neral circulation, otherwife did: great authorities have afcribed his attachment to Alcibiades to the moft virtuous principle; common fame, or perhaps (more properly speaking) common defamation, turned it into a charge of the impure nature: in like manner we find him ridiculed for his devotion to the noted Afpafia, in whofe company he is faid to have paffed much of his time; and Athenæus quotes fone paffages of his dialogues with her, which he tells us were publifhed by Herodicus, and which we must either totally reject, or allow him to have been fubject to fuch private weakneffes and frailties, as were unfuitable to his pub. lic character: what were the real motives for his frequent vifits to Afpafia, as well as for his feemiug attachment to the ftrumpet Theodote, must be left to conjecture; of the fact there is no room to doubt. He is ftigmatized for his guilty connections in his youth with his preceptor Archelaus, and yet this charge (however improbable it may feem) rests upon the authority of Ariftoxenus, a man of the most candid character, and whofe credit flands high with all true critics. Herodicus the hiftorian whom I have before mentioned, and who lived about three hundred and fifty years before the Chriftian era, feems to have treated Socrates with the greatest feverity, charging him with fitting up all night drinking and caroufing with Agatha and others, whom when he had left drunk and afleep, he reeled into the Lyceum, more fit (in the words quoted from the relator) for the fociety of Homer's cannibals, than of thofe he found there in this debauch it is pretended, that although Phedrus, E

3

ryximachus and many other potent drinkers fied the company, Socrates fate to the lait, iwallowing drenches of wine out of enormous goblets of filver: he defcribes him fitting amongst lafcivious revellers at a banque', where dancing girls and boys were exhibiting their indecent attitudes to the music of harpers and minstrels: he expofes this mafter of morality entering into a controverfy with his fcholar Critobulus upon the fubject of male beauty; and becaufe Critobulus had ridiculed him for his uglinets, he afferts that Socrates challenged him to a naked exhibition, and that he actually expofed his un feemly perfon to a Pathic and a dancing girl, the appointed umpires of the difpute; the conqueror was to be rewarded with an embrace from each of thefe umpires, as the prize of fuperior beauty, and the decifion was of confequence given ex abfurdo to the philofopher, in preference to one of the handfomest young men in Greece, and he enjoyed the prize annexed to the decree. If we can believe this anecdote to have been gravely related by an hiftorian, who lived fo near to him in point of time, we fhall ccafe to wonder that Ariftophanes had the whole theatre on his fide, when fuch ftories were in circulation against the character of Socrates.

"As I have no other object in view but to offer what occurs to me in defence of Aristophanes, who appears to have been moft unjustly accufed of taking bribes for his attack upon Socrates, and of having paved the way for the cruel fen tence by which he suffered death, I fhall here conclude an invidious task, which my fubject, not my choice, has laid upon me."

Ад

N forming the minds and regu

thing feems to be of greater importance than a proper fyftem of what may be termed domeftic morality; the fcience of thofe relative duties, which do not apply only to particular fituations, to large fortunes, to exalted rank, to extenfive influence, but which constitute that part and character in life which almost every one is called to perform.

"Of all above the lower ranks, of all who claim the station or the feelings of a gentleman, the knowledge of this fcience is either inculcated by family precept and examp'e, or is endeavoured to be inftilled by reading. In the latter cafe the works made ufe of for that purpole are either purely didactic, which fpeak the language of authoritative wisdom; hiftorical, which hold forth the example of paft events to the judgement; or they are of that fort which are calculated to mould the heart and the manners through the medium of the imagination. Of this laft clafs the principal are ftories or novels and theatrical compofitions. On the fubjects of novels, I have in a former paper delivered a few general remarks, calculated to afcertain their moral tendency. In this I propofe extending my confideration to dramatic writing; and, as it is neareft to the novel, at least to that fpecies which I principally confidered in the paper alluded to, I fhall begin with a fimilar examination of tragedy.

The engines which tragedy profeffes to ufe for moral inftruction, are the paffions. The father of dramatic criticifin has told us, that

which, from its fhort apothegmatical form, is fubject to confiderable obfcurity. A modern writer, in his defence of tragedy as a moral exhibition, explains its meaning, by the analogy of the Spartan cuftom of making their flaves drunk, and fhewing them in that beastlystate to their children, in order to infpire a deteftation for the vice of intemperance. But if this is to furnifh us with an illuftration of Ariftotle's affertion, I am afraid it will not aid the cause of tragedy as a fchool of morals. It was from the previous contempt of the rank and manners of the drunkard, that the Spartan boy was to form his eftimate of drunkenness. The vice of a fave could hardly fail to difguft him. But had they fhewn him the vice itself, how loathfome and degrading foever in its own nature, in a perfon of fuperior refpect and eftimation, what would have been the confequence? The faireft answer may be drawn from the experience of thofe countries where freemen get drunk, where fenators and leaders of armies are fometimes intoxicated. The youths who behold thefe examples the oftenest are not the lefs liable to follow them. am afraid it is even fo with trage. dy. Scenes prefenting paffions and vices, round which the poet throws the veil of magnanimity, which he decorates with the pomp of verse, with the fplendor of eloquence, familiarize the mind to their appearance, and take from it that natural difgult which the crimes, prefented in their native form, would certainly excite. Cruelty, revenge, and

murder,

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murder, are often the attribute of the hero; for he must always be the hero on whom the principal ftrefs of the action lies. What punifhment awaits, or what mistortunes attend his crimes, is little to the purpofe; if the villain is the prominent figure of the piece, he will be the hero of the tragedy, as the robber, though he is about to be hanged, is the hero of the trial or the execution. But even of the nobler characters, does not the morality of fentiment often yield to the immorality of fituation? Treachery is often the fruit of wifdom and of refolution; murder, an exertion of valour; and fuicide, the refource of virtuous affliction. It will be remembered, that it is not fo much from what the hero fays, as from what he does, that an im. preffion is drawn. The repentant lines which Cato fpeaks when he is dying are never regarded. It is the dagger only we remember, that dagger by which he escaped from chains, and purchafed immortality.

But the leading paffion of modern tragedy is one to which Ariftotle could fcarce have meant his rule to apply; because in ancient tragedy it was almost unknown. The paf fion I allude to is love. The man ners and fociety of modern times neceffarily led to this change in the drania. For the obfervation which fome authors have m de is perfectly jut, that the fentiments of the itage will always be fuch as are flattering, rather than corrective of national manners and national failings; fuperftition in Greece, gallantry in France, freedom and courage in England. In every popular exhibition this must be the cafe. Even the facrednefs and authority of the pulpit is not exempted from its influence. In polite chapels

1787.

preachers exhort to morality: in crouded churches of lefs fashionable people they enlarge on doctrinal fubjects, on faith and fanctification. But the very existence of the stage depends on that public opinion which it is not to reform but to conciliate: and Dr. Johnfon's expref fion is not the lefs true for its quaintnefs,

They that live to please, must please to live."

To this neceffary conformity to the manners of the audience is owing the introduction of love into almost all our dramatic compofiions; and thofe, as might be expected, are most in favour with the young, where this paffion is allowed the moft extenfive influence, and the most unlimited power. It was this which, when it was the fashion for genteel people to pay attention to tragedies, drew fuch audiences to Lee's Theodofius, and to Dryden's Anthony and Cleopatra, where the length of the fpeeches, and the thinncis of the incidents, would have been as tirefome to them as a fermon, had it not been for a tendernels and an extravagance of that paffion, which every girl thought he could feel, and believed fhe could understand. 'The moral confequences of fuch a Drama it is unneceflary to question. Even where this paffion is purified and refined to its utmost degree, it may be fairly held, that every fpecies of com. pofition, whether narrative or dramatic, which places the only felicity of life in fuccefful love, is unfa vourable to the strength and purity of a young mind. It holds forth that fingle object to the ambition and purfuit of both fexes, and thus tends to enfeeble and reprefs every cther exertion. This increases a

fource of weakness and corruption, which it is the bulinefs of a good intractor to correct and overcome, by fetting before the minds of his pupils other objects, other attain ments, of a nobler and leis felfifh kind. But in that violence, in that tyranny of dominion, with which love is invested in many of our tragedies, it overbears every virtue and every duty. The obligations of justice and of humanity link before it. The king, the chief, the patriot, forgets his people, his followers, and his country; while parents and children mention the dearest objects of natural attachment only to lead them in the triumph of their love.

It is the bufinefs of tragedy to exhibit the paffions, that is, the weakneffes of men. Ancient tragedy fhewed them in a fimple minner; virtue and vice were ftrongly and diftinétly marked, widom and weaknefs were eafily difcriminated; and though vice might be fometimes palliated, and weaknefs excufed, the fpectator could always difcover the character of each. But in the modern drama there is an uncertain fort of outline, a blended colouring, by which the diftinction of the fe objects is frequently loft. The refinement of modern audiences calls for fhades of character more delicate than thofe which the stage formerly exhibited; the confequence is, that the bounds of right and wrong are often fo uncertainly marked as not to be cafily diftinguifled; and if the powers of poetry, or the eloquence of fentiment, thould be on the fide of the latter, it will require a greater firmnels of mind than youth or inexperience is master of to refift it.

Reafon condemns every fort of weaknefs; but paffion, enthufiafm, and fickly fentibility, have

dignified certain weakneffes with the name of amiable; and the young, of whom fome are fufceptible, and others affect fufceptibility, think it often an honour to be fubject to their coutroul. In tragedy, or tra gic writing, they often find fuch characters for their imitation. Such characters, being various, compli cated, and fluctuating, are the propereft for tragedy. The poets have not neglected to avail themfelves of that circumstance: their dramas are filled with fuch characters, who fhift the hue and colour of their minds, according to the change of fituation or the variety of incident; or fometimes, whofe minds, in the hand of the poet, produce that change, and create that variety. Wifdom and virtue, fimple, untform, and unchanging, only fupe rior artists can draw, and fuperior fpectators enjov.

"The high heroic virtue we fee exemplified in tragedy warms the imagination and fwells the mind; but being distant from the ordinary feelings and exertions of life, has, I fufpect, but little influence upon the conduct. On the contrary, it may be fairly doubted, whether this play of the fancy, in the walks of virtue and benevolence, does not leffen the exertion of thofe qualities in practice and reality. "Indocilis privata lo"qui," faid Lucan of Cæfar: fo in fome meafure, he who is deeply converfant in the tragic phrafe, in the fwelling language of compaffion, of generofity, and of love, finding no parallel in his common intercourie with mankind, will not fo readily open his heart to the calls on his feeling, which the vulgar diftreffes of his fellow creatures, of the ordinary relations of life, may occafion. I age-misfortunes, in fancied fuffe:ings, the drapery of

the

the figure hides its form; and real diftreis, coming in a homely and uhornamented ftate, difgufts the eye which had poured its tears over the hero of tragic mifery, or the martyr of romantic woe. Real calamity offends with its coarfenefs, and therefore is not produced on the fcene, which exhibits in its ftead the fantastic griefs of a delicate and high-wrought fenfibility. Lillo, in his Fatal Discovery, prefented extreme poverty as the diftrefs of the fcene; and the moral of his piece was to inculcate, that poverty was not to be fhunned, nor wealth purfued, at the expence of honesty and virtue. A modern audience did not relish a distress fo real, but gave their tears to the widow of St. Va lori, who was mad for the lofs of a husband killed twenty years before. From the fame caufe, the Gamefter, one of the best and most moral of our later tragedies, though fucceffively reprefented by the greatest players, has never become popular. And even now the part of Mrs. Beverley, (the first character of the first actress in the world), is performed to indifferent houfes.

"The tragic poet is ftriving to diftrefs his hero that he may move his audience: it is not his bufinefs to equalize the affliction to the evil that occafions it; the effect is what he is to exhibit, which he is to clothe in the flowing language of poetry, and the high colouring of imagination; and if the caufe be not very difproportionate indeed," the reader, or the fpectator, will not find fault with it. Caftalio, in the Orphan, (a play fo grofsly immoral, that it were unfair in me to quore it, except as illuftrative of this fingle argument), is mad with anguifh and with rage, because his wife's maid refufes him access to her apartment, according to the

previous appointment they had made; and Oroimane, in Zayre, remains "immobile, er fa lingue "glacée," becaufe his bride begs him to defer their marriage for a day. Yet thefe were dilappointments which the lover of Otway, and much more the hero of Voltaire, might furely have borne with great er fortitude:

"If we are to apply all this in example, it feems to have a tendency to weaken our mind to our own fufferings, without opening it to the fufferings of others. The real evils which the dignity of the fcene hides from our view, are thole which we ought to pity in our neighbours; the fantastic and imaginary diftreffes which it exhibits," are those we are apt to indulge in ourfelves. Here then tragedy adds to the list of our calamities, without increafing the catalogue of our virtues.

"As tragedy thus dignifies the diftreffes, fo it elevates the actions of its perfonages, their virtues and their vices. But this removes vir tue at a greater diftance from us, and brings vice nearer; it exalts the first to a point beyond our imitation, and ennobles the latter to a degree above our abhorrence. Shakespeare, who generally difcriminates ftrong ly the good and ill qualities of his characters, has yet exhibited a Maca beth, a tyrant and a murderer, whom we are difpofed rather to pity than to hate.

• Modern tragedy, fays a celebrated critic, has become more a school of virtue than the ancient, by being more the theatre of paffion: an Othello, hurried by jealousy to murder his innocent wife; a Jaf fier, ensnared by refentment and want to engage in a confpiracy, and then ftung with remorfe and • involved in ruin; a Siffredi, 'through

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