yet one is apt to fufpect fome fallacy, confidering that no critic, however ftrict, has ventured to confine the unities of place and of time within fo narrow bounds.* A view of the Grecian drama, compared with our own, may perhaps relieve us from this dilemma: if they be differently conftructed as fhall be made evident, it is poffible that the foregoing reafoning may not be equally applicable to both. This is an article that, with relation to the prefent fubject, has not been examined by any writer. All authors agree, that tragedy in Greece was derived from the hymns in praife of Bacchus, which were fung in parts by a chorus. Thefpis to relieve the fingers, and for the fake of variety, introduced one actor; whofe province it was to explain hiftorically the fubject of the fong, and who occafionally reprefented one or other perfonage. Efchylus, introducing a fecond actor, formed the dialogue, by which the performance became dramatic; and the actors were multiplied when the fubject reprefented made it neceffary. But ftill, the chorus, which gave a beginning to tragedy, was confidered as an effential part. The firft fcene, generally unfolds the preliminary circumftances that lead to the grand event: and this fcene is by Ariftotle termed the prologue. In the second scene, where the action properly begins, the chorus is introduced, which, as originally, continues upon the stage during the whole performance: the chorus frequently makes one in the dialogue; and *Boffu, after obferving with wonderous critical fagacity, that winter is an improper feafon for an epic poem, and night no lefs improper for tragedy; admits however, that an epic poem may be fpread through the whole fummer months, and a tragedy through the whole funthine hours of the longest fummer-day. Du poem epique, 1. 3. Chap. 12. At that rate an English tragedy may be longer than a French tragedy; and in Nova Zembla the time of a tragedy and of an epic poem may be the fame. and when the dialogue happens to be fufpended, the chorus, during the interval, is employ'd in finging. Sophocles adheres to this plan religiously. Euripides is not altogether fo correct. In fome of his pieces, it becomes neceflary to remove the chorus for a little time. But when that unusual step is rifked, matters are fo ordered as not to interrupt the reprefentation the chorus never leave the ftage of their own accord, but at the command of fome principal perfonage, who conftantly waits their return. Thus the Grecian drama is a continued reprefentation without interruption; a circumftance that merits attention. A continued reprefentation without a paufe, affords not opportunity to vary the place of action, nor to prolong the time of the action beyond that of the reprefentation, To a reprefentation fo confined in place and time, the foregoing reafoning is strictly applicable: a real or feigned action that is brought to a conclufion after confiderable intervals of time and frequent changes of place, cannot accurately be copied in a reprefentation that admits no latitude in either. Hence it is, that the unities of place and of time, were, or ought to have been, ftrictly obferved in the Greek tragedies; which is made neceffary by the very conftitution of their drama, for it is abfurd to compofe a tragedy that can not be justly reprefented. Modern critics, who for our drama pretend to establish rules founded on the practice of the Greeks, are guilty of an egregious blunder. The unities of place and of time were in Greece, as we fee, a matter of neceflity, not of choice; and I am now ready to fhow, that if we fubmit to fuch fetters, it must be from choice, not neceflity. This will be evident upon taking a view of the conftitution of our drama, which differs widely from that of Greece; whether W 3 more more or lefs perfect, is a different point, to be handled afterward. By dropping the chorus, opportunity is afforded to divide the representation by intervals of time, during which the ftage is evacuated and the fpectacle fufpended. This qualifies our drama for fubjects fpread through a wide fpace both of time and of place the time fuppofed to pafs during the fufpenfion of the reprefentation, is not measured by the time of the fufpenfion; and any place may be fuppofed when the reprefentation is renewed, with as much facility as when it commenced: by which means, many fubjects can be juftly reprefented in our theatres, that were excluded from thofe of ancient Greece. This doctrine may be illustrated, by comparing a modern play to a fet of hiftorical pictures; let us fuppofe them five in number, and the refemblance will be complete. Each of the pictures refembles an act in one of our plays: there muft neceffarily be the strictest unity of place and of time in each picture; and the fame neceffity requires these two unities during each act of a play, becaufe during an act there is no interruption in the fpectacle. Now, when we view in fucceffion a number of fuch hiftorical pictures, let it be, for example, the hiftory of Alexander by Le Brun,we have no difficulty to conceive, that months or years have paffed between the events exhibited in two different pictures, though the interruption, is imperceptible in paffing our eye. from the one to the other; and we have as little difficulty to conceive a change of place, however great. In which view, there is truly no difference between five acts of a modern play, and five fuch pictures. Where the reprefentation is fufpended, we can with the greateft facility fuppofe any length of time or any change of place: the fpectator, it is true, may be confciousthat the real time and place are not the the fame with what are employed in the reprefentation: but this is a work of reflection; and by the fame reflection he may also be conscious, that Garrick is not King Lear, that the playhoufe is not Dover cliffs, nor the noife he hears thunder and lightning. In a word, after an interruption of the reprefentation, it is no more difficult for a fpectator to imagine a new place, or a different time, than at the commencement of the play, to imagine himself at Rome, or in a period of time two thousand years back. And indeed, it is abundantly ridiculous, that a critic, who is willing to hold candle-light for fun-fhine, and fome painted canvaffes for a palace or a prifon, fhould be fo fcrupulous about admitting any latitude of place or of time in the fable, beyond what is neceffary in the reprefentation. There are, I acknowledge, fome effects of great latitude in time that never ought to be indulged in a compofition for the theatre: nothing can be more abfurd, than at the close to exhibit a full grown perfon who appears a child at the beginning: the mind rejects, as contrary to all probability, fuch latitude of time as is requifite for a change fo remarkable. The greatest change from place to place hath not altogether the fame bad effect. In the bulk of human affairs place is not material; and the mind, when occupied with an interefting event, is little regardful of minuté circumstances: thefe may be varied at will, because they scarce make any impreffion. But though I have taken arms to rescue modern poets from the defpotifm of modern critics, I would not be understood to justify liberty without any referve. An unbounded licence with relation to place and time, is faulty for a reafon that seems to have been overlooked, which is, that it feldom fails to break the unity of action. In the ordinary courfe of human affairs, fingle events, fuch as are fit to be reprefented on the ftage, are confined to W 4 a narrow a narrow spot, and commonly employ no great extent of time we accordingly feldom find ftrict unity of action in a dramatic compofition, where any remarkable latitude is indulged in thefe particulars. I fay further, that a compofition which employs but one place, and requires not a greater length of time than is neceffary for the reprefentation, is fo much the more perfect because the confining an event within fo narrow bounds, contributes to the unity of action: and also prevents that labour, however flight, which the mind must undergo in imagining frequent changes of place and many intervals of time. But ftill I muft infift, that fuch limitation of place and time as was neceffary in the Grecian drama, is no rule to us; and therefore, that though fuch limitation adds one beauty more to the compofition, it is at beft but a refinement, which may juftly give place to a thou fand beauties more fubftantial. And I may add, that it is extremely difficult, I was about to fay impracticable, to contract within the Grecian limits, any fable fo fruitful of incidents in number and variety, as to give full scope to the fluctuation of paffion, It may now appear, that critics who put the unities of place and of time upon the fame footing with the unity of action, making them all equally effential, have not attended to the nature and conflitution of the modern drama. If they admit an interrupted reprefentation, with which no writer finds fault, it is abfurd to reject its greateft advantage, that of reprefenting many interefting fubjects excluded from the Grecian ftage. If there needs must be a reformation, why not reftore the ancient chorus and the ancient continuity of action? There is certainly no medium for to admit an interruption without relaxing from the strict unities of place and of time, is in effect to load us with all the inconveniences of the an, |
