The English Moral Plays 375 
to be so sanctioned that handled matters of religion or state. 
Throughout the whole period the government made determined 
efforts to prevent objectionable meddling by the stage. 
In this chapter the development of the moral play under the 
stimulus of the Reformation has been outlined. It was no radical 
innovation to exact of a dramatic type that had long been the 
support of religion an alliance with one party or the other; for the 
idea of godliness in the sixteenth century was never free from the 
taint of partizanship. The moral play, therefore, ceased to be a 
plain homily, and became argument and invective. The change of 
purpose widened its scope. In handling public questions the play 
could no longer confine itself to abstractions; special problems of 
statecraft and church, and the policies of real leaders, took their 
place with ethical warning on the stage. The spirit of criticism, 
the bitterness of invective, the sharp play of satire, entered also 
into the play. Thus it was given new and broader possibilities than 
it had before enjoyed, and in the development was warped from 
the simplicity of its first design. But it still had a serious mission 
to perform, and, although marred to our eyes by unfairness and 
coarseness of partizan zeal, these controversial plays represented 
exactly the religious spirit of their day, just as earlier plays had 
responded to the serener and clearer purpose of their churchly 
authors. 
CuapreR Vii.—PLays or THE RENAISSANCE. 
By the religious controversy of the sixteenth century the morality 
play was held longer than it otherwise would have been to the 
service of the church. In the old field new opportunities were 
offered to a dramatic literature already showing a restiveness under 
its restrictions. But the call of the Reformation could not wholly 
exclude the religious dramatists from the broader interests in life 
and literature that even earlier had come to England with the New 
Learning. Besides the plays that broached and debated the great 
public questions of Henry’s reign, there were others that spoke the 
message of Humanism. In so doing they did not altogether forsake 
the cause of morality; it was possible to exalt the dignity of secular 
learning as a means to the higher end that the old-time moralities 
directly reached to attain. It was possible, also, to find instances 
of the traditional Psychomachia in the walks of life followed by the 
humanists and their disciples. Here again, therefore, the moral 
play found an opportunity for rejuvenation and extension. 
