criticism of our contemporaries. Suffice it to say, that the age has no reason to apprehend any decay of dramatic talent.

Neither can our actors be supposed inadequate to the representation of such pieces of dramatic art, as we judge our authors capable of producing. We have lost Mrs. Siddons and John Kemble, but we still possess Kean, Young, and Miss O'Neil; and the stage has to boast other tragic performers of merit. In comedy, perhaps, it was never more strong. In point of scenery and decoration, our theatres are so amply provided, that they may rather seem to exceed than to fall short of what is required to form a classical exhibition.

Where, then, are we to look for that unfortunate counterbalance, which confessedly depresses the national Drama in despite of the advantages we have enumerated? We apprehend it will be found in the monopoly possessed by two large establishments, which, unhappily for the progress of national taste, and, it is said, without any equivalent advantage to the proprietors, now enjoy the exclusive privilege of dramatic representation. It must be distinctly understood, that we attribute these disadvantages to the system itself, and by no means charge them upon those who have the administration of either theatre. The proprietors have a right to enjoy what the law invests in them: and the managers have probably discharged their duty to the public as honourably as circumstances would admit of; but the system has led into errors which affect public taste, and even public morals. We shall briefly consider it as it influences, 1st, the mode of representation; 2dly, the theatrical authors and performers; and 3dly, the quality and composition of the audience.

The first inconvenience arises from the great size of the theatres, which has rendered them unfit for the legitimate purposes of the Drama. The persons of the performers are, in these huge circles, so much diminished, that nothing short of the mask and buskin could render them distinctly visible to the audience. Show and machinery have therefore usurped the place of tragic poetry; and the author is compelled to address himself to the eyes, not to the understanding or feelings of the spectators. This is of itself a gross error. Everything beyond correct costume and theatrical decorum is foreign to the legitimate purposes of the Drama, as tending to divide the attention of the audience; and the rivalry of the scene-painter and the carpenter cannot be very flattering to any author or actor of genius. Besides, all attempts at decoration, beyond what the decorum of the piece requires, must end in paltry puppet-show exhibition. The talents of the scenepainter and the mechanist cannot, owing to the very nature of the stage, make battles, sieges, &c., anything but objects of ridicule. Thus we have enlarged our theatres, so as to destroy the effect of acting, without carrying to any perfection that of pantomime and dumb show. Secondly, The monopoly of the two large theatres has operated un

favourably both upon theatrical writers and performers. The former have been, in many instances, if not absolutely excluded from the scene, yet deterred from approaching it, in the same manner as men avoid attempting to pass through a narrow wicket, which is perpetually thronged by an importunate crowd. Allowing the managers of these two theatres, judging in the first and in the last resort, to be possessed of the full discrimination necessary to a task so difficult-supposing them to be at all times alike free from partiality and from prejudicestill the number of plays thrust upon their hands must prevent their doing equal justice to all; and must frequently deter a man of real talents, either from pride or modesty, from entering a competition, clogged with delay, solicitation, and other circumstances, "haud subeunda ingenio suo." It is unnecessary to add, that increasing the number of theatres, and diminishing their size, would naturally tend to excite a competition among the managers, whose interest it is to make experiments on the public taste; and that this would infallibly secure any piece, of reasonable promise, a fair opportunity of being represented. It is by such a competition that genius is discovered.

The exclusive privilege of the regular London theatres is equally, or in a greater degree, detrimental to the performer; for it is with difficulty that he fights his way to a London engagement, and when once received, he is too often retained for the mere purpose of being laid aside, or shelfed, as it is technically called ;-rendered, that is, a weekly burden upon the pay-list of the theatre, without being produced above four or five times in the season to exhibit his talents. Into this system the managers are forced from the necessity of their situation, which compels them to enlist in their service every performer who seems to possess buds of genius, although it ends in their being so crowded together that they have no room to blossom. In fact, many a man of talent thus brought from the active exercise of a profession, to be paid for remaining obscure and inactive in London, and supported by what seems little short of eleemosynary bounty, either becomes careless of his business or disgusted with it; and stagnates in that mediocrity to which want of exercise alone will often condemn natural genius.

Thirdly, and especially, the magnitude of these theatres has occasioned them to be destined to company so scandalous, that persons not very nice in their taste of society, must yet exclaim against the abuse as a national nuisance. We are aware of the impossibility of excluding a certain description of females from public places in a corrupted metropolis like London; but in theatres of moderate size, frequented by the better class, these unfortunate persons would feel themselves compelled to wear a mask at least of decency. In the present theatres of London, the best part of the house is openly and avowedly set off for their reception; and no part of it which is open to the public at large is free from their intrusion, or at least from the open dis

play of the disgusting improprieties to which their neighbourhood gives rise. And these houses, raised at an immense expense, are so ingeniously misconstructed, that, in the private boxes, you see too little of the play, and, in the public boxes, greatly too much of a certain description of the company. No man of delicacy would wish the female part of his family to be exposed to such scenes; no man of sense would wish to put youth, of the male sex, in the way of such temptation. In London, if we would enjoy our most classical public amusement, we are braved by vice on the very threshold.

We notice these evils, without pretending to point out the remedy. If, however, it were possible so to arrange interests, that the patents of the present theatres should cover four, or even six, of smaller size, dedicated to the same purpose, we conceive that more good actors would be found, and more good plays written; and, as a necessary consequence, that' good society would attend the theatre in sufficient numbers to enforce respect to decency. The access to the stage would be rendered easy to both authors and actors; and although this might give scope to some rant, and false taste, it could not fail to call forth much excellence, that must otherwise remain latent or repressed. The theatres would be relieved of the heavy expense at present incurred, in paying performers who do not play; and in each maintaining three theatrical corps, for the separate purposes of tragedy, comedy, and musical pieces; only one of which can be productive labourers on the same evening, though all must be supported and paid.

We might prove, that the drama is in itself as capable of being directed either to right or wrong purposes, as the art of printing. It is true that, even after a play has been formed upon the most virtuous model, the man who is engaged in the duties of religion will be better employed than he who is seated in a theatre, and listening to the performance. When the necessity of daily labour is removed, and the call of social duty fulfilled, that of moderate and timely amusement claims its place, as a want inherent in our nature. To relieve this want, and fill up the mental vacancy, games are devised, books are written, music is composed, spectacles and plays are invented and exhibited. And if these last have a moral and virtuous tendency; if the sentiments expressed are calculated to rouse our love of what is noble, and our contempt of what is base or mean; if they unite hundreds in a sympathetic admiration of virtue, abhorrence of vice, or derision of folly; it will remain to be shown how far the spectator is more criminally engaged, than if he had passed the evening in the idle gossip of society; in the feverish pursuits of ambition; or in the unsated and insatiable struggle after gain-the graver employments of the present life, but equally unconnected with our existence hereafter.

227

MOLIÈRE.*

It will be universally admitted that in tragic performances nothing can be more distinctly different than the laws which regulate the French and English stage. The dissimilarity is so great, that a native of either country, however candid or liberal, must have studied with some attention the literature of the other, to enable him, not merely to relish, but even to endure, the tragedies of the neighbouring kingdom. A Parisian critic would be shocked at the representation of Hamlet au naturel, and the most patient spectator in a Drury Lane audience would incur some risk of dislocating his jaws with yawning, during the representation of a chef-d'œuvre of Racine or Corneille. This difference betwixt the taste of two highly civilized nations is not surprising, when we consider that the English tragedy existed a hundred years at least before the French, and is therefore censured by our neighbours as partaking, to a certain extent, of the barbarity and grossness of the age of Queen Elizabeth. The two great tragedians of France, on the contrary, had the task of entertaining a polished and highly ceremonious court, whose judgment was at least as fastidious as it was correct, and in whose eyes a breach of etiquette was a more formidable crime than any deficiency in spirit or genius.

Thus the English stage exhibited in word and in action every "change of many-coloured life," mingled the tragic with the comic, the ludicrous with the horrible, seized by storm on the applause of the halfstartled, half-affrighted audience, and presented to the judgment, like Salvator's landscapes to the eye, a chaos of the wonderful, mixed with the grotesque, agitating the passions too strongly to leave time to inquire whether the rules of critical taste were not frequently violated. The French stage, on the other hand, is carefully and exactly limited by a sense of decorum, which, exercised in its rigour, may be called the tyranny of taste. It is not lawful to please, says this dramatic code, unless by observance of certain arbitrary rules or to create a deeper and a more intense interest, than a strict obedience to the precepts of

* Euvres de Molière avec un Commentaire, un Discours Prěliminaire, et une Vie de Moliere. Par M. de l'Auger, Académie Française. 9 vols. 8vo. Paris. 1819-1827. Histoire de la Vie et des Ouvrages Molière. Par J. Taschereau. Paris. 1825. 8vo.

Aristotle and his modern commentators will permit. The English authors have therefore preferred exhibiting striking incidents and extraordinary characters, placed in violent contrast, at the risk of shocking probability; and their keenest partizans must own, that they have been often absurd, when they aimed at being sublime. The French, on the other hand, limiting themselves in general to long dramatic dialogues, in which passion is rather analyzed than displayed, have sometimes become tedious by a display of ingenuity, where the spectator expected touches of feeling. It follows as a matter of course, that each country, partial to the merits of its own style of amusement, and struck with the faults which belong to a cast of composition so extremely different, is as severe in censuring the foreign stage, as it is indulgent in judging of its own. Two important questions arise out of this: first, whether, considering the many differences betwixt the taste both of nations and individuals, either country is entitled to condemn with acrimony the favourite authors of the other, merely because they did not hit a mark against which they never directed their arrows? and, secondly, whether there may not remain to be trodden, by some splendid genius yet to be born, some middle path, which may attain the just mean betwixt that English freedom approaching to license, and the severe system of French criticism, that sometimes cramps and subjects the spirit which it is only designed to guide or direct?

Happily for us, our present subject does not require us to prosecute an inquiry so delicate as that which we have been led to touch upon. The difference in the national tastes of France and England, so very remarkable when we compare the tragedies of the two countries, is much less conspicuous in their comic dramas; where, setting aside their emancipation from the tenets of the Stagyrite, the English comic writers do, or ought to, propose to themselves the same object with the French of the same class. As a proof of this, we may remark, that very few French tragedies have ever been translated, and of these few (the Zaire of Voltaire excepted) still fewer have become permanently popular, or have been reckoned stock-plays,-whereas the English authors, from the age of the great man of whom we are about to speak, down to the present day, have been in the habit of transferring to the British stage almost all the comedies which have been well received in France. How it happens, that two nations which differ so much in their estimation of the terrible or the pathetic should agree so exactly in their sense of the gay, the witty, and the humorous, is a different question, which we are not called upon to discuss very deeply. Lord Chesterfield, however, has long since remarked (with the invidious intention of silencing an honest laugh) that laughter is a vulgar convulsion, common to all men, and that a ridiculous incident, such as the member of a company attempting to sit down when he has no chair behind him, will create a