gle act, a supposition that cannot be far from truth; it follows, that a continued representation of lonendurance than an act, instead of giving scope ger to fluctuation and swelling of passion, would overstrain the attention, and produce a total absence of mind. In that respect, the four pauses have a fine effect; for by affording to the audience a seasonable respite when the impression of reality is gone, and while nothing material is in agitation, they relieve the mind from its fatigue; and consequently prevent a wandering of thought at the very time possibly of the most interesting scenes.

In one article, indeed, the Grecian model has greatly the advantage: its chorus during an interval not only preserves alive the impressions made, upon the audience, but also prepares their hearts finely for new impressions. In our theatres, on the contrary, the audience, at the end of every act, being left to trifle time away, lose every warm impression; and they begin the next act cool and uncerned, as at the commencement of the representation. This is a gross malady in our theatrical representations; but a malady that luckily is not incurable. To revive the Grecian chorus, would be to revive the Grecian slavery of place and time; but I can figure a detached chorus coinciding with a pause in the representation, as the ancient chorus did with a pause in the principal action. What objection, for example, can there lie against music between the acts, vocal and instrumental, adapted to the subject? Such detached chorus, without putting us under any limitation of time or place, would recruit the spirits, and would preserve entire the tone, if not the tide of passion: the music, after an act, should commence in the tone of the preceding passion, and be gradually varied till it accord with the tone of the passion, that is to succeed in the next act. The music and the representation

would both of them be gainers by their conjunction; which will thus appear. Music that accords with the present tone of mind, is, on that account, doubly agreeable; and accordingly, though music singly hath not power to raise a passion, it tends greatly to support a passion already raised. Further, music prepares us for the passion that follows, by making cheerful, tender, melancholy, or animated impressions, as the subject requires. Take for an example the first scene of the Mourning Bride, where soft music, in a melancholy strain, prepares us for Almeria's deep distress. In this manner, music and representation support each other delightfully the impression made upon the audience by the representation, is a fine preparation for the music that succeeds; and the impression made by the music, is a fine preparation for the representation that succeeds. It appears to me evident, that, by some such contrivance, the modern drama may be improved, so as to enjoy the advantage of the ancient chorus without its slavish limitation of place and time. And as to music in particular, I cannot figure any means that would tend more to its improvement: composers, those for the stage at least, would be reduced to the happy necessity of studying and imitating nature; instead of deviating, according to the present mode, into wild, fantastic, and unnatural conceits. But we must return to our subject, and finish the comparison between the ancient and the modern drama.

The numberless improprieties forced upon the Greek dramatic poets by the constitution of their drama, may be sufficient, one should think, to make us prefer the modern drama, even abstracting from the improvement proposed. To prepare the reader for this article, it must be premised, that as in the ancient drama the place of action never varies, a place necessarily must be chosen, to which every

person may have access 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 transactions within doors, though these commonly are the most important. Such cruel restraint is of itself sufficient to cramp the most pregnant invention; and accordingly Greek writers, in order to preserve unity of place, are reduced to woful improprieties. In the Hippolytus of Euripides,* Phedra distressed 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 support 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 still more improper, her female attendant uses the strongest entreaties to make her reveal the secret cause of her anguish; which at last Phedra, contrary to decency and probability, is prevailed upon to do in presence of that very chorus. Alcestes, 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, a secret is imparted to Dejanira, the wife of Hercules, in presence of the chorus. In the tragedy of Iphigenia, the messenger employed to inform Clitemnestra that Iphigenia was sacrificed, 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 Tauris, the necessary presence of the chorus forces Euripides into a gross absurdity, which is to form a secret in their hearing;§ and to disguise the absurdity, much court is paid to the chorus, not one woman but a number, to en

*Act I. sc. vi.
Act II.

t Act II. sc. ii.
§ Art IV. at the close.

+ Act II. sc. i.

gage them to secrecy. In the Medea of Euripides, that princess make no difficulty, in presence of the chorus, to plot the death of her husband, of his mistress, and of her father the King of Corinth, all by poison. It was necessary to bring Medea upon the stage, and there is but one place of action, which is always occupied by the chorus. This scene closes the second act; and in the end of the third, she frankly makes the chorus her confidants in plotting the murder of her own children. Terence, by identity of place, is often forced to make a conversation within doors be heard in the open street; the cries of a woman in labour are there heard distinctly.

The Greek poets are not less hampered by unity of time than by that of place. In the Hippolytus of Euripides, that prince is banished at the end of the fourth act; and in the first scene of the following act, a messenger relates to Theseus the whole particulars of the death of Hippolytus by the sea-monster: that remarkable event must have occupied many hours; and yet in the representation, it is confined to the time employed by the chorus upon the song at the end of the fourth act. The inconsistency is still greater in the Iphigenia in Tauris :* the song could not exhaust half an hour; and yet the incident supposed to have happened during that time, could not naturally have been transacted in less than half a day.

The Greek artists are forced, no less frequently, to transgress another rule, derived also from a continued representation. The rule is, that as a vacuity, however momentary, interrupts the representation, it is necessary that the place of action be constantly occupied. Sophocles, with regard to that rule as well as to others, is generally correct.

Act V. sc. iv.

But Euripides cannot bear such restraint: he often evacuates the stage, and leaves it empty for others. Iphigenia in Tauris, after pronouncing a soliloquy in the first scene, leaves the place of action, and is succeeded by Orestes and Pylades; they, after some conversation, walk off; and Iphigenia re-enters, accompanied with the chorus. In the Alcestes, which is of the same author, the place of action is void at the end of the third act. It is true, that to cover the irregularity, and to preserve the representation in motion, Euripides is careful to fill the stage without loss of time: but this still is an interruption, and a link of the chain broken; for during the change of the actors, there must be a space of time, during which the stage is occupied by neither set. It makes indeed a more remarkable interruption, to change the place of action as well as the actors; but that was not practicable upon the Grecian stage.

It is hard to say upon what model Terénce has formed his plays. Having no chorus, there is a pause in the representation at the end of every act. But advantage is not taken of the cessation, even to vary the place of action: for the street is always chosen, where every thing passing may be seen by every person; and by that choice, the most sprightly and interesting parts of the action, which commonly pass within doors, are excluded; witness the last act of the Eunuch. He hath submitted to the like slavery with respect to time. In a word, a play with a regular chorus, is not more confined in place and time than his plays are. Thus a zealous sectary follows implicitly ancient forms and ceremonies, without once considering whether their introductive cause be still subsisting. Plautas, of a bolder genius than Terence, makes good use of the liberty afforded by an interrupted representation: