When it was first publickly known that the New Theatre would be open'd against us; I cannot help going a little back to remember the Concern that my Brother-Menagers express'd at what might be the Consequences of it. They imagined that now all those who wish'd Ill to us, and particularly a great Party who had been disobliged by our shutting them out from behind our Scenes, even to the Refusal of their Money,[132] would now exert themselves in any partial or extravagant Measures that might either hurt us or support our Competitors: These, too, were some of those farther Reasons which had discouraged them from running the hazard of continuing to Sir Richard Steele the same Pension which had been paid to Collier. Upon all which I observed to them, that, for my own Part, I had not the same Apprehensions; but that I foresaw as many good as bad Consequences from two Houses: That tho' the Novelty might possibly at first abate a little of our Profits; yet, if we slacken'd not our Industry, that Loss would be amply balanced by an equal Increase of our Ease and Quiet: That those turbulent Spirits which were always molesting us, would now have other Employment: That the question'd Merit of our Acting would now stand in a clearer Light when others were faintly compared to us: That though Faults might be found with the best Actors that ever were, yet the egregious Defects that would appear in others would now be the effectual means to make our Superiority shine, if we had any Pretence to it: And that what some People hoped might ruin us, would in the end reduce them to give up the Dispute, and reconcile them to those who could best entertain them.
In every Article of this Opinion they afterwards found I had not been deceived; and the Truth of it may be so well remember'd by many living Spectators, that it would be too frivolous and needless a Boast to give it any farther Observation.
But in what I have said I would not be understood to be an Advocate for two Play-houses: For we shall soon find that two Sets of Actors tolerated in the same Place have constantly ended in the Corruption of the Theatre; of which the auxiliary Entertainments that have so barbarously supply'd the Defects of weak Action have, for some Years past, been a flagrant Instance; it may not, therefore, be here improper to shew how our childish Pantomimes first came to take so gross a Possession of the Stage.
I have upon several occasions already observ'd, that when one Company is too hard for another, the lower in Reputation has always been forced to exhibit some new-fangled Foppery to draw the Multitude after them: Of these Expedients, Singing and Dancing had formerly been the most effectual;[133] but, at the Time I am speaking of, our English Musick had been so discountenanced since the Taste of Italian Operas prevail'd, that it was to no purpose to pretend to it.[134] Dancing therefore was now the only Weight in the opposite Scale, and as the New Theatre sometimes found their Account in it, it could not be safe for us wholly to neglect it. To give even Dancing therefore some Improvement, and to make it something more than Motion without Meaning, the Fable of Mars and Venus[135] was form'd into a connected Presentation of Dances in Character, wherein the Passions were so happily expressed, and the whole Story so intelligibly told by a mute Narration of Gesture only, that even thinking Spectators allow'd it both a pleasing and a rational Entertainment; though, at the same time, from our Distrust of its Reception, we durst not venture to decorate it with any extraordinary Expence of Scenes or Habits; but upon the Success of this Attempt it was rightly concluded, that if a visible Expence in both were added to something of the same Nature, it could not fail of drawing the Town proportionably after it. From this original Hint then (but every way unequal to it) sprung forth that Succession of monstrous Medlies that have so long infested the Stage, and which arose upon one another alternately, at both Houses outvying in Expence, like contending Bribes on both sides at an Election, to secure a Majority of the Multitude. But so it is, Truth may complain and Merit murmur with what Justice it may, the Few will never be a Match for the Many, unless Authority should think fit to interpose and put down these Poetical Drams, these Gin-shops of the Stage, that intoxicate its Auditors and dishonour their Understanding with a Levity for which I want a Name.[136]
If I am ask'd (after my condemning these Fooleries myself) how I came to assent or continue my Share of Expence to them? I have no better Excuse for my Error than confessing it. I did it against my Conscience! and had not Virtue enough to starve by opposing a Multitude that would have been too hard for me.[137] Now let me ask an odd Question: Had Harry the Fourth of France a better Excuse for changing his Religion?[138] I was still, in my Heart, as much as he could be, on the side of Truth and Sense, but with this difference, that I had their leave to quit them when they could not support me: For what Equivalent could I have found for my falling a Martyr to them? How far the Heroe or the Comedian was in the wrong, let the Clergy and the Criticks decide. Necessity will be as good a Plea for the one as the other. But let the Question go which way it will, Harry IV. has always been allow'd a great Man: And what I want of his Grandeur, you see by the Inference, Nature has amply supply'd to me in Vanity; a Pleasure which neither the Pertness of Wit or the Gravity of Wisdom will ever persuade me to part with. And why is there not as much Honesty in owning as in concealing it? For though to hide it may be Wisdom, to be without it is impossible; and where is the Merit of keeping a Secret which every Body is let into? To say we have no Vanity, then, is shewing a great deal of it; as to say we have a great deal cannot be shewing so much: And tho' there may be Art in a Man's accusing himself, even then it will be more pardonable than Self-commendation. Do not we find that even good Actions have their Share of it? that it is as inseparable from our Being as our Nakedness? And though it may be equally decent to cover it, yet the wisest Man can no more be without it, than the weakest can believe he was born in his Cloaths. If then what we say of ourselves be true, and not prejudicial to others, to be called vain upon it is no more a Reproach than to be called a brown or a fair Man. Vanity is of all Complexions; 'tis the growth of every Clime and Capacity; Authors of all Ages have had a Tincture of it; and yet you read Horace, Montaign, and Sir William Temple, with Pleasure. Nor am I sure, if it were curable by Precept, that Mankind would be mended by it! Could Vanity be eradicated from our Nature, I am afraid that the Reward of most human Virtues would not be found in this World! And happy is he who has no greater Sin to answer for in the next!
But what is all this to the Theatrical Follies I was talking of? Perhaps not a great deal; but it is to my Purpose; for though I am an Historian, I do not write to the Wise and Learned only; I hope to have Readers of no more Judgment than some of my quondam Auditors; and I am afraid they will be as hardly contented with dry Matters of Fact, as with a plain Play without Entertainments: This Rhapsody, therefore, has been thrown in as a Dance between the Acts, to make up for the Dullness of what would have been by itself only proper. But I now come to my Story again.
Notwithstanding, then, this our Compliance with the vulgar Taste, we generally made use of these Pantomimes but as Crutches to our weakest Plays: Nor were we so lost to all Sense of what was valuable as to dishonour our best Authors in such bad Company: We had still a due Respect to several select Plays that were able to be their own Support; and in which we found our constant Account, without painting and patching them out, like Prostitutes, with these Follies in fashion: If therefore we were not so strictly chaste in the other part of our Conduct, let the Error of it stand among the silly Consequences of Two Stages. Could the Interest of both Companies have been united in one only Theatre, I had been one of the Few that would have us'd my utmost Endeavour of never admitting to the Stage any Spectacle that ought not to have been seen there; the Errors of my own Plays, which I could not see, excepted. And though probably the Majority of Spectators would not have been so well pleas'd with a Theatre so regulated; yet Sense and Reason cannot lose their intrinsick Value because the Giddy and the Ignorant are blind and deaf, or numerous; and I cannot help saying, it is a Reproach to a sensible People to let Folly so publickly govern their Pleasures.
While I am making this grave Declaration of what I would have done had One only Stage been continued; to obtain an easier Belief of my Sincerity I ought to put my Reader in mind of what I did do, even after Two Companies were again establish'd.