviour of women ut- 
 terly destitute of modesty, who seek, by their 
 languishing gestures, their penetrating voices, 
 their empoisoned action, to en flame, to consume 
 you with the fierceness of desire: not to uige 
 this, were there no other objection to the The- 
 atre than the sight of a sex always dangerous, 
 but then still more so, when their charms are 
 improved by every ornament that taste and lux- 
 ury can invent; alas! even then it would be the 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 41 
 
 surest snare of innocence." Miss Bailie, a mo- 
 dern writer of most admirable talents, though 
 she does not absolutely condemn the Stage, is 
 constrained, as a moralist, to enter her pro- 
 test against Busy, that is, fashionable comedy: 
 " The moral tendency of it (she observes) is very 
 faulty; that mockery of age, and domestic au- 
 thority, so constantly held forth, has a very bad 
 effect upon the younger part of an audience, and 
 that continual lying and deceit in the first cha- 
 racters of the piece, which is necessary for con- 
 ducting the plot, has a most pernicious one." 
 
 I conclude the tedious work of quotation by 
 an extract from Collier*; the veteran chief in 
 
 * It is fashionable to stigmatize this writer as a sour puri- 
 tan; with what propriety, will he evident from a perusal of the 
 following remarks of Johnson: — " Collier, a fierce and implaca- 
 ble nonjurer, knew that an attack upon the Theatre would 
 never make him suspected for a puritan ; he therefore pub- 
 lished A short View of the Immorality and Profaneness of the 
 English Stage ; I believe with no other motive than religious 
 zeal and honest indignation. He was formed for a controver- 
 tistj with sufficient learning; with diction vehement and 
 pointed, though often vulgar and incorrect ; with unconquer- 
 able pertinacity ; with wit in the highest degree, keen and sar- 
 castic ; and with all those powers, exalted and invigorated by 
 just confidence in his cause/' As a specimen of his style and 
 manner, I will furnish the reader with the concluding para- 
 graph of his preface to the Short View. — ;; There is one thing 
 more to acquaint the reader with ; 'tis, that I have ventured to 
 change the terms of mistress and lover for others somewhat 
 more plain, but much more proper. I don't look upon tin? a- 
 
42 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 this warfare, who in his day vanquished the great- 
 est dramatic writers : " As for innocent diver- 
 sions I have nothing to say against them : but I 
 think people should take care not to relieve 
 their spirits at the expense of their virtue — nor 
 to cure melancholy witk madness, and shake off 
 their spleen and their reason together." 
 
 It will perhaps be opposed to this list of au- 
 thorities, that the objections I have quoted are 
 levelled against the abuse of the Theatre, that 
 they affect the ancient, and not the modern 
 Drama: but I beg leave to remark, that these 
 censures are strikingly applicable to Theatres 
 as they have ever been managed, and to plays 
 as they have generally been written. An imma- 
 culate Stage is one of the wonders of Utopia. 
 But those who are so fond of pleading for the 
 Theatre, under the notion of what it may be- 
 come, should not go thither: — I think I could 
 
 any failure in civility. As good and evil are different in them- 
 selves, so they ought to be differently marked. To confound 
 them in speech is the way to confound them iu practice. Ill 
 qualities ought to have ill names to prevent their being catching. 
 Indeed things are, in a great measure, governed b\ words ; 
 to gild over a foul character serves only to perplex the idea, to 
 encourage the bad, and mislead the unwary. To treat honour 
 and infamy alike is an injury to virtue, and a sort of levelling 
 in morality. I confess I have no ceremony for debauchery. 
 For to compliment vice is but one remove from worshipping 
 the devil." 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 43 
 
 venture to assure them that a blameless Stage 
 would afford them no amusement. 
 
 The reputation of the Theatre has never been 
 high among any who have had any regard for 
 their own. The Fathers of the Church, Philo- 
 sophers and Divines, enlightened Statesmen, and 
 genuine Patriots, have all concurred to consider 
 the Stage as dangerous and destructive. One of 
 the most strenuous writers in defence of the 
 Theatre (I do not say the most convincing) I 
 ever remember to have read, advises notwith- 
 standing that the public should hold it with a 
 M Tight rein." It is bad indeed when an advo- 
 cate, after exhausting so much rhetoric in behalf 
 of a client, informs the court that he is not to 
 be trusted; and advises the judge to tie his 
 hands to prevent his doing mischief. I think 
 this gentleman has mistaken his object: instead 
 of vindicating, he has indeed condemned the 
 Theatre, and adds his suiirage to those distin- 
 guished characters already quoted, among whom 
 no doubt, after mature consideration, he will be 
 proud to enrol his name, 
 
44 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 CHAP. V. 
 
 WHETHER THE STAGE IS IN A STATE OF MO- 
 RAL IMPROVEMENT CONSIDERED. 
 
 JL HE design of this chapter is to represent the 
 futility of those arguments which would prolong 
 the existence of a Theatre until it attain a degree 
 of purity, which will effectually silence the ob- 
 jections of the religious fanatic, and the rigid" 
 moralist. Great stress has been laid on the ad- 
 vances which it has already made towards per- 
 fection. The comparative state of the Drama, 
 in the reigns of Charles the Second and George 
 the Third, has been exultingiy made. The dif- 
 ference in appearance is certainly great. But 
 I am afraid that its principles and radical 
 State are precisely the same; that they have 
 been the same in every age ; and that no real im- 
 improvement in this respect can reasonably be 
 expected. 
 
 It is essential to the existence of the Stage, 
 that it should have charms to attract the gay and 
 the fashionable; it must please; not merely by 
 gratifying a poetical taste, and by simple Drama- 
 tic composition, but by delineating character 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 45 
 
 and manners. The character and manners it 
 must delineate, are those of the vicious and de- 
 praved; or if it pourtray the virtues, it must 
 confine its pictures to the showy and the splen- 
 did: and though it may shoot the follies of man- 
 kind, it must not cut the heart, or touch the 
 conscience. 
 
 This consideration of itself for ever confounds 
 the expectations of those who could improve an 
 established Theatre. It would be a hopeless pro- 
 ject to construct a Stage solely to amuse Poets 
 and Philosophers — such a stage could never be 
 supported: — there must be something to attract 
 the multitude, and to obtain an audience suffici- 
 ently large to defray the expenses of a Theatre; 
 something in fact suited to the general taste. 
 The Theatre, to support itself in splendor, must 
 be the creature of the public. And those who 
 are acquainted with human nature need not to 
 be told, that the strong hand of the legislature 
 is absolutely necessary to preserve a popular 
 amusement within the bounds of decency. 
 
 The principles, the pleasures, the conduct of 
 mankind, must be changed before the Stage can 
 be morally improved. It is a truth which requires 
 little reasoning to establish it, that the Theatre, 
 which derives its existence from the will of 
 society, must always remain what that society 
 chooses to make it. Depravity and vice, which 
 
46 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 are now the general features of the world, must 
 yield to purity and virtue before we can expect 
 the transformation of the Stage. The Theatre 
 is the immoral creature of an immoral audience: 
 
 66 The Drama's laws, the Drama's patrons give. 
 And those who live to please, must please to live." 
 
 It is the prerogative of a system entirely divine to 
 effect the moral revolution of mankind; no hu- 
 man contrivance, no worldly institution, will 
 ever produce it. 
 
 It may be confidently asked, What are the 
 data on which the theatrical visionary builds his 
 conclusion, that that which has been the bane 
 will one day become the blessing of the world? 
 As well may we expect all noxious things to 
 change their nature: the thorn may as suddenly 
 arise to the tall majestic fir, and the thistle be- 
 come a vine. To be consistent with themselves, 
 those who tell us that the Theatre is on the 
 march of improvement, should adopt the ridicu- 
 lous theory of the perfectibility of man, and 
 believe that we carry in our depraved heart and 
 fragile body the seeds of future renovation and 
 of immortal vigour. 
 
 The natural tendency of all evil things is from 
 bad to worse; the intervention of circumstances 
 may impede the progress of depravity — may 
 preserve it stationary for a time; ingenious so- 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE, 47 
 
 phistry, and artful refinement, may cover it 
 with a veil to conceal its deformity, but they 
 can never change its nature. It is readily con- 
 ceded, as I have more than once remarked, that 
 evil is not essential to mere dramatic represen- 
 tation, but it is essential to a Theatre ; and never 
 did a Theatre exist which did not gratify the 
 pride, the passion, and the folly of the hu- 
 man heart. Here the advocates of the Stage and 
 its opponents are at issue; and it devolves ou 
 the former to disprove what has been urged 
 against it, on the ground that it cannot, in a 
 moral point of view, be essentially reformed. 
 
 The Theatre is a mirror, in which are re- 
 flected the vices and follies of mankind; its legi- 
 timate object is to " show the very age and body 
 of the time, his form and pressure ; and of course 
 its improvement can never be greater than the 
 moral improvement of the world. The boasted 
 superiority of the Drama of the present above 
 any former age, will be little credited Dy an 
 impartial person, who will take the pains of 
 comparing modern theatrical productions with 
 those of the most licentious period in the days 
 that are past. 
 
 The recent introduction of the German Drama 
 may be considered as a phosnomenon in the 
 world of dissipation. The writings of Congreve 
 and Dryden are absolutely pure,- when compared 
 
48 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 with the vile disgusting offspring of the profli- 
 gate Kotzebue; and yet the plays of this writer 
 have been the principal source from whence 
 an English audience, for several winters past, 
 have derived their instruction and amusement: 
 even women have submitted to the ■ shameful 
 task of translating pages which modesty never 
 ought to have perused. 
 
 " When the Stranger was introduced to the 
 public (says a good writer) many of our fair 
 dames welcomed him to this hospitable metro- 
 polis. Their sympathy for the poor adulteress, 
 so ably defended by Kotzebue, was a striking 
 proof of their sensibility; and from the recent 
 instances of crim con, it may be conjectured 
 that the system of our male and female marriage 
 haters is daily obtaining new proselytes. But 
 the triumph of Kotzebue was incomplete till the 
 appearance of Pizarro. That renowned Spanish 
 warrior was conjured up from the ' Pale nations 
 of the dead' to conquer a country which the 
 Armada had assailed in vain. The extraordinary 
 effects of this melange of tragedy, farce, and pan- 
 tomime were indescribable. Multitudes crowded 
 to the Theatre, where they were amused with 
 thunder and lightening; while the sonorous rant 
 of Rolla, and the drawling whine of Cora, ex- 
 cited universal sympathy. Seized as it were 
 with a general hysteric affection, the ladies blub- 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 49 
 
 bered to the great detriment of their eyes; while 
 the men, animated by the bombast of Rolla, 
 gazed with ardent sensations of heroism. So 
 easy is it to be benevolent when there is nothing 
 to be given; and so undaunted is true valour 
 when there is no danger nigh! As Kotzebue elo- 
 quently pleaded the cause of the adulteress in 
 the Stranger, so, in his Natural Son, or as it has 
 been called by an English play-monger his 
 Lovers' Vows, he has placed a kind unwedded 
 fair one in an equally amiable and affecting 
 point of view. The Noble Lie, written by the 
 same dramatist, is another proof of the felicity 
 of his invention in the extenuation of guilt." 
 
 Let us hear no more then of the moral im- 
 provement of the Stage; its character is indeli- 
 bly marked, and a review of its favourite pro- 
 ductions is as dishonourable to the present, as 
 the plays of that period were disgraceful to the 
 age of Charles the Second: the principles are 
 the same: the change is only in modification. 
 In the former, morals were openly attacked; in 
 the latter, they are artfully undermined: but 
 their destruction is equally the object of both. 
 In confirmation of this sentiment, it is not a lit- 
 tle flattering to be able again to boats of the cele- 
 brated Miss Bailie as an auxiliary : u At the be- 
 ginning of its career, (she remarks) the Drama 
 
 D 
 
50 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. ^ 
 
 was employed to mislead and excite; and were 
 I not unwilling to refer to transactions of the 
 present times, I might abundantly confirm what 
 I. have said by recent examples." 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 51 
 
 CHAP. VI. 
 
 CURSORY OBSERVATION? ON THE WRITERS 
 FOR THE STAGE, ON THE ACTORS, AND THE 
 AUDIENCE, ILLUSTRATIVE OF ITS DAN- 
 GEROUS AND IMMORAL TENDENCY. 
 
 i 
 
 JL HAT which has prostituted and debased the 
 finest talents, instead of claiming the favour, 
 certainly merits the severest reprobation of man- 
 kind. It is truly affecting to behold men sacrifice 
 the dignity of superior intellect at the shrine of 
 folly and of vice ; yet such has been the sacrifice 
 the Theatre has demanded of its writers. It is a 
 notorious fact, that Theatrical Authors relax, 
 soften, and abridge the code of morals : to be 
 successful, they must always accommodate their 
 characters to the prevailing taste; instead of giv- 
 ing " Ardour to virtue and confidence to truth," 
 which is the only dignified employment of lite* 
 rary talents, they must submit to the humiliating 
 drudgery of gratifying the wishes of the volup- 
 tuous and the proud, the licentious and the vain. 
 The men who have instructed and delighted 
 the world, Addison and Johnson, Thomson and 
 Young, were indeed captivated by the lucrative 
 D 2 
 
V% ESSAY ON THE STAGE, 
 
 rewards of the Drama and wrote for the Stage. 
 But how short-lived was their dramatic fame: — 
 these writers could not descend : — they would 
 maintain, even on the Stage, the dignity of the 
 moralist ; and this, to a polite audience, rendered 
 their productions dull and uninteresting: yet, it 
 must be acknowledged, warped by the Theatre, 
 they have too often amidst the finest moral sen- 
 timents departed from the simplicity of virtue. 
 Addison in his Cato, sacrifices at the shrine of 
 Patriotism, Fortitude and Magnanimity, and 
 reduces his hero at last to a dastardly coward; 
 who, rather than endure the ills he felt, aban- 
 doned the post of honour for the grave of 
 the suicide. 
 
 Johnson indeed, " The majestic teacher of 
 moral and religious wisdom," disdained to court 
 applause as a writer of tragedy at the expense of 
 his taste and virtue, and the const quence was — his 
 " Irene did not please the public." The great 
 dramatic favourites have generally been men of 
 libertine principles. Shakespeare * and Congreve, 
 
 * I am sorry that necessity obliges me to mention 4fc Nature's 
 ravounte cm:*;, 1 ' o'Vuimorta; bard, in terms of ^approba- 
 tion. The n^agic olis genius, 1 am free to acknowledge, lias 
 often he?d me in enhsir.atic admiration ; and, captivated by 
 the charms of glowil sentiment and exquisite poetry which 
 abound in his works, Welt reluctance in classing him with the 
 authors who have conkbutedto spread immorality and misery 
 among mankind. Be bare-faced obscenities, low vulgarity, 
 
1:^5 AY ON THE STAGE. Dj 
 
 Rowe, Otway, and Kotzebue, have borne away 
 the palm from every competitor. The talents of 
 these writers have been eminent; but a " Peck 
 of refuse wheat" would more than buy the virtue 
 of all the tribe. Who is there that does not feel 
 the bitterness of regret, while contemplating the 
 greatest intellectual powers, the strongest ener- 
 gies of native genius exhausted and spent in 
 degrading the human character, which they were 
 intended to exalt and improve ? Enlisted on the 
 
 and nauseous vice, so frequently disfigure and pollute his pages, 
 
 that we cannot but lament the " luckless hour 11 in which he 
 became a writer for the Stage. This it was that degraded and 
 debased the uoblest powers th t ever distinguished a human 
 being • but for THis.Shakspeare would never have thus ignomi- 
 uiously descended.—- On the plays of Shakspeare, 31 rs. Moore 
 has ventured the following ver\ pertinent observations : — ;i With 
 these excelleucies the works of this most unequal of all poets 
 contain so much that is vulgar, so much that is absurd, and so 
 much that is impure, so much indecent levity, false wit, and 
 gross descriptions, that he should be only read in parcels, and 
 with the nicest selection. 
 
 The sentiments of this excellent writer, on the morality of 
 Rowe and Otway, deserve some regard. Contrasting the pro- 
 fessed objects of their dramatic pieces with their execution she 
 exclaims — " In how many, for instance, of the favourite trage- 
 dies of Rowe and Otway, which are most frequently acted, do 
 we find passages,, and even whole scenes of a directly contrary 
 tendency :. passages calculated to awaken those very passions, 
 which it was the professed object of the author to counteract-— 
 tt First raising a combustion of desire, 
 With some cold moral they would quench the fire." 
 
 D 3 
 
j4 essay on the stage. 
 
 side of virtue, what might not these men have 
 achieved ? But viewed as they are, the menial 
 servants of the Stage, who can think of them 
 without pity ! 
 
 It surely is no inconsiderable argument against 
 the Theatre, that it made even Addison forget 
 his virtue and his creed; and degraded men of 
 more genius and less principle from eminence 
 they might have attained, to dishonour and 
 infamy ; which, for the sake of lucre and tempo- 
 rary renown, they were willing to incur. If a 
 tribunal had not been established which pays 
 homage to talents without virtue, the strongest 
 temptation to vice would not have existed ; and 
 without profit or applause, few men would take 
 pleasure in disseminating immorality and misery 
 for their own sake. 
 
 Another collateral argument of some impor- 
 tance against the Stage, may be drawn from the 
 general character of players. The sentiments 
 of mankind have ever consigned this wretched 
 class of beings to infamy. The story of the 
 unfortunate Laberius, exhibits in a strong point 
 of view the odium which was attached to the 
 profession of an actor among the Romans. Com- 
 pelled by Caesar at an advanced period of life, to 
 appear on the Stage to recite some of his own 
 works, he felt his character as a Roman Citizen 
 insulted and disgraced; and in some affecting 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 30 
 
 verses spoken on the occasion, he incensed the 
 audience against the tyrant, by whose mandate 
 he was obliged to appear before them. " After 
 having lived (said he) sixty years with honour. 
 I left my house this morning a Roman knight, 
 but shall return to it this evening an infamous 
 stage player. Alas ! I have lived a day too 
 long!" It is impossible to entertain respect for 
 a player; and there is nAt a family of any con- 
 sideration in Britain, which would not count it 
 an indelible disgrace if any of its members were 
 to embrace this dishonourable profession. 
 
 It may not be improper to enquire, on what 
 this almost universal detestation of such em- 
 ployment is founded. The common sense of 
 mankind is seldom, perhaps never wrong; what 
 all concur to disapprove must be liable to serious 
 objections. The reasons which render the pro- 
 fession of an actor contemptible, are so con- 
 spicuously and dispassionately stated by Dr. 
 Witherspoon, that, together with my respect for 
 the memory of the worthy author, and the con- 
 sciousness that it is not in my power to do the 
 subject so much justice in other words, I am 
 induced to quote a page or two of his admirable 
 Letter respecting Play Actors. 
 
 " First, All powers and talents whatever, 
 though excellent in themselves, when they are 
 applied to the single purpose of amusing the idle, 
 D 4 
 
0§ ESSAY OS THE STAGE. 
 
 vain, or vicious part of society, become con- 
 temptible. 
 
 " There is not upon record among the sayings 
 of bold men, one more remarkable than that of 
 Sobrius the tribune, to Nero the Roman emperor; 
 when asked by the emperor, why he, who w 7 as 
 one of his personal guards, had conspired against 
 him ? He answered, I loved you as much as any 
 man, as long as you deserved to be loved, but I 
 began to hate you, when, after the murder of 
 your wife and mother, you became a charioteer, 
 h coaildian and a buffoon. I am sensible, that 
 uj this reasoning, I consider theatrical pieces, 
 properly speaking, as intended for amusement, 
 I am not however ignorant, that some have 
 hified them with the character of schools or 
 lessons of morality. 
 
 " But as they have been generally called, and 
 are still called by man)* writers, amusements, so 
 I am confident every body must perceive, that 
 this was their original purpose, and will be their 
 capital and their principal effect. It seems to 
 me of consequence in this argument to observe, 
 that what is true of theatrical exhibitions, is true 
 of every other effect of human genius or art, 
 when applied to the purposes of amusement and 
 folly, they become contemptible. Of all ex- 
 ternal accomplishments there is none, that has 
 been for many ages held in greater esteem than 
 
ESSAY 0N T THE STAGE. 57 
 
 good horsemanship. It has been said, that the 
 human form never appears with greater dignity 
 than when a handsome man appears on horseback, 
 with proper and elegant management of that 
 noble creature. Yet when men employ them- 
 selves in singular and whimsical feats, standing 
 instead of riding upon a horse at full gallop, or 
 upon two horses at once, or other feats of the like 
 nature, in order to amuse the vain, and gather 
 money from the foolish, it immediately appears 
 contemptible. And for my own part, I would 
 no more hold communication with a master of 
 the Circus than a manager of the Theatre. And 
 I should be sorry to be thought to have any 
 intimacy with either the one or the other. 
 
 "The general observation which I have made, 
 applies to all human arts of every kind and class. 
 Alusic has always been esteemed one of the finest 
 arts, and was originally used in the worship of 
 God, and the praise of heroes. Yet, when music 
 is appiiedto the purposes of amusement only, it 
 becomes wholly contemptible. And I believe 
 the public performers, from the men-singers- and 
 women-singers of Solomon, to the singers in the 
 present Theatres, are considered as in a dis- 
 graceful employment. I am happy to have even 
 Lord Chesterfield on politeness, for my assistant 
 in this cause: for though he acknowledges music 
 to be one of the fine arts, yet he thinks to be 
 D 5 
 
58 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 too great a connoisseur, and to be always fiddling 
 and playing, is not consistent with the character 
 of a gentleman. 
 
 " In the second place, as players have been 
 generally persons of loose morals, so their em- 
 ployment directly leads to the corruption of the 
 heart. It is an allowed principle among critics, 
 that no human passion or character can be well 
 represented unless it be felt: this they call 
 entering into the spirit of the part. Now I 
 suppose, the following philosophical remark is 
 equally certain, that every human passion, es- 
 pecially when strongly felt, gives a certain mo- 
 dification to the blood and spirits, and makes the 
 whole frame more susceptible of its return. There- 
 fore, whoever has justly and strongly acted human 
 passions that are vicious will be more prone to 
 these same passions; and indeed, with respect 
 to the whole character, they will soon . be in 
 reality what they have so often seemed to be. 
 
 a This applies to the whole extent of theatrical 
 representation. Whoever has acted the part of 
 a proud or revengeful person, I should not like 
 to fall in his way when offended : and if any man 
 has often acted the part of a rogue or deceiver, I 
 should not be willing to trust him with my 
 money. It may either be added as another remark 
 or considered as a further illustration of the one 
 last made, that players by so frequently appearing 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 59 
 
 in an assumed character, lose all character of their 
 own. ' Nothing, says an eminent and learn- 
 ed writer, is more awkward and insipid, than 
 a player oat of the line of his own profession.' 
 And indeed what must that memory and brain be, 
 where the constant business of its possessor is to 
 obliterate one scene or system of folly, only to 
 make way for another ? 
 
 " In the third place, I cannot help thinking it 
 is of some moment to observe, that players, in 
 consequence of their profession, appearing con- 
 tinually in an assumed character, or being em- 
 ployed in preparing to assume it, must lose all 
 sense of sincerity and truth. Truth is so sacred 
 a thing that even the least violation of it is not 
 without its degree of guilt and danger. It was 
 far from being so absurd as it often has been said 
 to be, what the old Spartan answered to an Athe- 
 nian who spoke to him of the fine lessons found in 
 their tragedies; " I think I could learn virtue 
 much better from our own rules of truth and 
 justice, than by hearing your lies. 
 
 " I will here observe, that some very able and 
 judicious persons have given it as a serious and 
 important advice to young persons, to guard 
 against mimicking and taking off others, as it is 
 called, in language, voice, and gesture, — because 
 it tends to destroy the simplicity and dignity of 
 personal manners and behaviour. I myself in 
 
 DO 
 
60 - ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 early life, knew a young man of good talents, 
 who absolutely unfitted himself for public speak- 
 ing by this practice. He was educated for the 
 ministry, and was in every respect well qualified 
 for the office; but having without suspicion fre- 
 quently amused himself and others by imitating 
 the tones and gestures of the most eminent 
 preachers of the city where he lived, when he 
 began to preach himself, he could not avoid 
 falling into one or other of those tones which he 
 had so often mimicked. This, as soon as it was per- 
 ceived, threw the audience into a burst of laughter, 
 and he was soon obliged to quit the profession alto- 
 gether for no other reason, than that he had thus 
 spoiled himself by the talent of imitation. I may 
 say further, in support of this remark, that I have 
 known no instance of one eminent for mimicking, 
 who did not in time make himself contemptible. 
 
 " But the human passion that makes the most 
 conspicuous figure in the Theatre, is love. A 
 play without intrigue and gallantry would be no 
 play at all. This passion is of all others that 
 which has produced the greatest degree of guilt 
 and misery in the history of mankind. Now is 
 it, or can it be denied, that actors in the Theatre 
 are trained up in the knowledge and excercise of 
 this passion in all its forms? It seems to have 
 been a sentiment of this kind that led a certain 
 author to say, that to send young people to the 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 61 
 
 Theatre to form their mannners, is to expect 
 that they will learn virtue from profligates, and 
 modesty from harlots." 
 
 As then the profession of an actor is so igno- 
 minious, and as it has uniformly debased the 
 human character, what virtuous mind will con- 
 tribute to the support of a class of men so 
 miserable, and whose very employment must 
 render them contemptible ? 
 
 Shuter, whose facetious powers convulsed 
 w^hole audiences with laughter, and whose com- 
 panionable qualities often " Set the table in a 
 roar," was a miserable being. The following 
 anecdote of him, told from the best authority, will 
 confirm this assertion ; and I am afraid were we 
 acquainted with many of his profession, we should 
 find that his case is by no means a singular one.— - 
 Shuter had heard Mr. Whitefield, and trembled 
 with apprehension of a judgment to come ; he had 
 also frequently heard Mr. Kinsman, and some- 
 times visited him in London. One day accidentally 
 meeting him in Plymouth, after some years of 
 separation, he embraced him with rapture and 
 enquired if that was the place of his residence : — 
 Mr. Kinsman replied, " Yes, but I am just re- 
 turned from London, where I have preached so 
 often and to such large auditories, and have been 
 so indisposed, that Dr. Fothergill advised my 
 immediate return to the country for change of 
 
0^ ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 air." " And I," said Shuter, " have been acting- 
 Sir John Falstaff so often, that I thought I should 
 have died, and the physicians advised me to come 
 into the country for the benefit of the air. Had 
 you died it would have been in serving the best 
 of masters, but had I it would have been in 
 the service of the devil. Oh sir, do you think I 
 shall ever be called again? I certainly was once, 
 and if Mr. Whitfield had let me come to the 
 Lord's table with him, I never should have gone 
 back again. But the caresses of the great are 
 
 exceedingly ensnaring. My Lord E sent 
 
 for me to day and I was glad I could not go. 
 Poor things ! They are unhappy and they want 
 Shuter to make them laugh. But O, sir! such 
 a life as yours: — as soon as I leave you I shall be 
 king Richard. This is what they call a good play, 
 as good as some sermons. I acknowledge there 
 are some striking and moral things in it ; but 
 after it I shall come in again with my farce 0i" A 
 Dish of all Sorts," and knock all that on the head. 
 Fine reformers we! Poor Shuter, once more 
 thou wilt be an object of sport to the frivolous 
 and the gay, who will now laugh at thee, not for 
 thy drollery, but thy seriousness ; and this story 
 probably will be urged against thee as the 
 weakness of a noble mind ; weakness let it be 
 called, but in spite of himself man must be 
 serious at last. And when a player awakes to ; 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE, 6$ 
 
 sober reflection, what agony must seize upon his 
 soul. Let those auditories which the comic per- 
 former has convulsed with laughter, witness a 
 scene in which the actor retires and the man 
 appears ; let tiiem behold him in the agonies of 
 death, looking back with horror on a life of guilt, 
 while despair is mingled with anticipations of the 
 future. Players have no leisure to learn to die ; 
 and if a serious thought wander into the mind, 
 the painful sigh which it excites is suppressed, 
 and, with an awful desperation, the wretched 
 creature rushes into company to be delivered 
 from himself. A more careless, a more unre- 
 flecting being than a player cannot exist; for if 
 an intense impression of the dignity of reason, 
 the importance of character, and future respon- 
 sibility beoncefelt, he can be a player no longer. 
 
 Upon what principles then of Christianity, or 
 of moral obligation, can I hire an individual to 
 prostitute his talents and his life to that which 
 must render him infamous and wretched, and 
 which, with respect to myself and family, I should 
 esteem a reproach and a serious calamity ? Bene- 
 volence, the great law of universal equity, the 
 welfare of society, of which players are the peet, 
 call upon us in an imperious tone, to relinquish 
 an amusement which demands the sacrifice ot so 
 many human victims. 
 
 We have shuddered at the barbarous cruelty 
 
04 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 of the Indian Tribes, when, to appease their 
 gods, they have cherished devotion with the 
 warm blood of humanity ; and when we have seen 
 the horrid libation poured out to their execrable 
 deities, our hearts have bled with compassion. 
 But are we not chargeable with an enormity 
 much more shocking, when we erect the Stage as 
 an altar, and immolate to the god of pleasure the 
 talents, the morals, the eternal happiness of so 
 many immortal beings, who from time to time 
 and in quick succession are consigned to infamy 
 worse than death in this Temple of delusion?— 
 It is true, we endeavour to calm the perturbed 
 spirits of our departed Heroes of the Boards, by 
 raising monuments to their fame in the cloistered 
 abbey; but could Garrick rise from the tomb, 
 with what indignation would he trample into 
 dust the marbie that perpetuates his disgrace. 
 
 No man presents a stronger proof of the fatal 
 influence of the profession of an actor on 
 character than David Garrick. This Roscius of 
 his day, this universal favourite, what is his post- 
 humous renown? What advantages have society 
 derived from the excercise of his talents? What 
 would the world have been injured if he had never 
 lived, and what was the loss it sustained when 
 he died? Take a man of equal celebrity from 
 any of the honourable departments of life, either 
 a Lawyer, a Divine, or a man of Literature, and 
 
BSSAY ON THE STAGE. 65 
 
 compare him with Garrick. Read together the 
 memoirs of their lives, and you will find that the 
 actor degraded the man; and that a comparison 
 of him with a fellow-being of equal talents and 
 equal fame in another profession, is infinitely to 
 his disadvantage. 
 
 When Johnson and Garrick launched forth 
 together on the ocean of life, their condition was 
 the same — " Unknowing and unknown," they had 
 each a character to form and reputation to acquire. 
 And now they have gained the port, and live but in 
 the sentiments of mankind, let us view the memo- 
 rial with which their names are handed down to 
 posterity. Garrick lived atrifler; — never was a 
 life more barren of incidents which reflect honour 
 on human nature than his: — amoral lesson never 
 fell from his lips. In a prologue, he even ridiculed 
 Dr. Young for washing to appropriate the profits 
 of his play to the spread of the gospel. Under 
 opposition he w T as fretful and malicious; — in 
 prosperity he appeared a compound of arrogance, 
 envy and vanity. He is known but by his 
 biographer; and I think no man who reads his 
 life w 7 ill say," I wish I had been Garrick." John- 
 son, on the contrary, will be remembered and 
 revered to the latest posterity. There is indeed 
 a ruggedness in his character, a sort of repellent 
 quality, that rendered him not very amiable in 
 the drawing-room ; but this moroseness, if it may 
 
66 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 be called by so harsh a name, in a great measure 
 proceeded from his circumstances. Let us re- 
 present to ourselves Johnson, the greatest of 
 human beings, struggling with poverty, encoun- 
 tering difficulties, and often depending for the 
 next meal on the resources of his own talents, or 
 the precarious humours of unfeeling booksellers, 
 and we shall not be surprized that his character 
 was deeply tinctured with something which cer- 
 tainly does not resemble the milk ot human kind- 
 ness*: but with all his failings, ttie conversation of 
 Johnson was always interesting, always instruc- 
 tive; he was the friend of religion, and drew his 
 sublime morality from this its purest source. He 
 and Garrick lived tor the public; but the one 
 was its creature, its ape, its mimic, while the 
 other enriched it with lessons of wisdom, and 
 incited it to virtue by the persuasives of eloquence 
 aided by sincerity in the cause. 
 
 * I have endeavoured, in the delineation of the character of 
 this great man, says one of his biographers, with equal care to 
 avoid the extremes of praise and blame ; I trust to the charity, 
 the gratitude, and the justice of impartial posterity, that the 
 failings of a man, whose whole life was a conflict with pain and 
 adversity, will either be forgiven or forgotten- and that the 
 remembrance of his virtues, and a reverence for the wonderful 
 endowments of his mind, and his zeal in the employment of them 
 to the best purposes, will be coeval with those excellent lessons of 
 religion, morality, and oeconomical wisdom which he has left 
 behind him. 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 67 
 
 Johnson's best eulogium is his works, which 
 will be read with admiration as long as taste, 
 literature, and virtue are preserved among men. 
 There is this difference in the feelings of a person 
 who reads the lives of Garrick and Johnson — 
 Garrick we pity, Johnson we admire: — with 
 Garrick we are often disgusted and mortified ; 
 the more we know of Johnson the more we desire 
 to learn. In closing the last volume of Garrick' s 
 memoirs we sigh and say, " This man lived in 
 vain !" but as we draw on to the evening of John- 
 son's life, it is with sad reluctance: — wethink 
 not even Boswell tedious; we would protract 
 the history ; and when we are forced to shut the 
 volume, it is with this conviction, " It is happy 
 for the world that Johnson lived !" 
 
 Having introduced Dr. Johnson on this subject, 
 as a contrast to Garrick, to show the pernicious 
 influence of the Stage on the character of a player 
 of eminent talents in his profession, — it may not 
 be amiss to enquire what ideas our great moralist 
 entertained of the employment. In his life of 
 Savage, he speaks of the condition of an actor, as 
 that which makes almost" Everyman, for what- 
 ever reason, contemptuous, insolent, petulant, 
 selfish and brutal/' That there have been a few 
 exceptions to this, that Mrs. Siddons and two or 
 three others have retained a virtuous character, 
 notwithstanding all the temptations and blandish- 
 
68' £SSAY ON- THE STAGE, 
 
 ments of the profession, is no argument against 
 this general, notorious fact. In a town infected 
 with the plague, an individual or two may have 
 escaped the contagion; but who would welcome 
 the pestilence into their neighbourhood, because 
 it has not been universally destructive; or who 
 would seriously argue, that because some consti- 
 tutions have withstood its power that it is there- 
 fore harmless? 
 
 The argument against the Theatre, drawn from 
 the general character of players,will, I am aware, 
 have little influence on those who would sacrifice 
 the human race if it could administer to their 
 pleasure; to propose such an argument to them, 
 they will say, betrays the most arrant fanaticism. 
 Those who can deride a Wilberfoiice for his 
 noble ;xertions to effect the abolition of the 
 slave trade, because luxury demands its con- 
 tinuance; will laugh too at the attempt which 
 would restore the degraded player to the dignity 
 of a human being, by destroying a profession 
 which, though it has made him infamous, affords 
 amusement and pleasure to the fashionable and 
 the gay. 
 
 But perhaps it may be urged, that the man 
 who commences actor does it from choice, and 
 that the degradation is on his part voluntary. 
 But is not female prostitution voluntary likewise ? 
 And is not that man guilty of a breach of moral 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGS. 69 
 
 obligation, is he not an enemy to society, who 
 supports a prostitute ? That a \ layer voluntarily 
 embraces a profession that sinks him into con- 
 tempt, is a proof of his degeneracy. But are we 
 to be partakers of other men's sins? Because 
 there was a wretch like Hubert to be found, was 
 the murderer John less criminal, when he em- 
 ployed him to assassinate the infant prince of 
 whom he should have been the protector, the 
 guardian, the friend? 
 
 Pretended benevolence, I know, may still plead 
 for a Theatre, under the idea that players are fit 
 for nothing else ; that disgust at the sober and 
 honourable occupations of life, and a moral ina- 
 bility to discharge its duties, together with a 
 love of vanity and an eager desire of applause, 
 first led them to tread the boards; that persons 
 of this description are only qualified to be the 
 menial servants of the public ; and that if we 
 take away from them figure, gesture, enunciation 
 and the power of memory — there is " Preterea 
 ttihfl." — There would be indeed some weight in 
 this consideration, if the disease which afflicts 
 the r, oral constitution of these poor creatures 
 were not contagious; if it did not infect otiiers, 
 and contribute to enlarge the sphere of vice and 
 misery. Could we convert the Theatre into a 
 sort of Bedlam, and not suffer these ragitig chil- 
 dren of passion and folly to propagate their 
 
70 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 wretchedness, we might gratify the best feelings 
 of the heart, and indulge a compassion which 
 reason and humanity would justify. 
 
 There is another argument on which some 
 persons lay great stress, and which I am afraid 
 will render all the former reasoning against 
 players and the Theatre ineffectual ; — and that 
 is, if we abolish the Stage, people of fashion will 
 be deprived of the most productive topic of con- 
 versation. Deduct from fashionable discourse 
 the last night's play, Kemble's attitudes, and the 
 affected tragic strutting of the infant Betty, and 
 what remains? If the Theatre did not kindly 
 relieve the embarrassments arising from the 
 want of subjects to talk of in many genteel cir- 
 cles, after the bow and the stare, they would 
 have nothing to do but to bow again and retire. 
 We must have players, that those things called 
 Beaus and Belles may not be reduced to mere 
 automata, or given up to dismal ennui. The 
 happiness of so important a part of society ought 
 surely to induce hesitation before we rashly and 
 barbarously propose the abolition of the Stage. 
 
 To one who views the Theatre, and its ad- 
 mirers, in the same contemptible light, this is a 
 consideration of little moment; and such an one 
 will not even now be convinced that players 
 should sacrifice the dignity of human nature, 
 and every thing that is dear to man, to compH- 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 71 
 
 ment the fashionable world. It is indeed the 
 province of the unhappy individuals themselves 
 to decide on this. But it should be the deter- 
 mination of every friend of humanity to leave the 
 support of the Theatre to those who derive from 
 it this only advantage which it can possibly yield. 
 In addition to what has been already written 
 on the pernicious and destructive influence of 
 the Stage, the audience which it usually 
 attracts, is an argument which should be seri- 
 ously weighed. I cannot help considering the 
 Theatre in this view, as the enchanted ground of 
 iniquity; it is here that vice lifts up its head with 
 undaunted courage; that the most licentious 
 and abandoned females endeavour, by meretri- 
 cious ornament, and every art which lascivious 
 wantonness can invent, to allure the young and 
 inconsiderate, who, with passions enkindled by 
 what is passing on the Stage, are thrown off 
 their guard, and thus fatally prepared to fall the 
 victims of seduction. The avenues to the The- 
 atres, the box-lobby, and many of the most con- 
 spicuous places in it, are filled with women of 
 this description. On the stage there is every 
 thing to excite improper ideas in the mind, and 
 in the audience every thing to gratify them. 
 The emotion is soon inflamed to a passion; rea- 
 son quickly yields to its powerful empire, and 
 ruin is too often the fatal consequence. 
 
*2 ESSAY ON, THE STAGE. 
 
 I know it is by no means unusual to condemn 
 this mode of reasoning- as inconclusive. It has 
 been said, that temptations to vice are to be 
 found every where, and that the Church is as 
 dangerous in this respect as the Theatre. This 
 however is not true. Temptations are no where 
 armed with such power as at the Playhouse. 
 That the abomination of desolation sometimes 
 intrudes into the holy place, and pollutes the 
 sanctuary, is an awful truth. But is there not 
 in a place of worship every thing to check un- 
 hallowed passions, and to counteract the influ- 
 ence of vice in its most seductive forms ? At 
 the house of prayer we have heard of infamous 
 women, who came to scoff, shrinking with hor- 
 ror, and trembling with apprehension; and, in- 
 stead of seducing others, they have been them- 
 selves reclaimed. But the Theatre, by its own 
 proper influence, and the coinciding influence 
 of accidental evil in the audience, has made a 
 thousand male and female prostitutes; while at 
 Church, there perhaps was never a youth of 
 untainted morals who fell into the snare of 
 female profligacy. They are not men of virtue 
 who are seduced at Church: — that man must 
 have been practised in iniquity who could 
 sutler himself to be led astray from before the 
 altar: but a youth hitherto innocent and un- 
 contaminated may fall an easy victim at the 
 
1.SSAY OS THE STAGK. }$ 
 
 Theatre. The sighs and tears of many wretched 
 parents, whose children have been swallowed 
 
 up in this vortex of dissipation, are in the place 
 
 « 
 
 of a thousand arguments against the destructive 
 tendency of a Theatre, and a theatrical audi- 
 ence. 
 
 Sir John Hawkins, in his Life of Johnson, has 
 a remark which strikingly illustrates what I 
 have now advanced. " Although it is said of 
 plays, that they teach morality; and of the Stage, 
 that it is the mirror of human life: these asser- 
 tions are mere declamation, and have no foun- 
 dation in truth or experience: on the contrary. 
 a Playhouse, and the regions about it, are the 
 very hot-beds of vice. How else comes it to 
 pass, that no sooner is a Playhouse opened in 
 any part of the kingdom, than it becomes sur- 
 rounded by an Halo of Brothels? Of this truth 
 the neighbourhood of the place I am now speak- 
 ing of (Goodman's Fields Theatre) has had ex- 
 perience; one parish alone, adjacent thereto, 
 having, to my knowledge, expended the sum of 
 1500/. in prosecutions, for the purpose of remov- 
 ing those inhabitants whom, for instruction in 
 the science of human life, the Playhouse had 
 drawn thither." 
 
 Let the contents of this chapter, and their 
 agreement with facts, be seriously examined and 
 dispassionately considered, and I have no doubt 
 
 E 
 
7 4 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 that every impartial mind will justify the con- 
 clusion to which I am brought — that the Stage 
 is evil only evil, and that the welfare of society, 
 and the happiness of the world, call loudly for 
 its abolition. But as this cannot be expected in 
 the present state of things, the wise and the 
 virtuous should at least discountenance it, both 
 by their influence and example. 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. Jo 
 
 CHAP. VII. 
 
 THE STAGE CONSIDERED WITH RESPECT TO 
 ITS INFLUENCE IN RETARDING THE PRO- 
 GRESS OF VITAL CHRISTIANITY. 
 
 Christianity is the balm of life; its 
 
 healing virtue invigorates the exhausted powers, 
 enlivens the depressed spirits, silences torment- 
 ing apprehensions, and tranquillizes the agitated 
 breast. There is no case of misery which it 
 cannot reach; there is no depth of human woe 
 which it cannot fathom: " Like the fabled power 
 of enchantment, it changes the thorny couch 
 into a bed of down; closes with a touch- the 
 wounds of the soul ; and converts a wilderness 
 of sorrow into the borders of paradise." But 
 Christianity, calculated as it is to banish guilt 
 and wretchedness from the world*, is powerless 
 and ineffectual until it becomes a vital principle 
 in the heart, until its doctrines are cordially em- 
 braced, and its morality implicitly obeyed. To 
 yield a cold assent to its evidences, to enlist 
 under its standard by merely wearing its name 
 as a badge of distinction, is in fact not to believe 
 
76 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 in it at all: — it must be welcomed to the bosom, 
 and must there be enthroned, or the blessings 
 which follow in its train can never be enjoyed. 
 
 Perhaps there are very few persons who would 
 deliberately renounce the Christian faith, I 
 would hope there are fewer still who do not 
 shudder with abhorrence when they think of the 
 philosophical association, with Voltaire at its 
 head, which was formed to annihilate Chris- 
 tianity, and whose watch-word, when the Re- 
 deemer's honour was to be assailed, was, "Crush 
 the wretch." But it is to be feared there are 
 many of this description, who, while they be- 
 lieve that a disavowal of Christianity would be 
 the renunciation of ail future hope, are yet very 
 far from being Christians indeed. They really 
 and in fact give up every thing in Christianity 
 but the name; that they retain as a sort of 
 charm to lull an accusing conscience to repose, 
 and to disarm death of some of his terrors. The 
 opinions they reverence are such as the New 
 Testament rejects as pernicious and destructive; 
 the code of morals which they have formed to 
 themselves, independently of the Cospel, is such 
 as the Christian Legislator never enforced; and 
 Christians of this character are remarkable for 
 nothing so much as a universal departure, both 
 in spirit and conduct, from their great Exem- 
 plar. 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 77 
 
 Among a great variety of causes which have 
 contributed to produce this strange inconsist- 
 ency and opposition between name and princi- 
 ple, profession and practice, we may reckon the 
 Stage. This enemy has robbed many of the lit- 
 tle religion which once distinguished them, and 
 lodged in the hearts of others the strongest pre- 
 judices against the practical influence of Chris- 
 tianity. The fashionable religionists of our day 
 are illustrations of the first part of this assertion ; 
 and the difficulty which persons, under a pow- 
 erful conviction of the truth and importance of 
 religion, feel in resigning to its influence their 
 last favourite — the Stage, is a proof of the other 
 part*. 
 
 When I hear some fashionable Christians 
 converse, when I behold their conduct in the 
 world, I at once perceive, that the orator on the 
 boards has a far greater influence than the ora- 
 tor in the pulpit; and an attendance on both has 
 produced such an oddity and inconsistency of 
 character, that Adam would scarcely know his 
 offspring; and Jesus of Nazareth must certainly 
 
 * Two persons, one an eminently pious minister of the Gos- 
 pel, and the other an accomplished and excellent female, 
 assured me, when conversing with them on this subject, that 
 previous to their becoming serious, the Stage opposed in theis 
 hearts the most powerful barrier to their receiving genuine 
 religion •, they thought they could sacrifice every thing to its 
 claims — but the Theatre, 
 
 E3 
 
t6 ESSAY ON THE STAGE, 
 
 disfranchise them from all the privileges and 
 immunities which will distinguish his genuine 
 followers. 
 
 The Theatre, when resorted to by persons 
 who profess to have embraced the Christian 
 religion in its peculiar doctrines and strict mo- 
 rality, soon displays its wonder-working power: 
 Religion quickly resigns the throne to Pleasure; 
 the doctrines of the Cross give place to a less 
 severe and more accommodating system; or if 
 the creed remain unaltered, it loses its practical 
 effect — " The salt has lost its savour;" the pecu- 
 liar features of the Christian character are gra- 
 dually softened down till they disappear. 
 
 I am aware it will be no easy task to persuade 
 the religious lovers of the Stage that it has pro- 
 duced this effect upon them; for apostasy, from 
 the purity and simplicity of the Gospel is a dis- 
 ease, which, while it strikes every eye besides, is 
 concealed from the miserable patient himself. 
 It was when the church at Laodicea was poor, 
 and miserable, and blind, and naked, that she 
 imagined herself rich and increased in goods. 
 The character of a man- is certainly discovered, 
 by his pleasures. If a person, professing to be 
 regulated in his spirit and conduct by the pure, 
 morality of the Gospel, can be gratified with 
 amusements, which are pursued with avidity by 
 the vicious and the vain, in exact proportion as 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. ]& 
 
 he derives pleasure from those amusements, he 
 must be departing from the spirit of Christi- 
 anity; for Christianity aims to produce a cha- 
 racter singular, and every way unlike the charac- 
 ter of those who are the abettors of the Sage. If 
 one fashionable amusement more than another 
 be stampt with the features of what is called in 
 the Gospel " The world/' it is the Theatre. Be- 
 fore a person can seek pleasure from the Drama 
 he must have imbibed much of the spirit of the 
 world: for there every thing is exhibited, and 
 exhibited with plausibility, to which the Chris- 
 tian Lawgiver has said, " Be not conformed." 
 When Christians sanction the Stage, they betray 
 their religion into the hands of the enemy; and 
 Christianity is more effectually injured by these, 
 its pretended friends, than by the open attacks 
 of the most hostile and inveterate of its avowed 
 adversaries. To such Christians I would recom- 
 mend consistency, and advise them never to 
 absent themselves from the Theatre when the 
 play-bills announce for perforajance — " The 
 Hypocrite." 
 
 The Stage has operated against Christianity 
 two ways: — its morality has always been a mo- 
 rality diametrically 'opposite to tke morality of 
 the Gospel, and consequently it produces an 
 antichristian character: — it has also vitiated the. 
 taste by raising the passions above their proper 
 E4 
 
SO ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 tone, and thus inducing a dislike and aversion 
 to grave and serious subjects, which have no- 
 thing to recommend them but their simplicity 
 and importance. 
 
 CHRISTIAN MORALITY AND THE MORALITY 
 OF THE STAGE CONTRASTED. 
 
 The sublime morality of the Gospel has ex- 
 cited the admiration, if not the love, of all 
 mankind: even infidels, who proudly contemn 
 the Christian faith, have paid their reluctant 
 homage to that system of morals which the 
 genius of Christianity has revealed, and which 
 by its sanctions it inculcates and maintains, 
 This morality has indeed renounced the spurious 
 virtues of a depraved world; it calls nothing 
 good but that which really is so in the nature 
 of things; it perplexes and renders ridiculous 
 man}' terms in the Nomenclature of moral 
 science, invented by mere philosophers and 
 poets; and that which conduces not to the hap- 
 piness of man as an individual, or a social being, 
 however specious its appearance, it despises and 
 condemns. In this it is singularly inditlerent to 
 the prejudices and sentiments of mankind; it 
 neither courts their admiration, nor deprecates 
 their censure: — as the instructor of a world, its 
 tone is dignified and firm. Its system is open 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 81 
 
 to the inspection of all, but it accommodates its 
 principles and injunctions to none. What is 
 good it enjoins : what is evil, and even that 
 which has the appearance of evil, it forbids. 
 
 The morality of the Gospel is strict but neces- 
 sary, and is austere to those only who are viti- 
 ated and destitute of its spirit. It is an unerring 
 guide in every path, and in every situation of 
 life; to the children of men it kindly speaks, and 
 its language is, " This is the way, walk ye in 
 it." This is the only infallible Mentor: other 
 self-appointed instructors will present them- 
 selves on the road, assuming the garb, and 
 sometimes the language, of Christianity: but of 
 these we are commanded to beware; their steps 
 lead down to death. But it not unfrequently 
 happens that the enemy of man is caressed as 
 his friend, and welcomed by general consent to 
 the heart. We should however recollect, that 
 it may not be virtue which the multitude ap- 
 plauds, and that he is not the sincerest friend 
 who is the most insinuating, and who boasts of 
 his qualifications. The sentiments of what is 
 called a Christian public, are not always to be 
 regarded as Christianity. TlTe subtle writer 
 who, to restore the moral constitution, mingles 
 sweet poison with his medicine, is a quack hi 
 ethics, and, like ail empirics, kills where he 
 ought to cure. And from what is known of the 
 
 E 5 
 
82 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 human heart, no man, who avails himself of 
 such a method of doing good, will ever succeed; 
 he departs from the genius and spirit of Chris- 
 tianity. He who consults the public taste, and 
 who would conciliate the depraved passions 
 which lurk in the bosom, in order to convey 
 instruction to the mind, will destroy his pupils : 
 to every grain of virtue conveyed in this danger- 
 ous vehicle, there must be an ounce of destruc- 
 tive vice. Now r such a Pretender to moral sci- 
 ence, when contrasted with the Gospel, is the 
 Stage. 
 
 The Gospel is moral in every view, and every 
 way hostile to sin. The Stage dazzles with a 
 few specious qualities, which are greatly ex- 
 ceeded by entire characters of disgusting vice. 
 Sometimes indeed the midnight horror of ini- 
 quity experiences a momentary illumination by 
 a solitary flash of virtuous sentiment; but even 
 its best sentiments are tainted; and when com- 
 pared with the Gospel retire into nothing, or 
 worse than nothing; while its counterfeit vir- 
 tues, and real vices, are fatally destructive to 
 morals and to man. 
 
 The ascendancy of the passions over reason— 
 the perversion of reason by inherent depravity, 
 is the fruitful source of all human misery. To 
 destroy this ascendancy — to sanctify the pas- 
 sions — and to impart a holy principle to reason, 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 83 
 
 is the object and the aim of Christianity: — its 
 doctrines, its precepts, the sublime example 
 which it proposes, all and equally tend to re- 
 store man to holiness and happiness. Thus 
 every thing in the Gospel is directly opposed to 
 pride and ambition, to anger and revenge, to 
 levity and wantonness: every page of this inva- 
 luable book inculcates humility and content- 
 ment, condescension and meekness, sobriety and 
 chastity; a spirit of fervent pity breathes from 
 the alpha to the omega of the New Testa- 
 ment; and its leading fundamental principle is — 
 " Whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God." 
 The man whose life is regulated by Christianity 
 acknowledges God in all his enjoyments, and 
 submits to his equitable government without 
 murmur or complaint in the hour of suffering 
 and distress. Xow let a person who has read 
 the Gospel till its spirit is all his own — till its 
 principles are deeply rooted in his soul — let such 
 an one enter the Theatre, our modern school of 
 virtue; and if it were possible to detain him 
 there during the performance of one evening, 
 what would be his sensations— what the com- 
 punction of his heart — that he had ever pas* 
 sed the unhallowed threshold of this sanctu- 
 ary of folly and delusion! How would he 
 blush for human nature, and weep at the 
 
84 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 awful depravity of these boasted intructors of 
 mankind* ! 
 
 * Some perhaps will censure, while others will commend, my 
 introducing here the following quotation : but it is connected 
 with the subject, and certainly has a tendency to produce a 
 beneficial effect on the minds of those who are in the habit of 
 visiting the Theatre. It is extracted from a sermon of Mr. 
 Love, a clergyman of Scotland, who once preached in Artillery- 
 !ane, London ; the sermon is entitled, " The radical Cause of 
 National Calamity j" and had Britain listened to that warning 
 voice, the portentous cloud which is ready to burst over our 
 devoted heads might, perhaps, have passed away. 
 
 " At the Theatre, when all is sunk in haughty forgetfulness 
 of God; after the proud have once more displayed their bril- 
 liancy, and * set their heart as the heart of God j' after th«» eyes 
 of vanity have, for the last time, feasted themse ves ; after 
 the tears which real guilt and misery demanded, have been 
 wasted on fictitious crimes and calamities, and the whole crowd 
 hath been shaken with the madness of laughter; after profane- 
 ness hath unfurled its flag of defiance, with hell-bred gall mtry 
 setting at nought the name of the Most High, the tremendous 
 operations of Providence, and the terrors of the bottomless-pit j 
 after obscenity hath shallowed down its morsel of elegant fil- 
 tliiness j let a celestial spirit shine forth, eclipsing the lumina- 
 ries of the place, and scattering round those terrors which were 
 once felt at the Sepu ehre of Jesus of Nazareth; and in such 
 strains as these let his voice announce the hastening doom:— . 
 • Worms of the dust, enemies of the eternal God ! you have 
 10:15 been the abhorrence of the inhabitants of heaven ; you 
 have disdained to seek Jesus, who was crucified , the ; ivine sor- 
 rows, the pure delights, which his spirit creates in repenting 
 souls, you have rejected- — you have treated with derision ; now 
 the day of your visitation expires. I swear by him that liveth 
 for ever and ever, you shall have time no longer !* Then let trem- 
 bling rock the ground ; let the. fabric and its miserable assem- 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 85 
 
 A brief review of one of the most celebrated 
 theatrical productions, and the least exception- 
 able of any 1 have read, will evince the truth of 
 the above remarks, and be a sufficient apology 
 for their severity. 
 
 Comedy is in its nature so contemptible, and 
 the " Stuff" of which it is made so disgusting to 
 a mind of common dignity, that its plots, its 
 follies, and what some are pleased to call, its 
 good-humoured vices, shall not pollute my page. 
 Love, intrigue, prodigality dressed in the garb 
 of generosity, profaneness dignified with the 
 name of fashionable spirit, seduction and adul- 
 tery, mere peccadillos in these days of refine- 
 ment, are all materials which the comic muse 
 combines and adorns to please and instruct her 
 Votaries. More pernicious to the moral consti- 
 tution than is hellebore to the natural, are the 
 seductive plays imported from Germany. The 
 Pizarro of Kotzebue is levelled at Christianity, 
 and, like our Humes and our Gibbons, its author 
 has purchased to himself indelible disgrace, by 
 
 bly roll down the opening chasm } and let the croud of dislodged 
 spirits beho'd the majestic, unveiled, flaming countenance of 
 their Judge. \\ ould such vengeance be too severe .—-Let us not 
 presume to say that it would j rather let us wonder that, 
 amidst ages of provocation, such tokens of wrath have not ap- 
 peared ; and if our impenitence is still continued, let us think 
 with awe for what solemn catastrophe such a people as we may 
 be reserved." 
 
86 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 making Jesus of Nazareth the author and insti- 
 gator of crime. The Virgin of the Sun is ex- 
 ceptionable on another ground; and the mother 
 that could suffer her daughters to read it in the 
 closet, much more behold it at a Theatre, must 
 be the monster of her species, and the deliberate 
 murderer of female virtue in the person of her 
 own offspring. I would, but I dare not, tran- 
 scribe a passage which is entitled to pre-eminent 
 infamy — my soul revolts, and I commit the de- 
 tested copy to the flames. — 'Twas an act of jus- 
 tice: — my heart is at ease. I will now go on. 
 
 I shall not be accused of partiality in my se- 
 lection from the English Drama, if I offer a few 
 strictures on the Tragedy of Douglas. This 
 is reckoned one of our best theatrical perform- 
 ances; its morality has been highly applauded, 
 and it is written by a clergyman. — But its prin- 
 ciples are autichristian. Its author, one of the 
 angels of the Scottish church, if he ever under- 
 stood the Gospel, is fallen like Lucifer, son of 
 the morning. There are in this production some 
 vestiges of an acquaintance with Christianity — 
 but ah, how mutilated!— -how 7 changed ! And 
 if the religion of his sermons inculcate the mo- 
 rality of his tragedy, his unfortunate bearers, if 
 they admire and approve, wiil be any thing but 
 Christians. 
 
 As a dramatic composition, this tragedy is 
 
ESAYS ON THE STAGE. 87 
 
 entitled to considerable praise; it is well con- 
 ducted; the style is elegant, and in the highest 
 degree it is interesting : but in a moral point of 
 view, and with regard to its aspect on Chris- 
 tianity, it is exceedingly dangerou s. 
 
 The first speech of Lady Randolph has a fault 
 which no Christian writer ought to commit; she 
 concludes her soliloquy by a reflection on " Fate." 
 But is Fate the God we worship? There are 
 many excellent traits in the character of this 
 heroine of the piece: — she feels as a mother; but 
 she talks not, she acts not, like a Christian ; yet 
 she is held up to the audience as a character to 
 be admired and imitated. A clandestine marriage 
 is the cause of her misfortunes: but she is not 
 blamed for this act of imprudence. Her father 
 was not consulted, but deceived: — she indeed 
 laments the deception, but does not repent of 
 her romantic love. In relating her story to Anna 
 she refers again to " ruling Fate;" and as she 
 advances, in the spirit of dissatisfaction, and as if 
 in contempt of Providence, she upbraids the God 
 of Heaven for afflicting her: — 
 
 - u mighty heaven, 
 
 What had i done to merit this affiiction ?" 
 
 Does this resemble him who said, " The Lord 
 gave, and the Lord hath taken away, blessed be 
 the name of the Lord?" But what has a fictiti- 
 
88 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 ous character on the Stagfe to do with Heaven? 
 How shameful this solemn appeal in such circum- 
 stances, and how dreadfully impious the sen- 
 timent; 
 
 Again : hear this Amazon breathing a martial 
 spirit, exalting the trade of arms above the shep- 
 herd's humble useful walk. 
 
 u what does my Anna think 
 Of the young Eaglet of a valiant nest ? 
 How soon he gaz'd on bright and burning arms ; 
 Spurn'd the low dunghill where his fate had thrown him 5 
 Aud tower 1 d up to the region of his sire." 
 
 Here is a sentiment which Christianity abhors; 
 but it appears to be a favourite with our Chris- 
 tian divine, for he has more than once introduced 
 it with approbation. The feudal spirit animates 
 him, and the peasantry, the strength and glory 
 of a country, the sinews of a state, are in his 
 view the refuse of the dunghill; while the 
 barbarous love of arms exalts its possessor to 
 another, and a higher rank of being. This high 
 told rant may gratify the Scottish pride of ances- 
 try, and may be sweet music in the ear of the 
 haughty baron ; but the Gospel knows nothing 
 of a natural inequality of mankind. And, if to 
 be born with the savage spirit of war, and with a 
 thirst for blood, be a proof of inherent dignity, 
 the Tyger of the woods claims the precedence, 
 and is superior to the most distinguished heroes 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE, 89 
 
 that ever Scotland knew. But listen : this Chris- 
 tian lady is at her devotions : hear her prayer : 
 
 " Oh thou all righteous and eternal King, 
 Who Father of the fatherless art calPd, 
 Protect my son ! Thy inspiration, Lord, 
 Hath fiil'd his hosom with that sacred lire, 
 Which in the breasts of his forefathers burn'd ; 
 Set him on high, like them, that he may shine 
 The star and glory of his native land." 
 
 Pride, ambition, revenge, the love of glory, all 
 which Christianity is intended to extirpate from 
 the human breast, and which have been the 
 bane and misery of man, are here traced to a 
 source which makes me shudder : — the inspiration 
 of Jehovah hath filfd her son's breast with the 
 sacred fire of these unhallowed passions! What 
 page of the New Testament warrants any of its 
 votaries to adopt such sentiments? St. James 
 would never have addressed such a prayer to the 
 God of Heaven : — " Whence come wars and fight- 
 ings among you ? Come they not of your lusts?" 
 was his opinion on the subject. What I have 
 hinted before, the awful profaneness of such ap- 
 peals to heaven from an actress on the Stage, 
 must chill every pious breast with horror. What 
 daring impiety! A Christian divine is deter- 
 mined to write a tragedy, and, for the sake of stage 
 effect, he ventures to make the Eternal God 
 one of the dramatis persons; and calls him ever 
 
90 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 and anon to sanction pride, to smile on ambition, 
 to lend his authority, and stamp with dignity a 
 fiction — a lie. Frequent instances of this shocking 
 impiety occur in the tragedy of Douglas. 
 
 But Lady Randolph, with whom the audience 
 is made to sympathize, and who is the most 
 virtuous heroine that ever figured on the Stage, 
 is brought at last to crown her piety and her vir- 
 tue with suicide. Unable longer to sustain the 
 shock of adversity : deprived of every earthly 
 comfort; and as if the consolations of that 
 Heaven in which she is made to trust were sus- 
 pended, she closes her career by self-murder. 
 
 44 such a son, 
 
 And such a husband drive me to my fate." 
 
 The other characters of this piece are equally 
 exceptionable; ttieir morality cannot bear the 
 severe test of the Gospel. Lord Randolph and 
 Douglas are exhibited to be admired; but this 
 would be a miserable world, if mankind were to 
 imbibe the spirit and temper of these personages. 
 Prompt to revenge an injury; proud and ambiti- 
 ous in the highest degree; impatient of restraint; 
 and deadly in their hate, are these instructors of 
 a Christian audience. Douglas dies, acknow- 
 le ging that he only wished to live to run the 
 career of glory and to be admired. There is a 
 scene in his life, where the audience are made to 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 91 
 
 catch the spirit of duelling, and almost to regret 
 that the sword was not drawn to avenge a private 
 wrong. His leaving the house of his reputed fa- 
 ther as an adventurer, is not mentioned as a fault, 
 though his sudden departure wrung the old man's 
 heart with anxiety and sorrow. In the eye of the 
 author this boy has no defect ; and he undoubtedly- 
 intended him as a model for our British youth. 
 The whole tragedy is well adapted to make them 
 warriors, duellists, and suicides. But the self- 
 denying virtues of Christianity; that benevolence 
 which embraces the whole human race as one 
 family; that controul over our own spirit; that 
 disposition to forgive injuries, and to do good to 
 those who despitefully use us ; that fervent zeal to 
 live to the glory of God ; that acquiescence in his 
 will, in every situation of trial and affliction; all 
 of which are the distinguishing features of Chris- 
 tian morality, they will never learn from Douglas, 
 nor from any other theatrical performance that 
 was ever received with approbation on the Mage. 
 Indeed, Christian virtue, or the Christian cha- 
 racter drawn to the life, wholly complete in 
 every part, wouldnpt please, but disgust a mixed 
 audience : — and the reason is obvious; those who 
 refuse o welcome true religion to their Hearts, 
 ipu$t have then aversion to it subdued beiore 
 they can be pleased with seeing it on the Stage, 
 Christianity aims to complete the moral cha- 
 
S2 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 racter, and acknowledges none as its votaries till 
 they renounce every sin. The Stage fixes on 
 one or two amiable qualities, which cannot be 
 considered as virtues, to atone for a thousand 
 follies and a thousand crimes. And it is remark- 
 able, that on the Stage those qualities only are ap- 
 plauded, which a man may possess while he is en- 
 tirely destitute of religion ; and others too are com- 
 mended which he ought not, which he cannot pos- 
 sess if he be a real Christian. If a character be 
 frank, open generous, and brave, he has, ac- 
 cording to the Vocabulary of the Stage," A good 
 heart." He may be an adulterer, a libertine, a 
 despiser of Cod, and a trampler on his laws, 
 and these are only human frailties. 
 
 Will it not then be acknowledged with univer- 
 sal conviction, that the morality of the Stage, 
 and the morality of the Gospel, are irreconcil- 
 ably at variance; that there is little, if any thing, 
 in common between them; and that in propor* 
 tion as the one advances in the formation of 
 character, an effectual barrier is opposed to the 
 influence and success of the other? 
 
 The Stage is a miserable school for the con- 
 duct of life; its most finished character is the 
 slave of passion, the creature of the moment, 
 without capacity or inclination to perform the 
 most essential duties which are required of him 
 as a social being, The good man of the Theatre, 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 93 
 
 who receives the plaudits of a Christian audi- 
 ence, is not a Christian ; his principles are taught 
 in a seminary where Christ has no authority, and 
 are directly opposite to those which Christianity 
 would implant in the breast. It is a maxim with 
 him, that present gratification is to be preferred 
 to suffering virtue; that ambition is superior to 
 contentment : that pride is necessary to carry a 
 man with decency through the world ; that re- 
 sentment is manly spirit; and patience of inju- 
 ries, meanness and degradation. Such, with re- 
 spect to the conduct of life, is a character formed 
 by the Stage. And the objects which the The- 
 atre instructs its votary to pursue, are as anti- 
 christian as the principles which it would recom- 
 mend. It is said of the Christian, that he lives 
 in the present world — ■" As seeing him who is 
 invisible:" he considers himself as a stranger 
 and traveller, whose goal is immortality, and 
 whose reward is the approving smile of heaven : 
 he pursues an incorruptible treasure, and pro- 
 claims himself to be the Denizen of a city whose 
 builder and maker is God. 
 
 -" the liisrh-born soul 
 
 Disdains to rest her heav'n-aspiring wing 
 Beneath its native quarry." 
 
 The degraded pupil of the Stage, on the con- 
 trary, has no prospects beyond the limits of mor- 
 
94 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 tality; his horizon is the grave; his schemes are 
 all " Earthly, sensual, or devilish ;" the highest 
 precept of his instructor is — " Live while you 
 live." What Foster beautifully declares of elegant 
 literature, is strikingly applicable to the best 
 theatrical productions which are exhibited on 
 the Stage, with all the pomp of scenery, gesture, 
 and action. The Theatre " Does not instruct a 
 man to act, to enjoy, and to suffer, as a being 
 that may to-morrow have finally abandoned this 
 orb; every thing is done to beguile the feeling 
 of his being a stranger and pilgrim on the earth." 
 The Stage " Endeavours to raise the groves of 
 an earthly paradise, to shade from sight that vista 
 which opens to the distance of Eternity." 
 
 So completely a man of this world is the hero 
 of the Theatre, that if disappointment, which is 
 the common lot of humanity, overtake him, he 
 is inconsolable; and as if his fortune and happi- 
 ness were forever wrecked, he mourns that " The 
 Everlasting has fixed his canon 'gainst self-mur- 
 der ;" or, forgetting entirely that there is an 
 Almighty Being or a future state, he ends with 
 his own hands what he fondly hopes is the 
 whoie of his existence. This method of closing 
 the earthly scene, is peculiar to him who 
 makes this wond all important, and who is 
 regardless of another. The very tendency of 
 the Theatre leads to this:— having confined ob- 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 95 
 
 jects worthy of pursuit to a present state, it 
 teaches — that want of success is the loss of 
 every thing; and that a man, whom the world 
 and benignant Fortune disown, has no business 
 with life. 
 
 The pleasures of a character formed by the 
 Theatre, are such as Christianity forbids, and 
 which to the Christian are insipid and disgusting. 
 
 These two beings seem to be cast in a different 
 mould: that of which the one speaks with 
 rapture, upon which he reflects with satisfaction, 
 and to the repetition of which he looks forward 
 with delight, is to the other nauseous; he rejects 
 it " With hatefullest disrelish," and avoids it as 
 the minister of pain. The pursuit of both is 
 happiness; but in what different paths is it 
 sought by each! and how opposite the sources 
 from whence it is derived ! I know of no worse 
 purgatory to a man whose character the Stage 
 has formed, than to be doomed to converse and 
 associate with a real Christian. Place an indi- 
 vidual of this description beside the seraphic 
 John, or holy Paul; let them both disclose the 
 sources of their enjoyments, the objects which in 
 the possession afford them pleasure, and the an- 
 ticipations that charm them with the delights of 
 hope, and you will at once perceive that every 
 thing is dissimilar and opposite: — the Apostle 
 views his companion with pity and concern; the 
 
96 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 companion regards the Apostle with wonder and 
 contempt. 
 
 It may perhaps be urged, that without the 
 influence of the Theatre, every man destitute of 
 religion would be equally averse from the con- 
 duct, the pursuits, and the pleasures of the Chris- 
 tian. That the depravity of the human heart is 
 a decided foe to exalted, scriptural piety, is un- 
 doubtedly true ; but it is possible surely to mature 
 the seeds of vice, to increase the natural enmity 
 of the human mind against the Gospel, by 
 arming it with prejudice, and deluding it with 
 error. This is effectually done when the world 
 creates its instructor, and becomes its own law- 
 giver; when it establishes a school where man- 
 kind are flattered into a persuasion, that the 
 human heart, without the salutary, transforming 
 influence of religion, is the seat of virtuous prin- 
 ciple ; that sufferings, which are the consequences 
 of guilt, may be considered as an atonement for 
 crime; and that he who has lived imperfectly 
 virtuous, even according to its own system of 
 virtue, while his heart is estranged from God, 
 may, nevertheless, confidently expect the mercy 
 of heaven. Clothed in this Panoply furnished 
 by the Stage, the heart is assailed by Christianity 
 in vain; for it is the Stage that inculcates 
 doctrines like these, and impresses their characters 
 indelibjy on the Soul. Man is naturally pleased 
 
ESSA.Y OX THE STAGE. 97 
 
 with the teacher that prophecies good concerning 
 him, while he turns away with aversion from 
 the less accommodating instructor, who, fearless 
 of consequences, would force upon him un- 
 welcome truth; and the more he is captivated 
 by the one, his prejudices are increased and 
 strengthened against the other. 
 
 No one, I think, will seriously deny, that a 
 man who has imbibed the general sentiments 
 which are enforced on the Stage, is a more de- 
 cided enemy to pure, unsophisticated Christianity, 
 than he who has never yielded to its influence; 
 for though the latter may be depraved, and con- 
 sequently averse from vital religion, yet his 
 heart is not fortified with the prejudices of error. 
 And whatever opposition is to be subdued by 
 the Gospel previous to its complete triumph over 
 him, it has not to contend with the impressions 
 of a theatrical character. It has no ingenious 
 sophistry to unravel, no enchanting visions to 
 disrobe of their fallacious beauty, no daz- 
 zling, yet destructive principles of action to 
 eradicate. 
 
 To err in our ideas of moral obligation, and 
 the nature and extent of moral science, is fatal to 
 individual and social happiness. Such error is a 
 formidable opponent to Christianity — it makes 
 usTniserable and keeps us so. Yet, the Stage is 
 the school where pure morality is mutilated, 
 
 F 
 
98 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 tarnished, and perplexed; where precept and 
 example combine their influence to form a cha- 
 racter whose every feature Christianity must 
 efface before it can be admitted into the heart. 
 In proportion, therefore, to the moral influence 
 of the Stage, must be the sum of human wretch- 
 edness. That this influence operates strongly 
 against Christianity, will appear from another 
 view of the subject. 
 
 The Stage raises the passions above 
 their proper tone, a s d thus induces a 
 dislike to grave and serious subjects, 
 which have nothing but their simplicity 
 and importance to recommend them. 
 
 The Gospel is simple and grave; it rejects 
 with indignation the foreign aid of ornament ; to 
 recommend itself to the world, it depends on 
 nothing but its own intrinsic excellence. The 
 enticing words of man's wisdom, the finesse of 
 oratory, the rich attire, the modern drapery, in 
 which some advocates of " Pulpit eloquence" 
 would fain invest divine truth, are but the efforts 
 of imbecility to adorn a theme, whose dignity is 
 plainness, whose nature is simplicity. The 
 Theatre and theatrical productions are just the 
 reverse of this; and an attendance on the Stage 
 has, in this view, been greatly prejudicial to 
 Christianity. The Stage, as its doctrines and 
 precepts are congenial with the frame and dis- 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGTE. £# 
 
 position of the human heart, as it nourishes, or 
 at best but refines the degeneracy of our depraved 
 nature, so there is every thing in its manner to 
 fascinate, to allure, to impress the Soul. The 
 passions, our treacherous enemies, are touched 
 by the scenes of the Drama, and bewilder and 
 delude the understanding. 
 
 Poetry, music, action, oratory, all enlisted in 
 the cause of fiction, combine their influence to 
 draw off the mind from the simple and the useful, 
 while a passion for the romantic, the showy, and 
 the splendid, is excited and increased. The soul 
 is elated, and sometimes wound up to rapture, 
 while sentiments are impressed on the mind, 
 which neither time nor occupation will ever 
 efface. The most dangerous effect produced by 
 the Theatre in this view, is, that it absolutely 
 debilitates the mind, and renders it inaccessible 
 by simple, yet everlastingly important truth. — As 
 the powers are raised above their proper tdnc 
 artificial impulse, the best instructions- conveyed 
 in a different method are nugatory and vain. 
 What the ingenious Mr. Knight haft said of the 
 passion for Romances and X ovels, is strikingly 
 true of the Stage — it produces" A sickly sensi- 
 bility of mind, which is equally adverse to thq 
 acquisition of useful knowledge an'.i sound mo- 
 rality." The passions which guard the avenue.-, 
 to the understanding, have received a kind yi 
 F 2 
 
100 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 stupor, from which nothing but theatrical power 
 can rouse them. A weak stimulus will not act 
 after one that is more powerful. Thus sentiments 
 however pernicious and destructive to the moral 
 character and to happiness, received at the 
 Theatre, continually deepen their impression on 
 the Soul, till they are absolutely indelible: — 
 they become the inseparable attendants on con- 
 sciousness, and the individual must forget himself 
 to lose these, his constant companions. If his 
 mind ever ask for new ideas : if, not satiated with 
 what it already has attained, it longs for more, he 
 must visit the Theatre : — reading is insipid, 
 except a novel relieve the tedious interval ; con- 
 versation for improvement is dull and uninterest- 
 ing; nothing can seize his attention powerfully 
 but the Drama. 
 
 It is said of Sir Matthew Hale, " That he was 
 an extraordinary proficient at School, and for 
 some time at Oxford ; but the Stage Players 
 coming thither, he was so much corrupted by 
 seeing plays, that he almost wholly forsook his 
 studies. By this he not only lost much time, 
 but found that his head was thereby filled with 
 vain images of things; and being afterwards 
 sensible of the mischief of this, he resolved, upon 
 his coming to London, never to see a play again, 
 to which he constantly adhered." 
 
 If then a love for the Stage unfit the mind for 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAG I.. 101 
 
 the acquisition of useful knowledge which has 
 no connexion with religion, how seriously hos- 
 tile must it be to Christianity! I knew a young 
 man so bewitched by the Theatre, that he felt an 
 absolute incapacity to read the most interesting 
 productions in Science and Theology. " Around 
 this enchanted spot (said he to a friend) I linger- 
 ed long, till its fatal influence had nearly beguiled 
 me of my salvation ; I thought the Gospel insipid, 
 and lessons of morality insufferably disgusting: 
 and had not the powers of the world to come roused 
 me from this moral lethargy, Christianity would 
 have continued my aversion, and the Stage my 
 idol." The indignant eloquence of the Abbe 
 Clement will also assist me here. The Theatre, 
 say its advocates, informs and relieves the mind. 
 " Yes, if to make all useful reading insipid ; to 
 withdraw the mind, by an indescribable and 
 secret charm, from every serious and important 
 occupation; to deprave the taste, by exciting 
 aft insurmountable aversion to simplicity, and an 
 exclusive admiration of the marvellous; and to 
 debase the feelings, by destroying all sense of 
 gratification but in the most violent agitations of 
 the soul: — if this be to inform the mind, the 
 argument is irresistible. My friends, this de- 
 scription is not overcharged, you know that it is 
 not; you know that these are the effects of the 
 best regulated Stage," To live in fairy land, and 
 
 F 3 
 
102 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 to converse with fiction, is charming; but it has 
 the same effect on the intellectual and moral 
 constitution as opium on the natural. There are 
 pleasures ill madness which only madmen know; 
 '.but what rational being would envy the maniac 
 his joys? And if fiction and the Stage rob us of 
 sober truth and reasonable pleasure ; if, when we 
 break from their influence, we are left without 
 consolation, and without hope, shall we yield to 
 their enchantment, or suffer ourselves to be 
 carried away by such delusory vanities ? When 
 their fatal tendency is considered; when we 
 reflect, that subjects, the most essential and 
 important, fail to impress a theatrical mind; 
 that religious and moral improvement can never 
 be attained, while we accustom ourselves to the 
 pleasures of the Stage, shall we for a moment 
 hesitate which to abandon. 
 
 The most preposterous inconsistency marks 
 that tnan's character, who, while he pretends to 
 venerate Christianity, can admit for a moment 
 the opposing claims of the Theatre. Irrecon- 
 cilable enemies cannot be seated on the same 
 throne ; and the love of vital religion cannot 
 exist in the heart that feels the remotest approach 
 to a theatrical passion. That the Stage is in 
 every view hostile to the Spirit and influence of 
 Christianity, is a question which may soon be 
 decided by an impartial examination of the New 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 103 
 
 Testament, and those theatrical productions 
 which have allured and deceived the world. 
 
 My views of the Gospel, may, perhaps, be 
 condemned by some as unreasonably strict and 
 severe ; yet, I think, if the Christian Lawgiver be 
 deemed infallible, and if the system of morals 
 which he has made known be admitted without 
 mutilation or change, objections on this ground 
 will vanish into air. Those who consider the 
 New Testament as the standard and the source 
 of evangelical and moral truth, must acknowledge 
 that I have oniy copied from the great original ; 
 that the " Sermon on the Mount," and the hor- 
 tatory eloquence of Paul, are in perfect unison 
 with that delineation of Christian Ethics which 
 I have feebly made; between which and the 
 Theatre there is the widest clifterence, and the 
 greatest opposition. 
 
 By sutiering the Gospel to speak out its 
 claims, by exhibiting its native characters, with- 
 out reference or regard to the sentiments and 
 prejudices of mankind, I am conscious of having 
 exposed myself to the charge of fanaticism. The 
 accommodating moralist and the fashionable 
 divine, will each depart from his usual softness, 
 and, with the unpoliteness of vulgar censure, 
 consign me to infamy. But this is nothing new; 
 it is no uncommon thing to affect to despise that 
 to which we have no disposition to conform. 
 Accordingly, pure, unsophisticated Christianity 
 
104 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 has ever been held in derision by those whose 
 conduct it censures, and whose principles it 
 condemns. " The world is not its friend, nor 
 the world's law." And its advocates must ex- 
 pect to share in the obloquy which it is doomed 
 to suffer. But let no man shrink from a firm 
 and dignified avowal, that he is the friend, the 
 admirer, the champion, of a system which is 
 divine. — Unmov'd by censure or applause, the 
 cause he should consider as every thing. Secure 
 in the approbation of conscience, the opposition 
 of men he should cheerfully sustain, or nobly 
 disregard. 
 
 I pity the man w T hose passion for fame leads 
 him to court the approbation of his fellow crea- 
 tures, at the expense of their virtue ; who thrusts 
 Christianity into the shade, when it ought to 
 occupy the throne; or, if he bring it forward at 
 all, so softens its features, so transforms its cha- 
 racter, that it becomes the creature of a depraved 
 mind, rather than the infinitely pure system of a 
 Divine Author. Let it never be forgotten that it 
 is altogether out of the character of Christi- 
 anity, to act a subservient, or accommodating 
 part; she must be invested with absolute autho- 
 rity, or she is in fact disregarded and despised. 
 
 If Christianity, therefore, be the religion of 
 our choice, our amusements, and our amusing 
 instructors should be conformed to its nature, 
 and pervaded by its spirit. Conscious that, in 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 105 
 
 this reasoning there is some force, Christians 
 who plead for the Stage have fallen into a 
 dangerous error; they have disfigured and tar- 
 nished the pure, immaculate robe of Christianity, 
 while they have bedizened the vest of Thalia 
 with ornaments and beauties which it never 
 possessed but in their imagination. And, thus,, 
 when the Gospel is " Shorn of its beams,'' and 
 the Stage arrayed in borrowed, adventitious 
 glories, a sort of resemblance is artfully produced 
 between them. 
 
 It not a little surprised me, that such a writer 
 fts Knox should evidently sanction the Theatre, 
 that he should commend in the gross (for he has 
 not discriminated) the moral tendency of the 
 Plays of Shakspeare, Otway, and Rowe. 
 
 After having " Entered into all the feelings' 5 
 of these writers, when we have " Assimilated with 
 their souls," let us take up the volume of truth 
 and righteousness; and we must certainly acknow- 
 ledge that however gratifying it may be to feel 
 with the Drama, it is not Christian feeling; it rs 
 something the very reverse, which Christianity 
 would suppress, and which Christians therefore 
 ought not to indulge. Yet Dr. Knox is a Chris- 
 tian divine, whose writings in general do honour 
 to his profession*. 
 
 * This was written before DK Knox printed his Philanthropic 
 Sermon : Literature and ReHgion should now disown him. 
 
 F 5 
 
106 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 If any men more than others are bound to 
 throw their whole weight of influence into the 
 scale opposite to the Theatre, they are Clergy- 
 men, who by profession are sacred teachers of 
 sacred truth. For divines to prostitute their 
 talents by writing for the Stage, is to destroy 
 with one hand what they build with the other: 
 they are vainly attempting to serve two masters 
 of opposite claims, and of characters so essen- 
 tially ditTe rent, that if they love the one, they must 
 despise the other. Equally culpable are those 
 w 7 ho sanction the Theatre by their presence and 
 example. Language cannot reprobate in terms 
 sufficiently strong, the conduct of those" Pliable 
 Priests," who waste th^ir evenings in sauntering 
 about the Theatre ; sometimes in the boxes, then 
 in the lobby, and other places of public and 
 indecent resort. Clerical fops, who/" Familiar 
 with a round of ladyships, make Cod's work a 
 v inecure." But there are who glory in their 
 shame. Censure is lost upon those who diead no 
 charge so much, as that of being sincerely in 
 earnest in their sacred profession. This would be 
 branding them with infamy indeed. But how- 
 ever lou^ the catalogue of their follies and their 
 crimes, this will never be inserted as one -of 
 its items. 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE, 107 
 
 CHAP. VIII. 
 
 THE STAGE CONSIDERED AS AN AMUSEMENT 
 ONLY. 
 
 -ITHERTO I have considered the Theatre as 
 amoral instructor; and though amusement be 
 its primary object I have endeavoured to show, 
 that it must have some influence in the forma- 
 tion of character, and th^t that influence is de- 
 cidedly hostile to the best interests of man. But 
 there are advocates of the Stage, who disclaim 
 the idea of its being a teacher, who plead for it 
 as an amusement only. And though I am per- 
 suaded that it must be injurious to morals, yet, 
 for the sake of argument, and to show that it 
 cannot be defended on any ground, I will divest 
 it of its character as an instructor, and consider 
 it only in the light in which Shaftsbury pleaded 
 for it, and Rousseau commended it. Shaftsbury 
 declares, " That the Theatre was intended merely 
 for recreation, and that if it have any tendency 
 to improve, the improvement extends only to 
 the art of the poet, and the refinement of taste." 
 Rousseau, in his System of Education, has a si- 
 F6 
 
10S ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 milar remark. " I carry Emilius to the Theatre 
 (says he), not to study morals, but taste ; for there 
 it particularly displays itself to those who are 
 capable of reflection. You have nothing to do, 
 I will tell him, with morality here, this is not 
 the place in which to learn it : the Stage was not 
 erected for the promulgation of truth, but to 
 flatter and amuse." 
 
 With respect to the improvement of taste and 
 the poetic art by the Drama, whatever the an- 
 cients might urge on this head, the moderns 
 surely have nothing to claim. Garrick in vain 
 attempted to discipline the taste of an English 
 audience; he at lastrelinguished the task in de- 
 spair, and was heard to say, " That if the public 
 required him to get up for the Stage the Pilgrim's 
 Progress, he would do it." I conceive there is 
 even less to be said in favour of the modern 
 Drama as a standard of taste, than can be ad- 
 vanced in its defence as a school of morals; and 
 in both, it is a severe reflection on our literature 
 and virtue. 
 
 As an amusement only, I think the Stage can- 
 not be defended: strip it of its pretensions to 
 taste, and to moral instruction, and it loses every 
 thing: — for as an amusement it is altogether 
 improper. The question naturally presents it- 
 self here — What is the nature and end of amuse- 
 ment? And when this is answered, another 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 109 
 
 immediately follows: — Does the Theatre cor- 
 respond with this idea; is it calculated to answer 
 this end? 
 
 Amusement is recreation, and is intended to 
 relieve the mind from severe attention, or to 
 recruit the animal spirits, by an agreeable sus- 
 pension of bodily labour. Man is formed for 
 exertion; his circumstances in general require 
 activity : but weariness and fatigue are the con- 
 sequence of a proper and becoming attention to 
 the business and duties of life. The mind must 
 sometimes relax — the body cannot always exert 
 its energies. But it is injurious to the intellec- 
 tual power6, and to the animal constitution, to 
 suffer an immediate transition from busy em- 
 ployment to perfect idleness. We naturally ask 
 for recreation, something that will assist the 
 mind pleasingly to unbend; that will enliven 
 and exhilarate the spirits, and thus prepare us 
 for the return of occupation, and qualify us to 
 enter upon it with new energy. 
 
 It is necessary that our amusements should be 
 suited to our pursuits. The student and the 
 man of science should recreate himself with 
 something adapted to the nature of his employ- 
 ment, and which at the same time conduces to his 
 health. Exercise, light reading, social converse, 
 are all sources of pleasure and recreation to the 
 student; and if he be not fastidious they are all 
 
110 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 lie requires. The man of business, after his mind 
 has been wearied by its cares, and his body 
 fatigued, if he have a rational taste, will retire 
 iuto the bosom of his family; or if he be not 
 blest with the endearments of domestic life, he 
 will certainly recreate and enliven his spirits 
 by innocent diversion ; he will studiously avoid 
 every thing which would violently agitate his 
 frame, which demands the labour of close atten- 
 tion, and which cannot be accomplished but by 
 a waste of time, incompatible with any active 
 employment. Amusement should invigorate, 
 and not exhaust the powers; it should spread a 
 sweet serenity over the mind, and should be en- 
 joyed at proper seasons. Midnight is no time 
 for recreation to a rational being, who lives 
 for any other purpose than to destroy his con- 
 stitution, and kill time. The amusements of 
 society should never encroach upon its duties, 
 or they defeat their object and become inju- 
 rious. 
 
 It must be perceived that I have hitherto 
 spoken of the amusements of those who are 
 "Useful to their kind;" I have not considered 
 the miserable expedients of fops and fools, by 
 which they endeavour to relieve themselves from 
 the burden of idleness, and the listlessness of 
 having no one important object to engage their 
 attention ; and who contrive one folly after ano- 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. Ill 
 
 ther, in quick succession, to enable them to pass 
 through life without reflection, and with as lit- 
 tle benefit as possible to themselves or others. 
 I pity the contemptible creature who has no- 
 thing to do but to get rid of his time; to talk of 
 amusing -such a being is a misapplication of 
 words. Amusement is his business; and who 
 will envy him his drudgery, or his toil ? He 
 inverts the order of nature; he seems to be 
 happy, but he betrays himself; it is easy to 
 discern, through his apparent gaiety, his real 
 wretchedness : — 'tis 
 
 " A face cf pleasure, but a heart of pain. - " 
 
 I think it would be a service, which all moral 
 writers would render to mankind, were they to 
 strike off these tiny beings, these animalcula, 
 from the list of rational existence; and therefore 
 I wish it to be distinctly understood, that I con- 
 sider their example and their claims lighter than 
 air: — they have mistaken the great end of living; 
 and their conduct is one continued aberration 
 from nature, reason, and happiness. 
 
 But to return. If the nature and end of 
 amusement be to recreate the mind, and to re- 
 cruit the strength of those who are performing 
 the duties of life; and if those things only are 
 proper for amusement which have this ten- 
 dency, it surely will never be urged, in favour x>f 
 
112 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 the Theatre, that it is a suitable recreation for 
 persons of this description and character. 
 
 The mind is as much employed, the attention is 
 as strongly seized at the Theatre, as in any of the 
 engagements of active life. Fatigue and weari- 
 ness are felt as much on quitting the Playhouse 
 as on leaving the Study, the Counting-house, or 
 the Exchange. There is nothing that exhausts 
 us more than the fever of the passions. The 
 tempest of the soul is succeeded by distressing- 
 lassitude. After it subsides, we seem deprived 
 of strength; our energies are gone; and it is 
 sometime before the mind recovers its former 
 tone. Now it is notorious, that the Theatre 
 rouses the passions, and agitates the soui. If we 
 attend at all to what is passing before us, we are 
 deeply interested; the real occurrences of life, 
 which involve in them the happiness or misery 
 of individuals, could not impress us more, nor 
 would they so much. One moment we swell 
 with ambition, and the next are fired with re- 
 venge; now we tremble with fear, then burn 
 with desire ; sometimes we chill with horror, 
 and anon in sympathy, with the imaginary child 
 of woe — 
 
 ^ Drop tears as fast as the Arabian trees 
 Their mediciual gum." 
 
 The Theatre then, in this view, cannot 
 
ESSAY Oi* THE STAGE, 113 
 
 reasonably be considered as an amusement. 
 Unless it assume a higher character; unless it 
 answer some moral purpose, it would be pre- 
 posterous to represent it as recreation for intelli- 
 gent minds, who wish to unbend and relax, that 
 they may attend with more ability and pleasure 
 to the great object for which they are bound to 
 live. 
 
 The hours, the precious hours, too, which are 
 consumed at the Theatre, is another argument 
 against it of great moment. To w r aste four 
 hours, some of which at least should be other- 
 wise employed by creatures who are accountable 
 to the Supreme Being, and who owe him grati- 
 tude and adoration, is defeating the very pur- 
 pose of amusement: it makes pleasure intrude 
 beyond the precincts of duty: it destroys the 
 peace ana order of every well regulated family, 
 and absolutely unfits the mind for performing 
 any thing with vigour through the whole suc- 
 ceeding day. And in addition to these consi- 
 derations it will not be claimed for theatrical 
 amusement, that it conduces to health. The 
 Rosy Goddess dwells not in the crowded The- 
 atre; but pale Sickness and wan Disease are 
 there seated on an ebon throne, scattering 
 around, with a lavish hand, the fatal seeds of 
 Death. 
 
 These are things so obviously striking, that 
 
114 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 every reader must acknowledge their force. If 
 persons visit the Theatre, without being at all 
 interested in what is there passing, their apathy 
 and idiocy are features of the clan to which they 
 belong; and to reason with those who are inca- 
 pable of thought would betray folly almost as 
 disgusting as their own. 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE, llo 
 
 CONCLUSION. 
 
 JL HUS, in almost every view in which we can 
 contemplate the Stage, we are struck with its 
 injurious and baneful tendency. Those who 
 defend it as a school of morals can never have 
 seriously examined its character, or traced its 
 influence. It will excite surprise that any man, 
 who professes to be acquainted with theatrical 
 productions, should gravely commend them in 
 the following strain: — <c True Tragedy is a se- 
 rious lecture upon our duty, shorter than 
 an epic poem, and longer than a fable ; other- 
 wise differing from both only iti the method, 
 which is dialogue instead of narration. Its pro- 
 vince is to bring us in love with the more exalt- 
 ed -virtues, and to create a detestation of the 
 blacker and (humanly speaking] more enor- 
 mous crimes. In Comedy, an insinuating mirth 
 laughs us out of our frailties, by making us 
 ashamed of them. Thus, wh n they are well 
 intended, Tragedy and Comedy work to one 
 purpose: the one manages us as cnildren, the 
 other convinces us as men.' 1 How finely this 
 sounds in theory ! But it would surely be kind 
 
116 ESSA\ r ON THE STAGE. 
 
 in such writers to inform us, in what age these 
 Tragedies, and these well-intended Comedies, 
 were written; and in what part of the world 
 they are acted with approbation and effect. 
 With this charming representation in our minds, 
 let us range through the ancient and modern 
 Drama. But in our researches after this potent 
 facinating instructor, we shall take even the 
 lamp of Diogenes in vain. 
 
 It has been said, in reply to those arguments 
 which maintain the immoral influence of the 
 Theatre, by confident individuals, " We have 
 attended theatrical representations, and escaped 
 the contagion; we have sustained no injury." 
 There are two sorts of persons who m y fancy 
 they can adopt this language: the very virtuous 9 
 the " Unco guid," who are proof against temp- 
 tation in its most seductive forms ; or those 
 whose vices are so numerous, and so deeply- 
 rooted in the heart, that even the Stage cannot 
 add to their number, or increase their power. 
 With respect to the first, we have only their 
 own testimony in favour of their extraordinary 
 goodness; and what shall we think of the humi- 
 lity and modesty of those who proclaim, that 
 they only, among the children of men, are the 
 persons who can trifle with sin without receiv- 
 ing the least immoral taint? We have heard of 
 a power to charm the adder; but these indivi- 
 
i^SAY ON THE STAGE. 117 
 
 duals have found a drug which will captivate 
 the " Old serpent" himself, and render him 
 harmless. However I doubt their pretensions, 
 I am ready to question that man's virtue who 
 can encourage, by his presence and example, 
 indecent ribaldry, profane swearing, and mock 
 devotion. This is indeed a sort of monstrous 
 virtue, which a man may make a show of; and 
 I know of no place so fit for its exhibition as the 
 Theatre. I would say to these very virtuous 
 persons — though you can rush into the fire, and 
 escape the injury of the flame, yet remember all 
 are not so invulnerable as you; and it is the 
 duty of a virtuous mind to study the good of 
 others. Perhaps the very night of your attend- 
 ance may be marked in the history of some de- 
 luded young person, as the dreadful osra from 
 whence he has to date his everlasting ruin. And, 
 oh horrid to think, you contributed, by your 
 example and your money, to keep open the 
 gates of hell, which, when they close, are to 
 close upon him for ever! The second class, 
 namely, those who are so depraved, so versed in 
 the science of iniquity, that they have nothing 
 to learn from the Stage, are persons with whom 
 I have nothing to do: — they are perhaps incor- 
 rigible ; and a book on the immorality of the 
 Stage they will never peruse. Those who have 
 no more virtue than their neighbours, who, in an 
 
118 ESSAY ON TttE STAGE. 
 
 evil hour, may be ensnared by vice/ or deluded 
 by temptation, will surely be warned of the dan- 
 ger which lurks in every avenue to a Theatre, 
 and which is enthroned on its boards; to them 
 it will be painful to receive impressions which 
 strongly fortify the heart against the Gospel of 
 our Salvation : — and no man, who is not bereft 
 of reason, will court amusement at the expense 
 of purity of conscience, and the rectitude of 
 virtue. 
 
 It has often struck me, when meditating on 
 this subject, that could we banish from the 
 Theatre the illusion with which its scenery, the 
 dress, and language of the performers captivate 
 the mind, we should lose all temptation to visit 
 it for amusement. 
 
 The apparatus for a Stage is thus humourously 
 described by Rousseau. " Imagine to yourself 
 the inside of a large box, about fifteen feet wide, 
 and long in proportion. This box is the Stage; 
 on each side are placed screens at different dis- 
 tances, on which the objects of the scene are 
 coarsely painted. Beyond this is a great curtain 
 daubed in the same manner, which extends from 
 one side to the other, and is generally cut 
 through to represent caves in the earth, and 
 openings in the heavens, as the perspective re- 
 quires; so that if any person, in walking behind 
 the scenes, should happen to brush against the 
 
ESSAY OX THE STAGE. 119 
 
 curtain, he might cause an earthquake so violent 
 as to shake — our sides with laughing. The skies 
 are represented by a parcel of bluish rags, hung 
 up with lines and poles, like wet linen at the 
 washerwoman's. The sun, for he is represented 
 here sometimes, is a large candle in a lantern. 
 A troubled sea is made of long roller?, covered 
 with canvas or blue paper, laid parallel, and 
 turned by the dirty understrappers of the The- 
 atre. Their thunder is a heavy cart, which rum- 
 bles over the floor. The flashes of lightning are 
 made by throwing powdered rosin into the flame 
 of a link: and the falling thunderbolt is a cracker 
 at the end of a squib. The stage is provided 
 with little square trap-doors, which opening on 
 occasion, give notice that ghosts and devils are 
 coming out of the cellar." 
 
 With respect to theatrical exhibitions them- 
 selves I can easily conceive; if an individual 
 could be found, whose reason is unbiassed, and 
 whose mind is stored with every kind of know- 
 ledge but that which is derived from poets and 
 the gay world, if such an one were told that a 
 number of men and women were maintained for 
 no other purpose than to pretend to make love 
 to, and to pretend to kill one another on a stage 
 prepared for the purpose; that their business 
 was to hold dialogues under fictitious characters, 
 and to feign the most extravagant passions that 
 
120 ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 
 
 ever agitated the human breast, in scenes of the 
 deepest interest; and if he were further told, 
 that multitudes of rational beings would sit 
 hours together to be amused by all this folly; 
 I can easily conceive I say, that he would be, 
 beyond measure, astonished. " Can the persons 
 of whom you speak (he would reply) be dignified 
 with the godlike power of reason? I know not 
 for my part which most to pity, the poor crea- 
 tures who are condemned to play the ape for so 
 many hours, or the contemptible beings who 
 voluntarily consent so long to play the fool." 
 
 That Christians ought to abhor the Stage, 
 when they consider it as a teacher; and that 
 they ought to despise it as an amusement, de- 
 grading to the character, and as injurious to the 
 pursuits of immortal beings, will be at once ac- 
 knowledged. They are obliged to do more than 
 others. If the subject were doubtful — were it a 
 matter of question only, whether the Theatre 
 were lawful to Christians or not, the disciple of 
 Jesus is bound to take the safest side, to avoid 
 the appearance of evil, and to live to the glory 
 of his God. Besides, it is not necessary for him 
 to seek enjoyment abroad in any of the distin- 
 guishing vanities of the world. The nearer he 
 approximates to Deity, terrestrial objects lose 
 their glory and their charms. His amusements 
 are the pleasures of religion: — he has what the 
 
ESSAY ON THE STAGE. 151 
 
 Scriptures call "A new heart;" a heart whose 
 affections centre in the All-sufficient Good:— it 
 is formed for celestial joys, and it aspires after 
 the entertainments of Angels. This is its ardent 
 language : — 
 
 " My wishes, hopes, my pleasures, aud my love, 
 My thoughts, and noblest passious, are above. 
 
 It is with you then, reader, to determine, whe- 
 ther you will renounce Christianity, or the The- 
 atre. Fear not the world, or its " Dread laugh," 
 but choose that wisdom, whose ways are plea- 
 santness, and all whose paths are peace. 
 
APPENDIX : 
 
 CONTAINING 
 
 STRICTURES ON AN ARTICLE 
 
 IN THE FIFTH VOLUME OF 
 
 THE ANNUAL REVIEW, 
 
 WHICH IS A 
 
 CRITIQUE ON THE PRECEDING ESSAY, 
 
 AND AVOWEDLY 
 
 3 defence of tbt %tw* 
 
 Judex ctemnatur cum nocens absolvitor. 
 
 Motto to the Edinburgh Review. 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 HEN an important subject is presented to 
 the public — when it excites attention, and rouses 
 discussion, the friends of truth have reason to 
 rejoice. On this account, I feel peculiarly hap- 
 py in being called upon to defend the principles 
 and reasonings contained in my Essay on the 
 Stage; especially when my opponent is a writer 
 in the Annual Review ; a work to which the name 
 of a responsible editor is affixed, and which has 
 considerable claim to literary distinction. Its 
 principles indeed I have never approved ; for its 
 literary department is poisoned with infidelity, 
 and its theological with Socinianism. Yet, as 
 it sustains a respectable character in the repub- 
 lic of letters, its strictures on any subject con- 
 nected with the interests of morality and religion 
 are worthy of some regard. In this Review I have 
 been honoured with more attention than I had 
 any reason to expect; my insignificant volume 
 has produced a laboured defence of the Stage, and 
 G3 
 
126 APPENDIX. 
 
 the most extravagant encomiums on its import- 
 ance and moral excellence; indeed the writer's 
 zeal seems to have overwhelmed his judgment, 
 and to have hurried him into excesses of literary 
 delinquency, for which the cool, deliberate la- 
 bours of his future life will scarcely atone; for 
 who will reverence the declamation of ignorance 
 and the extravagance of folly ?— « Happily for his 
 subsequent fame he is unknown; he has, for this 
 time, escaped; while he has left the avowed 
 editor of the work responsible for all his errors 
 of assertion and fallacies of reasoning. 
 
 Reviews in general deserve very little atten- 
 tion. An author may indeed amuse himself 
 with their contradictory reports — with their de- 
 nunciations and applauses of the same work; 
 but to be seriously affected with the one or the 
 other, would be preposterous folly. It requires 
 little sagacity to discover what kind of treat- 
 ment a book will receive from the different Re- 
 views. It is sometimes important to inquire by 
 whom a work is published, and you will then 
 almost certainly ascertain by what Reviews it 
 will be praised and blamed: at another time it 
 is desirable to know who and what the author is, 
 and, without reading a page of his book, you 
 may decide as to its fate among the various 
 tribes of critics. Many of our critical Journals 
 are merely booksellers' jobs, conducted, by men 
 
APPENDIX. 1^7 
 
 whose principles are safely deposited in the Till 
 of their employers, and who, according to their 
 bargain, applaud or condemn. 
 
 It is amusing to hear these sons of the quill 
 vaunting of their dignity, and calling them- 
 selves magistrates in the republic of letters: 
 their raving reminds us of Bedlam, and its mighty 
 kings of straw : however, we pardon their phren- 
 zy, for perhaps much learning has made them 
 mad*. By no hereditary right — by no elective 
 franchise, do they fill the chair of criticism, yet 
 they assume the lofty tone of legitimate sove- 
 reigns, whose will is law; from whose decisions 
 there is-.no appeal. Bloated with imaginary con- 
 sequence, they denounce and commend : but if 
 the question be asked, who are these mighty 
 judges of literary pretensions, that proudly de- 
 cide an author's fate? We soon discover that 
 their censures or applauses are only valuable 
 while they are themselves unknown. 
 
 It is not a little mortifying, when we have 
 read the haughty dictates of a literary' magis- 
 trate, to find that he is some needy adventurer, 
 who perhaps has never written any thing but 
 articles for Reviews, and whose name the book- 
 sellers, the vMecaenas's of our age, dare not 
 affix to any work which is manufactured^ under 
 
 * I do not here mean the Critical Reviewers j nobody will 
 ever suspect them to be guilty of the siu of knowing any thing. 
 
128 APPENDIX. 
 
 their patronage: when we consider the charac- 
 ters and qualifications of these self-created cen- 
 sors, well may we ask, in the language of the 
 satirist, 
 
 How could these self-elected monarchs raise 
 
 So large an empire on so small a base ; 
 
 In what retreat, inglorious and unknown, 
 
 l>id Genius sleep when dullness seized the throne ; 
 
 Whence absolute now grown, and fvee from awe, 
 
 She to the subject world dispenses law ? 
 
 Without her licence not a letter stirs, 
 
 And all the captive criss-cross row is her's. 
 
 The Stagyrite, who rules from nature drew, 
 
 Opinions gave, but gave his reasons too. 
 
 Our great dictators take a shorter way :— 
 
 Who shall dispute what the Reviewers say ? 
 
 Their word's sufficient-— and to ask a reason. 
 
 In such a state as theirs, is downright treason. 
 
 True judgment now with them alone can dwell, 
 
 Like church of Rome, they're grown infallible. 
 
 Dull superstitions readers they deceive, 
 
 And knowing nothing, every thing believe ! 
 
 But why repine we that these puny elves 
 
 Shoot into giants: — we may thank ourselves ; 
 
 Fools that we are, like Israel's foo:s of yore, 
 
 The calf ourselves have fashion' d we adore: 
 
 But let true reason once resume her reign, 
 
 This God shall dwindle to a calf again. 
 
 Periodical Reviews are now multiplying be* 
 yond all precedence in the annals of literature; 
 and, with a few exceptions, perhaps no time is 
 more unprofitably spent than that which is con* 
 
APPENDIX. 129 
 
 sumed in the perusal of these superficial produc- 
 tions : they generally contain a mutilated and 
 extremely incorrect statement of the progress of 
 literature, and the claims of particular works. 
 They uniformly contradict each other, and some- 
 times contradict themselves*. Their constant 
 practice is to address the passions, and the pre- 
 judices of men: but seldom do they appeal to 
 their reason and judgment : yet our half-educated 
 fine gentlemen, and our superficial scholars are 
 infinitely indebted to these literary dogmatizers, 
 from them they derive all their knowledge, and 
 their sentiments in conversation are the mere 
 echoes of the last Review, which they repeat 
 in every company till the next month fur- 
 
 * A curious instance of this occurs in a modem Review, the 
 most atrocious for literary injustice, as well as the most defici- 
 ent in literary talent, that has ever disgraced any age or coun- 
 try, whose imposing title, were it not disclaimed by the Uni- 
 versity, the name of whose city it has unwarrantably assumed, 
 might have deceived some into an opinion that it was not the 
 contemptible thing it really is. From some inexplicable cir- 
 cumstance the same book crept into its pages twice. It is a 
 
 sermon by a Mr. C . The first Review of this Sermon 
 
 coldly and sufficiently commends it; and the author, no doubt, 
 imagining that the Reviewer had now done with him, adorned 
 an advertisement of his sermon with this sprig of praise. But 
 the very day which announced to an admiring world that Mr, 
 C — — . had been praised by the Oxford Review, declared also 
 an " unco mournfu' " fact : the Oxford Review unbiushingly 
 tells the public, that the Sermon, which the month before it had 
 commended, was reaily below notice ! 
 
 G5 
 
130 APPENDIX. 
 
 nishes them with new materials. Whether this 
 is an evil or not I will leave the judicious reader 
 to decide. If Reviews were what they ought, and 
 what they profess to be, the interests of know- 
 ledge would certainly be advanced by them. But 
 destitute as these publications generally are of 
 character and principle, their circulation must 
 be injurious. For every man who reads a Re- 
 view is not acquainted with its secret history : 
 he knows not the degree of credit which is due 
 to its assertions, nor where it is likely to be 
 partial. He reads it probably for information, 
 and not for amusement, and therefore he must 
 often be led to erroneous conclusions, and to make 
 a false estimate of the passing works of the day. 
 
 I am sorry that I cannot exculpate the Annual 
 Review from the general charges which I have 
 levelled against most of its contemporaries; yet as 
 in many respects it is greatly superior to nearly 
 all of them, I consider it upon the whole as a 
 respectable adversary : but I hope, when I prove 
 against the individual who wrote the Critique on 
 my Essay, that he is entirely inadequate to the 
 task, that he is rather a tyro than a magistrate, 
 that Mr: Aiken will, in charity to him, and his 
 own reputation, prohibit him from writing in 
 the Annual Review till he is convinced that jus- 
 tice is a virtue, and knowledge and integrity 
 are essential to a reviewer. 
 
-APPENDIX. 131 
 
 For the sake of perspicuity, I shall class my 
 animadversions on this Critique under the 
 following particulars : — false assertions — glaring 
 contradictions — ■ inconclusive reasonings — and 
 unjnst censures. 
 
 In a critique of a few pages it is not a little 
 remarkable, that a man so very liberal in his cen- 
 sures on another, and who boasts fbo of " Mo- 
 ral tolerance," should betray the most palpable 
 ignorance of the subject which he professes 
 to discuss. Ignorance, the more inexcusable 
 because it is issued from the chair of critical 
 legislation. 
 
 His assertions are made without proof, 
 and contrary to fact. I am accused by him 
 of having indulged myself in the wildest, 
 strangest, most untenable, assertions. But this 
 will never be credited after an impartial rea- 
 der is acquainted .with the first paragraph 
 io which he commences his attack. Madam 
 Thalia is infinitely indebted to her knight-errant, 
 he has espoused her cause in the true spirit of 
 Quixotism, and his extravagance of assertion can- 
 not be exceeded. For my part, I cannot hel|> won- 
 dering at the temerity of a man who could dare 
 to write such a paragraph as the following, be- 
 fore he had applied the torch to the funereal pile 
 of history, and destroyed the records of the days 
 that are past* 
 
132 APPENDIX. 
 
 "An attack on the Stage is alike hostile to 
 public instruction, to public morality, and to 
 public happiness. The Fathers of the Christian 
 church, by conspiring to suppress the Theatres 
 of Greece and Rome, rebarbarized Europe, and 
 condemned the victims of their mischievous 
 tuition to a millenium of ignorance, vassalage, 
 and woe." 
 
 The first assertion, that the Theatre is the 
 school of public instruction, morality, and hap- 
 piness, may easily be established, or refuted, by 
 the annals of Theatrical history. 
 
 The Theatre of Greece, this writer himself 
 denounces as the most licentious of any upon 
 record; he invites me to read through the Eccle- 
 siazousai of Aristophanes; I suppose to convince 
 me of the importance of the Grecian stage to 
 public instruction, public morality, and public 
 happiness. Let the greater part of the Dramatic 
 writings of Greece and Rome be examined, and 
 we shall see what kind of instruction they con- 
 veyed ; and let the effect of a passion for scenic 
 representations be traced in the history of the 
 common wealths where it was indulged, and we 
 shall find the reverse of this author's assertion to 
 be true. The defenders of the Stage have been 
 the most dangerous enemies of public morals 
 and happiness. The lessons taught by Aristo- 
 phanes on the Grecian stage absolutely destroyed 
 
APPENBIX. 133 
 
 all sense of public virtue and decency; and it 
 has been justly observed by Mrs. Moore, " That 
 the profane and impure Aristophanes was almost 
 adored, while the virtue of Socrates not only- 
 procured him a violent death, but the poet, by 
 making the philosopher contemptible to the 
 populace, paved the way to his unjust sentence 
 by the judges. Nay, perhaps the delight which 
 the Athenians took in the impious and offen- 
 sively loose wit of this Dramatic poet rendered 
 them more deaf to the voice of that virtue which 
 w r as taught by Plato; and of that liberty in which 
 they had once gloried, and which Demosthenes 
 continued to thunder in their unheeding ears. 
 Their rage for sensual pleasure rendered them a 
 fit object for the projects of Philip, and a ready 
 prey to the attacks of Alexander* In lamenting 
 however the corruptions of the Theatre in 
 Athens, justice compels us to acknowledge that 
 her immortal tragic poets, by their chaste and 
 manly compositions, furnish a noble exception. 
 In no country have decency and purity, and, to 
 the disgrace of Christian countries let it be added, 
 have morality, and even piety, been so generally 
 prevalent in any Theatrical compositions as in 
 what — 
 
 w Her lofty grave tragedians taught 
 In chorus or Iambic, teachers best 
 Of moral prudence/' 
 
|^4 * APPENDIX. 
 
 Yet in paying a just and warm tribute to the 
 moral excellencies of these sublime Dramatists 
 is not an answer provided to that long agitated 
 question, whether the Stage can be indeed made 
 a school of morals. No question had ever a 
 fairer chance for decision than was here afforded. 
 If it be allowed that there never was a more 
 profligate city than Athens; if it be equally in- 
 disputable that never country possessed more 
 unexceptionable Dramatic poets than Eschylus, 
 Sophocles, and Euripides. If the same city thus 
 at once produced the best physicians and the 
 worst patients, what is the result? Do the 
 Athenian annals record that any class or condi- 
 tion of citizens were actually reformed by con- 
 stantly frequenting, we had almost said, by con- 
 stantly living, in the Theatre. 1 ' 
 
 If reforming the world have been the object of 
 the Theatre, no institution has been so singu- 
 larly unfortunate. This "Academy, where grown 
 persons assemble to study propriety*," has ge- 
 nerally taught them a very different lesson. 
 
 This writer acknowledges that there are some 
 cases in which the Theatre teaches the grossest 
 and most dangerous immorality; and it is to be 
 observed, that his standard of morals is not very 
 refined, or exalted. Those virtues, which are 
 exclusively Christian, he abandons as little 
 
 * Annual Review 
 
APPENDIX. 135 
 
 weaknesses. Yet, according to his very la xcode 
 -of morals, the Theatre is not always the school 
 "in which morality is taught. He confesses that 
 some plays irradiate the suicide of public cha- 
 racter; and I suppose he will acknowledge, that 
 Douglas, and several others, irradiate the sui- 
 cide of private character. But is this, he asks, 
 a formidable evil? Not perhaps to those who 
 believe that death is an eternal sleep. It is also 
 conceded that some comedies soften down adul- 
 tery ; but then this is the excuse furnished for the 
 comic poet. At the time these plays were writ- 
 ten, " It had not been discovered in how high a 
 degree domestic happiness and social order de- 
 pend on conjugal fidelity." But why was it not 
 then discovered ? and if it is now discovered, why 
 is it that we have daily so many cases of crim. 
 con ; and that those plays on the Engligh stage 
 which soften down adultery are the most popu- 
 lar ? And may I not ask, do not these concessions 
 give up the point? What are we to think of a 
 school of morals hi which the pupils are as often 
 likely to learn vice as virtue- — as often did I say? 
 If this writer will condescend t6 examine mi- 
 nutely the ancient and the modem D^ima, he 
 will find that there are very few plays wr/ch teach 
 a pure morality, and that the influence of every 
 Theatre which has hitherto existed, has givei: 
 a preponderance to the other scale; if he does no' 
 
136 APPENDIX. 
 
 know this, he ought to have known it before he 
 had volunteered his services in its defence. If 
 the Theatre were what this critic would insinu- 
 ate it to be, every criminal, every licentious play 
 must necessarily be excluded from it: instead 
 of which it furnishes no barrier whatever against 
 performances the most impure. It is notorious 
 that its tendency is directly on the side of vice; 
 and this tendency it is always necessary to check 
 with a strong hand. If the audience will endure 
 licentiousness, the players are ever ready to fur- 
 nish it; nay, to overstock the market. Yet to 
 attack the Stage is alike hostile to public in- 
 struction, to public morality, and public happi- 
 ness. 
 
 But we are informed, " That by conspiring to 
 suppress the Theatres of Greece and Rome, the 
 Christian Fathers rebarbarized Europe, and 
 condemned the victims of their mischievous 
 tuition to a millenium of ignorance, vassalage, 
 and w r oe." 
 
 Here are no less than three gross violations of 
 the truth of history. The Theatre is exhibited 
 as the depository of science — the palladium of 
 liberty — and the source of consolation and joy. 
 The Fathers are accused of rebarbarizing Europe 
 —. and it is said that they accomplished this 
 event by suppressing the Theatres of Greece 
 and Rome. May I not fairly retort upon my 
 
APPENDIX, 137 
 
 adversary, " That it requires no small share of 
 moral tolerance to argue respectfully with a 
 writer w r ho founds his arguments on assertions 
 like these." 
 
 By attempting to suppress the Theatre, we are 
 first assured, that the Christian fathers introduced 
 a millenium of ignorance. The Theatre then must 
 have been the depository of science, and it must 
 have been exclusively so. But was it indeed the 
 only light which shone in this dark world ? where 
 then was the grove of Plato, and the Lycseum of 
 Aristotle? where the great luminaries of the Hea- 
 then world? where the oracles of heaven and the 
 Sun of righteousness ? But what are these when 
 compared with theTheatres of Greece and Rome? 
 these indeed continued to shine in ail their glory, 
 but in the estimation of this critic, it was a twink- 
 ling glory little to be preferred to the blackness of 
 total night. The Theatre was opposed, and a 
 millenium of ignorance stole upon the world. 
 But if we may judge of the past by the present, 
 this sounding gasconade will evaporate. What 
 serious loss should we sustain if all the literature 
 of the English Drama were annihilated ? Should 
 we be rebarbarized? If there were not a piay in 
 our language, what mighty injury would be the 
 consequence? to the cause of morality and reli- 
 gion it would be a clear advantage ; and as for 
 useful knowledge, it never depended upon a 
 
13S APPENDIX. 
 
 Theatre, nor has ever been beneficially connected 
 with it. And of modern plays, correct taste, 
 and mental dignity are ashamed. The Theatre 
 of our day seems destined to give immortality to 
 Mother Goose, Tom Thumb, and Jack the Giant- 
 killer :— -what was formerly the sport of children, 
 is now the amusement of men, and the time 
 when Gog and Magog, are to revisit the earth 
 seems- to be arrived.* 
 
 But we are informed, that a millenium of 
 vassalage was another consequence of the hos- 
 tility of the fathers to the Theatres of Greece 
 and Rome. The Theatre then must have been 
 the palladium of liberty. But the fact is, what 
 this writer would exhibit as the palladium of 
 liberty was its grave; at least this was undoubt- 
 edly true of the Athenian Stage. Pericles took 
 this effectual method to supplant his competitors 
 in the Athenian state, and to secure his own 
 influence, he established a fund from the public 
 money to support the Theatre, and to pay for 
 the admission of the populace, and made it a 
 
 * The Mahometans believe, that when Gog and Magog are 
 to come, the race of men will have dwindled to such littleness, 
 that a shoe of one of the present generation will serve them for 
 a house, [f this prophecy be typical of the intellectual dimi- 
 nution of the species, judgiug from the present state of the 
 Theatre we must believe that Gog and Magog may soon. 
 be expected. 
 
APPENDIX. 139 
 
 capital crime to divert this fund to any other 
 service. " He scrupled not, (says Mrs. Moore) in 
 order to secure their attachment tojhis person, and 
 government, by thus buying them with their own 
 money, effectually to promote their natural levity 
 and idleness, and to corrupt their morals." Once 
 inspire n people with a rage for amusement and 
 shows, and they will soon yield up their liberty, 
 and become the vassals of any tyrant, who will 
 thus encircle them with the silken cords of 
 voluptuousness and pleasure. And with regard to 
 the happiness which is diffused by a Theatre, it is 
 imaginary, uncertain and evanescent. The fever of 
 the passions may produce a delirium of joy; but 
 it is only a delirium, and when a man awakes to 
 sober reflection, the phantoms of a Theatre will 
 not charm away the evil spirit. That man 
 is indeed a pitiable object whose happiness de- 
 pends on the existence of a Theatre. — This how- 
 ever is matter of mere opinion, and if an indi- 
 vidual chooses to say that he cannot be happy 
 without the pleasures of the Stage, I will not 
 dispute with him; but I maintain, that if the 
 Theatre were abolished, and there were no other 
 existing causes of woe, the world need not, and 
 would not be miserable. If the Christian fathers 
 therefore, had actually abolished the Theatres of 
 Greece and Rome, Europe by that means would 
 not have been rebarbarized.— It was not the de- 
 
140 APPENDIX. 
 
 struction of the Theatre that introduced the mil- 
 lenium of ignorance, vassalage, and woe. 
 
 But their dark and dismal empire must be as- 
 cribed to other persons and other causes. The 
 fathers of the Christian church are guiltless here, 
 and the Theatre might have perished without 
 the extinction of one ray of intellectual light or 
 civil liberty, had not the demons of superstition 
 and priestly power spread over the western 
 continent their raven wing, overwhelming the 
 earth with a darkness more horrible than that 
 of Egypt. The fathers of the church were the 
 enlightened friends of freedom and of man ; 
 they forged no chains for the human mind, 
 but they loosed the bands of superstition. They 
 were the aposties of a pure morality. They 
 attempted to allay the fever of the passions, and 
 to restore man to the dignity of reason. They 
 indeed attacked the Stage, because it was 
 hostile to the best interests of humanity; and 
 in this conduct it will afterwards appear this 
 Reviewer justifies them : he acknowledges that 
 Collier and the Abbe Clement " Aped their 
 anger without their provocation :" yet pro- 
 voked as they were by immorality and licentious- 
 ness, their attempts to suppress those evils con- 
 demned the victims of their mischievous tuition 
 to a miilenium of ignorance, vassalage, and woe. 
 Not to notice this palpable inconsistency, we 
 
APPENDIX. 141 
 
 may inquire, is this charge applicable to them 
 in any degree? Did they rebarbarize Eu- 
 rope? Surely not. They had their pecu- 
 liarities and their infirmities, for they were 
 men. And had the subsequent ministers of the 
 Gospel displayed their faith and purity, the 
 Theatre must have been abolished, but the rays 
 of civilization and science would have shed a 
 divine lustre over the habitable earth. — The 
 reign of barbarism commenced with the papal 
 power, the domination of ecclesiastical over civil 
 government; the establishment of the Pontificate 
 at Rome, with the doctrines of the Holy See, 
 were the sole causes which produced the mil- 
 lenium of darkness, which is here ascribed to 
 the attempts of the Christian Fathers to abolish 
 the Theatres of Greece and Rome. 
 
 May we not be permitted to ask, if the de- 
 struction of a taste for scenic representation^ 
 among the pupils of the Christian Fathers, over- 
 spread Europe with intellectual and moral dark- 
 ness, how was it, that when the Theatre became 
 a favourite amusement in Catholic countries, that 
 it did not pour forth upon them the light of day ? 
 To the reformation of Luther we are to ascribe 
 the revival of learning in Europe: that stupen- 
 dous event, like a tempest, purified the moral 
 atmosphere from the noxious vapours of super- 
 stition and ignorance ; burst asunder the chains 
 
142 APPENDIX* 
 
 of vassalage, and introduced new heavens and a 
 new earth. Beholding these astonishing, these 
 happy changes, and remembering the high cha- 
 racter which our critic has given the Theatre, 
 we naturally expect that it had some interesting 
 and important share in chasing away the dark- 
 ness of the night. The Theatre certainly was 
 not inactive, it was extremely zealous, but it was? : 
 to advocate the cause of ignorance, vassalage, 
 and woe; it was to rivet the chains which Popery 
 had forged. It w r as, if possible, to cover with 
 contempt the reformation, with its heroic apostle, 
 the immortal Luther. It was not therefore to . 
 the Stage Europe w r as indebted for her happy 
 change of circumstances in the sixteenth century. 
 But on the contrary, that school of instruction :. 
 of morality and happiness exerted all its powers- 
 that darkness and misery might be perpetual. 
 
 All historians uniformly mention the Theatre 
 as a mighty engine, in producing the destruction 
 of a refined people. But the emancipation of a 
 people from barbarism, its growth in the liberal, 
 arts and useful knowledge, are always ascribed 
 to other causes. None but a half-educated man 
 would have ventured to make such assertions as 
 those which I have now combated. One would 
 imagine, that the Theatre is the only seminary 
 in which this Reviewer has been taught. He calls. 
 Tragedy a lecture on history; and he seems to 
 
APPENDIXc 143 
 
 liave studied it in no oilier school. It is his mis- 
 fortune : I would advise him seriously to, sit down 
 to this important study. I would recommend to 
 him the history of the Christian church, as the 
 first object of regard; and if he would deign to 
 weigh the evidences in favour of Christianity, 
 and to examine, with profound attention, the 
 Christian Scriptures, he might be a better writer, 
 and a better man. 
 
 Another false assertion I will notice, and con- 
 clude this part of the subject. It is said by this 
 writer, p. 573, that Collier aped the anger of the 
 ancient fathers, without their provocation; in 
 other words, Collier censured the English Stage 
 without reason; his censure was ridiculous 
 because there was no object to excite it. This 
 is only another evidence that the morality of our 
 critic is very accommodating : indeed his virtue 
 so strongly resembles vice, that any man who is 
 not a sophist would confound them together. 
 If Collier was angry without provocation, a vir- 
 tuous mind may pass through the most nauseous 
 scenes of impurity, which are to be found in the 
 metropolis, with calm unruffled composure. On 
 this subject I will call to my assistance three 
 auxiliaries, men I imagine quite as creditable for 
 knowledge and talents as this zealous advocate 
 of -the Stage — Dr. Johnson, Lord Kaimes, and Mr. 
 Cumberland : each testifies that Collier was not 
 
144 APPENDIX* 
 
 angry without provocation. Speaking of Collier's 
 attack on the Stage, Johnson remarks, " His 
 onset was violent; those passages which, while 
 they stood single had passed with little notice, 
 when they were accumulated and exposed toge- 
 ther, excited horror; the wise and the pious 
 caught the alarm, and the nation wondered why 
 it had so long suffered irreligion and licentious- 
 ness to be openly taught at the public charge." 
 Lord Kaimes, referring to the age of Col* 
 lier, has ventured the following observations, 
 and they are strikingly in point. " The 
 licentious court of Charles the second, among 
 its many disorders, engendered a pest, the 
 virulence of which subsists to this day. The 
 English Comedy, copying the manners of the 
 court, became extremely licentious, and conti- 
 nues so with very little softening. It is there an 
 established rule to deck out the chief characters 
 with every vice in fashion, however gross. But 
 as such characters, viewed in a true light, would 
 be disgustful, care is taken to disguise their de- 
 formity under the embellishments of wit, spright- 
 liness, and good-humour, which, in mixed com- 
 pany, make a capital figure. It requires not 
 time nor much thought to discover the poisonous 
 influence of such plays. A young man of figure, 
 emancipated at last from the severity and re- 
 straint of a college education, repairs to the 
 
APPENDIX. 145 
 
 capital, disposed to every sort of excess. Tie 
 playhouse becomes his favourite amusement ; 
 and he is enchanted with the gaiety and 
 splendor of the chief personages. The disgust 
 which vice gives him at first, soon wears off, to 
 make way for new notions, more liberal in his 
 opinion; by which a sovereign contempt of reli- 
 gion, and a declared war upon the chastity of 
 wives, maids, and widows are converted from 
 being infamous vices, to be fashionable virtues* 
 The infection spreads gradually through all ranks, 
 and becomes universal. How gladly would I 
 listen to any one who would undertake to prove 
 that what I have been describing is chimerical! 
 But the dissoluteness of our young people of 
 birth will not suffer me to doubt of its reality. 
 Sir Harry Wildaif has completed many a rake; 
 and in the " Suspicious Husband/! Ranger, the 
 humble imitator of Sir L^arry, has had no slight 
 influence in spreading that character. Of the 
 fashionable women tinctured with the playhouse 
 morals, who would not be the sprightly, the 
 witty, though dissolute Lady Townly, before the 
 cold, the sober, though virtuous Lady Graced 
 How odious ought those writers to be, who thus 
 spread infection through their country: employ- 
 ; the talents they have from their Maker most 
 traiterously against him, by endeavouring to cor- 
 rupt and disfigure his creatures! If the Come* 
 
 H 
 
146 APPENDIX. 
 
 dies of Congreve did not rack him with remorse 
 in his last moments, he must have been lost to 
 all sense of virtue 1 
 
 The testimony of Cumberland, a writer of 
 plays, much more moral and decent than most 
 of his contemporaries of the same profession, 
 with regard to Congreve and the popular 
 writers of that age, is very characteristic and 
 conclusive. 
 
 " Congreve, Farquhar, and some others, have 
 made vice and villainy so playful and amusing* 
 that either they could not find in their hearts to 
 punish them ; or not caring how wicked they 
 were, so long as they w r ere witty, paid no atten- 
 tion to what became of them. ShadwelFs co- 
 medy is little better than a brothel." 
 
 I now pass on to an instance or two in which this 
 writer contradicts himself; first premising that 
 in another article, " Clarksor/s Portraiture of 
 Quakerism," the Quakers are justified by the 
 Reviewer in prohibiting to their youth the diver- 
 sions of the Stage, p. 598. 
 
 " They (the Quakers) object to the effects of 
 histrionism upon the moral character of the actor, 
 asneccssarily tending to sophisticate him. In this 
 there may be some truth, though probably not 
 much. They object to the usual morals of 
 the Drama with good reason. Its false he- 
 roism, false honour, false sentimentability 
 
APPENDIX. 147 
 
 are often abominable; and the custom of making 
 love, the main business, is more mischievous than 
 either/' Is it not amusing to contrast with this, 
 the fervid exclamation of my friendly critic: — 
 " Ye feel not for others, ye care not for the pub- 
 lic, who hold such a discipline (attendance at a 
 Theatre) indifferent to the evolution of the sub- 
 limest virtues." Gentle reader, do not these re- 
 viewers, which are only separated from each other 
 by a few pages, admirably agree? However this 
 is nothing remarkable; this writer can with won- 
 derful adroitness contradict himself. 
 
 He informs us in the commencement of his 
 paper, that the Christian fathers rebarbarized 
 Europe, by endeavouring to suppress the Theatres 
 of Greece and Rome. In p. 571 he tells us, that 
 the Grecian theatre was the most impudent on 
 record: by impudent, he means impure, un- 
 chaste, and licentious. In another, p. 573, he 
 justifies the Christian fathers for that opposition 
 which he before condemned. " No such public 
 -•hows (says he) exist now, as those against which 
 Tertullian, Augustine, Valerius Maximus, and 
 other ancients have left their protest." Either 
 this writer palpably contradicts himself or he 
 means to assert, that licentiousness, folly, and 
 crime are synonymous with public knowledge, 
 public morality, and public happiness. One 
 more instance of contradiction I shall notice, and 
 H 2 
 
148 APPENDIX. 
 
 proceed to the inconclusive reasoning of my 
 opponent. 
 
 In p. 570 he recommends the Stage," Because 
 by exhibiting dances and pantomimes, it tends 
 to inspire a taste for graceful exercises, that is, it 
 inflames a passion for dancing." In the very 
 next page, this argument in favour of the Theatre, 
 is rendered of no effect. " Think of the tumult 
 of lascivious ardour which glows panting at every 
 extremity of the frame, during the brisk pulsa- 
 tions, and consentaneous whirls of the embracing 
 dancers. Recollect that in every country, danc- 
 ing girls form the select basis of the prostitute 
 population ; and if you have a wife, sisters, or 
 daughters, hesitate whether you will often en- 
 courage or indulge so wanton a delight. " Come 
 then to the Theatre." For what? that you may 
 be inspired with a taste for " These graceful ex- 
 ercises, these consentaneous whirls?" All this is 
 very consistent, and worthy the advocate of such 
 a cause.— But let us now attend to the arguments 
 by which the Theatre is defended. 
 
 " The Stage,weare informed, is a succedaneum 
 for neglected education ; it is the academy where 
 grown persons assemble to study propriety." 
 This is gratuitous assumption, and rather forms 
 a serious objection against the Stage, than an 
 argument in its favour.-— For who are the persons 
 to be instructed? Those who have grown into 
 
APPENDIX. 149 
 
 life without having learnt propriety of beha- 
 viour; those whose education has been defec- 
 tive. — Now persons of this description are usually 
 confined to the lower orders of society; persons 
 whose education is just suited to their avocations 
 and pursuits, and who can derive no possible 
 advantage from the instructions which are con- 
 veyed at a Theatre, but who, on the contrary, 
 would be worse for such-mending. The ignorant, 
 the vulgar, and the empty-minded, the hopeful 
 pupils in this school of public virtue, are to be 
 exalted into tragic heroes, to talk fustian, and to 
 be unfitted for their sober and legitimate employ- 
 ments; and as they are excluded from fashionable 
 circles, they are to be taught to ape fashionable 
 manners, as they are extra tly exhibited in 
 
 genteel comedy. Is not this a very powerful 
 argument against the Stage, that it tends to make 
 a very useful branch of the community dis- 
 satisfied with their humble condition; that it 
 inspires them with an ambition to be what they 
 are not, and what they were never intended to 
 be by the God of Providence. Scholars and gen- 
 tlemen are previously and completely educated 
 before they enter into life. In this respect the 
 Theatre can be of no advantage to them. And to 
 all the rest of mankind it must be an evil of con- 
 siderable magnitude. Tragedy is nothing better 
 than romance, and cannot be depended on as 
 
 113 
 
150 APPENDIX. 
 
 historical truth ; and if comedy exhibit the man- 
 ners of fashionable life, it exhibits its follies and 
 its vices too; and if it be desirable to extend the 
 boundary of these, the Theatre is certainly an 
 admirable school for the purpose. 
 
 But we are told, " That it is at the Theatre 
 the selfish feelings learn their insignificance, and 
 the generous their beauty. In cases of colli- 
 sion between personal and general interest, the 
 public wish must be that any one should sacri- 
 fice himself to the rest. Hence the will of mul- 
 titudes is naturally virtuous raid philanthropic. 
 It is only from ignorance of what is for the uni- 
 versal good, that their praise is bestowed upon 
 hurtful conduct. A habit of deference for the 
 instinctive sentiments of a playhouse audience is 
 likely to operate beneficially and to invigorate 
 the good inclinations. Some persons grow up 
 benevolent who are also recluse; but they will 
 commonly be found to place merit in forwarding 
 the ends of a sect or party, distinct from the 
 common service of mankind. The Theatre 
 breaks in upon such prejudices, and unfolds to 
 the philanthropist the natural claims of society, 
 the comprehensive sympathies of human nature, 
 the feelings of unsophisticated man." I imagine 
 the writer conceived this to be a very fine piece 
 of reasoning : it is indeed so subtle, that not one 
 in ten of a playhouse audience would be able 
 
APPENDIX. 161 
 
 eoraiprehend it. How it is that the Theatre un- 
 folds to the philanthropist the natural claims of 
 society, it is not in my power to conceive, any more 
 than would a lord mayors show, or any popular 
 spectacle which would convene a multitude. 
 
 To teach a philanthropist benevolence, is also 
 perfectly gratuitous; if the Theatre indeed could 
 transform the character of a miser, there would 
 be this one solitary ground on which it might 
 be defended : but covetousness, like the dramatic 
 mania, is an incurable disease. It is a curious, 
 and rather an uncommon notion, that the will of 
 multitudes is naturally virtuous and philanthro- 
 pic. But I imagine, in support of this assertion, 
 the Reviewer will refer us to the internal history 
 of revolutionary France, when the will of the 
 multitude was law. Or to our theatrical annals, 
 in which it will appear that praise is almost 
 uniformly bestowed on hurtful conduct. But 
 this probably may arise from ibvincible igno- 
 rance, which even this school of morals cannot 
 subdue. 
 
 The instinctive sentiments ot a playhouse audi- 
 ence, are the instinctive sentiments of a depraved 
 heart. They can sympathize with an adulteress, 
 and laugh at a deoauehee: ribaldry is their diver- 
 sion, and profaneness their sport. And the genero- 
 sity which is acquired at a playhouse, is an indis- 
 criminate extravagance, the effect of mere feeling 
 H 4 
 
152 APPENDIX. 
 
 without principle. I suppose Howard never 
 visited a Theatre to learn benevolence; nor have 
 the philanthropic friends of religion, which are 
 to be found in the various sects and parties of 
 the Christian church, been at all the less insen- 
 sible to the comprehensive sympathies of human 
 nature by not witnessing on the Stage the feel- 
 ings of unsophisticated man. The most active 
 friends of the abolition of the Slave Trade, were 
 those Who perhaps never entered a Theatre;* 
 and their unwearied exertions in promoting this 
 glorious object, could not be to forward the 
 views of a sector party, distinct from the com- 
 mon service of man. And it is a question worthy 
 of discussion, whether such a thing as pure, dis- 
 interested benevolence is to be found among the 
 numerous supporters of a licentious Stage, who 
 must be lovers of pleasure more than lovers of 
 God. 
 
 I cannot forbear quoting a strange rhapsody, 
 in which my opponent is pleased to take the 
 other side of the question, and by his own con- 
 cessions to invalidate all his former arguments in 
 defence of the Stage. Hitherto he has exhibited 
 the Stage as a school of morals ; we now behold 
 it in a new character, the advocate of adultery 
 and crime." But then, instead of an instructor it 
 
 * Mr. Wilberforce has written against the Stage, and tUe 
 Quakers never visit the Theatre/ 
 
APPENDIX. 155 
 
 becomes a pupil, and it is to be taught by the 
 audience. A few virtuous individuals are to 
 assemble, for the express purpose of frowning 
 this teacher of a pure morality into a sense of- 
 propriety. But let him speak for himself: " As 
 there are some tragedies which soften down 
 suicide, so there are some comedies which soften 
 down adultery. Moliere's George Dandin is one, 
 to look no nearer home. In Moliere's time, and 
 in the unrefined nations, it had not yet been dis- 
 covered in how high a degree domestic happi- 
 ness and social order depend on conjugal fidelity. 
 It was not yet notorious, that a husband will 
 submit to no privations, and will undertake no 
 labour, no hazard to provide for the children of 
 a wife whom he has suspected. It was not yet 
 notorious, that filial, as well as parental affection 
 vanishes, where its object is uncertain or infa- 
 mous. The son disdains at home, without scru- 
 ple, the frown of a stranger, or the tears of a 
 harlot : the daughter forsakes, in their old age, 
 the one parent because he is not akin, and the 
 other because she has not a character. It was not * 
 yet calculated how short-lived is the pleasure of 
 gallantry; how long-lived its miserable and irrevo- 
 cable effect. Beauty lasts but an olympiad, the 
 constancy of a gallant but a summer ; and for this 
 summer, were it to be spent in the paradise of Ma- 
 homet, without fear, and without remorse, it would 
 
 H 5 
 
L54 APPENDIX. 
 
 not be worth while to endanger, far less fling a- 
 way,thirty or forty years of mutual confidence and 
 friendship. This, where there are no children, 
 and where there are, mothers, if such there be, 
 who for a moment have meditated, to snap these 
 ties asunder, how think you to buy again those 
 endearing charities, and purest pleasures of your 
 nature — that sympathy of family aifection, for- 
 bidden for ever to the hearth polluted by the 
 adulterer? The degradation of rank, the disso- 
 lution of acquaintance, are comparatively feeble 
 considerations. Let the comic poet therefore be 
 called to. a severe responsibility, when he seems 
 to dally with the holiest bonds, which hold our 
 hearts together. Let the matron rise and quit the 
 Playhouse, with her daughter, if her sacred pre- 
 sence is profaned by coarse ribaldry, or syste- 
 matic licentiousness. • Genius can be so taught, 
 that unless he is the slave of virtue, he must be- 
 come the outcast of fame ; that no works of art 
 endure, but those which advocate the enduring 
 interests of mankind ; and that the true road to 
 permanent praise on earth is to merit the favour 
 of a retributive Deity." 
 
 From the closeof this paragraph it appears that 
 this writer is nearly as good a Christian as he is a 
 reasoncr. What shall we think of a school which 
 requires so much caution in its pupils, and which 
 endanger^ their social and domestic happiness? 
 
APPENDIX. 155 
 
 Gan a more powerful argument be brought 
 against the Stage, than that it sometimes dallies 
 with the holiest bonds ; and that a combination 
 of virtuous individuals is necessary to shame it 
 by their reproaches into the bounds of decency ? 
 Is this writer aware, that the remedy he proposes 
 will never be applied. Exemplary characters 
 will not visit a Theatre to cry these comedies 
 down; and genius has so long been taught, that 
 to be successful on the Stage, he must be licen- 
 tious, that he will not heed the frowns of a few 
 virtuous individuals. And what virtuous matron 
 would carry her daughter to a place where it 
 was probable her sacred presence might be pro- 
 faned by coarse ribaldry and systematic licenti- 
 ousness. The regeneration of the Theatre has 
 been attempted again and again. I have proved 
 in my Lssay that it cannot essentially be changed ; 
 that from the characters of those who support 
 it, and the nature of its constitution, it must be 
 evil : it has long been reasoned out of existence, 
 and it can only be defended by degraded talents, 
 and the most egregious sophistry. 
 
 But it is time for me to defend myself from 
 the unjust censures which some assertions in the 
 Essay have provoked. Assertions which are de- 
 nominated the wildest, strangest, most untenable, 
 It is very easy to string together a number of. 
 5uperlatives ; and with a sweeping censure to 
 
156 APPENDIX. 
 
 'condemn; it is not so easy to reason, and to 
 refute. 
 
 Let us consider what these assertions are, and 
 fairly meet the charge of the critic. To him in- 
 deed they might appear wild, strange, and unte- 
 nable ; for he, no doubt, sat down to the vo- 
 lume, resolving that an enemy to the Stage 
 should receive no mercy at his hands. But it 
 sometimes happens, that when a critic would 
 wound another he stabs himself; and this is par- 
 ticularly the case when victory, instead of truth, 
 is the object of the contest. 
 
 With regard to the origin of the Stage, I have 
 nothing new to advance; I am not ashamed 
 again to declare, that the Theatre has ever owed 
 its origin to religion. But I cannot possibly 
 conceive how my admitting this can injure 
 the side of the question which I have espoused. 
 My Reviewer thinks the clergy acted wisely 
 in making religion the subject of dramatic 
 representation. This however is a singular 
 opinion of his own, unsupported by any reason- 
 ing; but my opinion is- directly the reverse of 
 this; and notwithstanding his sagacious sneers, 
 I am not ashamed to avow it; and were I called 
 upon to defend that opinion, it would not lead 
 ine to advocate the cause of undisguised popery, 
 and the shocking innovations with which it stript 
 the Christian worship of its purity and simpli- 
 
APPENDIX. 157 
 
 city: the other side of the question inevitably 
 involves in it this consequence; and yet, judg- 
 ing from this Review, we must conclude that its 
 writer is an infidel rather than a papist. 
 
 It is asserted, that the object of my second 
 chapter is to inquire into the causes which have 
 contributed to the success of the Stage, with a 
 view to prove that civilization, advanced beyond 
 its zenith, occasions this popularity. A reader 
 of this Review, unacquainted with the Essay on 
 the Stage, would certainly imagine that this was 
 . the leading, if not the only, design of the se-cond 
 chapter. However, this is only mentioned among 
 a variety of other things, equally potent in con- 
 tributing to the support and influence of the 
 Theatre. But because it is mentioned, I am, it 
 seems, liable to censure. The assertion is denied. 
 Perhaps the figure which I employed to convey 
 my meaning is liable to some exception. But 
 what I intended by it is sufficiently obvious from 
 a sentence which almost immediately follows; 
 and when an author explains himself, advantage 
 should not be taken of a single sentence, or mode 
 of expression; his meaning should be obviously 
 stated, and if erroneous, severely judged. 
 
 When I mentioned civilization, advanced be- 
 yond its zenith, as one cause of the success of 
 the stage, the ground on which I stood must 
 have been evident from the connexion. In the 
 
158 APTENDIX\ 
 
 very next' page I asserted, " There is a certain 
 point in civilization, beyond which it contributes 
 not to -a nation's prosperity or happiness; and 
 that point is the utmost limit of refinement con- 
 sistent with virtue. Now that point I consi- 
 dered as my zenith; and let me ask this Critic, 
 had not Athens advanced far beyond it at the- 
 time of the rivalship of Sophocles and Euripi- 
 des? And I imagine it will not for a moment 
 be doubted that Rome was far, very far, on the. 
 decline when Ovid and Julius C<esar assisted in. 
 translating Greek tragedies for the Roman stage. 
 I asserted also in the very same page, in illus- 
 trating my meaning on this subject, that when 
 the sinews of Roman and Athenian virtues were 
 the strongest, the people had neither time nor 
 inclination to regard the diversions of the bulge : 
 and with regard to Rome, I quoted Horace to 
 confirm my assertion: — see page 2 and 3. The 
 whole passage I will here transcribe; and if my. 
 Critic pleases, he may enter the lists with the 
 Roman satirist 
 
 Tibia non, ut nunc, oricbalco vincta, tubacque 
 jtmula • sed tenuis, simplexque foramine pauco 
 Aspirare, et adesse choris erat utilis, atque 
 Kondum spissa nimis complere sedilia tialu- 
 Quo sane populus numerabilis, utpote parvus, 
 TA fnigi, eastusque, verecuudusque coibat. 
 Postquam ccepit agros extendere victor- ct urbem 
 L%tior amplecti raurus 3 vino que diurno 
 
APPENDIX- . 159 
 
 PJacari Genius festis impune diebus ; 
 Accessit uumerisque inodisque licentia major. 
 
 Horace ars Poeiica. 
 
 Thus it appears, while the Roman community 
 was small, while its members were frugal, chaste, 
 and modest, the Theatre was little frequented — 
 it was not a national interest. A slender rude 
 pipe was all that was necessary to concur with 
 the chorus, and to fill the rows which were not 
 then too crowded. But afterwarus, when con- 
 quest enlarged the Roman territory, when it 
 poured into the city the profusions of luxury, and 
 enervated the people ; to gratify the sensual appe- 
 tites without controul, became the disgraceful 
 feature of their character who once were no- 
 ble, simple, brave; the Theatre, the effeminate 
 amusement which they once disdained, was 
 made the favourite source of pleasure ; and then 
 it was found expedient to satisfy the voracious 
 appetite of a luxurious people, to introduce into 
 its music and poetry greater licentiousness. 
 
 In page 570 of the Review I am condemned 
 for asserting " That the Athenians and Romans 
 were more virtuous before they had a Theatre;" 
 and with an air of triumph the Critic asks, 
 " Can the gentleman name any Greek conspi- 
 cuous for virtue who preceded Eschylus the 
 tragedian? the Romans having had no archives 
 u»til the year 450 after the foundation of the 
 
160 APPENDIX. 
 
 city, nothing trust-worthy can be known of 
 their earlier historical characters. In the year 
 568 they had long had a Theatre, because in that 
 year separate seats were first allotted to the 
 senate and the people. The story of CuriusDen- 
 tatus proves a iow state of public virtue; for it 
 was then a matter of astonishment and admira- 
 tion that a consul should refuse a bribe from the 
 enemy's ambassador. In the time of Fabricius 
 there wa« already a Theatre at Tarentum; 
 whence, probably, after the peace with Pyrrhus, 
 the institution came to Rome. Where then, 
 unless in the bingle person of Fabricius, who, 
 since he w r as invited to become the minister of 
 Pyrrhus, must have been familiar with Greek 
 language, and probably with the Greek drama, 
 shall a fin^ specimen of Roman virtue be sought 
 which preceded the establishment of the btage? 
 It rather seems as if the heroic delineations of 
 the dramatic poet were the models which gave 
 origin to public virtue." 
 
 The first question is, before I reply to this cu- 
 rious statement, have I any where asserted that 
 the Athenians and Romans were more virtuous 
 before they had a Theatre: the sixth page of 
 the first edition of the Essay is referred to; but 
 there I can only find the following observation : 
 — " Among the Romans, for a series of years, the 
 dramatic art was little cultivated. At the time 
 
APPENDIX. 161 
 
 of its first introduction the rigit| features of the 
 old Roman character were strongly visible : but 
 as these wore away, the Stage advanced' with 
 rapid progress, extended more widely its influ- 
 ence, and became, as at Athens, the fashion- 
 able resort of the idle, the dissolute, and the 
 gay . 
 
 The next question is, What does the writer 
 mean by the equivocal expression, " Had a 
 Theatre, he ought to mean, and I imagine he 
 does, a regular theatrical establishment, because 
 it is impossible to argue on the influence of the 
 Stage in those periods when it was without any 
 peculiar character, and destitute of general inte- 
 rest; or when it was the popular amusement for 
 a few days on extraordinary occasions. Taking 
 this for granted, I shall defend the declaration 
 made in the sixth page, which I have now quoted, 
 and reply to the strange assertions and reason- 
 ings which it has produced. 
 
 As I have in the passage referred to asserted no- 
 thing respecting the Athenians, it is not necessary 
 
 * In the chapter on the estimation in which the Theatre 
 was held by philosophers, legislators, and divines, I have quoted 
 from Augustine the following remark ; but this I only in f roduced 
 to exhibit the opinion v of Augustine on the subjeci c F 1 beatre. 
 •• The tricas artes virtus Romana nou noverat. - I do 
 
 Dot feel myself responsible, though if it be necessary I will un- 
 dertake to prove its truth, which, I think, sufficiently done ia 
 this and a few subsequent pages. 
 
162 APPENDIX. 
 
 forme to prove that they were more virtuous pre- 
 vious to the establishment of a Theatre among 
 them ;. and it will be observed, that with regard 
 to the Romans, I have only declared, that among 
 them, for a series of years, the dramatic art was 
 little cultivated, and that the cause of this vras the 
 rigid features of the old Roman character. And 
 will this writer venture to affirm, that the Theatre 
 had not to struggle with gn! at opposition before 
 it could gain at Rome a conlplete establishment? 
 Is he not aware of the jealousy with which every 
 thing Grecian was at first received among the 
 Romans? Does he not know that the republican 
 spirit, which was a spirit of industry, frugality*, 
 and indcpendence,constant!y opposed every thing- 
 luxurious, and that it therefore considered the 
 Theatre a most dangerous enemy to Rome. 
 The Romans universally believed, that Greece 
 destroyed her independence, and hurried herself 
 into rum by her rage for theatrical and other 
 effeminate amusements; and therefore it was 
 that Cato asserted, " That the establishment of a 
 regular Theatre would be to Rome a more dan- 
 gerous Carthage .than that .which they had just 
 destroyed." As a reason for the subsequent pro- 
 gress of the Stage among the Romans, 1 re- 
 marked, that as the rigid features of the old Ro- 
 man character wore away, the Stage advanced 
 with proportionate rapidity. I did not call these 
 
APPENDIX. 163 
 
 rigid features by the distinguished name of vir- 
 tue. In a Christian sense, this would have been 
 impossible. But had I considered the term in 
 its common and Heathenish acceptation, I might 
 have declared, that Rome was virtuous, and that 
 her virtue was the most powerful obstacle to the 
 influence of the Stage : and had I asserted this, 
 the Critic, who dignifies anger and resentment 
 with the name of virtue, could have no just 
 reason to blame me. 
 
 What is usually understood by Roman virtue 
 (and which was purity itself, when compared 
 with the subsequent degeneracy of this once 
 admirable people) flourished and decayed before 
 the establishment of a Theatre : not till after the 
 peace with Pyrrhus was any thing known at 
 Rome of the Grecian, or any other Theatre. 
 At the year 568, there was at Rome no regular 
 theatrical establishment, whatever may be said 
 of the allotment of separate seats to the senate 
 and the people, in those temporary fabrics which 
 were only reared to be in a few days demo- 
 lished. The first dramatic poet of Rome, Livius 
 Andronicus, lived about the year 514, U. C. that 
 is, twenty-five years after the peace made with 
 Pyrrhus. But .even then the Stage was not 
 established among the Romans. After the de- 
 struction of Carthage the policy of establishing 
 a Theatre was questioned, and produced the re- 
 
164 APPEND IX. 
 
 mark of Cato which I have before quoted, which 
 fully proves, that in the year 621, from the foun- 
 dation of the city, a Roman* theatrical establish- 
 ment was unknown. Pompey the Great, who flou- 
 rished immediately before his successful rival and 
 competitor for power, Julius Caesar, was the first 
 man who had power and predit enough to get a 
 Theatre continued. Till his time it had to contend 
 with insuperable difficulties. It was not a national 
 interest; yet how many fine specimens of Roman 
 virtue had appeared to delight, and to astonish 
 mankind, long before the arrival of this eera. 
 From the statement made in the Annual Review, 
 the reader is led to conclude, that there was 
 a theatrical establishment at Rome two centu- 
 ries before such an establishment existed. The 
 age of Fabricius also is stigmatized as being 
 remarkably deficient in virtue, though in his own 
 character he afforded the most striking specimen 
 of public virtue upon record. But let any man 
 read the pages of the Roman history which re- 
 late to that period, and I will venture to allirm,. 
 that so far from concluding that public virtue 
 was at that time in a low state, he will be per- 
 suaded, that the age of Faoricius was singularly 
 eminent in producing virtuous men: — indeed so 
 powerfully did this impress the mind of Gold- 
 smitn, that after he has narrated the circum- 
 stances of the war with Pyrrhus, and brought it 
 
APPENDIX. 165 
 
 to a close he ventures to pay this just tribute 
 to Roman virtue. — " In this manner ended tne 
 war with Pyrrhus, after six years continuance. 
 Through the whole of this, we tind the Romans 
 acting a nobler part than in any former period: 
 endeavouring to join the politeness of Greece to 
 the virtuous austerity of their own manners. A 
 spirit of frugality, contempt of wealth, and virtu- 
 ous emulation, had spread itself over the whole 
 senate. Fabricius not only brought poverty into 
 fashion by his example, but punished all p- 
 proaches to luxury by his authority as a magis- 
 trate. About this time, in the censorship of 
 Fabricius, Ruffinus, who had been twice a con- 
 sul, and once a dictator, was turned out of the 
 senate, and had a mark of infamy put upon his 
 name, for no other offence than being possessed of 
 ten pound of silver plate for the use of his table. 
 By this love of temperance, and these successes in 
 war, though the individuals were poor, the pub- 
 lic was rich; the number of citizens was also 
 increased to above two hundred thousand men 
 capable of bearing arms; and the fame of the 
 Roman name was so far extended, that Ptolemy 
 Philadeiphus, King of Egypt, sent ambassadors 
 to congratulate their success, and to entreat 
 their alliance." 
 
 At this period it will be remembered, accord- 
 ing to the Reviewer's own confession, a Theatre 
 
16(5 APPENDIX. 
 
 was unknown at Rome. The institution was 
 not carried thither till after the peace with 
 Pyrrhus, and it was imported, he says, from 
 Tarentum. It may not be wholly irrelevant to 
 iiiquire what glorious effects the Stage produced 
 among the Tarentines, who, according to this 
 writer, were destined to the high honour of com- 
 municating to Rome this " Origin of public vir* 
 titer 
 
 When Pyrrhus marched with an army to their 
 defence, he found the Tarentines in a most 
 deplorable condition. " Upon his arrival at 
 Tarentum (remarks the historian) his first care 
 was to reform the people he came to succour; 
 for observing a total dissolution of manners in 
 this luxurious city, and how the inhabitants 
 were rather occupied with the pleasures of bath- 
 ing, feasting, and dancing, than in preparing for 
 war; he gave orders to have all their. 
 
 PLACES OF PUBLIC ENTERTAINMENT SHUT UP. M 
 
 Yet with all this weight of evidence against him, 
 with facts which every school-boy knows staring 
 him in the face, with an effrontery peculiarly his 
 own, this Reviewer asks, " Where then, unless in 
 the single person of Fabricius, who, since he was 
 invited to becorne the minister of Pyrrhus, must 
 have been familiar with Greek language, and 
 probably with the Greek drama, shall a fine 
 specimen of Roman virtue be sought which pre- 
 
APPENDIX. 1(57 
 
 ceded the establishment of the Stager" And after 
 this he adds in a sort of triumph, " It rather seems 
 as if the heroic delineations of the dramatic poet 
 were the models which gave origin to public 
 virtue.'' On this last most curious discovery of 
 the origin of public virtue, I would make a few 
 observations. I would just remark, that these 
 heroic delineations of the dramatic poet are those 
 which were imported from Greece; from that 
 Theatre which, by this writer, is denounced 
 the most impudent of any upon record; and yet 
 these impudent, these licentious delineations, 
 Ci ft rather seems," were the models which gave 
 origin to public virtue. I confess I have a much 
 higher opinion of the Athenian Stage before the 
 reign of Aristophanes while it was supported 
 and adorned by the talents and virtues of Euri- 
 pides and Sophocles than this Reviewer: but 
 even the productions of these best of trage- 
 dians I cannot consider as deserving the extra- 
 vagant encomiums which are here passed with- 
 out discrimination upon all the performances 
 of the Grecian poets. Tragedy, this Reviewer 
 asserts, is a lecture on history; that is, it is a 
 heroic public spirited interesting delineation of 
 human nature. Now if this definition be accu- 
 rate, public virtue must have existed before it 
 could be represented in the scenes of the drama. 
 These delineations were not therefore the crea- 
 
168 APPENDIX. 
 
 tures of the poels imagination, but they were 
 exact representations of human nature, of some 
 great and distinguished characters, who had 
 lived and acted on the great stage of the world. 
 They were rather mirrors than models; and " It 
 rather seems," from the testimony of history 
 and experience, that these theatrical represen- 
 tations led the people to substitute admiration of 
 virtue for virtue itself, and to waste that time in 
 beholding a mere exhibition of the virtues of 
 others, which they should have employed in ac- 
 quiring excellences of their own, till a habit of 
 idleness was induced, which laid them open to 
 the artful designs of the comic poets, who gra- 
 dually undermined their virtue, and made them 
 slaves of licentiousness and folly. How other- 
 wise are we to account for the unbounded influ- 
 ence of Aristophanes, who almost, in their own 
 age, chased the great tragedians from the Stage. 
 This only proves, that a theatre is, in every view, 
 a most dangerous establishment. Its very ten- 
 dency to produce idleness in its best state was 
 the seed of its degeneracy, and renders it an evil 
 of awful magnitude. I think I may venture to 
 affirm, that after the time the Stage became a 
 general interest there is no striking instance of 
 Athenian virtue; and yet if it were the model 
 which gave origin to public virtue, the more 
 general its influence, the more virtue ought to 
 
APPENDIX. 169 
 
 abound among the people. And Rome was ra- 
 pidly on the decline when Pompey reared the 
 Theatre w r hich bore his name; nor could this 
 important establishment arrest the progress of 
 effeminacy and vice; but on the contrary, it 
 accelerated the fall of the mistress of the world. 
 I now proceed to mention another instance of 
 unjust censure on sentiments advanced in the 
 Essay. I am accused, page 570, of asserting., 
 " That nations become enervated, emasculated, 
 effeminate, and cowardly, by affording counte- 
 nance to the Stage," and in this I am con- 
 tradicted. It should, however, be recollected, 
 that I had, in a preceding chapter placed 
 wealth, luxury, and idleness among the causes 
 of the success of the drama. These I consi- 
 dered as tending to make a people effemi- 
 nate, and thus to prepare them for the amuse- 
 ments of the Stage : and having been thus pro* 
 duced by luxury, idleness, and dissipation, it was 
 but natural that the Theatre should bear the fea- 
 tures of its parents, and contribute to spread 
 their influence. To this reasoning, which is 
 supported by facts the most striking in history, 
 the Critic replies, " It suffices to oppose the in- 
 stance of the modern French, who are the least 
 enervated of the civilized nations, and the most 
 regardful of the pleasures of the Theatre/' Then 
 
 I 
 
110 APPENDIX. 
 
 follows a learned disquisition on the causes of 
 effeminacy, in which the writer very ingeniously 
 cnotrives to aim a blow at the Puritanic Metho- 
 dists of the modern world. 
 
 There are (he observes) physical, and there 
 are moral causes of effeminacy. He asserts, on the 
 physical causes of effeminacy, the Stage has little 
 effect: and its moral causes, he affirms, are 
 chiefly to be sought in the opinions of cer- 
 tain teachers, who advise that men should be 
 enured to all the virtues of women ; that they 
 should subdue anger and resentment; that they 
 should cultivate patience and content. Now 
 as courage is much connected with anger and 
 with activity, it will generally be found, that the 
 moral principles which attack these qualities 
 will, in proportion as they prevail, diminish the 
 mass of national bravery. In the ancient world, 
 principles of this kind w r ere propagated by the 
 Alexandrian Platonists, and their disciples, in 
 alliance with an unintelligible mysticism: and in 
 the modern world, principles of this kind are 
 propagated by the Puritanic Methodists; in both 
 cases with the obvious effect of diffusing a gentle 
 humane unresisting temper, running over with 
 benevolence, empty of courage. In replying to 
 this morceau of criticism and argument, I beg 
 leave first to quote the passage from the Essay, in 
 
AITE3DIX. 171 
 
 which it is declared, that the assertion here 
 combated is made*. " The Roman empire was 
 rapidly on the decline when Nero himself 
 became a buffoon and a comedian, and while 
 the Grecians were relaxing the nerves of their 
 strength by these effeminate amusements, for 
 which their luxury and idleness gave them a 
 taste, they were gradually unfolding the gates 
 of their city to Philip of Macedon." Now if 
 this statement agree with the truth : if by lux- 
 ury and idleness the people were led to the 
 Theatre as a principal source of gratification; 
 and if the theatre operated as a powerful instru- 
 ment in spreading effeminacy, and all its train 
 of national evils, both at Greece and Rome, I 
 am not persuaded, that an assertion founded 
 on fact, and which is most legibly inscribed 
 on the annals of their history ought to be 
 retracted: nor do I believe that the instance 
 of the modern French has any weight in the ar- 
 gument. May I be permitted to ask this writer 
 what were the moral causes which led to the 
 subjugation of Greece? and what was it that 
 tended more than any thing besides to in- 
 crease their influence? I refer him and the 
 reader to that section in the Preface of Rollings 
 Ancient History, entitled, " Passion for the re- 
 
 * Page 18j secand edition 
 
3 73 APPENDIX. 
 
 presensations of the Theatre one of the princi- 
 pal causes of the degeneracy and corruption of 
 the Athenian state." I imagine the reasoning 
 and the facts there stated will even shock the 
 confidence of an Annual Reviewer; and he will 
 find that I was not mistaken, when I solemnly and 
 nnblushingly cried out, " Standing on the base 
 of truth, I point to the column of history." As 
 some stress is laid on the instance of the modern 
 French, to prove that a passion for the Theatre 
 does not emasculate and render a people effe- 
 minate, though perhaps by some it may be con- 
 sidered as unnecessary, I will yet make some 
 remarks on the subject. And I observe, that the 
 circumstances of the modern French are very 
 different from those of Greece and Rome when 
 the Theatre contributed so awfully to their de- 
 generacy and ruin. The military spirit, and the 
 constant dangers to which France has been ex- 
 posed, have operated .as a most powerful check 
 upon the Stage. It has not yet made them 
 cowards ; they have had no leisure to be idle. 
 But the Theatre has not been entirely without 
 a pernicious influence even in France. The 
 rulers, during the revolution, were skilful adepts 
 in the art of corruption ; they knew that it was 
 necessary to corrupt before they could enslave: 
 they therefore opened an unexampled number 
 
APPENDIX* 173 
 
 of Theatres, and so reduced the price of admis- 
 sion as almost to emulate the gratuitous admis- 
 sion of the* Athenian populace in the time of 
 Pericles; and while their fellow citizens were 
 dragged by hundreds to the guillotine, they 
 could behold the horrors of the scene with 
 stupid insensibility, and leave the spectacle 
 of biood to be convulsed with laughter by the 
 fictitious exhibitions of pantomimical buffoons. 
 And is it no evidence of effeminacy and cowardice, 
 when a people, who, but a few years before, 
 made the most noble struggles for liberty, now 
 tamely submit to the absolute yoke of a proud 
 usurper. Let tranquility once more visit the 
 continent of Europe: let Buonaparte and his 
 legions return to enjoy the luxuries of the capi- 
 tal; with the spoils of conquered nations let 
 them sit down to gratify their taste, and study 
 the arts of refinement, and in a very few 
 years the Theatre of France will complete what 
 all Europe has combined its forces to accom- 
 plish in vain* A war of extermination com- 
 menced against France, roused her from that 
 stupor which threatened death ; healed those civil 
 discords which seemed to hasten its approach ; 
 broke the charm of those effeminate amusements 
 which allured her to destruction, and roused a 
 military spirit which has produced an army in 
 13 
 
J74 APPENDIX, 
 
 the heart of Europe, which has hurled down 
 the thrones on the continent, and which may, 
 ere long, disorganize and destroy the poli- 
 tical systems of the whole civilized world. By 
 this combination to ruin them, the effeminacy 
 of the French people received a mighty check. 
 But if ever amusement and frivolity again be- 
 come their business, (and luxury and peace will 
 have a tendency to hasten the event) France will 
 fall from her mighty eminence, and tremble in 
 her turn at the puny nations she now laughs to 
 scorn. It is therefore strikingly evident, that 
 the instance of the modern French has no weight 
 in the argument, against the effeminate influence 
 of the Theatre, but in some respects furnishes a 
 proof that the Stage does produce effeminacy, 
 and is a sort of silken lining to the yoke of slavery, 
 or rather a sweet ingredient which renders the 
 bitter draught less unpalatable. 
 
 The manner in which this advocate of the 
 Stage dismisses the subject in dispute, and under 
 the moral causes of effeminacy, levels an attack 
 upon Christianity, is almost too contemptible to 
 deserve regard. That it is Christianity he repro- 
 bates, and not the Puritanic Methodists, is evi- 
 dent. The peculiarities of Methodism, whatever 
 ^hey may be, he has not noticed, but the lessons 
 taught most expressly and unequivocally by 
 
APPENDIX. 173 
 
 Jesus Christ himself, he has ridiculed and con- 
 temned. The glorious Teacher and Founder of 
 our religion advised that men should be enured 
 to what are here contemptuously called the vir- 
 tues of women, and enjoined that they should 
 subdue anger and resentment; that they should 
 cultivate patience and content. The Christian 
 Lav/giver really, and the Puritanic Methodists 
 ostensibly, are censured for those moral quali- 
 ties, which more than any thing besides distin- 
 guish the Gospel from every mere human 
 system. And he who said " Avenge not your-- 
 selVes," who commanded " Love your -enemies,'' 
 and who prayed for his murderers — " Father for- 
 give them, for they know not what they do/' is 
 represented as an enemy to mankind, the mis- 
 chievous tendency of whose doctrines must dimi- 
 nish the mass of national bravery ; and his faith- 
 ful followers who imbibe the spirit of his religion, 
 and act under its powerful influence, are stigma- 
 tized as " Puritanic Methodists." But Chris- 
 tianity smiles at the censures of a man whose 
 diminutive greatnes is composed of anger, resent- 
 ment, and courage, who can only be brave when 
 he is angry, and active when his lips quiver with 
 revenge; in whose vocabulary self-denial is asceti- 
 tism, magnanimity folly, Christian benevolence 
 w eakness, patience and contentment the virtue 
 I 4 
 
176 ^ APPENDIX. 
 
 of women. This advocate of the Stage, when 
 he discloses the moral principles of his heart, 
 proves with resistless evidence its antichristian 
 tendency, and he is too much of a theatrical 
 fanatic, properly to estimate the value of the 
 .Christian character. 
 
 What is courage when it is a passion instead 
 of a principle, when it cannot exist but in the 
 company of anger and resentment, and what are 
 all the active virtues without the passive graces 
 ©f Christianity. Christianity, and Christianity 
 alone can perfect the human character, and there 
 is no virtue of Christianity, which can be injurious 
 to the general or individual interests of mankind. 
 Does the Gospel make men inactive and effe- 
 minate, because it teaches them to deny ungod- 
 liness, and worldly lusts, and must it therefore be 
 an enemy to human kind? To decide upon the 
 value and importance of the moral principles of 
 the Christian religion, it is only necessary that we 
 should view the character of its great and glori- 
 ous author. Without anger, without resentment, 
 with "All the virtues of women," he was actively 
 benevolent, he constantly went about doing good ; 
 benevolence, not anger, not resentment inspired 
 him with courage; but then it was a harmless 
 courage, by it he coolly and deliberately exposed 
 himself to the most imminent perils, but he 
 
APPENDIX. 177 
 
 injured not a human being. His courage bore 
 upon it the marks of real greatness. He contended 
 with the vices, the prejudices, and opinions of 
 men ; and he bestowed blessings upon them in 
 spite of themselves. And when his activity and 
 zeal involved him in danger, exposed him to the 
 malice of wicked men, he exhibited something 
 more noble than anger, more dignified than re- 
 venge. Rousseau a more ingenuous unbeliever 
 than this cowardly critic while he openly declared 
 that he could not believe the Gospel, avowed that 
 " The death of Jesus was the death of a God;" 
 he contemplated it with admiration, and joined 
 the centurion in his testimony/' Verily this is the 
 Son of God." If the virtues, which Jesus dis- 
 played on the cross, and which he exhibited 
 in various trying situations during his life, are the 
 virtues of women, women deserve our homage, 
 and we need not wonder that they captivate all 
 hearts; but I believe there will be found in this 
 concession to the fair sex more gallantry than 
 good sense. This would be a happy world if 
 both sexes were emulous to excel in these god- 
 like virtues; it is not for a human imagination to 
 conceive a scene of more perfect bliss than a com- 
 munity wholly Christian in which every heart 
 overflows with benevolence, every individual is 
 actually and constantly employed in the cause of 
 I 5 
 
178 APPENDIX. 
 
 goodness, and all esteeming others better than 
 themselves. A community where anger and 
 resentment are unknown, and where the unity of 
 the Spirit is maintained in the bond of peace. 
 Let the world look on such a scene till it resembles 
 what it view's. 
 
 But it seems, these are the moral principles 
 which are propagated by the Puritanic Methodists. 
 Glorious distinction ! Christianity has not then in 
 anger forsaken this ungrateful world ; despised 
 puritanic methodists, happy for mankind she has 
 taken up her abode with you ! Go on then with 
 a noble courage, disseminate the principles which 
 the Son of God came down from heaven to exem- 
 plify, and in defence of which he bled and died. 
 But why, let me ask, are all real Christians, who 
 are consistent enough to believe that the New 
 Testament is an infallible standard of Christian 
 doctrine and practice, and who, therefore, bow to 
 us decision and conform to is injunctions, why 
 are all such to be stigmatized with opprobrious 
 epithets? and why did not this enemy of the 
 Gospel of Christ, boldly avow his infidelity ? why 
 should he shield himself in an attack on the vitals 
 of Christianity, by insinuating that he only 
 levelled his malice against a sect, who, for what- 
 ever reason, are despised raid laughed at by the 
 world? To answer these questions would lead me 
 
APPENDIX. 179 
 
 into a wide field of discussion ; the conscience of 
 the Reviewer, and all who imitate him, can best 
 account for this strange injustice. 
 
 In this age of abounding infidelity, I confess I 
 am a little surprised that a writeiyvvho is evidently 
 a despiser of the Christian religion should be 
 ashamed to avow it, but when I remember that 
 some courage even now is necessary to enable a 
 man unblushingly to withstand the reproaches of 
 conscience, and the indignation of the good and 
 wise, and that this critic can only be courageous 
 when he is angry, my surprize yields to pity 
 that a man should love a cause which he is afraid 
 openly to espouse^ and that his courage should 
 fail him at the moment, and on an occasion when 
 the want of it must brand him with the meanness 
 of cowardice, and expose the cause he would 
 thus sneakingly serve to contempt. We may 
 indeed make for him this excuse, that he perhaps 
 imagined by this mode of procedure, more effec- 
 tually and with little expense of intellectual- 
 labour to give a deadly thrust at the religion of 
 Jesus. It probably occurred to him that stigma- 
 tizing doctrines and principles with the odious 
 name of Methodism was a certain and short way 
 of covering them with infamy : that he could 
 laugh at a Methodist with much more ease and 
 with much less danger than he could invalidate ' 
 I Q 
 
180 APPENDIX. 
 
 the truth and excellence of Christianity; and 
 why should a man waste his time and his efforts 
 by a long course of tedious reasonings when 
 one word will produce all the desired effect. 
 Here I cannot refrain quoting an appropriate 
 passage from Foster's Essays. " Whenever a grave 
 formalist feels it his duty to sneer at those ope- 
 rations of religion on the passions which he has 
 never felt, he has only to call them methodistical; 
 and notwithstanding that the word is both so 
 trite and so vague, he feels as if he had uttered a 
 good pungent thing. There is a satiric smartness 
 in the word, though there be none in the man. 
 In default of keen faculty in the mind, it is 
 delightful thus to find something that will do a& 
 well ready bottled up in odd terms. It is not 
 less convenient to a profligate, or a coxcomb, 
 whose propriety of character is to be supported 
 by laughing indiscriminately at religion in every 
 form ; the one to evince that his courage is not 
 sapped by conscience, the other to make the 
 best advantage of his instinct of catching at 
 irnpiety as a substitute for sense. The w T ord 
 methodism so readily sets aside all religion as 
 superstitious folly, that they pronounce it with 
 an air as if no more needed to be said. Such 
 terms have a pleasant facility of throwing the 
 Flatter in question to scorn without any trouble 
 
APPENDIX, 181 
 
 of making a definite, intelligible charge of extra- 
 vagance or delusion, and attempting to prove it." 
 
 Before I dismiss the subject of religion, I will 
 notice the remarks which the chapter on the 
 anti-christian tendency of the Stage has produced 
 from the Reviewer. 
 
 " Here comes out the secret cause of our 
 author's antipathy to the Theatre, it retards 
 forsooth the progress of a fanatical sect. Observe 
 what sort of beings grow up under their mis- 
 chievous discipline. The men are spiritless and 
 cunning ; the women want the amenity of bene- 
 volence, all are austere, anxious, shy, melancholy, 
 speaking with a slothful whine, and with few ra- 
 diations of intelligence. Without being aware of 
 the blasphemous impiety and more than atheistic 
 profaneness of such an opinion, they think and 
 teach of God as if he had a dislike to the happi- 
 ness of his creatures. Pitiable mistakers of 
 the .eternal interest which you affect to have at 
 heart; O learn while it is yet time that to enjoy 
 is to obey, and that habitually to diffuse happiness 
 is alone to deserve perpetual existence.' 5 After 
 this raving, this phrensy, I would give the advice 
 ofDamasippus to my disordered Critic. 
 
 u Naviget Anticyram."- 
 
 To assert the paramount claims of the Christian 
 
182- APPENDIX*- 
 
 lawgiver, to exhibit Christianity as^ its features 
 are pourtrayed in the New Testament, is, in the 
 estimation of this Reviewer, to advocate the 
 cause of a sect, and of a sect whose tenets accor- 
 ding to his representation are the most forbidding*, 
 from which the heart revolts, and which are as 
 repugnant to my feelings, as unsophisticated 
 Christianity is to the feelings of my opponent. 
 In the chapter on the antichristian tendency of 
 the Stage, I have only maintained the morality 
 of the Gospel; I have not even proposed what 
 are called its dogmas, I have confined myself 
 to its practical tendency, and to a display of 
 those virtues which are cordially embraced by 
 almostall the various sects and parties into which 
 the Christian world is divided. I have asserted 
 that the morality of the Stage has always been a ; 
 morality diametrically opposite to that of the 
 Gospel, and this I have proved from the New 
 Testament, and from a. view of the popular 
 theatrical virtues. No ingenuity could discover 
 from what I had written, that I was the advocate 
 of any sect: mine is the sectarianism of Christi- 
 anity, and my fanaticism, conviction from resist- 
 less evidence that the Gospel is divine, and that it 
 demandst he homage of the heart. If a fair, 
 estimate could be made, I believe it would 
 be found that my opponent is the greater: 
 
APPENDIX. 183 
 
 fanatic. He presumes where he ought to 
 tremble, he talks of perpetual existance, while 
 he speaks contemptuously of the only revelation 
 which brings immortality to light. He calls 
 Christian virtues, the virtues of women, and 
 represents the New Testament as forming a cha- 
 racter misanthropic, and spiritless, a character 
 without benevolence, and without enjoyment; 
 he ranges himself with the enemies of Christi- 
 anity, and would enter into the presence of the 
 eternal Judge, w r ould plunge into a world of 
 everlasting retribution with a lie in his right 
 hand. I have always considered the sect of 
 unbelievers as the most fanatical and the most 
 misanthropic. If fanaticism be a substitute for 
 reason, and an enemy to it, these are the men who 
 are under its shocking influence. Evidence as 
 clear as the noon-day sun their passions will not 
 allow them to discern, and claims of an immortal 
 interest are superceded by the vanities of the 
 passing hour. And where can there be found in 
 the coldest human bosom misanthropy more 
 forbidding than that which, under the pretence of 
 philosophy, teaches us to renounce all future hope, 
 and robs us of our guide and charter for eternity. 
 And what are all the enjoymentsof this mischiev- 
 ous sect, " To enjoy (say they] is to obey," to 
 gratify their passions and their depraved desires ; 
 
184 APPENDIX.^ 
 
 to listen to every claim of folly, and not to starve 
 a single wish, which rises in the bosom, however 
 vicious; this they call enjoyment, and thus to- 
 enjoy is to obey. How much more refined, exalted, 
 and durable the happiness of a sincere Christian. 
 He knows it is decreed, by the ruler of man, 
 that the present should be a state of discipline : 
 he feels that he has passions which he must 
 regulate; temptations which he must resist; 
 depravity which he must subdue- He believes 
 that our infinitely kind Benefactor has blended 
 duty and enjoyment together; that he has for- 
 bidden only what would injure, and enjoined 
 what would make us happy, and he reverses 
 the infidel maxim. He is persuaded that to 
 obey U to enjoy. Who then is the mistaker 
 of the immortal interest of the imperishable 
 soul? The Christian or the unbeliever, — the 
 friend of the Gospel, p or its adversary. Under 
 your, mischievous discipline ye apostles of 
 infidelity, men grow up enemies of God, and 
 enemies to their species. Your writings diffuse 
 misery, whenever they misrepresent religion, or 
 traduce the characters of its friends, I at least 
 am able flatly to contradict and to expose the 
 violations of truth contained in the description 
 of those, who, it is said, grow up under the mis- 
 chievous discipline of the sect to which I belong. 
 
APPENDIX, 185 
 
 We are neither destitute of spirit nor courage; 
 we dare avow our sentiments in the face of an 
 opposing world; we dare to repel the attacks 
 of insolence, and to chastize the temerity 
 of ignorance; we also can be benevolent, we can 
 pity a Reviewer when he laughs at religion, and 
 while we detest the crime, we can pardon the 
 criminal, and give him a brother's interest in our 
 hearts. 
 
 The last thing which I shall notice in this 
 extraordinary Critique is the arrogant style in 
 which the Reviewer calls upon me to retract an 
 assertion which is to be found in the 24th. page 
 of the Essay,namely, " That aTheatre much more 
 pure than any which modern Europe ever knew 
 wase stablished at ancient Athens/ 9 But if I can 
 fix on any period when this was the case, my 
 point is established and in my turn I may call 
 upon the Reviewer to retract his arrogant and 
 unfounded censures, and to acknowledge that at 
 least he is quite as ignorant as the Author of the 
 Essay on the Stage. If we look at the Theatre 
 of Greece in its first rise to eminence, and during 
 the most splendid period of its history from 
 the time of Eschylus to the commencement of 
 the dramatic reign of Aristophanes, we shall be 
 struck with its purity and its dignity, and in vain 
 shall we search in the modern world and in Christ 
 
186 APPENDIX. 
 
 tian countries for a Theatre which inculcates a 
 morality so unexceptionable, sofree from impiety 
 and licentiousness. That the Grecian Stage 
 soon and rapidly degenerated, only adds weight- 
 to the arguments which are advanced against 
 the Theatre. It is sufficient for my purpose to 
 prove that the Grecian Stage, though not entirely 
 immaculate,was much more pure than any which 
 has appeared in modern Europe. And there 
 was a period in the Athenian history, when 
 however the poets were disposed, the audience 
 would not endure the most distant approaches* 
 to profaneness, obscenity, and vice. " One cannot 
 (says Rollin,) sufficiently admire the extreme 
 delicacy expressed by the Athenian audience oil; 
 certain occasions, and their solicitude to preserve 
 the reverence due to morality, virtue, decency, 
 and justice. It is surprising to observe the 
 warmth with which they unanimously reproved 
 whatever seemed inconsistent with them, and 
 called the poet to an account for it, notwithstand- 
 ing his having the best-founded excuse in giving 
 such sentiments only to persons notoriously 
 vicious, and actuated by the most unjust 
 passions/' And it was not till the very lowest 
 of the people were gratuitously admitted to the 
 enjoyment of theatrical exhibitions, that the 
 comic poet dared to indulge in low. buffoonery. 
 
APPENDIX. 187 
 
 and gross obscenity. Horace indeed expressly 
 declares, that the ancient comedy was subse- 
 quent to the time of Eschylus * ; and if the 
 public mind at that time was so tenacious, so 
 delicately alive to a sense t of propriety, and so 
 disposed to reprobate every thing that had the 
 least appearance of immorality, some interval 
 must have taken place before that taste could have 
 been so shockingly depraved, as to banish a com- 
 pany of comedians because their scenes were not 
 grossly comic enough. 
 
 But that the taste of the people did thus de- 
 generate, that the great tragic poets could not 
 retain their influence, and exclude impure and 
 disgusting comedy from the Grecian Theatre is a 
 strong an irresistible proof, that the best regulated 
 Stage is a very unsafe, uncertain, and inefficient 
 school, both of morality and happiness. 
 
 Having now established what I intended, 
 having proved that with splendid, and even im- 
 posing talents this annual Reviewer is strangely 
 unqualified to fill the chair of criticism, and 
 having shewn how little its warmest advocates 
 can produce in favour of the Stage. I now con- 
 clude intreating my Critic to review his own 
 performance, to retract his false assertions, to 
 blush at his palpable contradictions, and to weep 
 
 * Successit vetus his comsedia nou suia muita laude. 
 
188 APPENDIX* 
 
 with the bitter tears of repentance over that 
 impiety which would wrest from the Christian 
 his consolations and his hopes, and shroud the 
 world in moial darkness. 
 
 ¥IN-I£» 
 
 R. Tl lling, Printer, Newport^ 
 Iele of Wight. 
 

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