fi*^ Lord Holland on the Life and Writings 



But had (he fatal sentence reich'd my ears Fresh sources of interest are opened, and 



In France, m Scotland, with my husband additional powers of iinagination called 



crown'd ,, , , i"t« activity. Can we then denv what 



Wot age Itself could have allaved mv fears. «„.. i •. ■ ■ j- .• j i 



Anrf t,« ,,„« I . u ^■"'*y^° "^y^"^' extends us jurisdiction and enhances its 



And my poor heart had shudder'd at the ;„,„,„,. .„ u • . ■ 



interest to be an improvement, in an art 



whose professed object is to stir the pas- 

 si'jiij by tlie imitatiiin of human actions? 

 Id saying this I do not mean to justify 

 the breach of decorum, tiie neglect of 



sound 

 But now immiirM for twenty tedious years. 

 Where nought my listening cares can catch 



around 

 But fearful noise of dan^e.- and alarms. 



The frequent threat of death, and constant probability, the anachronisms and other 



diitofarms, extravagancies of il)e foiinders of the' 



Ah! what have I in dying to bemoan? modern theatte. Because the first disci- 



What punishment in death can they devise P'*^* '^^. the school were not models of 



For her wlio living only lives to groan, perfection, it does not follow that the 



And see continual death before her eyes? Inndamental ma-.ims were defective. 



Comfort's in death, where 'tis in life The rudeneSs of their workmanship is no 



unknown; proof of the inferiority of the material; 



"Who death expects feels more than he nor does the want of skill deprive them 



_, who dies:— of ,hg merit of having discovered the 



Though too much valour may our fortunetry, n-.ine. The faults objected to them form 



To live in fear ot death IS many times to die. „o necessary part of the system they 



Where have 1 e'er repos'd in silent nighr, introduced. Their followers in every 



But death's stern image stalk'd around country have either completely corrected 



my bed ? 



What morning e'er arose on me with light, 

 But on my health some sad disaster bred? 

 Did Fortune ever aid my war or flight. 

 Or grant a refuge for my hapless head ? 

 Still at my life some fearful phantom aim'd, 

 My draughts with poison drugg'd, my towers 

 with treachery flamed. 

 And now with fatal certainty I know 

 Is come t!ie hour that my sad being ends, 



gradually reformed sfch abuses. 

 Those who bow not implicitly to the 

 authority of Aristotle, yet avoid such 

 violent outrages as are common in our 

 early plays. And those who pique them, 

 selves on the strict observance of his 

 laws, betray in the conduct, the senti- 

 ments, the characters, and the dialogue 

 of their pieces (especially of thi-ir come- 



Where life must perish with a single blow; ^'*^s)» '"Ofe resemblance to the nuKlern 



Then mark her death whom stedfast faith 'f"*" '''^ antient theatre: their ci.de niay 



attends: be Grecian, but their manners in spite 



My cheeks uncbang'd, my inward calm of themselves are Spanish, English, or 



shall shew, French: — they may renounce their pedi- 



While free from foes, serene, my generous gree, and even ciiange their dress, but 

 friends, they cannot divest their features of a cer- 

 Imeet my death— or rather I should say, ,aj„ family likeness to their poetical pro- 

 Meet my eternal hfe, my everlasting day. genitors. " The bef;ii.nii g of this race of 

 AKTiENT AND MODERN DRAMA. poets, like the origin of luUioiis, is some* 



The Greek tiagedians are probably what obscure. It would be idle to exa- 



superior 10 all moderns, if we except Ka- mine where the first play upon such a 



cine, in the correctness of their taste, and model was written ; becauj.e many of the 



their equals at least in the sublimity of earliest dramas in every modern language 



their poetry, and in the just and spirited are lost. But to xvbatever nation the 



delineation of those events and passions invention is due, the prevalence of the 



which they represent. These, however, modern system is in a great measure to 



are the nurits of the execution rather be attributed to Spain; and perhaps 



than of the design; the talents of the more to Lope de Vega than to any other 



disciple, not the excelle'ice of ihe school, individual of that country. The number 



They prove the skill of the workman, and merit of his plays, at n period when 



not the perfection of the system. With- the Castilian language was generally stu« 



out dwelling on the expulsiim of the cho- died throughout Europe, directed the at- 



»us (a most unnatural and inconvenient tentum of foreigners to the Spanish the- 



machinc), the moderns, by admitting a atre ; and probably induced thern more 



ceroplication of plot, have introduced a than the works of any one writer to form 



greater variety of incidents and charac- their compositions upon the model which 



ters. The province of invention is en- Corneille and others afterwards je- 



larged ; new passions, or at least new fined, 



forms of the same passions, are brought his rules of compositiobt. 



within the scope of diamatic poet»y. With regard to the unities of time, he 



asserts 



