172 ACCOUNT of the GERMAN THEATRE. 



forming us of what pafles in their minds, not by what the 

 fcene fhews in their actions, or what the fituation naturally 

 leads them to fay, but, if we may be allowed to refort to the 

 plain honeft confeffion of Mr Bayes, in order to give an op- 

 portunity of introducing good things. To this fault, the fimple 

 and the polifhed ftate of the drama are equally liable ; the firft 

 from that chace of images and analogies which the luxuriance 

 of fancy dictates, and which tafle has not yet taught her to re- 

 flrain ; the other, from a rigid obfervance of order and unity, 

 which adds to the narrative in proportion as it limits the exhi- 

 bition of the fcene. We find accordingly this defect: in many 

 paflages of the older poets ; and not lefs, and indeed in a much 

 more continued ftrain, in the modern dramatifls, particularly 

 the French, where the tirade, or firing of fine lines, is often 

 introduced, not to exprefs the feelings of the fpeakers, but 

 merely to fhew the eloquence of the poet. 



In my enumeration of the pieces contained in this collec- 

 tion, I mentioned, that mofl of thofe which are called come- 

 dies, rather come under the denomination of drames, containing 

 a delineation of the affections and paflions of ordinary life, 

 more allied to tragedy than to comedy, being only related to 

 comedy in its perfons, but to tragedy in its fentiments and its 

 fufFerings. Its fufFerings, however, are rather of feeling • than 

 of fituation, which is one great reafon of the interefl it excites 

 in that clafs, of people, a very amiable one, whofe minds from 

 nature, reading, or habit, pofTefs an exceflive and high flrained 

 delicacy and fenfibility. The fituation and diflrefTes of the 

 perfons reprefented in it, are but little removed from the fitua- 

 tion in which that clafs of readers are placed, or thofe diflrefTes 

 which they often feel. Hence perhaps no fpecies of the drama 

 may be fuppofed to have a flronger effect on actual life and 

 conduct. This might lead to an interefling moral inquiry, for 

 which the prefent is not the proper place, and which indeed has 

 not been unnoticed by feveral late moral writers. In general, 



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