more to the side of leaving the impression of virtuous sorrow full and strong upon the heart.

A question intimately connected with this subject, and which has employed the speculations of several philosophical critics, naturally occurs here; how it comes to pass that those emotions of sorrow which tragedy excites, afford any gratification to the mind? For, is not sorrow, in its nature, a painful passion? Is not real distress often occasioned to the spectators, by the dramatic representations at which they assist? Do we not see their tears flow? and yet, while the impression of what they have suffered remains upon their minds, they again assemble in crowds to renew the same distresses. The question is not without difficulty, and various solutions of it have been proposed by ingenious men.* The most plain and satisfactory account of the matter appears to me to be the following. By the wise and gracious constitution of our nature, the exercise of all the social passions is attended with pleasure. Nothing is more pleasing and grateful, than love and friendship. Wherever man takes a strong interest in the concerns of his fellow creatures, an internal satisfaction is made to accompany the feeling. Pity, or compassion, in particular, is, for wise ends, appointed to be one of the strongest instincts of our frame, and is attended with a peculiar attractive power. It is an affection which cannot but be productive of some distress, on account of the sympathy with the sufferers, which it necessarily involves. But as it includes benevolence and friendship, it partakes at the same time, of the agreeable and pleasing nature of those affections. The heart is warmed by kindness and humanity, at the same moment at which it is afflicted by the distresses of those with whom it sympathises, and the pleasure arising from those kind emotions, prevails so much in the mixture, and so far counterbalances the pain, as to render the state of the mind, upon the whole, agreeable. At the same time, the immediate pleasure, which always goes along with the operation of the benevolent and sympathetic affections, derives an addition from the approbation of our own minds. We are pleased with ourselves, for feeling as we ought, and for entering with proper sorrow, into the concerns of the afflicted. In tragedy, besides, other adventitious circumstances concur to diminish the painful part of sympathy, and to increase the satisfaction attending it. We are, in some measure, relieved, by thinking that the cause of our distress is feigned, not real; and we are also gratified by the charms of poetry, the propriety of sentiment and language, and the beauty of action. From the concurrence of these causes, the pleasure which we receive from tragedy, notwithstanding the distress it occasions, seems to me to be accounted for in a satisfactory manner. At the same time, it is to be observed, that, as there is always a mixture of pain in the pleasure, that pain is capable of being so much heightened, by the representation of incidents extremely direful, as to shock our feelings, and to render us averse, either to the reading of such tragedies, or to the beholding of them upon the stage.

Having now spoken of the conduct of the subject throughout the acts, it is also necessary to take notice of the conduct of the several scenes which make up the acts of a play.

See Dr. Campbell's Philosophy of Rhetoric, Book 1. ch. xi. where an account is given of the hypothesis of different critics on this subject; and where one is proposed, with which in the main I agree. See also Lord Kaimes's Essays on the Principles of Morality, Essay I. And Mr. David Hume's Essay on Tragedy.

The entrance of a new personage upon the stage, forms what is called a new scene. These scenes, or successive conversations, should be closely linked and connected with each other; and much of the art of dramatic composition is shown in maintaining this connection. Two rules are necessary to be observed for this purpose.

The first is, that, during the course of one act, the stage should never be left vacant, though but for a single moment; that is, all the persons who have appeared in one scene, or conversation, should never go off together and be succeeded by a new set of persons appearing in the next scene, independent of the former. This makes a gap, or total interruption in the representation, which, in effect, puts an end to that act. For, whenever the stage is evacuated, the act is closed. This rule is, very generally, observed by the French tragedians; but the English writers, both of comedy and tragedy, seldom pay any regard to it. Their personages succeed one another upon the stage with so little connection; the union of their scenes is so much broken, that, with equal propriety, their plays might be divided into ten or twelve acts, as into five.

The second rule which the English writers also observe little better than the former, is, that no person shall come upon the stage, or leave it, without a reason appearing to us, both for the one and the other. Nothing is more awkward, and contrary to art, than for an actor to enter, without our seeing any cause for his appearing in that scene, except that it was for the poet's purpose he should enter precisely at such a moment; or for an actor to go away, without any reason for his retiring, farther than that the poet had no more speeches to put into his mouth. This is managing the personæ dramatis exactly like so many puppets, who are moved by wires, to answer the call of the master of the show. Whereas the perfection of dramatic writing requires that every thing should be conducted in imitation, as near as possible, of some real transaction; where we are let into the secret of all that is passing; where we behold persons before us, always busy; see them coming and going; and know perfectly whence they come, and whither they go, and about what they are employed.

All that I have hitherto said, relates to the unity of the dramatic action. In order to render the unity of action more complete, critics have added the other two unities of time and place. The strict observance of these is more difficult, and perhaps, not so necessary. The unity of place requires, that the scene should never be shifted; but that the action of the play should be continued to the end, in the same place where it is supposed to begin. The unity of time, strictly taken, requires, that the time of the action be no longer than the time that is allowed for the representation of the play; though Aristotle seems to have given the poet a little more liberty, and permitted the action to comprehend the whole time of one day.

The intention of both these rules is, to overcharge as little as possible, the imagination of the spectators with improbable circumstances in the acting of the play, and to bring the imitation more close to reality. We must observe, that the nature of dramatic exhibitions upon the Greek stage, subjected the ancient tragedians to a more strict observance of those unities that is necessary in modern theatres. I showed that a Greek tragedy was one uninterrupted representation, from beginning to end. There was no division of acts; no pauses or interval between

them; but the stage was continually full; occupied either by the actors, or the chorus. Hence, no room was left for the imagination to go beyond the precise time and place of the representation; any more than is allowed during the continuance of one act on the modern theatre.

But the practice of suspending the spectacle totally for some little time between the acts, has made a great and material change; gives more latitude to the imagination, and renders the ancient strict confinement to time and place less necessary. While the acting of the play is uninterrupted, the spectator can, without any great or violent effort, suppose a few hours to pass between every act; or can suppose himself moved from one apartment of a palace, or one part of a city to another; and, therefore, too strict an observance of these unities, ought not to be preferred to higher beauties of execution, nor to the introduction of more pathetic situations, which sometimes cannot be accomplished in any other way, than by the transgression of these rules.

On the ancient stage, we plainly see the poets struggling with many an inconvenience in order to preserve those unities which were then so necessary. As the scene could never be shifted, they were obliged to make it always lie in some court of a palace, or some public area, to which all the persons concerned in the action might have equal access. This led to frequent improbabilities, by representing things as transacted there, which naturally ought to have been transacted before few witnesses, in private apartments. The like improbabilities arose, from limiting themselves so much in point of time. Incidents were unnaturally crowded; and it is easy to point out several instances in the Greek tragedies, where events are supposed to pass during the song of the chorus, which must necessarily have employed many hours.

But though it seems necessary to set modern poets free from a strict observance of these dramatic unities, yet we must remember, there are certain bounds to this liberty. Frequent and wild changes of time and place; hurrying the spectator from one distant city, or country, to another; or making several days or weeks, to pass during the course of the representation, are liberties which shock the imagination, which give to the performance a romantic and unnatural appearance, and, therefore, cannot be allowed in any dramatic writer who aspires to correctness. In particular, we must remember, that it is only between the acts, that any liberty can be given for going beyond the unities of time and place. During the course of each act, they ought to be strictly observed; that is, during each act the scene should continue the same, and no more time should be supposed to pass, than is employed in the representation of that act. This is a rule which the French tragedians regularly observe. To violate this rule, as is too often done by the English; to change the place, and shift the scene in the midst of one act, shews great incorrectness, and destroys the whole intention of the division of a play into acts. Mr. Addison's Cato, is remarkable beyond most English tragedies, for regularity of conduct. The author has limited himself, in time, to a single day; and in place, has maintained the most rigorous unity. The scene is never changed; and the whole action passes in the hall of Cato's house, at Utica.

In general, the nearer that a poet can bring the dramatic representation, in all its circumstances, to an imitation of nature and real life, the impression which he makes on us will always be the more perfect. Probability, as I observed at the beginning of the lecture, is highly es

sential to the conduct of the tragic action, and we are always hurt by the want of it. It is this that makes the observance of the dramatic uni ties to be of consequence, as far as they can be observed without sacri ficing more material beauties. It is not, as has been sometimes said. that by the preservation of the unities of time and place, spectators, when they assist at the theatre, are deceived into a belief of the reality of the objects which are there set before them; and that, when those unities are violated, the charm is broken, and they discover the whole to be a fiction. No such deception as this can ever be accomplished. No one ever imagines himself to be at Athens, or Rome, when a Greek or Roman subject is presented on the stage. He knows the whole to be an imitation only; but he requires that imitation to be conducted with skill and verisimilitude. His pleasure, the entertainment which he expects, the interest which he is to take in the story, all depend on its being so conducted. His imagination, therefore, seeks to aid the imitation, and to rest on the probability; and the poet, who shocks him by improbable circumstances, and by awkward unskilful imitation, deprives him of his pleasure, and leaves him hurt and displeased.This is the whole mystery of the theatrical illusion.

LECTURE XLVI.

TRAGEDY....GREEK, FRENCH, ENGLISH TRAGEDY.

HAVING treated of the dramatic action in tragedy, I proceed next to treat of the characters most proper to be exhibited. It has been thought, by several critics, that the nature of tragedy requires the principal personages to be always of illustrious character, and of high, or princely rank; whose misfortunes and sufferings, it is said, take faster hold of the imagination, and impress the heart more forcibly, than simi lar events happening to persons in private life. But this is more specious, than solid. It is refuted by facts. For the distresses of Desdemona, Monimia, and Belvidera, interest us as deeply as if they had been princesses or queens. The dignity of tragedy does, indeed, require, that, there should be nothing degrading, or mean, in the circumstances of the persons which it exhibits; but it requires nothing high rank may render the spectacle more splendid, and the subject seemingly of more importance, but conduces very little to its being interesting or pathetic; which depends entirely on the nature of the tale. on the art of the poet in conducting it, and on the sentiments to which it gives occasion. In every rank of life, the relations of father, husband, son, brother, lover, or friend, lay the foundation of those affect ing situations, which make man's heart feel for man.

more. Their

The moral characters of the persons represented, are of much great er consequence than the external circumstances in which the poet places them. Nothing, indeed, in the conduct of tragedy, demands a poet's attention more, than so to describe his personages, and so to order the incidents which relate to them, as shall leave upon the spectators, impressions favourable to virtue, and to the administration of Providence.

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It is not necessary, for this end, that poetical justice, as it is called, should be observed in the catastrophe of the piece. This has been long exploded from tragedy; the end of which is, to affect us with pity for the virtuous in distress, and to afford a probable representation of the state of human life, where calamities often befal the best, and a mixed portion of good and evil is appointed for all. But, withal, the author must beware of shocking our minds with such representations of life as tend to raise horror, or to render virtue an object of aversion. Though innocent persons suffer, their sufferings ought to be attended with such circumstances, as shall make virtue appear amiable and venerable; and shall render their condition, on the whole, preferable to that of bad men, who have prevailed against them. The stings and the remorse of guilt must ever be represented as productive of greater miseries than any that the bad can bring upon the good.

Aristotle's observations on the characters proper for tragedy, are very judicious. He is of opinion that perfect unmixed characters, either of good or ill men, are not the fittest to be introduced. The distresses of the one being wholly unmerited, hurt and shock us; and the sufferings of the other, occasion no pity. Mixed characters, such as in fact we meet with in the world, afford the most proper field for displaying, without any bad effect on morals, the vicissitudes of life; and they interest us the more deeply, as they display emotions and passions which we have all been conscious of. When such persons fall into distress through the vices of others, the subject may be very pathetic; but it is always more instructive, when a person has been himself the cause of his misfortune, and when his misfortune is occasioned by the violence of passion, or by some weakness incident to human nature. Such subjects both dispose us to the deepest sympathy, and administer useful warnings to ns for our own conduct.

Upon these principles, it surprises me that the story of Edipus should have been so much celebrated by all the critics, as one of the fittest subjects for tragedy; and so often brought upon the stage, not by Sophocles only, but by Corneille also, and Voltaire. An innocent person, one in the main, of a virtuous character, through no crime of his own, nay, not by the vices of others, but through mere fatality and blind chance, is involved in the greatest of all human miseries. In a casual rencounter, he kills his father, without knowing him; he afterwards is married to his own mother; and, discovering himself in the end to have committed both paricide and incest, he becomes frantic, and dies in the utmost misery. Such a subject excites horror rather than pity. As it is conducted by Sophocles, it is indeed extremely affecting but it conveys no instruction; it awakens in the mind no tender sympathy; it leaves no impression favourable to virtue or humanity.

It must be acknowledged, that the subjects of the ancient Greek tragedies were too often founded on mere destiny, and inevitable misfortunes. They were too much mixed with their tales about oracles, and the vengeance of the gods, which led to many an incident sufficiently melancholy and tragical; but rather purely tragical than useful or moral. Hence both the Edipus's of Sophocles, the Iphigenia in Aulis, the Hecuba of Euripides, and several of the like kind. In the course of the drama, many moral sentiments occurred. But the instruction, which the fablę of the play conveyed, seldom was any more than that reverence was owing to the gods, and submission due to the decrees of destiny. MoNnn