A Short View of the Immorality, and Profaneness of the English Stage. Jeremy Collier
δό ξαν ἐσθλην ἐνβροτοῖς κομίζεται.
How becoming a Quality is Modesty in all Places.
How strangly does it burnish a Character, and oblige ones Reputation?
The Scholiast upon these verses of Hippolitus.
Σοί τόν δε πλεκτὸν Στεφανον εξ ἀκηρά
Λειμῶνος, &c.
Makes this Paraphrase, 'Tha[ … … ] Mind should be clean and unsulli[ … … ] that the Muses being Virgins their Performances should agree with their Condition.'
To proceed. Hermione complains against Andromache because she was entertain'd by her HusbandAndrom. p. 303. Iphig. in Aulid. p. 51. Helen. 277, 278. Mourning Bride. p. 36.[58]: For this Andromache tells her she talk'd too much for a Young Woman, and discover'd her Opinion too far. Achilles at the first Sight of Clytemnestra, lets her understand he was as much taken with the Sobriety of her Air,[59] as with the rest of her fine Face and Person. She receives the Complement kindly, and commends him for commending Modesty. Menelaus and Helen after a long Absence manage the surprize of their good Fortune handsomly.[60] The Most tender Expression stands clear of ill Meaning. Had Osmin parted with Almeria as civilly as these Two met,[61] it had been much better. That Rant of smut and profainness might have been spared. The Reader shall have some of it.
O my Almeria;
What do that Damn'd endure but to despair,
But knowing Heaven, to know it lost for ever.
Were it not for the Creed, these Poets would be crampt in their Courtship, and Mightily at a loss for a Simile! But Osmin is in a wonderful Passion. And truly I think his Wits, are in some danger, as well as his Patience. You shall hear.
What are Wracks, and, Whips, and Wheels to this;
Are they not soothing softness, sinking Ease,
And wasting Air to this?
Sinking Ease, and Wasting Air, I confess are strange comforts; This Comparison is somewhat oddly equip'd, but Lovers like sick People may say what they please! Almeria takes this Speech for a Pattern, and suits it exactly in her return.
O I am struck, thy words are Bolts of Ice?
Which shot into my Breast now melt and chill me.
Bolts of Ice? Yes most certainly! For the Cold is struck up into her Head, as you may perceive by what follows.
I chatter, shake, and faint with thrilling Fears.
By the way 'tis a mighty wonder to hear a Woman Chatter! But there is no jesting, for the Lady is very bad. She won't be held up by any Means, but Crys out:
——lower yet, down down;
One would think she was learning a Spanel to Sett. But there's something behind.
——no more we'll lift our Eyes,
But prone and dumb, Rot the firm Face of Earth,
With Rivers of incessant scalding Rain.
These Figures are some of them as stiff as Statues, and put me in mind of Sylvesters Dubartas.
Now when the Winters keener breath began
To Crystallize, the Baltick Ocean,
To glaze the Lakes, to bridle up the Floods,
And periwig with Snow the bald pate woods.
I take it, the other Verses are somewhat of Kin to These, and shall leave them to Mr. Dryden's Reflection.Spanish Fryar. Ep. Ded.[62] But then as for Soothing Softness, Sinking Ease, Wasting Air, thrilling Fears, and incessant scalding Rain; It puts me to another stand. For to talk a little in the way of the Stage. This Litter of Epithetes makes the Poem look like a Bitch overstock'd with Puppies, and sucks the Sence almost to skin and Bone. But all this may pass in a Playhouse: False Rhetorick and false Jewells, do well together. To return to Euripides. Cassandra in reporting the Misfortunes of the Greeks stops at the Adulteries of Clytemnestra and Ægiala And gives this handsome reason for making a Halt.
Σιγᾶν ἄμεινον τἀισχρὰ, μηδέ μοῦσα μοῖTroad. p. 146.[63]
Γένοιτ ἀοιδὸς ἥτις ὑμνήσει κακὰ.
Foul Things are best unsaid, I am for no Muse,
That loves to flourish on Debauchery.
Some Things are dangerous in report, as well as practise, and many times a Disease in the Description. This Euripides was aware of and manag'd accordingly, and was remarkably regular both in stile, and Manners. How wretchedly do we fall short of the Decencies of Heathenism! There's nothing more ridiculous than Modesty on our Stage.Plain Dealer. p. 21.[64] 'Tis counted an ill bred Quality, and almost sham'd out of Use. One would think Mankind were not the same, that Reason was to be read Backward, and Vertue and Vice had changed Place.Provok'd Wife. p. 41.[65]
What then? Must Life be huddled over, Nature left imperfect, and the Humour of the Town not shown? And pray where lies the Grievance of all This? Must we relate whatever is done, and is every Thing fit for Representation? is a Man that has the Plague proper to make a Sight of? And must he needs come Abroad when he breaths Infection, and leaves the Tokens upon the Company? What then must we know nothing? Look you! All Experiments are not worth the making. 'Tis much better to be ignorant of a Disease then to catch it. Who would wound himself for Information about Pain, or smell a Stench for the sake of the Discovery? But I shall have occasion to encounter this Objection afterwards,** Remarks upon Quixot.[66] and therefore shall dismiss it at present.
The Play-house at Athens has been hitherto in Order, but are there no Instances to the contrary? Do's not Aristophanes take great Liberties and make Women speak extraordinary Sentences? He do's so. But his Precedent signifies nothing in the case. For
1st. We have both the Reason of the Thing, and all the Advantage of Authority on the other side. We have the Practise and Opinion of Men of much greater Sence, and Learning then Himself. The best Philosophers and Poets, Criticks and Orators, both Greek and Latin, both Antient and Modern, give the Cause against him. But Aristophanes his own Plays are sufficient to ruin his Authority. For
1st, He discovers himself a downright Atheist. This Charge will be easily Made good against him by Comparing his Nubes with his other Plays. The Design of his Nubes was to expose Socrates, and make a Town jest of him. Now this Philosopher was not only a Person of great Sence and Probity, but was likewise suppos'd to refine upon the Heathen Theology, to throw off the Fabulous part of it, and to endeavour to bring it back to the Standard of Natural Religion. And therefore Justin Martyr and some others of the Fathers, look'd on him as a Person of no Pagan Belief, and thought he suffer'd for the Unity of the God-Head. This Man Aristophanes makes fine sport with as he fancies: He puts him in a Fools Coat, and then points at him. He makes Socrates instruct his Disciple Strepsiades in a new Religion, and tell him that he did not own the Gods in the vulgar Notion. He brings him in elswhere affirming that the Clouds are the only Deities.Nub. Act. 1. Sc. 3. p. 104. Ed. Amstel.[67] Which is the same Lash which Juvenal gives the Jews, because they worship'd but one single Soveraign Being.
Nil præter Nubes & Cœli numen adorant.Sat. 14.[68]
Socrates goes on with his Lecture of Divinity and declares very roundly that there is no such thing