Essay upon Wit

by Sir Richard Blackmore

"I shall only speak a few words concerning Plays, which as they are now order'd among us, are a mighty Reproach to the Age and Nation.

"To speak against them in general, may be thought too severe, and that which the present Age cannot so well brook, and would not perhaps be so just and reasonable; because it is very possible they might be so fram'd and govern'd by such Rules, as not only to be innocently diverting, but instructing and useful, to put some Vices and Follies out of Countenance, which cannot perhaps be so decently reprov'd, nor so effectually expos'd and corrected any other way. But as the Stage now is, they are intollerable, and not fit to be permitted in a civiliz'd, much less a Christian Nation. They do most notoriously minister both to Infidelity and Vice. By the Profaneness of them, they are apt to instil bad Principles into the Minds of Men, and to lessen that awe and reverence which all Men ought to have for God and Religion: and by their Lewdness they teach Vice, and are apt to infect the Minds of Men, and dispose them to lewd and dissolute Practices.

"And therefore I do not see how any Persons pretending to Sobriety and Vertue, and especially to the pure and holy Religion of our Blessed Saviour, can, without great Guilt, and open Contradiction to his holy Profession, be present at such lewd and immodest Plays, much less frequent them, as too many do, who yet would take it very ill to be shut out of the Communion of Christians, as they would most certainly have been in the first and purest Ages of Christianity."

And not only wise and sober Men have declar'd their detestation of the Immorality of the Stage, but eminent Poets themselves, who have written the most applauded Comedies, have own'd, that the Theatre stands in great need of Restraints and Regulation, and wish'd that Plays were compil'd in such an inoffensive Manner, that not only discreet and vertuous Persons of the Laity, but a Bishop himself, without being shock'd, might be present while they were acted. Mr. Dryden has, up and down in his Prefatory Discourses and Dedications, freely aeknowledg'd the Looseness of our Dramatick Entertainments, which sometimes he charges upon the Countenance given to it by the dissolute Court of King Charles the Second, and sometimes upon the vitiated Taste of the People. In his Dedication of Juvenal, made English, to the late famous Earl of Dorset, he thus bespeaks him; "As a Counsellor bred up in the Knowledge of the Municipal and Statute Laws may honestly inform a just Prince how far his Prerogative extends, so I may be allow'd to tell your Lordship, who by an indisputed Title are the King of Poets, what an Extent of Power you have, and how lawfully you may exercise it over the petulant Scriblers of the Age. As Lord Chamberlain, you are absolute by your Office, in all that belongs to the Decency and good Manners of the Stage; You can banish thence Scurrility and Profaneness, and restrain the licentious Insolence of the Poets and their Actors, in all things that shock the publick Quiet or the Reputation of private Persons, under the Notion of Humour." Hence it evidently appears, that Mr Dryden look'd on the Decency of the Stage to be violated in his Time, by licentious and insolent Poets; and I wish I could say, that there is less Reason of Complaint in ours; In a Copy of Verses, publish'd in one of the Volumes of the Miscellany Poems, the same celebrated Author inveighs against the Lewdness and Pollutions of the Stage in the strongest Expressions that can be conceiv'd; and in his latter days, when his Judgment was more Mature, he condemns all his loose and profane Writings to the Flames, which, he says, they justly deserve: Which is not only a free and ingenious Confession of his Fault, but a considerable Mark of Repentance, and worthy to be imitated by his Successors, who have broken in upon the Rules of Vertue and Modesty in the like manner.

Tho all Men of Vertue, who wish well to Mankind, and are zealous for the Happiness of their Country, cannot but observe the mischievous Effects of these licentious Dramatick Compositions, yet they will find it very difficult to suggest an effectual Remedy for the Cure of so obstinate an Evil. The ingenious Spaniard mention'd before, for stopping the Progress of this contagious Lewdness in his Country, propos'd to the Government, that an Officer or Inspector might be establish'd, with Authority to peruse and correct the Poet's Writings, and that no Comedies should be presented to the Publick without his Licence and Approbation.

But if this would have been sufficient to have prevented or remov'd this hurtful Practice, the British Nation would long since have had no reason to complain on this Subject. We have Officers intrusted with this useful and important Power, and are able, if they please, to hinder the spreading of the Infection, by not permitting such noxious Productions to appear in Publick: But whether those Inspectors have had a true Taste and Judgment themselves, or have diligently apply'd themselves to the Reading and Amending the Comedies put into their Hands for their Approbation, or whether they comply with the Importunity of the Actors, who tell them, that such is the Disposition of the Audience, that no Plays of that kind will appear beautiful, if they are strip'd of those Embellishments and Ornaments of Wit, which some morose and unfashionable People stile impure and obscene, and that to leave out those ingenious Strokes and Heightnings of Fancy, and put into the Mouths of the Actors only good Sense and modest and clean Expressions, is to clear and refine our Comedies from the most entertaining and delightful Parts: Perhaps they assure them, that the Audience will endure no Reformation of the Stage, and that it were altogether as adviseable to shut up the Doors of the Play-House, as to attempt a Regulation of the Pleasures and Diversions of it.

But tho Men who love their Country, born down with a Torrent of profane Libertines, Persons without Taste and Distinction of Vertue and Vice, have almost despair'd of seeing the Comick Poets reform'd, and the exorbitant Liberties of the Stage restrain'd within the Limits of modest Language and decent Behaviour; yet now their Hopes revive, and they promise to themselves a sudden and effectual Reformation of these Abuses, since the Government has plac'd so worthy a Person at the Head of the Actors, and given him ample Authority to rectify their Errors: What a happy Revolution, what a regular and clean Stage may justly be now expected? How free from all sordid and impure Mixtures, how innocent, as well as diverting, will our Comedies appear, when they have been corrected and refin'd by such an accomplish'd Director of the Dramatick Poets? One that has a true and delicate Taste, and who is sensible of the Indecencies and hurtful Nature of our Plays; who has engag'd his celebrated Pen, in defiance of sneering Wits and powerful Libertines, on the Side of Vertue, and has propagated the Esteem of Morals, Humanity, Decorum and Sobriety of Manners; who with great Spirit, Genius, and Courage, to his lasting Honour, has publickly expos'd the Absurdities, Vices, and Follies, that stain and disgrace the Theatre; in which Censure he has not spar'd his own Performances: One who has express'd a warm Zeal on this Subject, and declar'd his generous Intention, if it were in his Power, to cleanse these polluted Places, and not to suffer a Comedy to be presented but what had past a severe Examination, and where all things which might shock a modest Ear, or be look'd on as repugnant to good Manners, might be expung'd.

But if these fair Expectations should be blasted in the Bloom, and notwithstanding the vigorous Efforts which will be made by this Reformer, Immorality shall maintain its ground and keep Possession of the Theatre, some other Expedients may be suggested to procure a Regulation. It might, perhaps be desirable, that a few Persons of Importance, Men of Learning, Gravity, and good Taste, might be commission'd by Authority, as a Check upon the Actors, to censure and suppress any Dramatick Entertainments that shall offend against Religion, Sobriety of Manners, or the Publick Peace; and all Persons should be encourag'd to send them such loose or profane Passages which they hear from the Stage, or read in the printed Plays: Nor will it be less expedient, that they should be instructed to peruse the Plays already publish'd, and which are now publickly acted, and to expunge all offensive and criminal Mixtures, that hereafter they may become a clean and innocent Diversion. Besides, this End would the more effectually be accomplish'd, if the Writers of Comedy, Farce, and Interludes, were rewarded and supported by Means independent on the Actors: For while the Poets, who write for a Maintenance, are paid by the Theatre, they will be under a great Temptation to write as desir'd and directed by the Actors, which was the Complaint of Cervantes above-cited, concerning the Comick Poets of Spain. The Actors, we may safely conclude, are not restrain'd by such rigorous Precepts of Vertue, but that they will always be inclin'd to present those Performances which will best fill the House and promote their Interest; and therefore they will readily humour the vitiated Taste of the Audience, by acting the most immoral Plays, while they find their account in doing so: And that which confirms this Observation is, that they never, as far as I have heard, rejected any Comedy merely for its Looseness, tho I believe they have refus'd many for want of that entertaining Quality. Now were the Comick Writers provided of a Subsistence some other way, they would be deliver'd from the Necessity of complying with their Actors, by writing such Plays as they shall bespeak, or at least approve, as the most likely to invite a profitable Audience.

It would prove an effectual Remedy for this Evil, if the Ladies would discountenance these loose Comedies, by expressing their dislike, and refusing to be present when they are acted: And this no doubt they would do, were they inform'd, that the Comedies which they encourage by their Appearance at the Theatre, are full of wanton Sentiments, obscene Allusions, and immodest Ideas, contain'd in Expressions of a double Meaning: for it cannot be imagin'd they would bear with Unconcernedness, much less with Pleasure, Discourses in Publick, which they detest as unsufferable in private Convention, if they knew them to be unchast. And should the Ladies assert their Esteem of Vertue, and declare openly on the Side of Modesty, the most attractive Beauty of the fair Sex, as certainly they would do, if they understood how much those amiable Qualities have been expos'd and affronted by our most eminent Comick Poets; this would lay the Ax to the Root, and at one Blow destroy this pernicious Practice; for after this, what Writer would transgress the Rules of Decency and Purity of Expression, when he knows, that by his immodest Mixtures he shall fright the Ladies from the House?

It would be another effectual Means to redress the Grievance of the Stage, if the Clergy could be prevail'd upon to condemn from the Pulpit and the Press, as well as in their Conversation, the unjustifiable Entertainments of the Theatre; would they insist upon it, and urge it as a necessary Duty of the People to avoid these Occasions, and at least Appearances of Evil; would they shew them, that by frequenting these unwarrantable Diversions, they rush into Snares, court Temptation, and invite others to follow their criminal Example; would they set before them the Hazard of playing on the nice and dubious Limits of Innocence, and adventuring to the utmost Extent of Vertue and the Frontier of Vice, there would be great hopes of stemming this strong Tide of Iniquity. And this is no more than the indispensable Obligation, which our Divines are under, whose proper Province it is to warn the People of their Danger, and to press them earnestly to fly from it. This venerable Order have, by solemn Engagements, set themselves apart, as spiritual Guides, to point out the fatal Rocks and treacherous Sands to their Neighbours, that they may not make Shipwreck of Modesty and Innocence, and plunge into the Depths of Irreligion and Vice: Nor is it obvious, why these Reverend Teachers, by their Silence and Neutrality, should give Profaneness and Immorality such fair Play, as if the Controversy between the Stage and the Pulpit were compremis'd, and the Poets and the Priests were engag'd, as indeed they ought to be, in the same good Designs, Interests, and Pursuits. It is certain, that this Mildness, and friendly Behaviour of the Clergy to the Comick Writers, cannot arise from any Respect or handsome Usage which that sacred Order has met with on the Theatre, where they have been so often jerk'd and expos'd in such a manner, that their Divine Function has been wounded through their Sides.