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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Untitled Article
is another question—and easily answered . It teaches nothifltti of the kind . It teaches everything opposite . He whose &mk is centred in a French farce , and has thence been enabled tor expand into a vulgar-min ^ d " spectacle , " considers that practical philosophy is the free indulgence in every caprice of
vice , with a callousness of consequences , and that morality is synonimous with hypocrisy , very useful now and then to public characters , but by no means so often necessary as folks are apt to imagine . Such an individual may persist in addresssing the corporal senses only , making their object both a means and an end , until his illiterate peers all follow his
example , and pervert the public mind and taste ; he may " buy up ' all the highest histrionic talent in order not to use it , and at the same time to prevent any other theatre from using it , thereby preventing , also , the representation of appropriate works ; he may do all this until the first authors and actors are banished from the theatre , and , perhaps , have to seek refuge in America—and no wonder , then , if people talk
of the decline of the drama ! The consequences of " the system , " we have seen ; we see now ; and shall continue to see until the Stage is radically Reformed . Our object has been to prove the extent and power of its influence , and how beneficial that influence might be under proper management . It would
be a new power in the country . Ihe Drama has not a fair chance : give it that chance , and how surely would be seen the " decline" of French farce and " spectacle ;"—not with high regret or loud lament ; not by slow degrees and with uplifting struggles ; not with every inch of the descent being powerfully resisted ; not with sustaining hope and steady fortitude ; but instantly—without a struggle—without a hopeand followed by a shout of contumely and disgust !
It must have been a pleasant thing to the German people at large , to see the duke of one of their States entertain a proper estimate of the great men of the time , and apply them accordingly . It was not surprising that the most salutary reforms and improvements were organized , and brought into practice , in Sachsen-Weini&r , when its reigning prince placed such men
as Herder at the head of church affairs ; Voigt in law reforms , and Goethe as the director of institutions of science and the arts , the management of the Court-theatre being included in the latter . Such princes are rare , they make us forgive , and almost admire their crowns , because we are bound to love them as men . But the renovation of the drama will not begin with princes among us : it can only be properly originated by some of our best intellects , and the funds , which need not be
Jurge , will probably be raised very soon b y some joint-stock company . There will be no great difficulty in the matter . Reserving to themselves the power of electing or deposing *
Untitled Article
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), June 2, 1836, page 337, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2658/page/9/
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