I am surprised that the judicious and ingenious Mr. de Muralt, who has
published some letters on the English and French nations, should have
confined himself; in treating of comedy, merely to censure Shadwell the
comic writer. This author was had in pretty great contempt in Mr. de
Muralt's time, and was not the poet of the polite part of the nation. His
dramatic pieces, which pleased some time in acting, were despised by all
persons of taste, and might be compared to many plays which I have seen
in France, that drew crowds to the playhouse, at the same time that they
were intolerable to read; and of which it might be said, that the whole
city of Paris exploded them, and yet all flocked to see them represented
on the stage. Methinks Mr. de Muralt should have mentioned an excellent
comic writer (living when he was in England), I mean Mr. Wycherley, who
was a long time known publicly to be happy in the good graces of the most
celebrated mistress of King Charles II. This gentleman, who passed his
life among persons of the highest distinction, was perfectly well
acquainted with their lives and their follies, and painted them with the
strongest pencil, and in the truest colours. He has drawn a misanthrope
or man-hater, in imitation of that of Moliere. All Wycherley's strokes
are stronger and bolder than those of our misanthrope, but then they are
less delicate, and the rules of decorum are not so well observed in this
play. The English writer has corrected the only defect that is in
Moliere's comedy, the thinness of the plot, which also is so disposed
that the characters in it do not enough raise our concern. The English
comedy affects us, and the contrivance of the plot is very ingenious, but
at the same time it is too bold for the French manners. The fable is
this:--A captain of a man-of-war, who is very brave, open-hearted, and
inflamed with a spirit of contempt for all mankind, has a prudent,
sincere friend, whom he yet is suspicious of; and a mistress that loves
him with the utmost excess of passion. The captain so far from returning
her love, will not even condescend to look upon her, but confides
entirely in a false friend, who is the most worthless wretch living. At
the same time he has given his heart to a creature, who is the greatest
coquette and the most perfidious of her sex, and he is so credulous as to
be confident she is a Penelope, and his false friend a Cato. He embarks
on board his ship in order to go and fight the Dutch, having left all his
money, his jewels, and everything he had in the world to this virtuous
creature, whom at the same time he recommends to the care of his supposed
faithful friend. Nevertheless the real man of honour, whom he suspects
so unaccountably, goes on board the ship with him, and the mistress, on
whom he would not bestow so much as one glance, disguises herself in the
habit of a page, and is with him the whole voyage, without his once
knowing that she is of a sex different from that she attempts to pass
for, which, by the way, is not over natural.
The captain having blown up his own ship in an engagement, returns to
England abandoned and undone, accompanied by his page and his friend,
without knowing the friendship of the one or the tender passion of the
other. Immediately he goes to the jewel among women, who he expected had
preserved her fidelity to him and the treasure he had left in her hands.
He meets with her indeed, but married to the honest knave in whom he had
reposed so much confidence, and finds she had acted as treacherously with
regard to the casket he had entrusted her with. The captain can scarce
think it possible that a woman of virtue and honour can act so vile a
part; but to convince him still more of the reality of it, this very
worthy lady falls in love with the little page, and will force him to her
embraces. But as it is requisite justice should be done, and that in a
dramatic piece virtue ought to be rewarded and vice punished, it is at
last found that the captain takes his page's place, and lies with his
faithless mistress, cuckolds his treacherous friend, thrusts his sword
through his body, recovers his casket, and marries his page. You will
observe that this play is also larded with a petulant, litigious old
woman (a relation of the captain), who is the most comical character that
was ever brought upon the stage.
Wycherley has also copied from Moliere another play, of as singular and
bold a cast, which is a kind of _Ecole des Femmes_, or, _School for
Married Women_.
The principal character in this comedy is one Homer, a sly fortune
hunter, and the terror of all the City husbands. This fellow, in order
to play a surer game, causes a report to be spread, that in his last
illness, the surgeons had found it necessary to have him made a eunuch.
Upon his appearing in this noble character, all the husbands in town
flock to him with their wives, and now poor Homer is only puzzled about
his choice. However, he gives the preference particularly to a little
female peasant, a very harmless, innocent creature, who enjoys a fine
flush of health, and cuckolds her husband with a simplicity that has
infinitely more merit than the witty malice of the most experienced
ladies. This play cannot indeed be called the school of good morals, but
it is certainly the school of wit and true humour.
Sir John Vanbrugh has written several comedies, which are more humorous
than those of Mr. Wycherley, but not so ingenious. Sir John was a man of
pleasure, and likewise a poet and an architect. The general opinion is,
that he is as sprightly in his writings as he is heavy in his buildings.
It is he who raised the famous Castle of Blenheim, a ponderous and
lasting monument of our unfortunate Battle of Hochstet. Were the
apartments but as spacious as the walls are thick, this castle would be
commodious enough. Some wag, in an epitaph he made on Sir John Vanbrugh,
has these lines:--
"Earth lie light on him, for he
Laid many a heavy load on thee."
Sir John having taken a tour into France before the glorious war that
broke out in 1701, was thrown into the Bastille, and detained there for
some time, without being ever able to discover the motive which had
prompted our ministry to indulge him with this mark of their distinction.
He wrote a comedy during his confinement; and a circumstance which
appears to me very extraordinary is, that we don't meet with so much as a
single satirical stroke against the country in which he had been so
injuriously treated.
The late Mr. Congreve raised the glory of comedy to a greater height than
any English writer before or since his time. He wrote only a few plays,
but they are all excellent in their kind. The laws of the drama are
strictly observed in them; they abound with characters all which are
shadowed with the utmost delicacy, and we don't meet with so much as one
low or coarse jest. The language is everywhere that of men of honour,
but their actions are those of knaves--a proof that he was perfectly well
acquainted with human nature, and frequented what we call polite company.
He was infirm and come to the verge of life when I knew him. Mr.
Congreve had one defect, which was his entertaining too mean an idea of
his first profession (that of a writer), though it was to this he owed
his fame and fortune. He spoke of his works as of trifles that were
beneath him; and hinted to me, in our first conversation, that I should
visit him upon no other footing than that of a gentleman who led a life
of plainness and simplicity. I answered, that had he been so unfortunate
as to be a mere gentleman, I should never have come to see him; and I was
very much disgusted at so unseasonable a piece of vanity.
Mr. Congreve's comedies are the most witty and regular, those of Sir John
Vanbrugh most gay and humorous, and those of Mr. Wycherley have the
greatest force and spirit. It may be proper to observe that these fine
geniuses never spoke disadvantageously of Moliere; and that none but the
contemptible writers among the English have endeavoured to lessen the
character of that great comic poet. Such Italian musicians as despise
Lully are themselves persons of no character or ability; but a Buononcini
esteems that great artist, and does justice to his merit.
The English have some other good comic writers living, such as Sir
Richard Steele and Mr. Cibber, who is an excellent player, and also Poet
Laureate--a title which, how ridiculous soever it may be thought, is yet
worth a thousand crowns a year (besides some considerable privileges) to
the person who enjoys it. Our illustrious Corneille had not so much.
To conclude. Don't desire me to descend to particulars with regard to
these English comedies, which I am so fond of applauding; nor to give you
a single smart saying or humorous stroke from Wycherley or Congreve. We
don't laugh in rending a translation. If you have a mind to understand
the English comedy, the only way to do this will be for you to go to
England, to spend three years in London, to make yourself master of the
English tongue, and to frequent the playhouse every night. I receive but
little pleasure from the perusal of Aristophanes and Plautus, and for
this reason, because I am neither a Greek nor a Roman. The delicacy of
the humour, the allusion, the _a propos_--all these are lost to a
foreigner.
But it is different with respect to tragedy, this treating only of
exalted passions and heroical follies, which the antiquated errors of
fable or history have made sacred. OEdipus, Electra, and such-like
characters, may with as much propriety be treated of by the Spaniards,
the English, or us, as by the Greeks. But true comedy is the speaking
picture of the follies and ridiculous foibles of a nation; so that he
only is able to judge of the painting who is perfectly acquainted with
the people it represents.