does not diffemble his intent to raise a laugh, and his hopes to fucceed in it. CHA P. II. No Man who has not naturally an elevated Soul, will ever perform well the Part of a Heroe upon the Stage. WE E fhall not, we hope, be accused of giving the pompous name of Elevation of Soul in the title of this chapter, to that ridiculous and idle imagination that is found in certain modern tragedy players, who fhall be namelefs, who are fo infected with the enthusiasm of their profeffion, that they become princes and heroes for life, by perfonating fuch characters on the ftage; who can by no means condescend to throw off their grandeur with their buskins, but will carry it in full force to make them the ridicule of the next company they fall into. These people never receive a vifit from a familiar friend, but they perfwade themselves they are giving audience; nor mix among the deliberating parties of their company, but they fancy themselves affifting at a council of ftate. They fpeak to their domefticks, or if they have none, to the porter or coffee-boy, with all the folemnity of voice with which a Roman general delivers his orders; and if they pay a compliment to an author, who has caft them an advantageous. part in his play, they do it with an air that tells him they imagine they are conferring a favour on him by accepting it, or giving him a reward for his merit. We We fatter ourselves alfo that no body will misunderstand us fo far as to fuppofe we mean to give this lofty name to the arrogant opinion fome other gentlemen of the fame rank have conceived of their own confequence in the world or to fuppofe an actor has an elevated foul, because be is mad enough to imagine, that great players are at least as eminent in the eye of reafon as great men; and would tell the world, if he dar'd, that it is almost easier to be a heroe, than to reprefent one well upon the stage. The vanity and pride of the former fet, tho' abundantly ridiculous, may be useful to them; and while it renders them contemptible among their familiars, may ferve to make them excellent in the eye of the public; as it will always keep up in them a fuitable turn of mind for the executing their parts to advantage. It will doubtless lead them into many difagreeable scrapes among their friends; but it will in return give them the means of claiming an uncommon fhare of applause upon the ftage; and by accuftoming themselves to play the kings and generals in their family, they will acquire a habit of doing it more naturally in their profeffion, than any man can, who only takes up his royalty or heroifm for the ufe of the prefent moment, or while it is requir'd of him in his part. Yet this habitude, however inforc'd, will at the utmost be only fufficient to influence their exterior figure and deportment; it will indeed throw an air of dignity and greatnefs into their mien and geftures, but it will never be able to give that noble pride, that elevated grandeur to their expreffion, which is neceflary to the infpiring us with that generous tranfport with which we love to hear the fentiments of the F tragic tragic poet. It is poffible indeed that this fettled habit may give a man, who has a good figure and an eafy carriage from nature, all that dignity which we find afcribed by a very great writer, with an uncommon warmth, to the late Mr. Booth in his afcending his throne in the character of Pyrrhus; but it will never give to any man the innate greatnefs, with which Mr. Quin pronounces the fentiments of Cato. The high opinion also which many of our players have of their profeffion, may not be without its uses to them. This imaginary excellence in it may naturally be the occafion of their loving it more than they otherwife wou'd have done the player of this turn perhaps may owe the greatest part of his excellence on the stage to this very opinion; and wou'd never have taken half the pains he has done to excell in his profeffion, if he had thought lefs nobly of it. The mind neceffarily takes an elevated turn from the exalted idea it forms of the objects it is converfant about; but there is befides this, another far nobler elevation of foul, which the actor in tragedy muft fhew us he is poffefs'd of before he can rife to that applaufe, which fome of our prefent theatrical performers have found the way to deferve. This confifts in a noble enthusiasm, produc'd from a paffion for every thing that bears the character of true greatnefs: This must be native and inherent in the man; and this is what we understand by the term elevation of foul. 'Tis this enthufiafm which diftinguishes the capital performers in tragedy, from thofe of a moderate thare of merit; and 'tis peculiarly by means of this valuable and rare qualification that fuch a player player as we have just now mentioned in Catc, creates as it were in the hearts of even the lower clafs of his audience, fentiments and emotions which they never felt before, nor even had ever suspected themselves to be capable of feeling. The power of elevating our hearts far above our real felves, is the great prerogative of tragedy; but in many cafes the poet alone is not able to do this: We must hear, not read the paffages that are calculated to this end; and the great, the excellent performer gives them that eminence upon the stage, which we fhou'd never have found in them in the clofet. The language in which the poet chooses to convey his most heroic, most ennobling fentiments, is, to a very great part of a common audience, what a piece of mufic prick'd down upon paper is to a perfon who has not been taught any thing of that science. The merit in both cafes is indeed all there the poet and the compofer have both perfectly done their parts; but, in the one cafe, till a good finger by his voice, gives the notes their foul and expreffion, or a good player enforces and explains the fentiment by his expressive elocution; in the other, the harmony, is not known to the one, nor is the fublimity of the fentiment underftood by the other. It will readily be allow'd us, that no author in our language, or perhaps in any other, has arrived at that height in the fublime that Milton has; and we flatter ourselves that it will also be allow'd that no man ever arriv'd at an equal perfection in fpeaking the fublime with Mr. Quin. There is alfo this other happy connexion between that great writer and this great player, that their turn of foul feems much the fame; their fentiments apF 2 pear pear to be of a like kind; the very language of Milton feems contriv'd on purpose for the voice of Mr. Quin, and the voice of Mr. Quin, while he is fpeaking it, feems form'd on purpose for the language of Milton. Whoever has heard him read any part of the Paradife Loft of that divine author, knows the full force of what we are advancing; but to thofe who have not had that pleasure, we may recommend his playing Comus. This is a light every body has an opportunity to fee him in; and in this it is cafy to obferve, that he has all that ftrength of conception and expreffion, we have now been celebrating, all that power of enforcing the fentiments of an author which we have defcribed, and of giving meaning to every period, while he addreffes it to those who otherwife wou'd have enter'd into none of its beauties. We have lately had the advantage of a contrat to prove the truth not only of this propofition in general, but of this particular inftance of it. We have feen another Comus, and have obferved a whole audience (the few of a modern audience who are capable themselves of understanding Milton only excepted) yawn over the whole part, and thew no fign of pleafure but in the fcenery and the bacchanals. What an abfolute inattention was there to the fpeech in which Comus difcovers his furprise at the lady's voice, as spoke by this weak attempter of the part! and how ftrong is the fenfe, how evident the beauty of every line as Mr. Quin delivers the fame words! With how noble a fhare of the enthusiasm we have been mentioning, with what a feeming heartfelt rapture does he fay, Can |