and why may not the fecond imitation represent an action that happened years after the firft; ifit be fo connected with it, that nothing but time can be supposed to intervene? Time, is, of all modes of existence, most obfequious to the imagination; a lapfe of years is as eafily conceived as a paffage of hours. In contemplation we cafily contract the time of real actions, and, therefore willingly permit it to be contracted when we only fee their imitation. It will be asked, how the drama moves, if it is not credited. It is credited with all the credit due to a drama. It is credited, whenever it moves, as a juft picture of a real original; as reprefenting to the auditor what he would himfelf feel, if he were to do or fuffer what is there feigned to be fuffered or to be done. The reflection that ftrikes the heart is not, that the evils before us are real evils, but that they are evils to which we ourselves may be expofed. If there be any fallacy, it is not that we fancy the players, but that we fancy ourfelves unhappy for a moment; but we rather lament the poffibility than fuppofe the prefence of misery, as a mother weeps over her babe, when fhe remembers that death may take it from her. The delight of tragedy proceeds from our confcioufnefs of fiction; if we thought murders and treafons real, they would please no more. Imitations produce pain or pleasure, not because they are mistaken for realities, but because they bring realities to mind. When the imagination is recreated by a painted landscape, the trees are not fuppofed capable to give us fhade, or the fountains coolness; but we confider, how we fhould be ( pleafed with fuch fountains playing befide us, and fuch woods waving over us. We are agitated in reading the hiftory of Henry the Fifth, yet no man takes his book for the field of Agincourt. A dramatick exhibition is a book recited with concomitants that increafe or diminish its effect. Familiar comedy is often more powerful on the theatre, than in the page; imperial tragedy is always lefs. The humour of Petruchio may be heightened by grimace; but what voice or what gesture can hope to add dignity or force to the foliloquy of Cato? A play read, effects the mind like a play acted. It is therefore evident, that the action is not fuppofed to be real; and it follows that between the acts a longer or fhorter time may be allowed to pass, and that no more account of space or duration is to be taken by the auditor of a drama, than by the reader of a narrative, before whom may pafs in an hour the life of a hero, or the revolutions of an empire. Whether Shakspeare knew the unities, and rejected them by defign, or deviated from them by happy ignorance, it is, I think, impoffible to decide and ufelefs to enquire. We may reasonably fuppofe, that, when he rose to notice, he did not want the counfels and admonitions of scholars and criticks, and that he at laft deliberately perfifted in a practice, which he might have begun by chance. As nothing is effential to the fable, but unity of action, and as the unities of time and place arife evidently from false affumptions, and by circumfcribing the extent of the drama, leffen its variety, I cannot think it much to be lamented, that they were not known by him, or not observed; nor, if fuch another poet could arife, fhould I very vehemently reproach him, that his firft act paffed at Venice, and his next in Cyprus. Such violations. of rules merely pofitive, become the comprehenfive genius of Shakspeare, and fuch cenfures are fuitable to the minute and flender criticifm of Voltaire : "Non ufque adeo permifcuit imis Longus fumma dies, ut non, fi voce Metelli Yet when I speak thus flightly of dramatick rules, I cannot but recollect how much wit and learning may be produced against me; before fuch authorities I am afraid to ftand, not that I think the prefent question one of thofe that are to be decided by mere authority, but because it is to be fufpected, that these precepts have not been fo easily received, but for better reafons than I have yet been able to find. The refult of my enquiries, in which it would be ludicrous to boast of impartiality, is, that the unities of time and place are not effential to a juft drama, that though they may fometimes conduce to pleasure, they are always to be facrificed. to the nobler beauties of variety and inftruction; and that a play, written with nice obfervation of critical rules, is to be contemplated as an elaborate curiofity, as the product of fuperfluous and oftentatious art, by which is fhown, rather what is poffible, than what is necessary. He that, without diminution of any other excellence, fhall preferve all the unities unbroken, deferves the like applaufe with the architect, who fhall display all the orders of architecture, in a citadel, without any deduction from its flrength; but the principal beauty of a citadel is to exclude the enemy; and the greateft graces of a play are to copy nature, and inftruct life. Perhaps, what I have here not dogmatically but deliberately written, may recall the principles of the drama to a new examination. I am almoft frighted at my own temerity; and when I eflimate the fame and the ftrength of thofe that maintain the contrary opinion, am ready to fink down in reverential filence; as Eneas withdrew from the defence of Troy, when he faw Neptuné fhaking the wall, and Juno heading the besiegers. Those whom my arguments cannot perfuade to give their approbation to the judgment of Shakfpeare, will eafily, if they confider the condition of his life, make fome allowance for his igno rance. Every man's performances, to be rightly eftimated, must be compared with the ftate of the age in which he lived, and with his own particular opportunities; and though to a reader a book be not worse or better for the circumftances of the author, yet as there is always a filent reference of human works to human abilities, and as the enquiry, how far man may extend his defigns, or how high he may rate his native force, is of far greater dignity than in what rank we fhall place any particular performance, curiofity is always bufy to difcover the inftruments, as well as to furvey the workmanfhip, to know how much is to be afcribed to original powers, and how much to cafual and adventitious help. The palaces of Peru and Mexico were. certainly mean and incommodious habitations, if compared to the houses of European monarchs; yet who could forbear to view them with astonishment, who remembered that they were built without the use of iron? The English nation, in the time of Shakspeare, was yet ftruggling to emerge from barbarity. The philology of Italy had been tranfplanted hither in the reign of Henry the Eighth; and the learned languages had been fuccefsfully cultivated by Lilly, Linacre, and More; by Pole, Cheke, and Gardiner; and afterwards by Smith, Clerk, Haddon, and Afcham. Greek was now taught to boys in the principal schools; and those who united elegance with learning, read, with great diligence, the Italian and Spanish poets.. But literature. was yet confined to profeffed fcholars, or to men and women of high rank. The public was grofs and dark; and to be able to read and write, was an accomplishment fill valued for its rarity. Nations, like individuals have their infancy, A people newly awakened to literary curiofity, being yet unacquainted with the true ftate of things, knows not how to judge of that which is propofed as its refemblance. Whatever is remote from common appearances is always welcome to vulgar, as to childish credulity; and of a country unenlightened by learning, the whole people is the vulgar. The ftudy of those who then aspired to plebeian learning was laid out upon adventures, giants, dragons, and enchantments. The Death of Arthur was the favourite volume. The mind which has feafted on the luxurious wonders of fiction, has no tafte of the infipidity of truth. A play which imitated only the common occurrences of the world, would, upon the ad |