M T. 



A< TA 



7(1 



Tb wonl Act* has been used in M analogous way in other instances 

 in modern time*. The ' Act* Sanctorum ' denote generally all the old 

 stories of the mutyn of the Church ; and, specially, that Urge work 

 begun in 1643 by the Jesuit Holland, and continued by hi* successors 

 to 1794, in 63 folio volume*, which contain such account*. The ' Act* 



in 1080, by Otto Mencken, a profewor of Leipzig, and 

 written in I ilin It was published monthly, and was continued for a 

 oantury. Other journals of a like kind also adopted the name of Acta. 

 The name of ' Transactions ' in now given in England to the AcU of 

 moot learned and scientific bodies : the AcU of the Court* of Justice, 

 ao far as they are made public, are called ' Report*,' the ' Acta forensia ' 

 of the Hotnani, D. 26. 8. 21, while the proceeding* of the courts as 

 registered are called ' Records.' 



(Rotteck aud Welcker, SlaaU-LtJcico*, art. by W.) 



ACT (in the Drama), that portion of a play which is separated from 

 the rent by an interval, during which the stage is left empty, und the 

 action is supposed to proceed unseen by the spectators. In the Greek 

 drama there were no act* ; although in some modern editions, such as 

 Burton's < Pentalogia,' we find Greek play* thus divided. The language 

 does not rjomnno a word answering to the Latin and English ' Act.' 

 Among the Greeks the stage was never left empty from the beginning 

 to the end of the performance. When the other acton retired, those 

 forming the chorus still remained, aud continued the business of the 

 play by their songs. For these songs, it is important to observe, were 

 in general essential parts of the drama ; they were not of the nature of 

 a piece of music, or a dance, or any other extrinsic representation, 

 thrown iu merely to fill up a chasm in the action ; they carried forward 

 the action in the game manner as the ordinary dialogue did. For an 

 exact copy of the form of a Greek drama in this respect, the English 

 reader may be referred to the ' Sampson Agonistes ' of Milton. In that 

 play there is no division into acts ; nor is there any such division in 

 Buchanan's two Latin tragedies, entitled, ' Jephthes ' and ' Baptist**,' 

 which are also professedly composed upon the Greek model. The 

 latter poet, we may add, has followed the same plan in his translations 

 of the ' Medea ' and the ' Alceutin ' of Euripide.-. l-'rom this const it ution 

 of the Greek drama, it naturally followed, that the real duration of the 

 .ictiou of any play could not well be supposed greatly to exceed that of 

 iU theatrical representation. In other words, what has been called the 

 Unity of Time became a principle almost invariably observed in every 

 dramatic composition. On the Roman stage there was no chorus, and 

 the play was divided into acts, as on our own. But, although Plant us 

 has frequently in his comedies supposed a considerable portion of time 

 to pass between the close of one act and the opening of another, the 

 most famous of the Latin dramatists. Terence, has not availed himself 

 of this liberty, but has adhered closely to the practice of his Grecian 

 models, in not permitting the interval between the acts to form more 

 than a very short interruption of the progress of the story. By modern 

 dramatist*, however, the practice of dividing a play into acU has 

 generally been taken advanUtnge of to extend the time of the story 

 greatly beyond the space to which it wan necessary to confine it on the 

 Greek stage. Each act, in fact, is now what the Greeks would have 

 called a separate drama, except that it does not contain a complete 

 plot ; aud the whole play may be compared to those Trilogies of the 

 Greeks, in which three dramas, representing so many successive separate 

 part* of the same history, followed one another in one theatrical 

 exhibition. Perhaps it was this consideration which made the Romans 

 call each of the separate portions in question an Act or A ctut ; for that 

 word is exactly a translation of the Greek Ipa/ia, which was used to 

 .u^iftr^t.. an entire play. The term, therefore, may be taken as, in iU 

 original and proper sense, denoting a distinct and, to a certain extent, 

 independent theatrical action or picture, although capable also of being 

 introduced as one of a series of such pictures, united by some common 

 subject. And this is precisely what Shnkspere must be understood to 

 meant when, in the famous speech which he puU into the mouth of 

 Jaques, in ' As you like it,' comparing the world to a stage, he goes on 

 to say, " One man in his time plays many parts, his aett being seven 

 ages. The infant, the school-boy, Ac., are acU only iu the sense of 

 being so many separate pictures or exhibitions of human life, each 

 complete in itself, although following each other according to a natural 

 order of succession, like the acU of a play. Viewed in thi.-i li^ht. it 

 will be perceived that the division into act* is really that distinction of 

 the modern drama which, more than anything else, gives to it iU 

 peculiar character. Dr. Johnson has observed that, in modern plays, 

 ' The tuna required by the fable elapses, for the most part, between 

 the acU ; for of so much of the action as is represented, the real and 



poetical duration is the name The drama exhibit* successive 



imiUtioM of s<icassiv actions ; and why may not the second imitation 

 isprisant an sction that happened years after the first, if it be so con- 

 ntkotad with it, that nothing but time can be supposed to intervene. 

 Time Is, of all modes of existence, most obsequious to the imagination ; 

 a lapse of years i* as easily conceived as a Upse of hours." In tie null- 

 exhibitions of the English stag* before Shakspsrs, the violation of the 

 classical unities was startling to educated minds. Thu .Sidney, in hi* 

 Defsnet of Poany,'" Where the stage should always repreneMt but 

 one place, and the uttermost time presupposed in it should be, both >.y 



t-cept and common reason, but one day, there is both many 

 days and many places inartincially imagined." 



We may here remark, that although the French dramatic writers 

 have adhered to the principle of leaving the stage empty ..nl\ 

 end of an act, many of the F.ngliah have followed a different practice. 

 In Shakspere particularly, every successive scene uniformly presents 

 a new set of characters, and most commonly a change of place also. 

 He rarely interrupt* the action, however, for any considerable space, 

 except during the interval between two acU ; but here he does not 

 hesitate to pass over any length of time he may find convenient In 

 the ' Winter's Tale,' Perdita, who wo* a new-born infant at the and of 

 the third act, is grown up a young woman at the beginning of i lie- 

 fourth. In this instance, indeed, the dramatist introduces T 

 explain and apologise for the license he had taken to 



o I 



O'er sixteen years and leave the growth untried 

 Of that wide gap." 



Time is here said to appear ' ag Chorus ; ' and hi the beginning of 

 Henry V., Chorus is also brought forward to request the audience to 

 allow their thoughu iu the course of the representation to pass from 

 one place to another : 



"Jumping o'er times ; 



Turning the accomplishment of many yean 



Into an hour-glan." 



Neither of these personagee, however, performs exactly the office of the 

 ancient Chorus. 



We may add, that the old English Mysteries and Moralit 

 produce of our national dramatic genius, were long destitute of any 

 division either into scenes or act*. The earliest of the Moralities 

 which assume the regular dramatic shape, are not more ancient than 

 the beginning of the reign of Elizabeth. Moralities continued to be 

 both printed and acted long after this date. ' The Chester Mysteries ' 

 were performed in the year 1674. Down to this time there is every 

 reason to believe that the scene never was changed from the beginning 

 to the end of any stage-spectacle. 



As for the Moralities, they were acted even in the ivi^ii of James I., 

 and they are enumerated under the name of 'Morals' in the 

 granted to the company of which Shakspere was a member in 1603. 

 But even several of our early tragedies and comedies, down to an era 

 subsequent to this, were without any division into either -< 

 acte. There is no such division in Pr> i.ii-e.-,,' the i 



which Shakspere is supposed to allude in ' Henry V..' and whii 

 author entitles ' A lamentable Tragedy mixed full of pleasant Mirth.' 

 printed in 1501 ; nor in Peele's ' David and Bethwbe.' which a] 



. In the tragedy of ' Soliman and Perseda,' 1599 (supposed to 

 be by Kyd), there are acts, but not scenes ; but there arc neither one 

 nor other in Dekker's ' Satiromantix, or the Trussing of the Hun 

 Poet,' nor in the comedy of the ' Wily Begiuled,' both of whii-h 

 appeared after the commencement of the 17th century, the 1 

 late as 1623. 



Much discussion has taken place among the eiiti, -, >, the .. 

 the rule which restricU a regular ib <n to the 



of neither mure nor less than five acU ; and which Horace, in IT 

 of Poetry,' has laid down in a peremptory and well-known veme. I'|.n 

 this subject the French writer, Marmontel, has delivered a very .-en-il ile 

 judgment, the substance of which is, that the rule neither stand 

 such a foundation as to constitute it an essential law. nor in it -o nn 

 reasonable as to deserve to ! banished from the th' 



ive itu just extent given to it. and no more. The law of nature 

 must be followed, which i.s cnjuTior to that of art. 



ACT, in the universities, an exercise to be performed by .-indent* 



'hey are admitted to their degreed. In the I'niversity 'ot ' 

 it has almost fallen into disuse, and in Dublin is a mere form; lint at 

 Cambridge it is still preserved as a preliminary test of the comparative 

 meriU of the candidates for the degree of Bachelor of Arts, who aspire 

 to I'niversity honour*. It is also performed bycandid.it> - f>.rth>->! 

 in law, physic, or divinity. The student proposes cert ns con- 



nected with his subject to the presiding officer of tin- *-/>W. (th. 

 in which acts are kept), who thereupon nominates other stud. 

 oppose them. The discussion is carried on syllogistic-ally and in Latin. 

 and terminates by the presiding officer >|i! i Hi.. 



person who is said to " keep the net." and his >/ 

 them with a short, compliment to c.ioh. in pr]Kiifioii to his deserts. 



Ai'TA DM UN > .n/s of th.- d:iy) w;w the title of a r 



to use the nearest modern term, drawn up and published >laily at ! 

 both under the republic and the empire. It a|i|>ar- 

 an abstract of the proceeding <-i ih>- puMic asM-mt.lie... of the law 

 courts, of the punishment of .itt.nd.1^. an any public 



buildings or > it her works in progress, together with .1 list >if births, 

 deaths, marriages, and divorces, cV :ne* of 



Rome, provision was made under .. n-ligioiu sanction for the due 

 registration of birth, assumption of th.' '<>/" ,irilit (or dress of man- 

 hood), and death, accompanied Ly the payment of a certain fee into 

 the respective treasuries of the goddesses Juno, Lucina. Juvcnt < 

 Venus Libitina. From the registers thus formed such extn 

 Wre important might be made for publication. The law courts would 

 furnish authority i ment of <liv..r.<-; ami in this aiticle of 



