POLITICAL PLAYS
"Whoever attempteth to introduce corruption into any community,
doth much the same thing, and ought to be treated in much the
same manner with him who poisoneth a fountain."
--Dedication of the _Historical Register_.
A prolonged retirement into Dorsetshire, however pleasant were the banks
of Stour with a beautiful young wife, and a sufficient estate, could
scarce be expected of Fielding's restless genius. He was now thirty-five;
his splendid physique was as yet unimpaired by the gout that was so soon
to attack him; his powers were still hardly revealed; and, as far as we
can discover, he was, at the moment, under no pressure for money. Still,
the hunting choruses of the Squire Westerns of Dorsetshire can hardly
have long sufficed for one whom Lyttelton declared to have had "more wit
than any man I ever knew"; and the social and political conditions of the
country were increasingly calculated to inflame into practical activity
that "enthusiasm for righteousness," which Mr Gosse has so well detected
in Fielding. [1] The distracted state of the London stage, divided by the
factions of players and managers, afforded moreover an excellent
opportunity for a dramatist of some means to essay an independent venture.
And accordingly, at the beginning of 1736, we find the Harry Fielding of
the green-room and the poet's garret, the Henry Fielding Esqre of East
Stour, suddenly throwing the full force of his energies into political
life, as the manager of, and writer for, a theatre with indisputable
political aims. For the next eight years of his short life Fielding was
largely occupied in the lively turmoil of eighteenth-century politics; and
here, first by means of the stage, and later as journalist, he played a
part which has perhaps been somewhat unduly overshadowed by the surpassing
achievements of his genius as father of the English novel. But if we would
perceive the full figure of the man this time of boisterous political
warfare is of no mean account. In the dedication of his first party play,
the amazingly successful _Pasquin_, Fielding subscribes himself as "the
most devoted Servant of the public"; and no more appropriate keyword could
be found for the energies which he threw into those envenomed political
struggles of 1736-41.
At the date of his first plunge into these struggles England stood sorely
in need of a pen as biting, as witty and as fearless, as that of Henry
Fielding. For over ten years the country had been ruled by one of those
"peace at any price" Ministers who have at times so successfully inflamed
the baser commercial instincts of Englishmen. Sir Robert Walpole, the
reputed organiser of an unrivalled system of bribery and corruption, the
Minister of whom a recent apologist frankly declares that to young members
of Parliament who spoke of public virtue and patriotism he would reply
"you will soon come off that and grow wiser," the autocrat enamoured of
power who could brook no colleague within measurable distance, the man of
coarse habits and illiterate tastes, above all the man who induced his
countrymen to place money before honour, and whose administration even an
admirer describes as one of unparalleled stagnation--such a man must have
roused intense antagonism in Fielding's generous and ardent nature. For,
from the days of his first boyish satires to the last energetic acts of
his life as a London magistrate, for Fielding to see an abuse was to set
about reforming it. To his just sense of the true worth of money, the
wholesale corruption of English political life accredited to Walpole, the
poisoning, to adopt his own simile, of the body politic, must have seemed
the vilest national crime. There could never have been the least sympathy
between the mercenary and apathetic methods of Walpole and the
open-hearted genius of Fielding. And, added to such fundamental opposition
of character, the influence of Fielding's old school friend, George
Lyttelton, would, at this juncture especially, draw him into the active
ranks of the Opposition.
Lyttelton was then rising into celebrity as a ready parliamentary speaker;
a celebrity as yet not wholly eclipsed by the youthful oratory of William
Pitt, the young cornet of the horse, who also had lately taken his seat on
the Opposition benches. It was the burning patriotism, the lofty character
and the towering genius of Pitt, the fluency and personal integrity of
Lyttelton, that led the younger members of the Opposition in the House of
Commons; while in the Lords another friend from whom Fielding was to
receive "princely benefactions," the young Duke of Bedford, a man of
"inflexible honesty and goodwill to his country," attacked Walpole's
alleged corrupt practices in the election of Scottish peers. With leaders
such as William Pitt and Lyttelton on the one hand, and the corrupt figure
of Walpole on the other, there is no wonder that Fielding flung all his
generous force into the effort to free England from so degrading a
domination. Accordingly, in 1736, when the young Pitt's impassioned
eloquence was soon to alarm the _Great Man_--"we must muzzle that terrible
Cornet of the Horse," Sir Robert said--and when fierce and riotous
hostility to the government had broken out in the country over an
attempted Excise Bill, Fielding appears as a frankly political manager of
the "New Theatre" in the Haymarket. This small theatre stood precisely
adjoining the present Palladian structure, as may be seen from a print of
1820, showing the demolition of the old building and the adjacent façade
of the modern "Haymarket." According to Tom Davies, who, as an actor in
Fielding's company and as an author of some pretensions should be
reliable, Fielding was a managing partner of this "New Theatre," in
company with James Ralph, "about the year 1735." [2] And apparently early
in 1736 [3] his political, theatrical, and social satire of _Pasquin_
appeared on the little stage, and immediately captured the town.
In _Pasquin_ a perfectly outspoken attack on Walpole's corrupt methods is
united with a comprehensive onslaught on abuses in the stage, law,
divinity, physic, society, and on the odes of Colley Cibber, sufficient
one might suppose to satisfy even Fielding's zeal. In an exuberant
newspaper advertisement of the 5th of March Mr Pasquin is announced as
intending to "lay about him with great impartiality," and throughout the
play Fielding's splendid figure may be felt, swinging his satiric club
with a boisterous enjoyment. The immediate success achieved by the piece
was certainly not due to any great dramatic excellence; and that so
loosely knit a medley as _PASQUIN, a Dramatic Satire on the Times: Being
the Rehearsal of Two Plays, viz. A Comedy call'd THE ELECTION and a
Tragedy, call'd The Life and Death of COMMON-SENSE_ should have achieved
almost as long a run as the _Beggars Opera_, shows that the public
heartily sympathised with the satirist. _Pasquin_ begins with the
rehearsal of a comedy, called _The Election_, consisting of a series of
broadly humorous scenes in which the open and diverse bribery at
elections, the equally open immorality of fashionable town life, the
connivance of country dames, and the inanity of the beau monde, are
satirised. The country Mayor, the Ministerial candidates and the
Opposition squire drink, bribe and are bribed with complete impartiality.
A scene devoted to the political young lady of the day affords opportunity
for a hit at the sickly and effeminate Lord 'Fanny' Hervey, that
politician whom Pope described as a "mere white curd of Asse's milk," and
of whom Lady Mary Wortley Montagu observed that "the world consisted of
men, women, and Herveys." Pope had stigmatised Hervey as _Lord Fanny_, and
Fielding obviously plays on the nickname by references to the value
attached by certain young ladies to their fans. "Faith," says his comic
author, "this incident of the fan struck me so strongly that I was once
going to call this comedy by the name of the Fan." The comedy ends with
the successful cooking of the election returns by Mr Mayor in favour of
the Ministerial candidates, for which "return" he is promised a "very good
turn very soon"; and by the precipitate marriage of one of the said
candidates to the Mayor's daughter "to strengthen his interest with the
returning officer."
Having settled the business of the corrupt and corrupting Ministry in his
comedy, Mr Pasquin proceeds to exhibit the rehearsal of his tragedy, _The
Life and Death of Common Sense_. Here the satirist, leaving politics,
applies his cudgel mainly to the prevailing taste for pantomime, a form of
entertainment introduced it was said some thirty years previously by one
Weaver, a country dancing master, and already lashed by Sir Richard Steele
in his couplet:
"Weaver, corrupter of the present age,
Who first taught silent sins upon the stage."
That the Covent Garden manager, John Rich, [4] could engage four French
dancers, and a German with two dogs, taught to dance the _Louvre_ and the
_Minuet_, at ten pounds a night, and clear thereby "above 20 good houses,"
while the Othello of Booth and the Wildair of Wilkes were neglected, was
sufficient to rouse the indignation alike of moralists, dramatists and
playgoers. Fielding in turn took the matter up with all his natural
warmth; and in _Pasquin_ he represents the kingdom of the Queen of Common
Sense as invaded by a vast army of "singers, fidlers, tumblers, and
ropedancers," who moreover fix their standard in Covent Garden, the
headquarters of Rich.
Not content with assailing this public folly, the 'Tragedy' of _Pasquin_
strikes a higher note by ranging among the foes of Common Sense three
unworthy professors of Law, Medicine, and Religion; callings, as Fielding
is careful to point out,
"in themselves designed
To shower the greatest blessings on Mankind."
Queen Common Sense seemingly receives her deathblow; but her ghost finally
rises victorious, and so justifies the author's contention that his "is
almost the only play where she has got the better lately." The vigour with
which Mr Pasquin here 'laid about him,' in such matters as the legal
abuses relating to imprisonment for debt, may be inferred from the
following passage. Queen Common Sense is speaking to the representative of
_bad_ Law, and tells him she has heard that men
"unable to discharge their debts
At a short warning, being sued for them,
Have, with both power and will their debts to pay,
Lain all their lives in prison, for their costs.
_Law_. That may perhaps be some poor person's case
Too mean to entertain your royal ear.
_Q.C.S_. My Lord, while I am Queen I shall not think
One man too mean, or poor, to be redress'd."
So too, the great genius of Fielding, when in long after years harnessed
to the drudgery of a London magistrate, held no porter's brawl or beggar's
quarrel too mean "to be redress'd."
The immediate success of _Pasquin_ attests, as we have said, the readiness
of London audiences in 1736 to applaud an honest and humorous presentation
of wicked Ministers, corrupt clergy, lawyers, and doctors, inane
Laureates, and degrading public entertainments. Mrs Delany, gathering
London news for Dean Swift, writes on April 22, "When I went out of Town
last Autumn, the reigning madness was Farinelli; I find it now turned on
_Pasquin_, a dramatic satire on the times. It has had almost as long a run
as the Beggar's Opera; but in my opinion not with equal merit, though it
has humour." [5] We are told how the piece drew numerous enthusiastic
audiences "from _Grosvenor_, _Cavendish_, _Hanover_, and all the other
fashionable Squares, as also from _Pall Mall_ and the _Inns of Court_" And
on the 26th of May a benefit performance for the author was announced as
the "60th. Day." The vogue of the satire even demanded a key, as may be
seen in an advertisement in the _London Daily Post_ for May 17: _This Day
is published, Price Four-Pence. A Key to Pasquin, address'd to Henry
Fielding Esqre._
Mr Pasquin's own advertisements for his little theatre are not without the
zest with which our beef-eating ancestors attacked politics, social abuses
and one another. The announcement for March 5, ran as follows:--
"_By the_ Great Mogul's _Company of_ English
_Comedians, Newly Imported_. At the New Theatre in the
Haymarket, this Day, March 5, will be presented
PASQUIN,
A Dramatick SATYR on the times.
Being a Rehearsal of two PLAYS, viz. a Comedy call'd The
ELECTION; and a Tragedy, call'd The Life and Death of COMMON
SENSE....
N.B.--Mr Pasquin intending to lay about him with great
Impartiality, hopes the Town will all attend, and very civilly
give their Neighbours what the find belongs to 'em.
N.B.--The Cloaths are old, but the Jokes entirely new...."
In the following month the Opposition was busy over the marriage of their
chief supporter, the Prince of Wales; and Mr Pasquin duly chronicles the
event in his advertisements of the 28th of April, observing that his
company "by reason of the Royal Wedding expecting no Company but
themselves, are obliged to defer Playing till tomorrow." A few days
later, on the 12th of May, Sir Robert Walpole celebrated the royal
marriage by a grand evening entertainment given at his house in St James
Park; and on the same night 'Pasquin' had the audacity to advertise a
special performance, in the following terms (the "country party," it
should be understood, was a usual name for Walpole's opponents):--
"For the Benefit of Miss Burgess, who has so zealously espoused the
Country Interest.... Miss Burgess hopes all Patriots and Lovers of their
Country will appear in her favour and give all encouragement to one who
has so early distinguished herself on the side of Liberty." In Pasquin's
_Election_ scenes, this lady played the part of Miss Stitch, a political
damsel, opposed to Walpole's candidate. Next day appeared an ironic
counter-advertisement of a performance for "the Benefit of Miss Jones (the
Mayor's daughter who hath so furiously espoused the Court [_i.e._
Walpole's] Interest....) _N.B._--Miss Jones does not doubt that all true
loyal People will give her all Encouragement in their Power, as she has
engaged in so unpopular a Side and even given away her FAN (which very few
young ladies would) for the service of the Country: she hopes the
Courtiers will not let her be out of pocket by the Bargain." Here, again,
is doubtless a hit at Lord 'Fanny' Hervey; as well as a plain hint that
those who espoused Walpole's cause might expect ample payment for their
trouble.
Is there any wonder that a wrathful and uneasy Minister, not yet
overthrown, shortly took stringent measures against the 'liberty' of the
stage; measures by which a political stage censorship was formally
established, and the topical gaiety of our theatre, and the pungency of
our theatrical announcements, henceforth immeasurably dulled.
A few further points of minor interest remain to be noted concerning that
popular and scathing personage Mr Pasquin. By May the company styled
themselves "Pasquin's Company of Comedians"; a fresh indication of the
credit attaching to the performance. In the previous month a contributor
to _The Grub Street Journal_ tells "Dear Grub" that he has seen Pope
applauding the piece; and, although the statement was promptly denied, a
rare print by Hogarth lends some colour to a very likely story; for the
great Mr Pope, the terror of his enemies, the autocrat of literature, was
warmly on the side of the Opposition. Hogarth depicts the stage of
Fielding's theatre, and thereon a scene in the fifth act of _Pasquin_, in
which the foes of Queen Common Sense are for the moment triumphant. The
side boxes are well filled; and in one of them Mr Pope's deformed figure,
apparently, turns away, declaring: "There is no whitewashing this stuff."
The curious may find another plate by Hogarth in which Pope _is_ busy
whitewashing Lord Burlington; but the drift of the remark for the
Opposition drama of _Pasquin_ seems obscure. The gains that accrued to
Fielding from the success of _Pasquin_ are indicated by another rare
print, that entitled the _Judgement of the Queen o' Common Sense.
Addressed to Henry Fielding Esqre._ Here, again, it is _Pasquin's_ satire
on the prevailing furore for pantomime that is chiefly illustrated; as
Common Sense gives to Rich, the harlequin, a halter, while to Fielding she
accords an overflowing purse. Supporting Fielding are a long lean
Shakespeare, and two figures, possibly the distinguished players Kitty
Clive and Quin; on the opposite side, behind Harlequin, are figures
representing the bad clergy, lawyers, and doctors satirised in the
_Tragedy_; and the whole is balanced by the emergence of the ghost in
Hamlet, from a trap door in the foreground. Doggerel verses, at the foot
of the print, celebrate the arrival of a bard, "from ye Great Mogul,"
bringing with him _Wit, Humour, and Satyr_, and receiving the Queen's
"honest favour," in "show'rs of gold."
Under those golden showers, and with the applause of 'all the fashionable
Squares' ringing in his ears, we may leave Mr Pasquin. Fielding's first
venture as political dramatist and theatrical manager had proved
brilliantly successful; his little theatre, like his own Tom Thumb, had
assailed a dozen giant abuses, an all-powerful Minister among them, and
the town had applauded the courage and wit of the performance. In the
following season, those same boards were to witness the author of
_Pasquin_ "laying about him" with an even greater political audacity.
* * * * *
Content, doubtless, with the success of _Pasquin_, Fielding does not seem
to have launched any further political attacks during the remaining months
of 1736. A newspaper advertisement of June announces the intention of the
'Great Mogul's Company of Comedians' to continue "playing twice a week
during the summer season," and _Pasquin_ remained occasionally in the
bills as late as the 2nd of July. The public were advised that "This is
much the coolest House in Town"; and audiences must have been drawn even
in August, for in that month one small and presumably party play was
performed, the _New Comi-Tragical Interlude call'd the Deposing and Death
of Queen Gin_. This little piece consisted of only two scenes, and was
probably a skit on a Bill "against spirituous liquors" which Walpole had
supported earlier in the year. The measure met with violent opposition,
including petitions from the Liverpool and Bristol merchants; and in view
of Sir Robert's own notorious excesses with the bottle a temperance Bill
from his hands may well have roused Fielding's ironic laughter. The
authorship of the satire is unknown; but the moral appears to have been
unexceptionable, as _Queen Gin_, in the final scene, "drinks a great
quantity of liquor and at last dies."
Fielding clearly began his second year at the 'little theatre' with some
social or political exhortation, as the following bill appears for
January:--"By a Company of Comedians, At the New Theatre in the Haymarket,
this Day, January 26, will be presented a Dramatick Satire on the Times
(never performed before) call'd The Mirrour." By February "the Original
Company who perform'd _Pasquin_" are notified on the bills; and on the 2nd
of March a performance is announced of a _Dramatick Tale of the King and
the Miller of Mansfield_, presumably the same _Miller of Mansfield_ openly
declared by one of Walpole's "hired scribblers" to be aimed at the
overthrow of the Ministry. [6] All such preliminary skirmishes, however,
served but to introduce the grand attack of the _Historical Register for
the Tear 1736_, the first performance of which may be assigned to the end
of March 1737. [7]
In the _Register_ we have the most complete display of Fielding's vigour
as a fighting politician. Here, to recur to Mr Pasquin's characteristic
phrase, he "lays about him" with a gusto and honest frankness quite lost
among our own tepid conventions. But however hard the hitting, however
boisterous the broad humour, however biting the irony, it is noteworthy
that in this his chief political satire, written moreover for a yet
unregulated stage, Fielding never stoops to the shameless personalities of
his day. The fashion of the eighteenth-century permitted even the great
and classical genius of Pope to hurl lines at the persons of his opponents
that, to modern ears, scarcely bear quotation. Fielding, as we know,
constantly asserted his intention of throwing not at the vicious but at
vice; and accordingly, even in this party play, flung openly in the face
of the Minister, there is but one reference (and that only a fling at his
"lack of any the least taste in polite literature") to the notorious
personal failings of Sir Robert. It is against the Minister, and not the
man, that the hot-blooded Opposition dramatist directs his humour and his
irony. Fielding's manly and generous nature here permitted no virulent
personalities to blacken his pages. [8]
The irony of the _Register_ is chiefly reserved for the _Dedication to the
Public_, designed for the reader at leisure; though here Walpole is
indicated broadly enough, first in the figure of an ass hung out on a
signpost, and again as "Old Nick," for "who but the devil could act such a
part." Here the attacks of the Ministerial papers are parried by ironic
explanations that "The Register is a ministerial pamphlet calculated to
infuse into the minds of the people a great opinion of their ministry,"
explanations full of admirable fencing and excellent hits. And in these
dedicatory pages Fielding utters a sonorous warning to his countrymen
concerning the insidious policy that was undermining their very
constitution: "... Here is the danger, here is the rock on which our
constitution must, if it ever does split. The liberties of a people have
been subdued by conquests of valour and force, and have been betrayed by
the subtle and dexterous arts of refined policy, but these are rare
instances; for geniuses of this kind are not the growth of every age,
whereas if a general corruption be once introduced, and those, who should
be the guardians and bulwarks of our liberty, once find or think they find
an interest in giving it up, no great capacity will be required to destroy
it. On the contrary the meanest, lowest, dirtiest fellow, if such an one
should ever have the assurance in future ages to mimick power, and
browbeat his betters, will be as able as Machiavel himself could have
been, to root out the liberties of the bravest people." From the
solemnities of the _Dedication_ we come to the "humming deal of satire,"
and the boisterous action, of the play itself. As in the case of _Pasquin_
the form of the drama is that of a rehearsal, a form which affords
excellent opportunities for such explanatory asides as that addressed to
the critic who complains of the attempt to review a year's events in a
single play: "Sir," says the author, "if I comprise the whole actions of a
year in half an hour, will you blame me, or those who have done so little
in that time?" The long years of Walpole's power were admittedly "years
without parallel in our history, for political stagnation." Scene one
discovers five 'blundering blockheads' of politicians, in counsel with one
silent "little gentleman yonder in the chair;" who knows all and says
nothing, and whose politics lie so deep that "nothing but an inspir'd
understanding can come at 'em." The blockheads, however, have capacity
enough to snatch hastily at the money lying on their council table.
Walpole's jealousy of power, it may be remembered, had driven almost every
man of ability out of his ministry. Then comes a vivacious parody on the
fashionable auctions of the day. Lots comprising "a most curious remnant
of Political Honesty," a "delicate piece of Patriotism," and a "very clear
Conscience which has been worn by a judge and a bishop" and on which no
dirt will stick, go for little or nothing, while Lot 8, "a very
considerable quantity of Interest at Court," excites brisk bidding, and is
finally knocked down for one thousand pounds. From the excellent fooling
of the auction, the action suddenly changes to combined satire on the
Ministry and on the two Cibbers, father and son. The Ministry are
ingeniously implied to have been damn'd by the public; to give places with
no attention to the capacity of the recipient; and to laugh at the dupes
by whose money they live. A like weakness for putting blockheads in office
and for giving places to rogues, and a like contempt of the public, is
allegorically conveyed in the third act, in which 'Apollo' casts the parts
for a performance among sundry unworthy actors, and declares that the
people may grumble 'as much as they please, as long as we get their
money.' "There sir," cries the author to the critic of the rehearsal, "is
the sentiment of a great man." The _Great Man_ was a phrase, to use Pope's
words, "by common use appropriated to the first minister"--that is, to
Walpole. In the next scene the effrontery of the piece culminates in a
ballet where the Prime Minister appears, leading a chorus of false
patriots, who, to use Fielding's own words, are set in the 'odious and
contemptible light' of a set of "cunning self-interested fellows who for a
little paltry bribe would give up the liberties and properties of their
country." These worthy patriots are of four types, the noisy, the
cautious, the self-interested (he whose shop is his country) and the
indolent ("who acts as I have seen a prudent man in company, fall asleep
at the beginning of a fray and never wake 'till the end o't"). To them
enters Quidam, unblushingly announced in the play bill as "Quidam, Anglice
a Certain Person," in other words Walpole himself. Quidam pours gold into
the pockets of the four patriots, drinks with them, and then, when the
'bottle is out' (a too frequent occurrence at Sir Robert's table) takes up
his fiddle, strikes up a tune and dances off, the patriots dancing after
him. But even this is not all. "Sir," says the author, "every one of these
patriots have a hole in their pockets as Mr Quidam the fiddler there
knows; so that he intends to make them dance 'till all the money is fall'n
through, which he will pick up again and so not lose one halfpenny by his
generosity...." We may suppose that the final scene lost nothing in
breadth by the acting of Quidam; and it is not surprising that the
immediate result was the subjugation not, alas! of the Ministry, but of
the liberty of the stage. Walpole's fall was delayed for three years; the
destruction of the political stage was accomplished in three months.
It is difficult to imagine that any party, in those days of comparatively
arbitrary power, would venture a public satire so unveiled and so menacing
as that of the _Register_, unless supported by some confidence in the
immediate fall of their opponents. Without such confidence the political
tactics of such an onslaught would be simple foolhardiness. Signs of these
false hopes are not wanting in the slight, but equally bold, satire on the
sycophants represented as composing Walpole's _levée_, which was shortly
added to the _Register_. This little sketch, in which a protest concerning
the damning, early in the year, of Fielding's ballad farce _Eurydice_ is
combined with the political satire, was advertised as follows:--
"EURYDICE HISS'D: or, a Word to the Wise, giving an Account of
the Rise, Progress, Greatness, and Downfal of Mr Pillage, ... with
the dreadful Consequence and Catastrophe of the whole." [9]
We have the authority of Tom Davies, at this time a member of Fielding's
company, for the statement that "Fielding in his _Eurydice Hiss'd_ had
brought on the Minister [Walpole] in a _levée_ scene" [10]; and as Pillage
is the "very great man" who holds the _levée_ in the fragment, the above
allusion to an expected downfall of Walpole's Ministry seems obvious.
Passages of similar import to the advertisement occur in the piece itself.
Thus the play is declared to convey a "beautiful image of the instability
of human greatness"; and the spectacle is promised of the 'author of a
mighty farce' at the pinnacle of human greatness and adored by a crowd of
dependants, become by a sudden turn of fortune, scorned, "deserted and
abandon'd."
The single scene of the play opens when Pillage is at the zenith of his
power; a stage direction orders that "The Lèvee enters, and range
themselves to a ridiculous tune"; a partition of places ensues under the
allegory of the business arrangements of a theatrical manager; and the
author explains that by this _levée_ scene he hopes that persons greater
than author-managers may learn to despise sycophants. Close on the heels
of the _levée_ comes the catastrophe. Not one honest man, Pillage sadly
admits, is on his side; as his 'shallow plot' opens out the first applause
changes to hisses; his farce is damn'd; and he himself is left consoling
the solitude of his downfall by getting exceedingly drunk on a third
bottle.
The figure of a fallen Minister boozing away his own intolerable
reflections, was not calculated to pacify that notoriously hard drinker,
Sir Robert, already soundly pilloried in the _Register_, and severely
indited by _Pasquin_. By the end of April the _Register_ had reached its
thirty-first performance, a good run at that date; and according to an
advertisement in the _Craftsman_ the satire was still being played on the
7th of May. In little more than four weeks, and after the alleged
perpetration of a treasonable and profane farce called _The Golden Rump_,
a Bill for stifling the liberty of the stage under a censorship was
introduced, had passed through both Houses, and received the royal assent.
Well might Lord Chesterfield exclaim in the brilliant speech which, in
Smollet's words, "will ever endear his character to all the friends of
genius and literature, to all those who are warmed with zeal for the
liberties of their country," that the Bill was not only "of a very
extraordinary nature, but has been brought in at a very extraordinary
season and pushed with very extraordinary despatch." Concerning the nature
of the measure Chesterfield had no doubt. He saw its tendency towards
restraining the "liberty of the Press which will be a long stride towards
the destruction of Liberty itself"; he pointed out that a Minister who has
merited the esteem of the people will neither fear the wit nor feel the
satire of the theatre; he denounced the subjugation of the stage under "an
arbitrary Court license" which would convert it into a canal for conveying
the vices and follies of "great men and Courtiers" through the whole
kingdom; he protested against the Bill as an encroachment not only on
liberty but also on property, for "Wit, my Lords, is a sort of property;
it is the property of those that have it, and too often the only property
that they have to depend on."
As a manager of the intrepid little theatre in the Haymarket, as well as
the author of the most successful of the offending plays, the Licensing
Act fell with double weight on Fielding. "When I speak against the Bill,"
cried Chesterfield, "I must think I plead the cause of Wit, I plead the
cause of Humour, I plead the cause of the British Stage, and of every
gentleman of taste in the Kingdom." Looking back over two centuries, we
honour Chesterfield in that, unknown to himself, he also pleaded the cause
of the greatest of English humourists. But appeals on behalf of genius and
freedom were thrown away upon Walpole; the Act received the royal assent
on June 21 1737; and, in the honourable company of Wit, Humour, and Taste,
Fielding was forced to retire from the theatre, on the boards of which he
had for two years so vigorously assailed Ministerial corruption and
autocracy.
[1] _Works of Henry Fielding_, Edited by Edmund Gosse. Introduction,
p. xxi.
[2] _Life of Garrick_. T. Davies. 1780, vol. i. p. 223.
[3] _Notitia Dramatica_, MSS. Dept. British Museum, speaks of _Pasquin_ as
performed for the fortieth time on April 21, 1736: and quotes an
advertisement of the play for March 5. There seems to be no record of the
actual first night.
[4] Rich appears to have been the manager at Covent Garden from 1733 to
1761.
[5] _Autobiography of Mrs Delany._ 1861. Vol I. p. 554.
[6] See Fielding's ironic reference to such "iniquitous surmises" in the
Dedication to the _Historical Register_.
[7] The earliest newspaper reference, so far available, is that of the
_Daily Journal_ for April 6 1737, which speaks of April 11 as the ninth
day of the _Register_.
[8] In the succeeding Epilogue of _Eurydice Hiss'd_ it must be admitted
that Sir Robert's love of the bottle is broadly satirised.
[9] _Daily Advertiser_, April 29. 1737.
[10] _Life of Garrick_, T. Davies, vol. ii. p. 206.