CHAPTER I. A COMPARISON BETWEEN THE WORLD AND THE STAGE. THE world hath been often compared to the theatre; and many grave writers, as well as the poets, have considered human life as a great drama, resembling, in almost every particular, those scenical representations which Thespis is first reported to have invented, and which have been since received with so much approbation and delight in all polite countries. This thought hath been carried so far, and is become so general, that some words proper to the theatre, and which were first metaphorically applied to the world, are now indiscriminately and literally spoken of both; thus stage and scene are by common use grown as familiar to us, when we speak of life in general, as when we confine ourselves to dramatic performances; and when transactions behind the curtain are mentioned, St. James's is more likely to occur to our thoughts than Drury Lane. It may seem easy enough to account for all this, by reflecting that the theatrical stage is nothing more than a representation, or, as Aristotle calls it, an imitation of what really exists; and hence, perhaps, we might fairly pay a very high compliment to those who by their writings or actions have been so capable of imitating life, as to have their pictures in a manner confounded with, or mistaken for, the originals. But, in reality, we are not so fond of paying compliments to these people, whom we use as children frequently do the more instruments of their amusement; and have and have much pleasure in hissing and buffeting them, than in admiring their excellence. There are many other reasons which have nduced us to see this analogy between the world and the stage. Some have considered the larger part of mankind in the light of actors, as personating characters no more than their own, and to which in fact they have no better title, than the player hath to be in earnest thought the king or emperor whom he represents. Thus the hypocrite may be said to be a player; and indeed the Greeks called them both by one and the same name. The brevity of life hath likewise given occasion to this comparison. So the immortal Shakspeare -Life's a poor player, That struts and frets his hour upon the stage, For which hackneyed quotation I will make the reader amends by a very noble one, which few, I believe, have read. It is taken from a poem called the "Deity," published about nine years ago, and long since buried in oblivion; a proof that good books, no more than good men, do always survive the bad. From Thee1 all human actions take their springs, The rise of empires and the fall of kings! See the vast Theatre of Time display'd, With pomp the shining images succeed, What leaders triumph, and what monarchs bleed Their pride, their passions, to thy ends inclin'd: A while they glitter in the face of day, Then at thy nod the phantoms pass away; No traces left of all the busy scene, But that remembrance says-The things have been! In all these, however, and in every other similitude of life to the theatre, the resemblance hath been always taken from 1 The Deity. the stage only. None, as I remember, have at all considered the audience at this great drama. But as Nature often exhibits some of her best performances to a very full house, so will the behaviour of her spectators no less admit the above-mentioned comparison than that of her actors. In this vast theatre of time are seated the friend and the critic; here are claps and shouts, hisses and groans; in short, every thing which was ever seen or heard at the theatre-royal. Let us examine this in one example; for instance, in the behaviour of the great audience on that scene which Nature was pleased to exhibit in the twelfth chapter of the preceding book, where she introduced Black George running away with the 500l. from his friend and benefactor. Those who sat in the world's upper gallery treated that incident, I am well convinced, with their usual vociferation ; and every term of scurrilous reproach was most probably Vented on that occasion. If we had descended to the next order of spectators, we should have found an equal degree of abhorrence, though less of noise and scurrility; yet here the good women gave Black George to the devil, and many of them expected every minute that the cloven-footed gentleman would fetch his own. The pit, as usual, was no doubt divided: those who delight in heroic virtue and perfect character objected to the producing such instances of villainy, without punishing them very severely for the sake of example. Some of the author's friends cried, "Look ye, gentlemen, the man is a villain, but it is nature for all that." And all the young critics of the age, the clerks, apprentices, &c., called it low, and fell a groaning. As for the boxes, they behaved with their accustomed polite ness. Most of them were attending to something else. Some of those few who regarded the scene at all declared he was a bad kind of man; while others refused to give their opinion, till they had heard that of the best judges. Now we, who are admitted behind the VOL. I. scenes of this R R |