396 Elbert N. S. Thompson 
Castle of Perseverance, together with the World and the Flesh, his 
constant associates in theological literature, he leads the forces of 
evil that seek the overthrow of man. In these early plays, the 
Devil is a serious character, the product of theological thought.t 
The origin of the Vice as a dramatic character is more a matter 
of dispute. Cushman believes that the Devil and the Vice are 
related only as all influences for evil were supposed to emanate 
from one source; that the Devil was a _ theological-mythological 
being, the antithesis of God, while the Vice was an ethical person, 
the summation of the deadly sins, the antithesis of piety and mor- 
ality.2. Eckhardt, on the contrary, argues that the Devil was the 
immediate, though not the exclusive, source of the conception of 
the Vice. Between the two views the difference is but slight; for, 
since the deadly sins were regarded by churchmen as the children 
of the Devil, both postulate for the Vice, as well as for the Devil, 
an origin in theological literature. Chambers has supported an 
entirely different opinion, that relates the vice to the court fool or 
jester, who would figure first in the farce; but to the present 
author the Vice seems more directly descendent from the Devil and 
the deadly sins. 
But neither character retained long the marks of its serious, the- 
ological origin; the Devil took on human traits, and the Vice be- 
came the intimate associate of man. In Wisdom Lucifer appears 
with the attire of a gallant showing beneath his traditional 
costume, thus combining the attributes of the trio, World, Flesh, 
and Devil, and immediately lays aside the Satanic garb to tempt 
man more effectually as a human being.’ In other plays the Devil 
discards his black skin, animal’s head, tail, horns, and claws, and 
assumes a more human grotesqueness, a fiery red face and Bar- 
dolphian nose. The Vice was still more completely humanized, and 
soon became a man playing the part of rogue and mischief-maker. 
In such rdles he seems more closely allied with the fool, because, 
the author thinks, older influences had waned. If such be the case, 
both the Devil and the Vice show again how the allegorical was 
forced to give way to the concrete, and how theological teaching 
was supplanted on the stage by comedy of manners. 
But as one thus traces along these several lines the breakdown 
of the old type of play under the influence of secular literature and 

1 Cushman, 16. 2 Tbid., 63; Eckhardt, 101 ff. 
3 The Devil of a French play assumes the same disguise under his 
more usual costume (Cohen, 220-21). 
