“All the world knows that comedy, falling into disrepute, was condemned to silence for a time; that after that came the satyres, which, being still more cruel, passed away more promptly; and that then the new comedy was born.
“In the beginning dramatic works consisted but of choruses. Soon there was added a certain number of characters. But Menander, followed in this by Terence, rejected the choruses as tedious. This latter was a most scrupulous observer of the precepts; never did he raise the style of comedy to a tragic loftiness, wiser in that respect than Plautus, whom they have so much reproached for this fault.
“Tragedy is founded on fact, comedy on fiction, and the latter was called ‘flat-footed’ because it was played without cothurnus or scenery, and because it took its plots from the humblest classes. Yet then, as now, there were several kinds of comedy: there were pallium comedies and toga comedies, and pantomimes, and fabulæ atellanæ and tabernariæ.
“The Athenians, who gave prizes to their dramatic poets and to their actors, in their comedies rebuked wickedness and vice with antique elegance. This is why Cicero called comedy the mirror of manners, the image of truth—sublime attribute which raises Thalia to the rank of history, and which shows us how much she merits esteem and honor.
“But already it seems to me that you draw back, saying: ‘What use is this translating of books and this fatiguing show of erudition?’ Believe me, it is not without motive that I recalled to your memory all these things; I wished to let you see that you have asked me for an essay on dramatic art in Spain, where all plays are written contrary to art, and I wished to declare that our pieces are not according to right or the ancient rules. But let us leave this; you have recourse to my experience, and not to what I may have been able to learn of an art which tells us the truth, but to which the vulgar prefer the false.
“If, then, you asked me for the rules of the art, I should refer you to the wise and learned Rebortelo, and you would see explained in his book on Aristotle or on comedy what otherwise is scattered in a crowd of works without order and without light. But since you ask the opinion of those now in possession of the stage, acknowledging that the public has the right to establish the incongruous laws of our dramatic prodigy, I will tell you my idea, and your command must excuse my temerity. I should like, since the public is in error, to deck this error with agreeable colors; I should like, since it is no longer possible to follow the ancient rules, to find a mean between the two extremes.
“First choose the subject of your comedy, and, in spite of the old precepts, do not disquiet yourself whether there be or be not kings among your characters. I ought not to conceal, however, that our king and lord, Philip the Prudent, was angry every time he beheld a king on the stage, either because he saw in that a violation of the rules of the art, or because he thought that even in fiction the royal authority should not be presented too near the gaze of the people.
“Besides, in this we draw near to the ancient comedy, in which Plautus did not fear to place even gods, as the part he gives Jupiter in the Amphitryon proves. Heaven knows it is difficult for me to approve of this. Even Plutarch, in speaking of Menander, formally blames ancient comedy; but since we in Spain have renounced the rules of the art and treat it cavalierly, this time the classicists are silenced.
“In mingling the tragic and the comic, and Terence with Seneca (from which results a species of monster like the Minotaur), you will have one part of the piece serious and the other farcical. But this variety pleases very much. Nature herself gives us the example of it, and it is from such contrasts that she gains her beauty.
“Take care only that your subject presents but one action; take care that your story is not overcharged with episodes (that is to say, with things which lead away from the main idea), and that no part can be detached without overthrowing the whole edifice. Do not trouble yourself about confining all the action within the space of one day, although it is the rule of Aristotle; we have already rejected his authority in mingling tragedy and comedy. Let us content ourselves with reducing the time as much as may be possible, unless the poet composes a story the action of which extends over several years, and in this case he could place the intervals of time in the ‘waits’—as, for instance, if one of his characters has a journey to take. These liberties, I know, disgust the critics. Well, the critics may stay away from our pieces.