[Footnote 1: Prospect]
[Footnote 2: shew]
[Footnote 3: has likewise]
* * * * *
No. 370. Monday, May 5, 1712. Steele.
'Totus Mundus agit Histrionem.'
Many of my fair Readers, as well as very gay and well-received Persons
of the other Sex, are extremely perplexed at the Latin Sentences at the
Head of my Speculations; I do not know whether I ought not to indulge
them with Translations of each of them: However, I have to-day taken
down from the Top of the Stage in Drury-Lane a bit of Latin which often
stands in their View, and signifies that the whole World acts the
Player. It is certain that if we look all round us, and behold the
different Employments of Mankind, you hardly see one who is not, as the
Player is, in an assumed Character. The Lawyer, who is vehement and loud
in a Cause wherein he knows he has not the Truth of the Question on his
Side, is a Player as to the personated Part, but incomparably meaner
than he as to the Prostitution of himself for Hire; because the
Pleader's Falshood introduces Injustice, the Player feigns for no other
end but to divert or instruct you. The Divine, whose Passions transport
him to say any thing with any View but promoting the Interests of true
Piety and Religion, is a Player with a still greater Imputation of
Guilt, in proportion to his depreciating a Character more sacred.
Consider all the different Pursuits and Employments of Men, and you will
find half their Actions tend to nothing else but Disguise and Imposture;
and all that is done which proceeds not from a Man's very self, is the
Action of a Player. For this Reason it is that I make so frequent
mention of the Stage: It is, with me, a Matter of the highest
Consideration what Parts are well or ill performed, what Passions or
Sentiments are indulged or cultivated, and consequently what Manners and
Customs are transfused from the Stage to the World, which reciprocally
imitate each other. As the Writers of Epick Poems introduce shadowy
Persons, and represent Vices and Virtues under the Characters of Men and
Women; so I, who am a SPECTATOR in the World, may perhaps sometimes make
use of the Names of the Actors on the Stage, to represent or admonish
those who transact Affairs in the World. When I am commending Wilks for
representing the Tenderness of a Husband and a Father in Mackbeth, the
Contrition of a reformed Prodigal in Harry the Fourth, the winning
Emptiness of a young Man of Good-nature and Wealth in the Trip to the
Jubilee, [1]--the Officiousness of an artful Servant in the Fox: [2]
when thus I celebrate Wilks, I talk to all the World who are engaged in
any of those Circumstances. If I were to speak of Merit neglected,
mis-applied, or misunderstood, might not I say Estcourt has a great
Capacity? But it is not the Interest of others who bear a Figure on the
Stage that his Talents were understood; it is their Business to impose
upon him what cannot become him, or keep out of his hands any thing in
which he would Shine. Were one to raise a Suspicion of himself in a Man
who passes upon the World for a fine Thing, in order to alarm him, one
might say, if Lord Foppington [3] were not on the Stage, (Cibber acts
the false Pretensions to a genteel Behaviour so very justly), he would
have in the generality of Mankind more that would admire than deride
him. When we come to Characters directly Comical, it is not to be
imagin'd what Effect a well-regulated Stage would have upon Men's
Manners. The Craft of an Usurer, the Absurdity of a rich Fool, the
awkward Roughness of a Fellow of half Courage, the ungraceful Mirth of a
Creature of half Wit, might be for ever put out of Countenance by proper
Parts for Dogget. Johnson by acting Corbacchio [4] the other Night, must
have given all who saw him a thorough Detestation of aged Avarice. The
Petulancy of a peevish old Fellow, who loves and hates he knows not why,
is very excellently performed by the Ingenious Mr. William Penkethman in
the Fop's Fortune;[5] where, in the Character of Don Cholerick Snap
Shorto de Testy, he answers no Questions but to those whom he likes, and
wants no account of any thing from those he approves. Mr. Penkethman is
also Master of as many Faces in the Dumb-Scene as can be expected from a
Man in the Circumstances of being ready to perish out of Fear and
Hunger: He wonders throughout the whole Scene very masterly, without
neglecting his Victuals. If it be, as I have heard it sometimes
mentioned, a great Qualification for the World to follow Business and
Pleasure too, what is it in the Ingenious Mr. Penkethman to represent a
Sense of Pleasure and Pain at the same time; as you may see him do this
Evening? [6]
As it is certain that a Stage ought to be wholly suppressed, or
judiciously encouraged, while there is one in the Nation, Men turned for
regular Pleasure cannot employ their Thoughts more usefully, for the
Diversion of Mankind, than by convincing them that it is in themselves
to raise this Entertainment to the greatest Height. It would be a great
Improvement, as well as Embellishment to the Theatre, if Dancing were
more regarded, and taught to all the Actors. One who has the Advantage
of such an agreeable girlish Person as Mrs. Bicknell, joined with her
Capacity of Imitation, could in proper Gesture and Motion represent all
the decent Characters of Female Life. An amiable Modesty in one Aspect
of a Dancer, an assumed Confidence in another, a sudden Joy in another,
a falling off with an Impatience of being beheld, a Return towards the
Audience with an unsteady Resolution to approach them, and a well-acted
Sollicitude to please, would revive in the Company all the fine Touches
of Mind raised in observing all the Objects of Affection or Passion they
had before beheld. Such elegant Entertainments as these, would polish
the Town into Judgment in their Gratifications; and Delicacy in Pleasure
is the first step People of Condition take in Reformation from Vice.
Mrs. Bicknell has the only Capacity for this sort of Dancing of any on
the Stage; and I dare say all who see her Performance tomorrow Night,
when sure the Romp will do her best for her own Benefit, will be of my
Mind.