Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 11.djvu/349

 it deals most sharply with contemporary writers, and especially with their latest works. It appeared at a time when the immorality of the theatre had reached its utmost pitch, when ladies, if they could not resist going to see a new play, went in masks, and when it was generally recognised that a play could scarcely please the public unless it was grossly indecent. Collier's mode of dealing was unsparing and courageous. Full of righteous indignation he delivers his blows, if perhaps with something less than the cool skill which generally marks his attacks, still with a force and vigour that were equally effective. He was hindered by no fear and by no respect of persons. Dryden and Congreve receive no more deference than D'Urfey. In spite, however, of the passion, the scorn, and the sarcasm he displays, he does not even here throw off the pedantry of the learned controversialist. He begins by a comparison of the immodesty of the contemporary stage with the better examples set by the Greeks and Romans, and quotes the opinions of some modern writers on the degeneracy of the drama. He then proceeds to the charge of profaneness, which he supports by a number of specific instances. The next part contains an indignant remonstrance against the abuse and ridicule of the clergy, a favourite subject with the dramatists of the Restoration. He then points out the encouragement to immorality offered by the stage, and cites many passages of particular plays, such, for example, as Dryden's ' Amphitryon,' Vanbrugh's ' Relapse, or Virtue in Danger,' and D'Urfey's ' Don Quixote,' and ends by setting forth the opinions of pagans, of the state, and of the church concerning the stage. The chief defect in the work is that the author goes too far and detects allusions where none were intended, especially in treating the charge of profaneness. He also commits the mistake of attributing to the corrupting influence of the stage the social immorality that was really due to other causes, and that may more truly be said to have found expression in the contemporary drama than to have arisen from it. That he is wholly lacking in artistic taste would scarcely be worth notice were it not that in addition to scourging dramatists for their sins against morality, he corrects them for what he considers their literary shortcomings. Writing throughout at boiling-point he makes little distinction between offences of diverse magnitude, and being perpetually indignant has no suspicion of anything ridiculous in his expressions, even though his jealousy for the reverence due to religion leads him to blame Dryden for writing lightly of Mahomet and scornfully of Apis. Despite some faults, however, the 'Short View' is a noble protest against evil. It had a marvellous success. Even before it appeared there were some faint signs of an impending reaction (, Histoire du Public et des Hommes de Lettres au Dix-huitième Siècle, p. 244), and its readers found that it gave distinctness and expression to feelings of which they had hitherto scarcely been conscious. Much, too, that had passed almost unnoticed in a play, assumed its true character when it appeared as a part of a mass of obscenity, and people were shocked at remembering that such things had given them pleasure. Collier had public opinion on his side. Men of the stricter sort were especially delighted, and, enraged as they had been at his conduct in the matter of the absolution, many of them considered that this pamphlet atoned even for that crime. Several of the wealthy among them sent him money ; one presbyterian, for example, Sir Owen Buckingham, an alderman of London and M.P. for Reading, sending him twenty guineas (, History of England, p. 192). The king, who never took much pleasure in the theatre, is said to have shown his approval by granting him a nolle prosequi, thereby stopping all proceedings against him (, Apology for his own Life, p. 158) ; he renewed an order previously issued against 'plays contrary to religion and good manners,' using in it the very words of the title of the 'Short View,' and further warned the master of the revels to be strict in licensing new plays. The authors did not remain silent under other's attack. Dryden indeed declined the conflict, and confessed that he had been to blame. In the preface to his ' Fables,' though writing somewhat bitterly of the uncivil, and as he thought not altogether fair, treatment he had received, and making some excuses for himself, he nevertheless says, 'If he [Collier] be my enemy, let him triumph. If he be my friend, as I have given him no personal occasion to be otherwise, he will be glad of my repentance.' And in his epilogue to Fletcher's 'Pilgrim,' while marking a defect in Collier's pamphlet, he acknowledges the justice of his censure— Perhaps the Parson stretched a point too far, When with our theatre he waged a war. He tells you that this very moral age Received the first infection from the Stage; But sure a banisht Court, with lewdness fraught, The seeds of open vice, returning, brought.

Congreve did not follow the example of his master ; he wrote an angry reply to the 'Short View,' full of abuse, but wanting alike