Various

“ Comedy introduces us to the cottage as well as the palace, and displays the economy of one as well as the splendour of the other; and it can amuse us with the intrigues of a citizen’s wife, as well as interest us with the passion of a princess. We see also in Comedy, as well as in the world itself, the despicable character of the rake, and the disgusting vanity of the coquette; we learn to distinguish between the different traits of character, and we soon find that those whose language is that of men of honour, often act like knaves. ”

“ Some benefit might indeed be derived, if a moral were attached to Tragedy, but it has no moral (at least very rarely) and for this simple reason: Tragedy professes to be a speaking picture of life,—and it is a melancholy but true reflection, that as in real life we see the deserving depressed, and the bad man flourishing in the world, so also it ought to be in Tragedy. Let us take Macbeth or Richard the Third as examples of this: we see here two men, by a succession of crime, arriving at the pinnacle of their ambition, and rewarded for giving way to their passions. ”

“ Nay, in our own times, have we not seen two men of genius, a Byron and a Burns: they both, by mandate of Nature, struggle and must struggle towards clear manhood, stormfully enough, for the space of six-and-thirty years; yet only the gifted ploughman can partially prevail therein; the gifted peer must toil, and strive, and shoot out in wild efforts, yet die at last in boyhood, with the promise of his manhood still but announcing itself in the distance. ”

“ Tragedy professes to be a representation of all the high passions that influence the mind, such as jealousy, hatred, or revenge; it can have nothing to do with vanity or any other of the petty passions, for a course of action dependent on them would appear as insignificant in Tragedy as the passions themselves. Now, what possible advantage, in the way of improvement, can be derived from witnessing a display of all the odious passions of our nature? ”

“ Yet though he constantly exposed himself to the public gaze in situations in which it is scarcely possible for any man to preserve much personal dignity, he to the last impressed those who surrounded him with the deepest awe and reverence. The illusion which he produced on his worshippers can be compared only to those illusions to which lovers are proverbially subject during the season of courtship. It was an illusion which affected even the senses. ”

“ It is all this diversity that makes Comedy so pleasing as well as so instructive. Thirdly, the end that Comedy has in view, is to bring about improvement by exciting contempt and ridicule: by thus mixing ridicule with vice, we feel a positive enjoyment in seeing it exposed, and it is by this powerful engine that the manners of a people may be insensibly improved. A satirical exhibition will at all times explode vice better than serious argument ”

“ There is one point in which I consider both Tragedy and Comedy, in modern days, to be at fault, and that is in the constant introduction of love on our stage. We cannot frequent the theatre without being sickened by the repetition of some nauseous courtship and love-making, the particulars of which, even in real life, can be agreeable to none but the parties themselves. This blemish is said to have arisen during the earlier periods of the drama, from the vanity of the female sex ”

“ By the constant employment of moments which would otherwise have been wasted to the intellect, an extraordinary mass of business was easily swept away; and, at the end of the very year in which he returned from Italy, a number of acts, diplomas, charters, letters, judgments, and affairs of all kinds, can be traced to Charlemagne himself, the despatch of which, together with all those that must have escaped research, would be utterly inconceivable, were we ignorant of what were the habits of that great and singular man. ”

“ It is said, that when modern play-writing first came in fashion, the ladies refused to honour the theatre with their presence, unless their inclinations were more attended to, and love was made the burthen of the song. Accordingly, we find even the pure taste of Addison giving in to this demand, and the otherwise beautiful tragedy of Cato (for even the unities are preserved in it) is spoiled by two stupid love plots, that not only disfigure it, but throw a complete weariness over the whole. ”

“ There is another great difference between Tragedy and Comedy, and that is, with regard to diction: the language made use of by Comedy is natural and proper, while that of Tragedy is laboured and elevated; we meet not unfrequently with long declamation and sentences highly polished, whereas passion never speculates in this manner; the feelings of nature dictate the simplest language, and generally find a vent in broken sentences, as we find them in the Greek tragedians. ”

“ It is not so confined in its sphere as Tragedy is, for it may affect as well as amuse; there should be a proper mixture of gravity with mirth, and that succession of ridiculous and pathetic events with which the life of man is variegated. But the main superiority of Comedy consists in its having what Tragedy wants, a moral. It is true that the enlightened portion of the audience do not require this moral ”

“ But with the man of uncommon character, again, in whom a germ of irrepressible Force has been implanted, and will unfold itself into some sort of freedom,—altogether the reverse may hold. For such germs, too, there is, undoubtedly enough, a proper soil where they will grow best, and an improper one where they will grow worst. True also, where there is a will, there is a way; where a genius has been given, a possibility, a certainty of its growing is also given. ”

“ The unities of the drama are rules which are the result of good sense, and serve greatly to heighten the entertainment of the stage; they undoubtedly tend to keep up the necessary illusion that we are witnessing scenes in real life, and the more they are acted up to, the greater is the merit of the piece, and the more perfect the effect produced. ”

“ With the generality of persons, who are not in the habit of reasoning upon subjects of this nature, this question would perhaps be decided, and the preference awarded to either species of the drama, according to the peculiar organization of each person: I mean, that those who are naturally grave, would be more gratified by being affected, and by having an appeal made to their feelings; while on the other hand, those who are of a freer temperament, and never dream of brooding over misfortune, would doubtless prefer being amused. ”

“ Truly, as was once written, “it is only the artichoke that will not grow except in gardens: the acorn is cast carelessly abroad into the wilderness, yet on the wild soil it nourishes itself, and rises to be an oak.” All woodmen, moreover, will tell you that fat manure is the ruin of your oak; likewise that the thinner and wilder your soil, the tougher, more iron-textured is your timber,—though, unhappily, also the smaller. ”

“ Secondly, let us consider the plot in Tragedy, and the characters it works with: the plot is rarely fictitious, but is generally built either on fact, or on some event that the antiquated errors of fable or history have made sacred; not having in this respect the advantage which Comedy possesses from liberty of invention, and correcting thereby the inequalities of life; and having also the additional fault of laying its scenes for the most part in a foreign country. The characters of Tragedy are always selected from high life ”

“ Pity is at the best but a feminine virtue, and by giving way to it, the mind, if not enervated, is at any rate not strengthened; and with regard to terror, a man under its influence is incapable of any reflection whatever. [pg 83] When we witness, for instance, the tragedy of Macbeth, the mind, after such a scene of human villany is rather inclined to become morbid than to feel either dignified or improved.
We will now turn to Comedy, which, in order to compare more satisfactorily with Tragedy, we will consider under the same view. ”

“ When the Congress of Erfurt was held, Napoleon wished to see Goethe, with whom he conversed for some time, and at the close of the conversation he gave the poet the decoration of the Legion of Honour. In 1825, a splendid bronze medal was struck by order of the Grand Duke, and presented to Goethe, to commemorate the fiftieth year of the poet’s residence at his court.
As Goethe wrote every sort of poem, from the simple ballad to the epic, and from a proverb to a tragedy, a mere list of his works would occupy some columns. His first appearance in print was in the annuals and literary journals. ”

“ The appearance of a Life of Charlemagne in these days of cobweb literature may probably be regarded as a phenomenon by booksellers. Whatever their feelings may be upon the matter, we are inclined to regard it as a valuable contribution to our substantial literature. The author, Mr. G.P.R. James has hitherto produced no work that can at all compete with the present in our esteem. He has shown his aptitude for research in three or four semi-historical novels, which will be forgotten, while his Life of Charlemagne will be allowed place with our standard historians. ”

“ In the poorest cottage are books; is one book, wherein for several thousands of years the spirit of man has found light, and nourishment, and an interpreting response to whatever is deepest in him; wherein still, to this day, for the eye that will look well, the Mystery of Existence reflects itself, if not resolved, yet revealed, and prophetically emblemed ”

“ Of this system of pious plunder we have many proud architectural memorials; though to rob with one hand, and found religious houses with the other, reminds one of the trade of a waterman—to look one way and row the other. ”

“ As the most hardy fall first, the infants, deprived of their protectors, should they escape the infection, must die of starvation. The cattle are abandoned, the crops neglected, and every traveller shuns the “city of the plague:” and even that precaution is no security. Pilgrims die in agony on the road: to enter one of these little vales is indeed to enter “the valley of the shadow of death.”—The inhabitants resign themselves to their destiny: the same fate would await them in a neighbouring village, perhaps, should they seek refuge there. They cling to their homes to the last gasp ”

“ John Wolfgang von Goethe was born at Frankfort, August 28, 1749, and died at Weimar, March 22, 1832, aged eighty-two years and seven months. He was a sickly child, and consequently participated but little in children’s pastimes. Youth—melancholy, or early habits of reflection, and an independence on others for amusement or formation of opinions were thus generated, which, operating on his exquisite organization, contributed to make him the master-spirit of his age. ”

“ English Comedy is not only considered inferior to that of most nations, but it is in many respects bad in its tendency, and may almost be looked upon as a school for vanity. To conclude, instead of regarding the drama as it is, I have rather endeavoured to consider it as it should be. ”

“ Nay, it is highly probable, if he possesses the gallantry which a well-bred bear ought to have, he will bring Mrs. Bruin and all the children along with him, and you can transact business with the whole family at once. In hunting the bear, take all the curs in the village along with you. Game dogs are useless for this purpose; for, unless properly trained, they fly at the throat, and get torn to pieces or hugged to death for their pains. The curs yelp after him, bite his rump, and make him tree, where he can be shot. The bear of Canada is seldom dangerous. ”

“ Thus, in Julius Caesar, Brutus, in one act is at Rome, and another in Thessaly. Again, in Coriolanus, now we find him expelled by the Romans, afterwards residing amongst the Volscians, and eventually marching an immense army to the gates of Rome; all within the space of two or [pg 84] three hours: this is a sad blow to any scenic illusion, and tends to weaken, if it does not entirely break, the thread of the imagination. ”

“ It has been said that no man is a hero to his valet;—and all the world saw as much of Louis the Fourteenth as his valet could see. Five hundred people assembled to see him shave and put on his breeches in the morning. ”

“ It has been observed by an able and popular writer2 of the present day, that the following proposition, though very generally received, is far from being a true one: “Tragedy improves and exalts the nature of man, while Comedy has a tendency to lower it.” ”

“ Nothing can be more melancholy than a pestilence among these fragments of humanity: cut off from their fellow-mountaineers by high ridges, these isolated little communities are left to perish unknown and unmourned. ”

“ At the very entrance you turn a little to the right, and are struck by a yawning mouth in the face of the opposite crag, whence the torrent pent up beyond, suddenly forced a passage, within the memory of man, which at every swell continues to spout out one of the boldest and most beautiful cataracts that can be conceived. ”

“ The first of these is an immense crag of limestone, 286 feet high, stretched in the shape of the segment of a large circle, across the whole valley, and forming a termination at once so august and tremendous, that the imagination can scarcely figure any form or scale of rock within the bounds of probability that shall go beyond it. ”