What more felicity can fall to creature
Than to enjoy Delight with Liberty,
And to be lord of all the works of Nature,
To reign in th’ air from earth to highest sky:
To feed on flowers, and weeds of glorious feature,
To take whatever thing doth please the eye?
Who rests not pleased with such happiness,
Well worthy he to taste of wretchedness!’
If we could but once realise this idea of a butterfly-critic extracting sweets from flowers and turning gall to honey, we might well hope to soar above the Grub-street race, and confound, by the novelty of our appearance, and the gaiety of our flight, the idle conjectures of ignorant or malicious pretenders in entomology!
Besides, having once got out of the vortex of prejudice and fashion, that surrounds our large Winter Theatres, what is there to hinder us (or what shall) from dropping down from the verge of the metropolis into the haunts of the provincial drama;—from taking coach to Bath or Brighton, or visiting the Land’s-End, or giving an account of Botany-bay theatricals, or the establishment of a new theatre at Venezuela? One reason that makes the Minor Theatres interesting is, that they are the connecting link, that lets us down, by an easy transition, from the highest pomp and proudest display of the Thespian art, to its first rudiments and helpless infancy.—With conscious happy retrospect, they lead the eye back, along the vista of the imagination, to the village barn, or travelling booth, or old-fashioned town-hall, or more genteel assembly-room, in which Momus first unmasked to us his fairy revels, and introduced us, for the first time in our lives, to that strange anomaly in existence, that fanciful reality, that gay waking dream, a company of strolling players! Sit still, draw close together, hold in your breath—not a word, not a whisper—the laugh is ready to start away, ‘like greyhound on the slip,’ the big tear of wonder and expectation is ready to steal down ‘the full eyes and fair cheeks of childhood,’ almost before the time. Only another moment, and amidst blazing tapers, and the dancing sounds of music, and light throbbing hearts, and eager looks, the curtain rises, and the picture of the world appears before us in all its glory and in all its freshness. Life throws its gaudy shadow across the stage; Hope shakes his many-coloured wings, ‘embalmed with odours;’ Joy claps his hands, and laughs in a hundred happy faces. Oh childish fancy, what a mighty empire is thine; what endless creations thou buildest out of nothing; what ‘a wide O’ indeed, thou chusest to act thy thoughts, and unrivalled feats upon! Thou art better than the gilt trophy that decks the funeral pall of kings; thou art brighter than the costly mace that precedes them on their coronation-day. Thy fearfullest visions are enviable happiness; thy wildest fictions are the solidest truths. Thou art the only reality. All other possessions mock our idle grasp: but thou performest by promising; thy smile is fruition; thy blandishments are all that we can fairly call our own; thou art the balm of life, the heaven of childhood, the poet’s idol, and the player’s pride! The world is but thy painting; and the stage is thine enchanted mirror.—When it first displays its shining surface to our view, how glad, how surprised are we! We have no thought of any deception in the scene, no wish but to realize it ourselves with inconsiderate haste and fond impatience. We say to the air-drawn gorgeous phantom, ‘Come, let me clutch thee!’ A new sense comes upon us, the scales fall off our eyes, and the scenes of life start out in endless quick succession crowded with men and women-actors, such as we see before us—comparable to ‘those gay creatures of the element, that live in the rainbow, and play i’ th’ plighted clouds!’ Happy are we who look on and admire; and happy, we think, must they be who are so looked at and admired; and sometimes we begin to feel uneasy till we can ourselves mingle in the gay, busy, talking, fluttering, powdered, painted, perfumed, peruked, quaintly-accoutred throng of coxcombs and coquettes,—of tragedy heroes or heroines,—in good earnest; or turn stage-players and represent them in jest, with all the impertinent and consequential airs of the originals!