D R A 



83 



D R A 



in all its branches, and especially with the application 

 of astronomy to the objects of his profession. Though 

 in other respects destitute of education, he possessed a 

 wonderful portion of natural eloquence, and is said to 

 have scarcely ever been heard to utter a feeble or un- 

 graceful expression. He was, on proper occasions, un- 

 commonly generous, but, at the same time, a great eco- 

 nomist in the management of his property. Though 

 rather rough and boastful in his manners, he was high- 

 ly estimable in his private character, anxiously careful 

 of those who were under his command, and displayed 

 the greatest civility and humanity to those whom the 

 fortune of war placed in his power. In all his enter- 



prises, it was his invariable maxim to regard the service 

 of his country in the first place, the profit of his em- 

 ployers in the second, and his own interest last. " For 

 the main, we say," to use the language of Fuller, " that 

 this our Captain was a religious man towards God, and 

 his houses generally speaking churches, where he came 

 chaste in his life, just in his dealings, true of his word, 

 and merciful to those that were under him, hating no- 

 thing so much as idleness." See Biog. Britannica ; and 

 Campbell's Lives of the British Admirals, vol. i. (5) 



DRAKENSTEIN. See CAPE OF GOOD HOPE, vol. 

 v. p. 396. 



DRAMA. 



Drama. JLlRAMA, from the Greek word }f*u*, is a poem accom- 

 ^Y-_. modated to action ; a poem in which the action is not 

 related, but represented. 



The drama is the most directly imitative species of 

 poetry, perhaps the only one that can strictly be said to 

 be imitative. 



The drama naturally divides itself into different 

 provinces, according to its means, or according to its 

 ends. 



When the means exceed those of mere recitation and 

 simple action, and include dancing and singing.or instru- 

 mental music, as important or necessary parts of the 

 performance, we call it Opera, or Melo-drama, and when 

 the subject is sacred, Oratorio. When it excludes recita- 

 tion, we call it Pantomime. If we divide the drama by 

 its objects, when the end is simply to excite laughter, 

 it is Farce. When rising above the mere object of visi- 

 bility, it gives a natural, amusing, and interesting draft 

 of manners and character, it is called Comedy. When 

 the end accomplished is to excite sympathy in the 

 strongest degree, and particularly the emotions of com- 

 passion and terror, the composition is entitled to the 

 name of Tragedy. To the latter division of the drama, 

 viz. that which arises from the distinction of its objects, 

 we shall principally attend. 



As the spectacle of human existence, which the 

 drama professes to imitate, exhibits in the original a 

 constant alternation and mixture of gay and of sor- 

 rowful objects, it occurs as an obvious question, whe- 

 ther the separation of tragedy and comedy be an 

 artificial or natural distinction ? and as a corollary 

 question, whether, on just principles of taste, they 

 ought to be kept separate ? We are disposed to say, in 

 answer to the former query, that the distinction is arti- 

 ficial, and, to a certain degree, conventional. Human 

 life, it must be owned, is for ever promiscuous in her 

 exhibitions of the great and the trivial, and of the cheer- 

 ful and miserable ; so that a constant succession of either 

 solemn or mirthful scenes, is a departure from probabili- 

 ty. We believe also, that the early history of all na- 

 tional dramas, not even excepting the Greek, would dis- 

 cover them to have been tragi-comic ; and the strongest 

 advocates for a legal and secret separation of the gay and 

 the grave dramas cannot deny, that early genius has suc- 

 ceeded in giving pictures of life of this motley contex- 

 ture, in many instances delightful and faithful to nature. 

 Yet the 1 progress of human taste has also visibly led to 

 demand an unity of effect in all the productions of the 

 fine arts, and as taste is only the power of judging from 

 a comparison of models, it is not a sufficient defence of 

 tragi-comedy, that it pleases a barbarous age. When 



Drama. 



it is admitted, therefore, that the above distinction of 

 the provinces of the drama is artificial, we must regard 

 the term artificial as denoting the result of human 

 judgment with respect to art. We must not take the 

 word nature, also, in too strict a sense, as the object of 

 the imitation of art. Nature herself, as Sir Joshua 

 Reynolds has observed, must not be too closely imi- 

 tated. The imitation of existence is only valuable, 

 in as far as it excites a decided and consistent train of 

 emotions. Abrupt or equivocal feelings are much less 

 satisfactory, than the full sway of those, which, by the 

 magic of genius, are made pleasingly continuous and 

 predominant over the whole soul, whether the feelings 

 to be indulged are those of pathos or humour. The on- 

 ly limitation of this general remark respecting the plea- 

 sure of human emotions, is, that a certain degree of 

 change may heighten the pleasure by relief. But still 

 that relief must not amount to absolute and extreme 

 contrast. It may be deduced from this reasoning, if 

 admitted, that though the tone of tragedy and comedy 

 may occasionally approach each other, their highest 

 characteristics should never be equivocally blend- 

 ed. 



Tragedy has been justly defined by the ingenious H urd, Tragah . 

 to be that species of dramatic composition, of which the 

 end is, to excite the passions of pity and terror, and 

 perhaps of some others nearly allied to them. From 

 this definition of the objects of tragedy, he concludes 

 that actions, not characters and manners, are the chief 

 objects of representation. By curiosity in actions and 

 events, our hearts are moved; by curiosity in manners 

 and characters, our minds are amused. In our deep 

 emotion at a tragedy, it is the fortunate or unfortunate 

 issues of events, that, in the first instance, agitate our 

 hearts ; plot and solid action are of the first conse- 

 quence to tragedy. Still the manners and characters 

 are so far essential to it, that our grief or joy in the ca- 

 tastrophe, depends on our love or hatred of the leading 

 characters ; and the probabilities and truth of manners 

 are indispensible to create illusion, and to secure our 

 belief. The genius of comedy, while it implies that Comedy. 

 display of humour which provokes risibility, supposes 

 also genuine representations of nature, (not caricatures, 

 like farce,) and derives its beauty, perhaps, in the first 

 degree, from fidelity to the truth of life. As a painting 

 of familiar nature, comedy classes and specifically dis- 

 tinguishes the difference of human character, and in 

 the perfection of the art, requires, no less exclusively, 

 and more minutely than tragedy, an observation of all 

 the shades and varieties in the moral physiognomy of 

 man, 



