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"quite the reverfe; for it implies that nothing "fhould follow it, but that fomething must “have preceded it. The middle implies, that fomething must precede it, and likewise fomething follow." This obfervation may be far more happily employed in the divifion of the drama. The first act, or beginning, will then fix the spectator's attention, by opening the plot, and raifing his expectation: the fecond, or middle, will further continue his perplexity, till he is utterly at a lofs to conceive how the piece will terminate; and the third, or end, will relieve him from that embaraffment and agreeable anxiety, after it is carried to the utmost, by an unexpected, yet natural catastrophe.

ARISTOTLE likewife praifes the, length adjudged to the ancient drama, because the spectator was able clearly to recollect and compare every circumftance from beginning to end. The ancient drama, as we have already seen, is fhorter, by the duration of two acts, than the modern; and the obfervation of Ariftotle will not apply to the modern drama, for it is fo long, that it is not eafy for the spectator to recapi

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recapitulate, and obferve the progrefs of fo lengthened a story, perplexed and ravelled as every good drama is.

ANOTHER ftrong reafon is, that the authors of modern dramatic perfomances always labour fo much under the duration they muft extend their plot to, that they are forced, of neceffity, to have recourse to foreign and adventitious circumstances, merely to eke out their pieces to a proper length. Hence our love episodes and under plots; and many of the other glaring abfurdities of the modern theatre; our dramatic writers never having found out, that the length alloted was more than any pure unmixed single action (one of the most effential attributes of the drama) would admit of, either according to the practice of the ancients, or common reafon and obfervation.

FROM thefe arguments, I look upon the divifion of the fable into three acts, into a beginning, a middle, and an end, as the most perfect, compact, and elegant, that the higher drama will admit. Tho indeed I fee not fo great reafon against four as against five acts,

when

when the plot requires a longer period than ufual to adjust and deduce. Five and seven ftrike every mind as uncouth and heterogeneous numbers. This remark, you will fay, has no great depth, nor philosophy; but what have our amufements, the fubjects of our prefent examination, to do with depth or philosophy? Five modern acts may be looked upon as almoft too long a duration for any fable fit for dramatic reprefentation: four have been admitted by one of our beft living writers with much fuccefs. The ufual divifion of the drama here combated is one proof, among many, of of custom above that of truth and

the
of nature:

power

Ond' è dal corso fuo quafi smarrita
Noftra natura, vinta dal coftume.

LETTER

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and yet it occurs in one or two popular writers, nay writers who have fome just claim to praife: if, as a trope, it must have a Greek name, call it "ANOIA, in English UTTER AB

SURDITY.

CERVANTES has fhewn no small skill in the ufe of this figure, in Book III. Chapters IX. XI. of the History of Don Quefada, where we find Sancho had his provision safe after it was taken from him by the galley flaves; and where, almost in one page, we read that he has loft his afs, that he is riding on him, and that he walks, because he has no fuch humble convenience; when the truth is, that the author had fo far gone to fleep, as to forget that no miracles are now wrought upon affes; and that if Gines de Paffamoute had him, Sancho could not. In Book IV. chap. 111. we also find the hero of the work draw his fword after he was robbed of it,

I MIGHT

I MIGHT enumerate one or two more inftances from profe writers of repute, but fhall content myself with adding one inftance from a Roman, and one from a British poet, as the figure does not stand much in need of illuftra

tion.

VIRGIL in his Eneid, book xII. V. 35. makes Latinus fpeak thus to Turnus:

recalent noftro Tiberina fluenta

Sanguine adhuc, campique ingentes offibus albent. In the name of all the profundity of dulnefs how could the ftreams be yet hot with their blood, and their bones whiten the ground?

JAMES THOMSON in his poem called Spring, among his Seasons, has, with great tenderness of heart, pleaded, as from his very bowels, against the inhuman practice of killing oxen to make beef ftakes; and almoft told us he would rather want his ftake than have any such doings. Nay, what is ftill more tender, he advises us not to torment poor worms, by putting them upon the hook alive. Upon the hook! For what purpofe? Why to catch fish fure; which he proceeds to give us cool directions for, as a fine diverfion.

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