the waking dream. Now fupposing an act to employ as much time as can easily be given with strict attention to any incident, a fuppofition that cannot be far from the truth; it follows, that the impreffion of reality would not be prolonged beyond the time of an act, even supposing a continued representation. If fo, a continued reprefentation of longer endurance than an act, must have a bad effect, by overftraining the attention and producing a total abfence of mind. In this refpect, the four paufes have a fine effect: for by affording to the audience a seasonable refpite when the impreffion of reality is gone, and while nothing material is in agitation, they relieve the mind from its fatigue; and confequently prevent a wandering of thought at the very time poffibly of the most interesting scenes. In one article indeed, the Grecian model has greatly the advantage: its chorus, during an interval, not only preferves alive the impreffions made upon the audience, but also prepares their hearts finely for new impreffions. In our theatres, on the contrary, the audience, at the end of every act, are in a manner folicited to withdraw their thoughts from what has been paffing, and to trifle away time the best way they can. Thus in the intervals between the acts, every warm impreffion is banished; and the spectators begin the next act cool and indifferent, as at the commencement of the play. This is a grofs malady in our theatrical reprefentations; but a malady that luckily luckily is not incurable: to revive the Grecian chorus, would be to revive the Grecian flavery of place and time; but I can figure a detached chorus coinciding with a pause in the reprefentation, as the ancient chorus did with a paufe in the principal action. What objection, for example, can there lie against music between the acts, vocal and inftrumental, adapted to the fubject? Such detached chorus, beside putting us under no limitation as to time and place, would have more than one happy effect: it would recruit the spirits; and it would preferve entire, the tone, if not the tide, of paffion: the mufic should begin with a strain in the tone of the paffion represented in the preceding act, and be gradually varied till it accord with the tone of the paffion that is to fucceed in the next act. The mufic and the reprefentation would both of them be gainers by their conjunction; which will thus appear. Mufie that accords with the prefent tone of mind, is, upon that account, doubly agreeable; and accordingly, though mufic fingly hath not great power to raise a paffion, it tends greatly to fupport a paffion already raifed. Further, mufic prepares us for the paffion that follows, by making chearful, tender, melancholy, or animated impreffions, as the fubject requires. Take for an example the first scene of the Mourning Bride, where foft mufic in a melancholy strain, prepares us finely for entering into Almeria's deep diftrefs. In this manner, mufic and representation representation fupport each other delightfully: the impreffion made upon the audience by the representation, is a fine preparation for the mufic that fucceeds; and the impreffion made by the mufic, is a fine preparation for the reprefentation that fucceeds. It appears to me evident, that, by fome fuch contrivance, the modern drama may be improved, fo as to enjoy the advantage of the ancient chorus without its flavish limitation of place and time. And as to music in particular, I cannot figure any plan that would tend more to its improvement. Compofers, thofe for the stage at least, would be reduced to the happy neceffity of studying and imitating nature; instead of deviating, according to the prefent fashion, into wild, fantastic, and unnatural conceits *. But we must return to our fubject, and finish the comparison between the ancient and the modern drama. The numberless improprieties forc'd upon the Grecian dramatic poets by the conftitution of their drama, are of themselves, one should think, a sufficient reason for preferring that of the moderns, even abstracting from the improvement proposed. To prepare the reader for this * Sounds may be fo contrived as to produce horror and several other painful feelings, which in a tragedy or in an opera may be introduced with advantage, to accompany the reprefentation of diffocial or disagreeable paffions. But fuch founds muft in themselves be disagreeable; and upon that account cannot be dignify'd with the name of mufic. VOL.K. Dd article, article, it must be premised, that as in the ancient drama the place of action never varies, a place neceffarily must be chofen to which every perfon may have accefs without any improbability. This confines the scene to some open place, generally the court or area before a palace; which excludes from the Grecian theatre tranfactions within doors, though thefe commonly are the most important. Such cruel reftraint is of itself fufficient to cramp the most pregnant invention; and accordingly the Grecian writers, in order to preserve unity of place, are reduced to woful improprieties. In the Hippolytus of Euripides*, Phedra, diftreffed in mind and body, is carried without any pretext from her palace to the place of action, is there laid upon a couch unable to fupport herself upon her limbs, and made to utter many things improper to be heard by a number of women who form the chorus: and what is ftill worfe, her female attendant ufes the strongest intreaties to make her re`veal the fecret caufe of her anguish; which at last Phedra, contrary to decency and probability, is prevailed upon to do in prefence of this very chorus . Alceftes, in Euripides, at the point of death, is brought from the palace to the place of action, groaning, and lamenting her untimely fate. In the Trachiniens of Sophocles |, Actr. fc. 6. + Act 2. fc. 2. ‡ A& 2. fc. r. a fecret is imparted to Dejanira, the wife of Hercules, in prefence of the chorus. In the tragedy of Iphigenia, the meffeng r employ'd to carry Clitemneftra the news that Iphigenia was facrificed, stops short at the place of action, and with a loud voice calls the Queen from her palace to hear the news. Again, in the Iphigenia in Tauvis, the necessary prefence of the chorus forces Euripides into a grofs abfurdity, which is to form a fecret plot in their hearing *; and to difguise the abfurdity, much courtship is bestowed on the chorus, not one woman but a number, to engage them to fecrecy. In the Medea of turipides, that princess makes no difficulty, in prefence of the chorus, to plot the death of her hufband, of his mistress, and of her father the King of Corinth, all by poifon: it was neceffary to bring Medea upon the stage, and there is but one place of action, which is always occupied by the chorus. This fcene clofes the fecond act; and in the end of the third, fhe frankly makes the chorus her confidents in plotting the murder of her own children. Terence, by identity of place, is often forc'd to make a converfation within doors be heard on the open street: the cries of a woman in labour are there heard diftinctly. The Grecian poets are not more happy with refpect to time than with respect to place. In the Hippolytus of Euripides, that prince is ba Act 4. at the close. Dd 2 nished |