On Dramatic Reprefentations. 105 
an énquiry concerning the fource of the intereft we 
take in fpedtacles of terror and diftrefs. It is fufficient 
to obferve, that juft the fame difficulty here occurs 
in reality, as in fiction. Every awful and terrific 
{cene, from an eruption of Etna, or an attack on 
Gibraltar, to a ftreet-fire or a boxing-match, is 
gazed at by affembled multitudes. In hiftories, is 
it not the page of battles, ‘* treafons and murders,” 
on which we dwell with moft avidity? I do not 
hefitate to affert, that we never behold with pleafure 
in fiitious reprefentation, what we fhould not have 
viewed with a fimilar fenfation in real action. ‘The 
truth is, that many of the tragic diftreffes are fo 
blended with lofty and heroic fentiments, that the 
impreffion of forrow for the fufferer is loft in applaufe 
and admiration. 
When Cato groans, who does not wifh to bleed? 
And when this is not the cafe, but pure mifery is 
painted without the alleviations of glory and con- 
{cious virtue, the effects on the beholder are 
invariably pain and difguft. We are, indeed, by 
the ftrong impulfe of curiofity, led to fuch repre- 
fentations, as the crowd are to fights and executions ; 
but what man of nice feelings would go a fecond 
time to fee Fatal Curiofity, or the butchery of a 
Damien? 
With refpect to the principle which renders a 
degree of dramatic unity neceflary, it feems not 
difficult to be afcertained.  Congruity is alike effential 
in real and in fictitious {cenes to preferve a continuity 
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