Theodoretes. and Comedians in Performance of every Part in his native Humor. Plautus himfelfe was fo inamored of the Actors in his Dayes, that hee publifhed many excellent and exquifite Comedies, yet extant. Ariftotle commends one Theodoretes to be the beft Tragedian in his Time. This in the Prefence of Alexander perfonated Achilles, which fo delighted the Emperour, that hee bestowed on him a Penfion of quinque mille Drachma, five thousand Drachmaes, and every thousand Drachmaes are twenty nine Pounds, three Shillings, four Pence Sterling, Roffius, whom the eloquent Orator, and excellent Statefiman of Rome, Marcus Cicero, for his elegant Pronuntiation and formal! Gefture called his Jewell, had from the common Trefury of the Roman Exchequer, a daily Pention allowed him of so many Seftertii as in our Coine amount to 16 Pound and a Marke, or thereabouts, which yearely did arife to any noble Mans Revenues. So great was the Fame of this Rofcius, and fo good his Eftimation, that learned Cato made a Question whether Cicero could write better then Rofcius could fpeake and act, or Rofcius fpeake and act better then Cicero write. Many Times when they had any important Orations, to be with an audible and loud Voyce delivered to the People, they imployed the Tongue and Memory of this excellent Actor, to whom for his Worth, the Senate granted fuch large Exhibition. que pervincere voces, To omit all the Doctors, Zawnyes, Pantaloones, Harlakeenes, in which the French, but especially the Italians, have beene excellent; and according to the Occafion offered to do fome Right to our English Actors, as Knell, Bentley, Mils, Wilson, Croffe, Lanam, and others: thefe, fince I never faw them, as being before my Time, I cannot (as an Eye-witneffe of their Defert) give them that Applaufe, which no doubt, they worthily merit, yet by the Report of many juditiall Auditors, their Performance of many Parts have been fo abfolute, that it were a Kinde of Sinne to drowne their Worths in Lethe, and not commit their (almoft forgotten) Names to Eternity. Heere I muft needs remember. Tarleton, in his Time gratious with the Queene his Soveraigne, and in the Peoples generall Applaufe, whom fucceeded Will, Kemp, as wel in the Favour of her Majefty, as in the Opinion and good Thoughts of the generall Audience. Gabriel, Singer, Pope, Phillips, Sly, all the Right I can do them, is but this, that though they be dead, their Deferts yet live in the Remembrance of many. Among fo many dead let me not forget one yet yet alive in his Time the most worthy famous, Maifter Edward Allen. To omit thefe, as alfo fuch as for divers Imperfections, may be thought infufficient for the Quality. A&tors fhould be Men pick'd out perfonable, according to the Parts they prefent, they fhould be rather Schollers, that though they canot fpeake well, know how to speake, or else to have that Volubility, that they can fpeake well, though they understand not what, and fo both Imperfections may by Inftructions be helped and amended: but where a good Tongue and a good Conceit both faile, there can never be good Actor. I also could wish, that fuch as are condemned for their Licentiousneffe, might by a generall Confent bee quite excluded our Society: for as we are Men that stand in the broad Eye of the World, fo fhould our Manners, Gestures, and Behaviours, favour of fuch Government and Modefty, to deserve the good Thoughts and Reports of all Men, and to abide the sharpeft Cenfures even of thofe that are the greateft Oppofites to the Quality. Many amongst us, I know, to be of Substance, of Government, of fober Lives, and temperate Carriages, Houfe-keepers, and contributary to all Duties enjoyned them, equally with them that are rank't with the most bountifull; and if amongst fo many of fort, they be any few degenerate from the reft in that good Demeanor, which is both requifite and expected at their Hands, let me entreat you not to cenfure hardly of all for the Mifdeeds of fome, but rather to excufe us, as Ovid doth the Generality of Women. Parcite paucarum diffundere crimen in omnes, Spectetur meritis quæq; puella fuis. For fome Offenders (that perhaps are few) Let every one be cenfur'd as they merit. Others there are of whom should you afke my Opinion, I muft refer you to this, Confule Theatrum. Here I might take fit Opportunity to reckon up all our English Writers, and compare them with the Greeke, French, Italian, and Latine Poets, not onely in their Paftorall, Hiftoricall, Elegeicall, and Heroicall Poems, but in their Tragicall and Comical Subjects, but it was my Chance to happen on the like learnedly done by an approved good Scholler, in a Booke called Wits Common-wealth, to which Treatife I wholy referre you, returning to our prefent Subject. Julius Cæfar himfelfe for his Pleasure became an Actor, being in Shape, State, Voyce, Judgement, and all other Occurrents, exterior and interior excellent. Amongst many other Parts acted by him in Perfon, it is recorded of him, that with generall Applaufe in his owne Theater he played Hercules Furens, and amongst many other Arguments of his Compleatneffe, Excellence, and extraordinary Care in his Action, it is thus reported of him: Being in the Depth of a Paffion, one of his Servants (as his Part then fell out) prefenting Lychas, who before had from Dejaneira brought him the poyfoned Shirt, dipt in the Bloud of the Centaure Neffus: he in the middeft of his Torture and Fury, finding this Lyckas hid in a remote Corner (appoynted him to creep into of Purpose) although he was, as our our Tragedians use, but seemingly to kill him by fome falfe imagined Wound, yet was Cæfar fo extremely carryed away with the Violence of his practifed Fury, and by the perfect Shape of the Madneffe of Hercules, to which he had fashioned all his active Spirits, that he flew him dead at his Foot, and after fwoong him terq; quaterq; as the Poet fayes, about his Head. It was the Manner of their Emperours, in thofe Dayes, in their publicke Tragedies to choose out the fitteft amongst fuch, as for capital Offences were condemned to dye, and imploy them in fuch Parts as were to be kil'd in the Tragedy, who of themfelves would make Suit rather fo to dye with Refolution, and by the Hands of such Princely Actors, then otherwife to fuffer a fhamefull and most deteftable End. And these were Tragedies naturally performed. And fuch Caius Caligula, Claudius Nero, Vitellius, Domitianus, Commodus, and other Emperours of Rome, upon their Festivals and Holy Daies of greatest Confecration, used to act. Therefore M. Kid in the Spanish Tragedy, upon Occa fion presenting it felfe thus writes. Why Nero thought it no Difparagement, Thefe Exercises, as Traditions, have beene fince (though in better Manner) continued through all Ages, amongst all the nobleft Nations of the Earth. But I have promised to be altogether Compendious, prefuming that what before is discourst, may for the Practife of Playes, their Antiquity, and Dignity be altogether fufficient. I omit the Shewes and Ceremonies even in these Times generally used amongst the Catholikes, in which by the Churchmen and most religious, divers Pageants, as of the Nativity, Paffion, and Afcention, with other Hiftoricall Places of the Bible, are at divers Times and Seafons of the Yeare ufually celebrated; fed hæc preter me. In the Yeare of the World 4207. of Chrift 246. Origin writ certaine godly Epiftles to Philip, then Emperour of Rome, who was the firft Chriftian Emperour, and in his Life I reade, that in the fourth Yeare of his Reigne, which was the 1000. Yeare after the Building of Rome, he folemnized that Yeare, as a Jubilee with sumptuous Pageants and Playes. Homer, the most excellent of all Poets, compofed his Illiads in the Shape of a Tragedy, his Odiffeas like a Comedy. Virgil in the first of his Eneiads, in his Defcription of Didoes Carthage. -bic altra Theatris Fundamenta locant alii immanefq; Columnas, Which proves, that in those Dayes immediatly after the Ruine of Troy, when Carthage had her firft Foundation, they built Theaters with stately Columnes of Stone, as in his Defcription may appeare. I have fufficiently difcourft of the firft Theaters, and in whofe Times they were erected, even till the Reigne of Julius Cæfar, the first Emperour, and how they continued in their Glory from him till the Reigne of Marcus Aurelius the 23. Emperour, and from him even to thefe Times. Now to prove they were in as high VOL. I. Сс Efti Estimation at Lacedemon, and Athens, two the most famous Citties of Greece Cicero in his Booke Cato major, feu de fenectute. Cum Athenis ludis quidam grandis natu in Theatrum veniffet, &c. An ancient Citizen comming into one of the Athenian Theaters to fee the Paftimes there folemnized (which fhewes that the most antient and grave frequented them) by Reason of the Throng, no Man gave him Place or Reverence: but the fame Citizen being imploy'd in an Embaffy to Lacedemon, and comming like a private Man into the Theater, the generall Multitude arofe at once, and with great ceremonious. Reverence gave his Age place. This Cicero alledges due to Age, and this I may fitly introduce to the Approbation of my prefent Subject. Moreover, this great Statefman of Rome, at whofe Exile twenty thousand of the chiefeft Roman Citizens wore mourning Apparrel, oftentimes commends Plautus, calling him Plautus nofter, and Atticorum antiqua Comedia, where he proceeds further to extoll fopus, for perfonating Aiax, and the famous Actor Rupilius, in Epigonus, Medea, Menalip, Clytemnestra and Antiopa, proceeding in the fame Place, with this worthy and grave Sentence, Ergo Hiftrio hoc videbit in Scena, quod non videbit fapiens in vita? Shall a Tragedian fee that in his Scene which a wife Man cannot fee in the Courfe of his Life? So in another of his Workes, amongst many Instructions to his Sonne Marcus, he applauds Turpio Ambinius for his Action, Statius, Nevius, and Plautus for their writing. Ovid in Auguftum. Luminibufq; tuis totus quibus utitur orbis, Scenica vidifti lufus adulteria. Thofe Eyes with which you all the World furvay, Auguftus Cafar, because he would have fome Memory of his Love to thofe Places of Paftime, reared in Rome two ftately Obelifci, or Pyramides, one in Julius Cæfars Temple in the Field of Mars, another in the great. Theater, called Circus Maximus, built by Flaminius: these were in Height an hundred Cubits a Peece, in Bredth foure Cubits, they were first raised by King Pheron in the Temple of the Sunne, and after removed to Rome by Auguftus: the Occafion of their firft Compofure was this: Pheron for fome great Crime, committed by him in his Youth against the Gods, was by them. ftrooke Blinde, and fo continued the Space of ten Yeares: but after by a Revelation in the Citty Bucis, it was told, that if he washt his Eyes in the Water of a Woman that was Chafte, and never adulterately touch't with any fave her Husband, he fhould againe recover his Sight: the King first tride his Wife, then many other of the moft grave and beft reputed Matrons, but continued ftill in Defpaire, till at length he met with one vertuous Lady, by whofe Chastity his Sight was reftored: whom (having first commanded his Queene and the reft to be confumed with Fire) he after married. Pheron in Memory of this, buildeth his two Pyramides, after removed to Rome by AUGUSTUS. Sanitaq; majeftas & erat venerabile nomen, Of T Of Actors, and the true Use of their Quality. The THIRD BOOKE. Ragedies and Comedies, faith Donatus, had their Beginning à rebus divinis, from divine Sacrifices, they differ thus: In Comedies, turbulenta prima, tranquilla ultima, In Tragedyes, tranquilla prima, turbulentà ultima, Comedies begin in Trouble, and end in Peace; Tragedies begin in Calmes, and end in Tempeft. Of Comedies there be three Kindes, moving Comedies, called Motoria, ftanding Comedies, call'd Statarie, or mixt betwixt both, called Mifte: they are diftributed into foure Parts, the Prologue, that is, the Preface; the Protafis, that is, the Propofition, which includes the firft Act, and prefents the Actors; the Epitafis, which is the Bufineffe and Body of the Comedy; the laft the Catastrophe, and Conclufion : the Deffinition of the Comedy, according to the Latins: a Difcourfe confifting of divers Inftitutions, comprehending civill and domefticke Things, in which is taught, what in our Lives and Manners is to be followed, what to bee avoyded, the Greekes define it thus : Κομεδια ἐστὶν ιδωτικῶν καὶ πολιτικῶν πραγ MaTwv axiv dovos πopony. Cicero faith, a Comedy is the Imitation of Life, the μάτων αχιν δονος ποροιχήν. Glaffe of Cuftome, and the Image of Truth, in Athens they had their first Originall. The ancient Comedians used to attire their Actors thus: the old Men in White, as the most ancient of all, the yong Men in Party coloured Garments, to note their Diverfity of Thoughts, their Slaves and Servants in thin and bare Vesture, either to note their Poverty, or that they might run the more lighter about their Affaires: their Parafites wore Robes that were turned in, and intricately wrapped about them: the fortunate in White, the difcontented in decayed Vesture, or Garments, growne out of Fashion; the Rich in Purple, the Poore in Crimson, Souldiers wore Purple-jackets, Handmaids the Habits of strange Virgins, Bawds, Pide Coates, and Curtezans, Garments of the Colour of Mud, to denote their Covetoufneffe: the Stages were hung with rich Arras, which was firft brought from King Attalus into Rome: his State-hangings were fo coftly, that from him all Tapestries, and rich Arras were called Attalia. This being a Thing ancient as I have proved it, next of Dignity, as many Arguments have confirmed it, and now even in thefe Dayes by the beft, without Exception, favourably tollerated, why fhould I yeeld my Cenfure, grounded on fuch firme and eftablifht Sufficiency, to any Tower, founded on Sand, any Castle built in the Aire, or any triviall Upstart, and meere imaginary Opinion. Oderunt Hilarem triftes triftemq; jocofi. I hope there is no Man of fo unfenfible a Spirit, that can inveigh against the true and direct Use of this Quality: Oh but fay they, the Romanes in their Time, and fome in these Dayes have abused it, and therefore we volly out our Exclamations against the Ufe. Oh fhallow? Becaufe fuch a Man had his House burnt, we fhall quite condemne the Use of Fire, because one Man quaft Cc 2 |