The machinery became more and more complicated toward the time of the Renaissance; but much money was needed, and for long the Court or the municipalities could alone use them. In England fixed or movable scenery reaches great perfection at Court: Inigo Jones shows a genius in arranging elegant decorations; some of his sketches have been preserved.[799] But such splendid inventions were too costly to be transferred to the stages for which Shakespeare wrote; and he never used any other magic but that of his poetry. Inigo Jones had fine scene-shiftings with the help of his machinists, and Shakespeare with the help of his verses; these last have this advantage, that they have not faded, and can still be seen.
III.
Whatever may be thought of so much simplicity, childishness, or barbarity of those ivy-clad ruins, the forms of which can scarcely be discerned, they must be subjected to a closer inspection; and if there were no other, this one consideration would be enough to incline us to it: while in the theatre of Bacchus the tragedies of Sophocles were played once and no more, the Christian drama, remodelled from century to century, was represented for four hundred years before immense multitudes; and this is a unique phenomenon in the history of literature.
The fact may be ascribed to several causes, some of which have already been pointed out. The desire to see was extremely keen, and there was seen all that could be wished: the unattainable, the unperceivable, miracles, the king's Court, earthly paradise, all that had been heard of or dreamt about. Means of realisation were rude, but the public held them satisfactory.
What feasts were in the year, sacraments were in the existence of men; they marked the great memorable stages of life. A complete net of observances and religious obligations surrounded the months and seasons; bells never remained long silent; they rang less discreetly than now, and were not afraid to disturb conversations by their noise. At each period of the day they recalled that there were prayers to say, and to those even who did not pray they recalled the importance of religion. Existences were thus impregnated with religion; and religion was in its entirety explained, made accessible and visible, in the Mysteries.
The verses spoken by the actors did not much resemble those in Shakespeare; they were, in most cases, mere tattle, scarcely verses; rhyme and alliteration were sometimes used both together, and both anyhow. And yet the emotion was deep; in the state of mind with which the spectators came, nothing would have prevented their being touched by the affecting scenes, neither the lame verse nor the clumsy machinery; the cause of the emotion was the subject, and not the manner in which the subject was represented. All the past of humanity and its eternal future were at stake; players, therefore, were sometimes interrupted by the passionate exclamations of the crowd. At a drama lately represented on the stage of the Comédie Française, one of the audience astonished his neighbours by crying: "Mais signe donc! Est-elle bête!..." In the open air of the public place, at a time when manners were less polished, many such interjections interrupted the performance; many insulting apostrophes were addressed to Eve when she listened to the serpent; and the serpent spoke (in the Norman drama of "Adam") a language easy to understand, the language of everyday life:
"Diabolus.—I saw Adam; he is an ass."
"Eva.—He is a little hard."
"Diabolus.—We shall melt him; but at present he is harder than iron."
But thou, Eve, thou art a superior being, a delicate one, a delight for the eyes. "Thou art a little tender thing, fresher than the rose, whiter than crystal, or snow falling on the ice in a dale. The Creator has badly matched the couple; thou art too sweet; man is too hard.... For which it is very pleasant to draw close to thee. Let me have a talk with thee."[800]