Page:The Journal of English and Germanic Philology Volume 18.djvu/340

 336 Gilbert After making more plain some of his ideas on the regulation of labor, Bucer deals with recreations. He approves of music, and even allows dancing when properly regulated, especially when accompanied by song in praise of God. Next he discusses tragedy and comedy. These he values for their moral effect, writing : The natures, morals, and emotions of holy men should be represented with the most intelligent imitation, to renew in the people all piety and virtue. . . . The men to whom is given the charge of this should have unusual understanding of these poems, and be tried in their constant zeal for the kingdom of Christ. . . They should take care that nothing light or merely theatrical should be admitted to representation, but all pure things should be represented, and with grave, yet pleasing action, proper to the blameless. And not so much the affairs themselves, and the actions, emotions, and disturbing passions of men are to be represented, as their morals and natural dispositions, and these should be so shown as to excite in the spectators zealous imitation, but as to those things which are wickedly undertaken and accomplished, the spectators should be confirmed in their detestation of them, and made more diligent in their avoid- ance of them. If these cautions are observed, there will surely be furnished to the youth much matter for recreation which will also be of service in nourishing them in virtue and in stimulating them to it, especially since zeal and desire may be stimulated for comedies and tragedies of this sort in the vernacular as well as in Latin and Greek. There are now in existence comedies and tragedies of this kind to which no objection can be made; the learned of this world may desire in comedies the acumen, wit, and elegance of style which they admire in the fables of Aristophanes, Terence, and Plautus, and in tragedies they may desire the gravity, subtlety, and elegance of language of Sophocles, Euripides, and Seneca; nevertheless, those who are learned in the kingdom of God, and desire to teach the wisdom of God, do not feel that the poems of men of our own faith lack heavenly learning, and emotions, manners, language, and events worthy of children of God. Yet it is to be desired that those to whom God gives the ability to excel in literary things should prefer to use their ability to his glory, rather than to retard the pious zeal of others by untimely censures, and that they should encourage the presentation of tragedies and comedies such as excellently exhibit knowledge of eternal life, even if they do not well exhibit the art of poetry, rather than the presentation of those by which the cultivation of taste and language may be somewhat aided, but the spirit and morals are denied with impious, base, and scurrilous alteration. 51 Bucer next deals with gymnastics: Those sports of the gymnastic art should be offered to the youth, which are especially helpful in preserving the strength of the body, and making its move- ments harmonious, and which make the young men fit and ready for military 61 Scripta Anglicana, pp. 142-5.