The Players Scourge
SCENA QVINTA.
THe fifth effect of Stage-plays, is the general depravation [ 5] of the minds, the manners, both of their Actors and Spectators; which administereth the 31. Argument against them.
That which ordinarily corrupts the minds, and vitiates the manners, both of the Actors and Spectators, must doubtless be unlawful, yea abominable unto Christians, if not intolerable in any Christian well-ordered Common-weal.
But Stage-plays ordinarily corrupt the minds, and vitiate the manners, both of their Actors and Spectators.
Therefore, they must doubtless be unlawful, yea abominable unto Christians, intolerable in any Christian well-ordered Common-weal.
The Major is most apparently evident: First, from the very principals of reason: For whatever vitiates another thing (especially men's minds and manners) must needs be corrupt it self, the depravation of the one, arising m • erely from the pravity of the other: If Stage-plays therefore corrupt the manners, the minds of others, they cannot but be ill themselves. Secondly, from the grounds of Theology: which as they enjoin men to avoid the corruptions that are in the world through lust: to eschew all occasions of evil, all scurrilous idle speeches, all wicked places, all lewd companions which may defile their souls, their manners; and to keep themselves unspotted of the world: So they condemn all occa • ions of evil, all dishonest contaminating pleasures of sin which filthily disteine men's souls. Thirdly • from the rudiments of civil policy. For as the happiness, honor, life and safety of every Common-weal consists • n the ingenuity, temperance, and true virtuous disposition of the people's minds and manners; so the distemperature, malady, and confusion of it always iss • e, from the exorbitant obliquity, the uncontroled dissoluteness, and degeneracy of their vicious lives, which bring certain ruin. Whence the most prudent Princes, and Republiques in all ages, have constantly suppressed all such pleasures, as might either empoyson the younger people's manners, or pervert their minds. The Major therefore is irrefragable.
The Minor, is an avowed truth, not only ratified by experience, but by the concurrent testimony of sundry States and Writers in • all ages, both Pagan and Christian. To begin with Pagan Authors, States, and Magistrates. The unparalleled Philosopher Plato, as his own Works, with sundry others testify, banished all Stage-players, Play-poets, and Play-poems out of his Common-weal, as being the chief instruments to effeminate the minds, to vitiate the manners of the people, (especially the younger sort) and to withdraw them from the study of virtue • to the love of vice. Aristotle, the Oracle of all human literature, excludes these Stage-plays out of his Republic; debarring youthes and children from them, as being apt to poison both their minds and manners, with their gross scurrility and lascivious shows. Solon, the wisest of the ancient Grecian Lawgivers, rejected Stage-plays; not only as lying, but deceitful fictions; which would quickly teach men both to cheat, to steal, to play the hypocrites and dissemblers, and to circumvent men in their dealings, to the public prejudice: whence he deemed them unsufferable mischiefs in a Citty. Tully, declaimes against all pleasurable effeminate amorous Plays and Poets, as the contagions of men's minds and manners, through their excessive delicacy: whence he adviseth the Romans to abandon them, lest they should effeminate and corrupt them as they had done the Grecians, and so subvert their Empire. Seneca informs us, that there is nothing so pernicious to good manners, as to sit idly at Stage-plays: for then vices easily creep upon us through pleasure: And therefore he much bewails the frequent concourse of the Roman Youth to Plays and Theaters, as an undoubted symptom of a degerated declining State, then near to ruin, Plutarch, an eminent Morali • t and Historian, disapproves all Stage-plays; not only as lascivious vanities, occasioning much prodigal vain expense to the Republics damage; but as contagious evils • which blast the virtues, mar the ingenuous education, corrupt the lives and manners of all those who frequent them, and with all he reports of Gorgias, that he reputed Tragedies and Stage-plays, mere impostures. Livy the gravest Roman Historian, writes of Plays: That they are scarce a tolerable folly or m • dnesse in wealthy Kingdoms: affirming withal • that these Stage-plays which were brought into Rome at first with an intent to asswage the Plague, and t • atone their en • aged Devil gods; did far more infect the minds of the Romans, then the Pestilo • ce did their bodies. Valerius Maximus relating the manner and cause of introducing Stage-plays among the Romans, records; that they were brought in, and devised only for the worship of their Devil-Idols and the delight of men; and that not without the blush or shame of peace; the Romans having steined both their pleasures and religion with civil blood, by means of scenicall Prodigies. So that he reputed the tolerating of Plays, a blemish to the Roman State, which he there concludes, to be intolerable mischiefs in a Republic, and grand empoysoners of men's manners, from the Massilienses example, which he there applauds. Socrates, the very wisest Graecian, by the express resolution of the Delphian Oracle, condemned all Comedies as pernicious, lascivious, scurrilous, and unseemly pastimes, to which he refused to resort; which caused Aristophanes, that carping Comedian, to traduce him on the Stage. Isocrates, that grave Greece • Orator, declaimes against all Plays and Actors as pernicious scurrilous, fabulous, ridiculous, invective, and expensive, not tolerable in a Citty. That valiant Roman Marius, in his Oration to the Roman Senate and people; produceth this as an argument both of his wisdom, temperance, valor and virtue, which some objected to him as a disparagement, that he kept never a Stage-player, nor costly Cook about him, as other voluptuous, eff • minate dissolute Romans did, whom he stiles, most filthy men. Gaius Plinius Secundus in his Pauegyricke to the Emperor Trajan, stiles Stage-plays; effeminate arts and studies, altog • there unbeseeming the world; whence he highly applauds this Emperor for banishing them the Roman Empire, whose honor they had blemished, whose virtues they had cankered, and in his Epistles likewise, he declaimes against them, as intolerable mischiefs in a Common-weal, for the precedent reasons. Cornelius Tacit • s, an Historian of no small repute, informs us, that the hereditary ancient manners of the Romans were • y little and little corrupted and abolished, and their public discipline subverted by Stage-plays; whence he de • laimes against them as the very plagues, and • verthrow of the Roman State: inveighing much against that Monster Nero, who corrupted the Roman Nation, and drew them on to all kind of vice • of luxury and lewdness, by these accursed Stage-plays, to the public ruin. And not only he, but likewise Polibius, Dion Cassius, Justin, Suetonius, Plutarch, Herodian, Julius Capitolinus, Trebellius Pollio, Flavius Vopiscus, and Juvenal. (to pass by E • tropius, Orosius, Zonaras, Grimston, Opmeerus, with other Christian Historians ) condemn and censure, Nero, Claudius, Tiberius, Commodus, Heliogabalus, Verus, Balbinus, Maximinus, Gallienus, Solonius, Carinus, and other dissolute Roman Emperors; for acting, countenancing and frequenting Plays; and harbouring Stage-players, (with whom they sometimes fraught their Courts) which did not only exhaust their treasures, and impoverish their subjects, but even corrupt their discipline, and strangely vitiate and deprave not only their own, but the very people's minds and manners, by drawing them on to all licentious dissoluteness, and excess • of vice, to the very utter subversion of their States, as these Authors jointly testify, whose walls could not secure them when as their virtues, their manners were gone quite to ruin. Horace and Juvenal. in their several Satirical Poems, together with Gellius Noctium At • icarū. lib. 20. cap. 4. inveigh against these Stage-plays, Players, and Stage-houses, as the occa • ions of much villainy and lewdness; the corrupters of youth; especially of the female sex, who were made Strumpets by them; and as the shames, the blemishes of the Cities where they were permitted. The wanton Poet Ovid ; who was far enough, I am sure, from all Puritanical preciseness, as men now style it, is even a rank Puritan in this case of Stage-plays, For after he had informed his bawdy leacherous companions; that Plays and Play-houses were the best places of Mart of unchaste bargains; the most commodious haunts for amorous Lovers, and Whore-masters; the most dangerous snares to entrap all beautiful persons, and the only places for Panders, Whore-masters, Whores and such like beastly Menmonsters to catch their desired prey; in these lascivious dis • ikes ; which notably descry the intolerable mischiefs both of Plays and Theaters:
When he had thus, I say, discovered the lewdness of these Stage-plays, though to a lewd intent, and withal informed Lovers, that it was impossible for Parents, for Husbands, with all their care and industry to keep their Wives or Children chaste, as long as there are so many Play-houses suffered in the Citty, in these four verses:
And to show his utter detestation of Plays and Play-houses, whose amorous lewdness he at large disciphers: he informs Augustus, that they are the Seminaries of all wickedness: the frequent occasions of much sin, much lewdness and adultery unto very many; the places of many adulterous meetings, and whorish contracts: whereupon he persuades Augustus, utterly to demolish all Play-houses and Theaters; to danme up all the port • ls and passages to them; and to suppress all Stage-plays; that so these their pernicious fr • its might be prevented. All which he thus elegantly expresseth.
What could any Puritan (as our profane Play-haunters style them) have said m • re against Plays then this? and what can any Christian speak le • se against • hem, when as a profane lascivious Heathen Poet hath written so much? If therefore we are loath to pass a censure upon Stage-plays, or to abandon Play-houses for fear we should be as good a • Puritans; y • t l • t us now at • ast renounce them, out of • hame, lest we prove far worse then Pagans, lest Horace, lest Juvenal, and these fore-named Heathen Authors: lest wanton Ovid: or obscene Porpertius (who thus cries out of Theaters:
should be more gracious, holy and precise then we; whose holiness should exceed even that of Scribes and Pharesies, much more then this of wanton Pagan Poets, which carried them no farther then to Hell ; what ever some old, some new Pelagians have dreamed to the contrary. To pass from Pagan Authors, to Heathen Magistrates, States and Emperors. The ancient Lacedemonians, excluded all Stage-plays out of Sparta, permitting neither Comidies nor Tragedies to be acted in it, lest their youth should be corrupted, their Laws derided and brought into contempt. And when as an Embassad • r of Rhodes demanded o • a Lacedaemonian, what was the occasion of their laws against Players and Iesters, since they shown pleasure to the people, and the people lost nothing by it, but laughed at their folly. The Lacedaemonian replied, that Lycurgus saw, he • rd or read of some great damage that Pla • ers and Iesters might do • in the Common-weal, since he had established so strait a Law against them. But this I know, that we Greeks are b • tter weeping with our Sages, then the Romans laughing at their Fools. The Athenians, though they much h • noured Actors, Players, and Play-poets at the first; yet growing wiser by dear-bought experience at the last, when • hey had effeminated their minds, exhausted their treasure, the sins of their Wars, and brought upon them sundry mischiefs; they abandoned all comical Stage-plays as pernicious evils, enacting this public law against them, that no man should from thence forth presume to pen or act • Comedy; and making common Actors thence-forth infamous. The very Heathens Massilienses, were so Puritanically rigid in this case, that they would upon no terms, no entreaties whatsoever, permit any Stage-plays to be acted within their Citty or Territories; for this very reason; lest the beholding of them should corrupt the minds and manners of their Youth; and draw them on to commit those vices in earnest, which were acted before them but in jest. The ancient Pagan Romans, as they reputed all common Actors infamous (as the Civilians and our own Statutes now esteem them,) disfranchising them their tribe as unworthy persons; and disabling them to inherit lands, to give any public testimony between man and man, or to bear any honor, office or dignity in the Common-weal, ( a very great evidence and acknowledgement of the evilness of Stage-plays, as Tertullian and others descant on it; since Players were thus branded with the note of infamy, even then when Plays themselves were in their first and best request;) even so they demolished all their Theaters, together with the Galleries built about them by a public edict, lest the minds and mann • rs of the people should be effeminated and deflowered by them, to the public prejudice. Themistocles the famous Athenian General, enacted a Law, that no Magistrates should resort to Stage-plays, le • t the Common-wealth it self should seem to loiter and play in them, (Et utinam audiretur à nostris ( writes John Sarisbury) ut saltem in provectiori aetate nugis suis republicae seria anteferrent:) and even before this law of his, it was an ancient custom in Athens, which was long observed, that not the leas • admittance into the Theater should be given unto any but such who should sing and utter honest things; lest the Magistrates and people there present should be made spectators of dishonest • asti • es, which might draw them on to vice. Not to speak of the Goths and other Barbarians, who censured and condemned Stage-plays as effeminate and ridiculous superfluities. Philippus Gl • verius informs us out of Tacitus, (who writes thus of the German women. Ergo sep • â pudicitiâ agunt, nullis spectaculorum illecebris, corrupta: ) that the ancient Pagan Germans knowing with what things the chastity of women was most corrupted among other Nations, did wholly abandon Stage-plays, with which they were unacquainted: of the corruption of which spectacles Seneca hath spoken most truly, That there is nothing so prejudicial to good manners as to sit idly at a Play • for then vice • creep more easily upon us through pleasure. O Prophetical and Divine speech most worthy so great a Teacher of Wisdom! This verily writes this Heathen man, who was all • ogether ignorant of those divine Precepts which God by Moses and other Prophets hath delivered to his people. We therefore who have now given up our names to Christ's discipline and warfare, with what face do we now not only excuse our Stage-plays, but like • ise applaud, and voluntarily instit • te them? which verily are so much the less to be tolerated, by how much the more they exceed the measure of that old Heathenish modesty. For now vices do not only steal upon us through the pleasure of beholding: but they are as it were by force thrust into sincere and pur • minds, by examples, by voice, by hand and action: so that I verily believe, there were never any inventors and Actors of Plays more corruptly licentious then ours now. But these things are rather foreign, then our own, for even now the Germans wives are less solicited with Stage-plays then the wives of other Nations. The ancient and moderne Germans then, by this Authors testimony, abandoned Stage-plays, as the very Seminaries of lewdness, the occasion of adultery, and the grand empoysoners, especially of all women's manners; which I would wish all husbands to observe. Scipio Nasica, that unparalleled Roman General, as sundry Authors testify, did by a public decree of the whole Senate demolish the Roman Theaters, and interdict their Stage-plays, as the very bane and ruin of the Romans manners, virtues, valor, and the like: as the Seminaries of all lewdness, effeminacy, idleness, vice and wickedness; and the very overtures of the Commonwealth: whose welfare was altogether inconsistent with lascivious Plays. Which worthy act of his, is much appla • ded by Livy, Tully, S. Augustine, and others here quoted in the margent. Trebonius Rufinus, banished all Iusts and Stage-plays out of Vienna, over which he was Governor, as infectious to their manners: for which when as he was accused before the Roman Senate by some dissolute Male-contents, because he did it of his own head, without any direction from the Senate ; Junius Mauricus, a grave Roman Senator t •• ke part with him, and justified this act of his, which he not only much applauded, but wished openly withal, that all Stage-plays were likewise expelled out of Rome, as well as out of Vienna; For the vices of the Viennians (saith he) reside only among themselves, but the Romans wander far abroad; and as in bodies, so in Empires, that disease is most grievous which is diff • sed from the head to the inferior members. Octavius the Nephew of Julius Caesar, as Marcus Aurelius informs us, drove away all Stage-players and Iesters out of Rome, as insufferable mischiefs in the State. I read indeed in Suetonius, and Dion Cassius, that Octavius (whom we usually call Augu • tus Caesar ) was at first very much delighted with Stage-plays, (the means perchāce of making him an adulterer) in the beholding of which he spent much time, and now and then whole days together. I read likewise, that he took away the power of punishing and suppressing Stage-players permitted to the Roman Magistrates at all times and places by the ancient law, (an infallible evidence that the ancient Roman laws condemned Stage-plays and Actors;) yet so, as that he reserved the power of punishing Players, and reforming Stage-plays to himself ; by virtue of which power; he first of all inhibited all Roman Knights, Gentlemen, and Gentlewomen from acting or dancing on the Stage, prohibited likewise by a former law: Secondly, he commanded one Stephanio, (some call him Epiphanius, ) an excellent Player and Iester (who upon a Holyday to show this Emperor some pleasure, and hoping to receive a good reward, went thrice unto his Palace: one time in the attire of a Page, and another time in the habit of a Roman Matron, and so truly counterfeited everything, that it seemed not to be him, but the selfsame person he represented;) t • be whipped public • lie three several times one after another about the Theater, and then to be banished for this fact of his. And when he complained that the Emperor commanded Vagabonds to be whipped but once, and he thrice: Augustus replied: Once they shall whip thee for the injury thou diddest to the Roman Matron whom thou representedst: The s • cond time they shall whip thee for the presumption thou hadst, to act it in my presence. The third, for the time thou hast made divers lose for beholding and hearing thee. For I • sters and Players deserve not so much punishment for their Iests and Plays, as for the time which they lose, and cause others to lose. Thirdly, he commanded Hylas an eminent Stage-player, upon a complaint of the Pret • r against him, to be publicly whipped in the Court of his Palace. Fourthly, he banished Pilades (some write him Pilas ) another Actor out of Rome and Italy, after he had tasted of the Whipping-post, for pointing at a Spectator with his finger, who had hissed at him; and so had made him notorious. Which Pilas, being very popular, and making many friends to Augustus, that he might not be exiled, Augustus notwithstanding gave sentence of banishment against him, saying: That Rome hath been mighty and puissant enough to make her enemies stoop, and now she is not able to banish Iesters and Fools; and that which is worst of all, they have presumption to vex us, and we have not courage to repr • ve them. Lastly, he banished all the Players and Iesters out of Rome for those intolerable mischiefs they did occasion. And when as the people earnestly besought him to recall Pilas from his exile: he condescended to their request with much ado, upon this condition; that they should give a Master and Tutor to Pilas, that should chastise and correct him as a Fool: saying, That since Sages take Fools to be their Masters, that Fools also should have Sages • or their Masters. All which is a sufficient evidence, that Augustus deemed Plays and Players, whom he thus whipped and exiled, intolerable mischiefs in a State. Tiberius, none of the best Emperors, though he much delighted in Plays at first; yet at last by reason of those grea • mischiefs, outrages, misdemeanors, tumu • ts, quarrels, murders, seditions, that Plays and Players did occasion, after many joint complaints preferred against them both by the Senate and the Common-people; he was enforced to condemn all Players to the Whipping-post, (a punishment suitable to such unruly Rogues) and then, to banish them and their Stage-plays out of Italy, as insufferable evils in a Kingdom. Nero that vicious Roman Emperor, who was so much besotted with Stage-plays, as sometimes to play the Actor, to his eternal infamy: was at last enforced to expel all Stage-players out of Rome and Italy • together with their Theatricall Interludes, for those many unsufferable villainies and uprores that they did produce. Domitian also did the like upon the same occasion. Yea Julian himself, that Atheistical Antichristian Apostate, as impious as he was, had thus much goodness in him, as to prohibit Stage-plays: and therefore in an Epistle to Arsatius, the Pagan High priest of Galatia, he commands him to exhort all the Idol-priests under his Jurisdiction, that they should not be seen in Play-houses, nor resort to T • eaters; endeavoring to draw the Pagans to imitate the very discipline and manners of the Christians; who inhibited both Ministers and people to resort to Plays ; though now both Ministers and people flock unto them, as if they were worse then Pagans. And if these very worst and dissolutest Heathen Roman Emperors exiled Plays and Players, as intolerable mischiefs and corruptions, what think ye did their better Pagan Successors do? You shall hear a true relation what they did. The Roman Princes that were good (as Guevara, and others witness;) did always cast out Plays and Stage-players, and those only that were evil called them in. So that one of the tokens to know a virtuous or vicious Prince in Rome, write Gu • vara and I. G. (how much more then to know a religious virtuous Christian Prince and Magistrate?) was to see, whether he maintained Players, Iesters, and Jugglers among the people, yea or no ; which did so effeminate, vitiate and deboist both Magistrates, Prince and people too, as to precipitate them into all kinds of lewdness, sin and wickedness, and to prepare them both for invasions and destruction, as Ammianus Marcellinus. lib. 28. c. 9.10. Augustine. De Civitate Dei. lib. 1. c. 31.32, 33. lib. 2. c. 3. to 17. Guevera, Dial of Princes. lib. 3. c. 43.44, 45, 46, 47. & Carolus Sigonius, De Occidentali Imperio. lib. 1. pag. 32. most plentifully testify. Hence that worthy Emperor Trajan, though a Pagan, ( who when he was entreated by his Courtiers to hear an active Player, made this most worthy reply, worthy all Christian Princes imitation: It is not for the Majesty of a grave and virtuous Prince that in his presence any such vain thing should be shown; for in such a case himself should be no less noted of lightness, then the other of folly; and that before Princes no man should be so hardy as to utter dishonest words, or to act any light representations, and that those who move Princes to behold such. Interludes deserve as great a punishment as those that act them, since none ought to present before Princes things that may move them to vice, but such things as might move them to amendment:) partly out of his own voluntary • disposition, and partly upon the people's own request, abandoned all Stage-plays out of Rome, as effeminate arts, and unbeseeming exercises, which did much dishonor and corrupt the Roman State: which memorable act of his is thus emblazoned by C. Plinius Secundus, being then the Roman Consul, in his elegant Panegyricall Oration to him in the Senate House, in the name of all the Senators. Perge modo Caesar, & vim effectum{que} censurae tuum propositum, tui actus obtineb •• nt, &c. Et quis terror valuisset efficere quod reverentia tua effecit? Obtinuit aliquis ut spectaculum Pantomimorum populi Romani tolli pateretur; sed non obtinuit ut vellet: rogatus es tu quod rogebat alius, caepit{que} esse beneficium quod necessitas suerat. Ne{que} enim à te minore concentu ut tolleres Pantomimos, quàm à patre tuo, ut restitueret, exactum est. Vtrum{que} recte: nàm & restitui oportebat, quod sustulerat malus princeps, & tolli restitutos. In his enim qu • à malis benefiunt, hic tenendus est modus, ut apareat, autorem displicuisse, non factum. Idem ergo populus ill aliquando scenici Imperatoris Spectator & applauser, nunc in Pantomimis quo{que} adversatur, & damnat effaeminata • arts, & indecora seculo studia. Ex quo manifestum est, principum disciplinam capere etiam v • lgus; quum rem, si ab uno fiat, severissimam fecerint omnes. Macte hac gravitatis gloria Caesar, qua consecutus e • , ut quod antea vis & Imperium, nunc mores vocarentur. Castigaverunt vitia sua ipsi qui castigari merebantur, ijdem{que} emendatores qui emendandi fuerunt. And a little after. Et quis iàm locus miserae adulationis manebat (speaking of Nero his times) quùm laudes Imperatorum ludis etiam & commessationibus celebrarentur saltarentur{que}, at{que} in omne ludibrium effaeminatis vocibus, modis, gestibus frangerentur? Sed illud indignum, quod • odem tempore in senatu & in scena ab histrione & à Consule la • dabantur: tu procul à tui cultu ludicras arts removisti. Seria ergo te carmina honor{que} aetern •• annalium, non haec brevis & pudenda praedicatio colit: quinetiam tanto maiore consensu in venerationem tui Theatr • ipsa consurgent, quanto magis de te scenae silebunt. A pregnant evidence how much this Emperor and the whole Roman Senate distasted Plays and Actors, as the very bane and ruin of the Common-weal. These Stage-plays creeping into Rome again after this good Emperors decease, in the reign of Antoninus Pius, qui amavit his • rionum arts, as Julius Capitolinus writes; Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, who succeeded him; that he might reduce the people to Philosophy and civility, took away the Gladiators and Players with him into the Wars, inhibiting all public Plays and meetings under a severe edict both at Rome and Antioch: Which Edict of his taking no such good success as he expected: he thereupon banished all Stage-players, Tumblers and Iesters out of Italy, and sent three Ships lading of them to Lambert Governor of Hellespont; commanding him in his Letter directed to him, to keep these lazy Loyterers hard at work, that they might no longer mind or practice their foolish Sports: certifying him withal in this his Letter; that the cause he had banished these Trewants and loitering Players from Rome, was not for the blood they had shed (for they had occasioned divers tumults in which many were slain ;) but for the hearts they had perverted: not for the occasion of any who were dead, but because they were Masters of • ollies to the living. For without comparision (writes he to Lambert) it is a greater offense to the gods, and more damage to the Common-weal for these Trewants to take away the wits from the wise folk, then for Murderers to take away men's lives. Yea there is nothing that our Fore-fathers did, which displeaseth me so much as the sufferance of these • nthrifty Trewants. In the year 264. of the foundation of Rome, in a time of an horrible pestilence in Italy, to rejoice the people was first found out the invention of Theaters by the advice of these Trewants. It is a shameful thing to hear, that the pestilence dured but two years, and the rage and folly of these • nthrifts dureth four hundred years. Would to the immortal gods that the plague had ended these few which remain, before this cursed generation had brought such abominable customs into Rome; for much better had it been for our Mother Rome that she had wanted Inhabitants, then such Rascals should have come and dwelt therein. These Master-fools have been so wily to teach folly, and the Roman youth so apt to learn, that though they be put in Barkes, their disciples would lade 3000. Carrackts. Rome was never overcome by those who were valiant and virtuous, yet that day we saw it overgone & trodden under foo • by those • ooles: the walls of Rome, that were never touched by the Paenians had that day their lowpes full of armed Trewants. Rome that triumphed over all Realms, was triumphed upon that day with Players and Jugglers. I am so abashed in this case, that I know not what to say or write. Yet one thing comforteth me, that sithe Rome and Romans unjustly do rejoice with these fools, • he and the famous Wisemen justly shall be chastised for their fools. And in this the gods shall not be dispeased; that sithe Rome laughed at these Trewands and mockeries, one day she shall weep with these Tumblers and Jugglers, &c. Thus far this Heathen Emperor, who bot • by his deeds and words, exterminated Plays and Players out of the Roman Territories, as the greatest contagions and corruptions of his Empire. Cornelius Taci • us records: That when as Pompie erected his standing Theater at Rome, he was accused and blamed for it by the Senators; because it would be a means to make the people sit wh • l • days together idle in the Theater beholding Plays; and utterly overthrow their hereditary manners and discipline by new acquired lasciviousness • So that the whole Roman Senate then reputed Stage-plays pernicious to their State and manners. And for a conclusion of this tragicke Scene, Trebellius Pollio relates: that Martianus, Heraclianus, and Claudius, three worthy Romans, conspired together to murder Gallienus the Emperor, (a man much besotted and taken up with plays, to which he likewise drew the Magistrates and people by his lewd example,) as Flavius and others conspired Nero his murder too for the selfsame cause, lest the Cōmon-weal being longer addicted to the Cirque and Theater, should utterly perish through the allurements of pleasures: which murder they accomplished. All these recited Authorities of Pagan Writers, Emperors, States and Magistrates, together with Ammianus Marcellinus, a famous Heathen Historian; who reckons up the unworthy approbation of Cirque-plays, and Stage-plays, in which the people spent their lives and time, as the very greatest corruption of the Roman State, and the chiefest character of their depraved manners: against which Plays, and their Spectators, he hath much inveighed: (which me thinks should forever shame and silence all such graceless Christians, who dare to plead for Stage-plays, giving out, that none but some few foolish Puritans did ever yet condemn them:) infallibly evidence unto all men's consciences; that Stage-plays desperately vitiate and deprave men's minds and manners, precipitating them into all vice, all wickedness and lewdness whatsoever; and that they are unsufferable contaminating pernicious plagues in any Well-ordered State; which caused these very Pagan Emperors, States and Magistrates thus solemnly to exile them; and these their Authors to declaim against them.To pass from these to Christians; we shall find both Christian Princes, Republics, Authors, of ancient and moderne times, concurring with these former Pagans in these their dooms of Plays and Actors. It is storied by Josephus; that when as King Herod would have brought Stage-plays, Cirque-plays, and other Spectacles into Jerusalem, where he had erected a beautiful Theather, and Amphitheater, adorned with Caesar's Titles and Inscriptions; the whole Nation of the Jews, (though Forraigne Spectators much admired and delighted in his spectacles) perceiving that these Plays did wholly tend to the dissolution of their ancient received Country discipline; and fearing that some great inconvenienc • to their Common-wealth would follow upon this alteration; thought it their duty to maintain their public discipline which was now declining, though it were with the hazard of their lives; and not to suffer Herod to proceed with these his Spectacles, shutting up their Citty Gates against them. Which when Herod perceived, he began to pacifi • and persuade them with good words, to admit of these his Plays; which prevailing nothing with many, he endeavored to introduce these Plays among them perforce: whereupon ten of the Jews conspired together to murder him whiles he was sitting in the Theater beholding these his Interludes; which they had certainly effected, had not this their conspiracy been casually detected: Of which Herod taking advantage, accomplished his desire, and so brought these his Theatricall Interludes into Jerusalem: by means whereof, saith Josephus (pray mark the dangerous consequence) the Jews departed more and more from their Country rites, and corrupted the inviolable Institutions of their Ancestors with foreign • inventions and delights; so that there was a very great declining and degenerating of their good manners into worse: the discipline decaying whereby the people were won • before this time to be kept in order. Such vigorous venom was there in these Stage-plays, both to subvert their State, and discipline, and corrupt their manners; the whole Nation of the Jews being thus both real witnesses and examples to confirm my Minors truth, whom I have here ranked among Christians, as being then opposite unto Pagans: I now come to real Christians. It is storied of Constantine the Great, that very first and most famous Christian Roman Emperor, (whose name we English men have special cause to honor, he being bor • e, bred, and first crowned King and Emperor here in England, his Mother Helena being a British woman to: ) That he wholly with-drew himself from the Secular Stage-plays of the Gentiles made in the third year of his Consulship, • o drive away plagues and diseases: contemning and rejecting these their E • terludes; at which these Pagan Gentiles grieved much: After which being established in his Empire, he did by public Edicts abolish all the ceremonies, rites, lascivious customs and obscenities of the Gentiles, and interdicted all gladiatory Plays and Interludes, as intolerable pernicious evils. Not to speak of Nerva, Constantius, Valentinian, Honorius, Arcadius, and others, who banished and prohibited all Sword plays • against which divers Fathers did declaim as barbarous and unchristian Spectacles, not tolerable in any civil State • with which our tumultuous bloody Tragedies have too near a • finity; I find Theodosius the Great, (who banished all Women-dancers, Players, and Singers by a public Edic • , as the plagues of those places and Cities where they were tolerated:) not only suppressing and inhibiting all Stage-plays and Cirque-plays a • Antioch, and stopping up all Cirques and Theaters, as the fountains of all wickedness, and the Nurseries of all those mischiefs that sprung up in Cities, as Chrysostom at large relates: and I likewise find both him, Valentinian and Gratian, together with Valens the Emperor, enacting these public laws against Stage-plays and common Actors, well worthy observation: That no Stage-plays should be acted on the Lord's-day; that Stage-players and Women-act • rs should be quite debarred from the Sacraments as long as they continued in their playing, and that the Sacrament should not be administered to them in their extremity, when as they lay upon their death-beds, though they de • ired it, unless the • did first renounce their wicked lewd profession, and protest solemnly that they would not return unto it again in case they should recover. Such was their detestation against common Actors, and so by consequence against Plays themselves, which made their Actors so base, so execrable, to these Christian Emperors. Justinian the Emperor, promulgated this pious Edict; That all sorts of Clergy men, together with all other Christians, should refrain, not only from Di • e play, and Dicers company, but likewise from the very acting and beholding of Stage plays and Theatricall Spectacles, because they are not the least part of those pomps of the Devil which Christians solemnly renounce when they are baptized. Leo and Anthemius, two worthy Christian Emperors, made this most pious Edict. All Fea • t-days, or Holy days dedicated to the most high God, shall not be taken up or solemnized with any pastimes or excursions. We therefore decree the Lord's-day to be always so honorable and venerable, that it shall be exempted from all Executions, Admonitions, Bayles, Appearances, Arrests, Lawsuites, and Controversies, which shall all th • n cease; Let all Advocates and Criers then be silent, let there be then a kind of tr • ce for a space, that so Adversaries may safely meet together upon it, without fear, and reconcile themselves one to the other, &c. Neither releasing the employments of this religious Day do we permit any one to be occupied in obscene pleasures. Let not the Theatricall Scene, nor the Cirque Combat, or the dol • full Spectacles of wild Beasts, claim any liberty to themselves on this day: and if any solemnity to be celebrated, either in respect of our coronation or nativity, shall chance to happen upon it, let it be put off to some other time. If any person shall ever hereafter presume to be present at Stage-plays on this Holy-day; or if the Apparitor of any Judge under pretext of any public or private business shall violate those things which are decreed by this law, he shall undergo the loss of his office, and the sequestration of his Patrimony. O that this godly Law were now in force with Christians! then Plays and Pastimes on Lord's-day evenings, would not be so frequent; then those who had served God at Prayers, and Sermons in the day time, would not so seriously serve the world, the flesh, the Devil, in Dancing, Dicing, Masques, and Stage-plays in the night, beginning perchance the Lord's-day (like the foolish Galatians) in the spirit, but ending it in the flesh, as alas too many carnal Christians do. Theodoricus, a Christian King of Italy, (whose praises E • nodius Ticinensis, hath proclaimed to the world) in his Epistle to Faustus, transmitted to posterity, by Marcus Aurelius Cassiodorus, hath-passed this Censure upon Stage-plays, and Cirque-plays: that they expel the gravest manners, invite the most trivial contentions; that they are the exhausters of honesty, the ever-running fountain of brawls and quarrels; which antiquity verily reputed sacred, but contentious posterity hath made them a mere ludibrium. Which passage he thus seconds in his Epistle to Speciosius. Who can expect grave manners in Stage-plays? Catoes know not how to meet together at Play-houses. Whatsoever is there spoken to the rejoicing people is not deemed an injury. It is a place which defends excess. In another Epistle of his to the Roman Senate, he thus informs them, what great mischiefs these Stage-plays had procured to the people, who were brought into extreme dangers by th • m. Animum nostrum, Patres Conscripti, Reipub. curis calentem, pulsavit saepius querela populorum, orta quidem ex causis levibus, sed graves eructavit excessus. Deplorat enim pro spectaculorum voluptate ad discrimina se ultima pervenisse, &c. And in his Epistle to Maximus, of the divers sorts of Spectacles, which the Consuls exhibited to the people out of a preposterous custom, to their great expense ; (against the several wickednesses of which Interludes he there much declaimes) he closeth up that Epistle with this pathetical Epilogue. Heu mundi error • olendus: si esset ullus aequitatis intuitus, tantae divitiae pro vita mortalium deberent dari, quantae in mortes hominum videntur effundi. Such was his Royal Censure of these pestiferous Stage-plays, which bred so many mischiefs and discords in the world. It it registered of Henry, the third Emperor of that name, whom they styled black and godly; that when as a great company of Stage-players and Actors flocked together to Ingelheim to his marriage, about the year 1044. he thrust them all out of the Court and Citty; and comm • nded that the money which should have been spent in maintaining, rewarding, and adorning them, should be distributed among the poor: An example (writes Master Gualther, who relates it) truly worthy of eternal praise; which if Princes and Magistrates of Common-weals would this day imitate, there would be less place left to filthy and slothful idleness, then which there is nothing more powerful to corrupt men's manners: yea wise and prudent men would be then in greater request, and the poor would be better provided for, who now wander about in every corner to the great scandal of Christianity: It is storied of Philip Augustus, the 42. King of France; that he being an enemy to public dissolutions, and a friend to good order and Justice, enacted public laws against Players, Jugglers, Plays, and D • cing-houses, which he wholly suppressed, as pornicious to his Kingdom; banishing all Stage-players out of France by a public Edict: the true grounds of which worthy act of his Vincentius in his Speculum Historiale, doth thus express. Cum antem in Curijs regum vel principu • frequens histrionum turba convenire solebat, ut ab eis aurum & argentum, & equos seu vestes, quas saepe principes mutare solent verba ioculatoria varij • adulationibus plena proferendo ab eis extorqueant: vide • s Rex Philippus haec esse vana, & animae saluti contraria, mente promptissima Deo promisit; quod omnes vestes suas quamdiu viveret intuitu Dei pauperibus erogaret; malens nudum Christum in pauperibus vestire; quàm adulatoribus vestes dando peccatum incurrere ; quoniam histrionibus dare (and I would those who spend their money at Play-houses would well consider it) est Daemonibus imolare. Hoc si quotidie principes attenderent, nequaquam tot leccatores per mundum discurrerent. Vidimus autem principes quosdam vestes diu excogitatas, & varijs florum picturationibus artificiosissime elaboratas vix evolutis septem di • bus, proh dolor, histrionibus, scilicet, Diaboli ministris (so he stiles them) ad primam vocem dedisse, pro quibus forsan .20. aut 30. vel 40. marcas argenti impenderent, de quo nimirum preci • totidem paupers per totum annum victus necessaria percipere potuissent. By all these several Acts and Testimonies of these worthy Christian Princes, it is most apparent; that Stage-plays insufferably corrupt men's minds and manners, and that they are no ways tolerable in a Christian State. The selfsame verity we shall find confirmed by the Fathers. Hence Clemens Alexandrinus, stiles Plays and Play-house • s; the very Chair of Pestilence, which corrupts men's minds. Hence Tertullian records; that the Roman Censors ofttimes demolish their re-erected Theaters to prevent the corruption of the people's manners, which they fore-saw would be much endangered and corrupted by the lasciviousness of Stage-plays ; the lewd effects of which he at large discovers, styling the Stage, the very Chair of Pestilence, and the Gallerie of the enemies of Christ. Hence Cyprian phraseth Stage-plays; the Masters not of teaching but of corr • pting, of destroying Yo •• h: and Play-houses, the very Brothels of public chastity; where all vices ar • • oth taught and learned; all modesty exiled, all contin ••• y wreck • d, men's souls and manners most incurably corrupted to God's dishonor a • d th • Church • s shame. Hence Lactantius informs us; that the v • ry hearing and beholding of Stage-plays exceedingly corrupt all Youth; by depraving their manners, enraging their unruly lusts, and te • ching them to commit adulteri •• , whiles they behold them acted: Whereupon he peremptorily concludes; that all Stage-plays are wholly to be aband •• ed, that so not only no vices might harbor in our breasts, but that the custom • of no pleasure might ever overcome us, and so turn us away from God and from good works. Hence Gregory Nazianzen avers; th • t Stage-plays ought to be reputed nothing else but the very plague and sickness of men's minds ; the several ill eff • cts of which he there reckons up at large, and thereupon he thus concludes; Wherefore it evidently appears, that these Stage-plays are naught else but th • very destruction of men's souls: which Censure of his is fully ratified by the concurrent suffrages of Tatianus, Oratio Advers. Graecos. Bibl. Patrum, Tom. 2. pag. 180.181. Of Theophilus Antiochenus, Ad Autolichum. lib. 3. Ibidem. pag. 170. G. H. Of Minucius Felix. Octavius. pag. 101.121. Of Arnobius Advers. Gentes. lib. 4. pag. 149.150, 151. & lib. 7. pag. 230. to 242. Of Basil. H • xaëmeron. Hom. 4. Tom. 1. pag. 45. & De Legendis Libris Gentilium. Oratio. pag. 308.312. Of S. Asterius, in Festum Kalendarum. Hom. Bibl. Patrum. Tom. 4 pag. 706. Of Gaudentius Brixiae. Episcopus, De Lectione Evangelij. Sermo 8. Ibidem. p. 812. G. Of S. Jerome. Comment. in Ezekiel. lib. 6. cap 20. Tom. 4. pag. 389. A. Of Eusebius & Damascene, Paralellorum. lib. 3. cap. 47. with • undry others hereaft • r quoted, who all pass the very selfsame doom upon them. Saint Chrysostom is exceeding copious in this Theame, as is evident by all his transcribed passages in the prec • ding Scene. (See here, page 401.402.404 • 405.406.415.416.424.431. whence he stiles the Play-house; the Caire of Pestilence; the Shop of Luxury • the Scaffold of Incontinency; the public School of L • wdnesse: a Babylonish Brothel full of many filthy noisome diseases, which depraves, depopulates, not the nature of the body, but the good habitude of the soul, which over-turns all laws, all modesty, virtue, discipline, and brings many great mischiefs unto Cities : Whereupon he thus concludes; that Magistrates by overthrowing Play-houses shall overturn all iniquity, and utterly extinguish all the plagues, the mischiefs of the State and Citty. Saint Augustine, as he informs us in express terms: That if there had been none but good and honest men in the Citty of Rome, that they would never have admitted Stage-plays to have any existence among human things, much less in Divine affairs: so • e proves at large out of Heathen Authors, that Stage-plays are most unsufferable cont • gions and mischiefs in a State, vitiating the minds, subverting the manners, th • discipline of those places where they are but tolerated. Among other passages to this purpose, he affirms: That the Roman virtue was altogether unacquainted with these Theatricall arts almost 400. years: which albeit they were sought after to delight the voluptuousness of men's lusts, and crept in only by reason of the corruption of men's manners, yet the Idol Heathen gods desired that they might be dedicated unto them. And then speaking of the first occasion of bringing Stage-plays into Rome, to asswage the pestilence which afflicted their bodies, they brought in (saith he) another far more grievous and perp • tuall pestilence of their minds, which he thus elegantly expresseth. Dij propter sedandam corporis pestilentiam ludos sibi scenicos exhiberi iubebant, pontifex autem vester (Scipio) propter animorum cavendam pestilentiam, ipsam scenam construi prohi • ebat. Si aliqu • lu • e mentis animum corpori praeponitis, eligere qu • m • olatis? Ne{que} enim & illa corporum pestilentia ideo conquievit, quia populo bellico •• , & solis antea ludis Circensibus assueto, luderum scenicorum delicata subi • travit insania: sed astutia spirituum nefandorum praevidens illam pestilentiam iàm •• ne de • ito cessat • ram, aliam longe graviorem, qua plurimum gaudet, ex hac occasion, non corporibus, sed moribus curav •• immittere: quae animos miserorum tantis occaecavit tenebris, ta • ta deformitate faedavit, ut etiam modo quod incredibile for • itan erit, si à nostris posteris audietur, Romana urbe vasta • a, quos pestilentia ista possedit, at{que} inde fugientes, Carthaginem pervenire potuerunt, in Theatris quo • idie certatim pro histrionibus insanirent. A me • tes, amentes, quis est hic taunt •• , non error, sed f • ror, ut exitium vestrum plangentibus Orientalibus populis, & maximis Civitatibus in remotissimis terris • publicum luctum maerorem{que} ducentibus, vos Theatra quareretis, intraretis, i • pleretis, & multo insaniora quàm fuerant antea faceretis. Hanc animarum labem ac pestem, hanc probitatis & honestatis eversionem (so he truly stiles the Theater) Scipio ill metuebat, quando consirui Theatra prohibebat, &c. ne{que} enim censebat ill faelicem esse rempub. stantibus maenibus, ruentibus moribus: sed in vobis plus valuit quod impij Daemones seduxerunt, quàm quod homines providi praecaverunt, &c. It is evident then by Saint Augustine's resolution: that Stage-plays incurably vitiate and desperately corrupt, if not subvert men's manners; and so bring ruin to that State that suffers them, the evils which they ingenerate in the people's manners, being far worse then the cruellest enemies. Hence he informs us • that Stage-plays had made Rome, which was gotten with the care, and augmented by the industry of their Ancest • rs, more filthy whiles it was standing, then when it was falling unto ruin: since in its ruin, only the stones and timber, but in the lives of Play-haunters, all the monuments and ornaments not of walls, but of manners were fallen to the ground; since their hearts burned with more lamentable polluting lusts, then the houses of the Citty did with flames. Yea hence he concludes and prov • s, the Pagan Deities of the Romans to be no gods, but beastly Devils, and unclean infernal spirits; who were no friends, no advancers, no protectors of the Romans or of their Common-weal, but professed en • mies, plagues, and traitors to them both, because they invented, exacted, countenanced, and delighted in those obscene, lascivious, vicious • Stage-plays, which defiled the minds, corrupted the lives, ruinated the manners, and eternally destroyed the souls of men, by precipitating them into all vice and lewdness whatsoever: which Plays both Plato, Scipio, Cicero, and the ancient Romans quite abandoned, as the very Pests, the Cankers, ban • and overthrow of the Common-weal. Such they, such he reputed them • and from thence he persuades the Romans to di • carde them, together with all their Devil-Idols who took such pleasure in them. Paulus Orosius, Saint Augus • ines entire friend and Coetanean, in his excellent History (dedicated to this learned Father,) relating the original introduction of Stage-plays among the Romans, to asswage the plague; thus discants on that passage. A • tores sua •• re pontifices, ut ludi scenicidijs expetentibus adere •• ur: & ita pro depellenda temporali peste corporum, accersitus est perpetuus morbus animarum: these Stage-plays being no other in his opinion, but a p • rpetuall sickness of men's souls, far worse then any p • stilence that could • ff •• ct their bodies: What State, what person then would foment such fatal plagues? Salvian, Bishop of Massilia in France, most elegantly inveigheth against the horrid obsc • nity of Stage-plays, informing the ancient Romans and others, that Stage-plays were those insufferable impurities which polluted their souls, depraved their manners, provoked the Majesty of their God to wrath, offended their blessed Savior, dishonored their Christian profession, and drew down God's Judgments on their State, which was then miserably wasted by the Goathes and Vandals: and th • reupon he adviseth them, eternally to abandon Plays and Theaters (according to their vow in baptism) as the most pernicious evils, which would bring their souls, their bodies, their Church and State to utter ruin. Isiodor Pelus • ota, who flourished about the year of our Lord 440. in his Epistle to Hi • r • , who then swayed the Common-wealth under Theodosius the Yonger, writes thus of Stage-players; that this is their chief end and study, not that many should be made better by their scoffs, (as some have said, deceiving both themselves, and those that hear them,) but that many might be drawn to sin. For their felicity is wholly placed in the lewdness of their Spectators. For so it is, that if their Spectators should be made better, their very occupation would go to wrack: wherefore they never so much as think of reforming any who o • fend, neither if they willed it, could they effect it. For their mimicall art of its own nature is only • itted for to hurt men. A passage, which not only answers that vain Objection of Play-patrons (which you see was ancient) that Stage-plays reform men by reprehending vice: but likewise man •• ests them to be intolerable mischiefs in any Christian State, since their very end and nature is only to corrupt and make men worse. Aurelius Cassiodo • us, describ • n • the office of the Roman Censor, or Surveyor of sports, records; that the dissolute lives, and light arts of Stage-players are remote from honest manners; and that therefore antiquity becoming a Moderator, did take care to suppress their insolencies by appointing Censors to correct and punish them, that so they might not wholly lash out, when as they should undergo the censure of a Judge. For the very exhibition of pleasures is to be administered under a certain discipline. If not a true, yet at leastwise let a shadowed order of justice keep Stage-plays with in compass. Let even these businesses be tempered with the qualification of laws, that so honesty may rule over dishonest persons, and they may live under certain rules, who know not the way of a right conversation: For these Players seek not so much their own pleasure as other men's mirth, and by a perverse condition, when as they deliver the dominion to their bodies, they have compelled their souls to serve. It is fit therefore that those should receive a Moderator, who know not to carry themselves with a legal moderation. For the office of a Censor is set up as a Tutor over these herds of men. For as Tutors keep children of tender years with diligent care, so vehement pleasures are to be curbed by the Censor, with great gravity, &c. Which passage, as it proves Stage-plays, intolerable mischiefs; and Players, disorderly dissolute wicked person, whose excesses need to be suppressed, even by the opinion of the ancient Pagan Romans, who appointed Censors of purpose to correct their gross abuses, which yet could never be redressed: so it condemns the excessive lewdness of our moderne Plays and Actors which have no such Surveyers to curb, to censure their abuses; & withal acquaints us, how pernicious Stage-plays are, both to men's manners & the public weal: and what reason Christians have forever to abandon them; since the very worst of Pagans, had long since wholly discarded them, for their unsufferable corruptions and abuses, but to please their Idols, to whom they wer • devoted; which reason holds not with us Christians, but engageth us most against them. To pass by John Saresbury, Alexander Fabritius, Holkot, • aulus Wan, Mapheus Vegius, Nicolaus De Clemangis, Thomas Bradwardine, Petrarcha, and other more ancient Writers, who censure Stage-plays; as the intolerable depravers of men's minds and manners; the Seminaries of all wickedness, vice, and lewdness; the corrupters of Youth, the subverters of all good discipline; the enemies of all virtuous education; and insufferable mischiefs in a State, which thorough the eyes and ears usher eternal death into men's souls: To whom I might accumulate; Ludovicus Vives, Astexanus, Cornelius Agrippa, Peter Primauday, Danaus, Peter Martyr, Johannes Langhecrucius, Bochellus, Johannes Mariana, Barnabas Brissonius, Caesar Bulengerus, Baronius, Spondanus, The Centuriators, with sundry other Forraigne Authors hereafter quoted ; who fully suffragate to this their Censure. I shall only recite the words of 4 • other moderne Outlandish Authors against the intolerable abuses of Stage-plays, and then pass unto our English Writers: The first of these, is Master Ralph Gualther, a reverend orthodox Divine, whose laborious learned Works all Protestant Churches highly honor: who acquaints us: That Stage-players, the artificers, the ministers of unlawful pleasures, who are wont to frequent the Courts of great Princes, and the eminentest richest Cities where there is most hope of gain propounded to them, are not a small plague of Common-weals: for they are the servitors of lust, they corrupt good manners, they bring all religion into contempt: they greatly exhaust both the public and m • ns private treasure, and that which ought to be distributed for the poor's relief, they by their arts have almost intercepted. These the Prophet compares to Locusts, not only for their multitude • but rather for their idle slothfulness, and because being borne only for to eat and drink, they do nothing in the mean time that is honest, or which may any way advance the public good. Wherefore grave men in all ages have thought fit to exclude this sort of men from the Common-wealth. This Plato a man of most acute judgment perceived when as he banished all Poets out of his Common-wealth, because he knew they would both corrupt men's manners, and bring the god, into contempt. Neither undeservedly is the old discipline of the Massilienses applaud • , who would admit no Stage-players into their Citty, • or any person • but such who were skillful in some art or other, whereby they might honestly maintain themselves To which this also may be added, that the ancient Divines most sharply condemn both Stage-plays and Spectacles: having a respect to that of the Apostle, who would not have fornication, filthy discourse, scurrility or any uncleanness, so much as to be once named among Christians: commanding all the followers of Christ, not to abstain from evil only, but likewise from all appearance of it. It is there • fore a great sign of corrupt and perverted discipline, that th • se effeminate persons and furtherers of most • ishonest pleasures, are in great esteem both in the Courts of Princes & in rich Cities, whiles grave men who excel in council and experience are in the mean time excluded and contemned, and the poor neglected, &c. Then he recites the examples of Licinius, and Henry the 3. Emperor of that name, who cast all Stage-players out of their Courts and Cities, as the very Rats and Moathes of the Court and Common-weal. Examples (writes he) worthy of eternal praise, which if Princes and Magistrates of the Common-weal would imitate at this day, there would be less rome left for filthy slothful idleness, then which there is nothing more powerful to corrupt men's manners: yea wise and prudent men would be in more esteem, and the poor would be better provided for, who now wander up and down in every corner, to the great scandal of Christianity. But because all here neglect their duty, God himself will at one time or other find out a means whereby he will cast out these plagues (so stiles he Plays and Players) not without some public calamity, as the Prophet here threatens to the Ninevites. Thus he. The second is Petrus Opm •• rus, a grave Historian, who writes thus of Plays. The ancient Romans did waste too much upon Pleasures and Spectacles, of which they had four sorts: Stage-plays which served to delight their ears: Cirque-plays, Gladiators, and Huntings, which served for their eyes: From the first of these, they learned filthiness and lewdness: from the latter, cruelty and inhumanity. Neither did any one bring back those manners from these Spectacles that he brought thither; for a certain rust and canker did spread it self over them at unawares. Neither do vices more easily or speedily corrupt men's minds then by these pleasures. The third is Didacus de Tapia, a famous Spanish Hermit; who discussing this question; Whether the Sacrament might be given to Stage-players? writes thus. The ancient Fathers inveigh so bitterly against this pernicious kind of men, and the holy Canons punish them so severely by Ecclesiastical censures, that I suspect that those things which were acted in Theaters heretofore, were filthier then those things that are acted now. But let this be as it will, yet the things that are played now are lascivious, filthy, and obscene, and very pernicious to Christian Religion. And therefore whosoever • asts any sweetness in the Lord, or is any whit wise towards God, is bound to repute them public sinners, and so much the more grivous plague of the Common-weal, by how much the wound of the soul is greater then that of the body. The Council of Carthage, Saint Cyprian, Chrysostom, and Augustine (whose words he there recites at large) excommunicate them both from the Society of the Faithful, and the Sacraments, as the very infamy, plagues, and blemish of the Church, which could not tolerate them without much infamy and dishonor; since the very Pagan Roman • s disfranchised them their tribes, and made them infamous. And if these Stage-players are reputed infamous among Heathens, and deprived of all honor, as Saint Augustine most truly affirmeth. De Civitate Dei. lib. 1. cap. 31. what ought we Christians now to do? Verily we ought to eschew and condemn both in Plays and sports, what ever is profuse, what ever is imm • dest, what ever is unseemly, what ever is wanton, what ever is wicked; all which even Tully himself condemned • n his Offices. But all these things are found in Play-houses: But if that Stage-players delight men with their pleasures, jests, and wily speeches, and with the sweetness of their songs, and music; or if they adorn and instruct men with their grave Sentences, and please them with the representation of ancie • t things, or with their passions ; (A common objection in the behalf of Stage-plays;) would to God they had never mixed these good things with their Com • dies: For this only happens because evil is so weak and miserable by it self, that it cannot defend and help it self, unless it be holpen and assisted by good: For evil, if it be perfect, de • troyeth it self, as Aristotle saith; and therefore it is hid under the show of good, that it may detain and deceive incautelous men: for by nature we are vehemently prone to honesty. But albeit some good things are mingled in these Plays, yet we always ought to have these excellent words of Jerome before our eyes, in his Epistle to Laeta. No Man (saith he) sendeth his Daughter to the Stews, although some Women may there be found bewailing their filthy corruption: no man commits his Heir to a company of Thieves, that he may learn audacity; no man enters into a Boat that is full of holes, that he may learn to avoid shipwreck. No man therefore ought to go to the impure and infamous place of the Theater which is contrary to religion, to modesty and sobriety, (a place so familiar to Devils, and so od • ous to God,) that he may learn or taste the things there acted: for they are intermixed with poison. Such is the venom, the contagion of Players and Play-haunters, in this Popish Hermits judgment, whose words of Papist (and I presume no Protestant) dares to question. The fourth is John Bodine, an eminent Politician, and renowned Statesman, who hath passed this verdict upon Stage-plays. I will (writes he) pass over in silence the abuses which are committed in suffering of Comedies and Interludes, the which (pray mark it) is a most pernicious plague to a Common-weal: for there is nothing doth more corrupt the Citizens good manners, simplicity and natural bounty then Stage-plays: the which have the more power and effect, for that their words, accents, gesture, motions and actions, governed with all the art that may be, and of a most filthy and dishonest subject, leaves a lively impression in their souls who apply thereunto even all their senses. To conclude, we may well say, that the Comedians Stage is an apprenticeship of all impudency, looseness, whoredom, cozening, deceit and wickedness. And therefore Aristotle doth not without cause say, That they must have a care lest the subjects went to Comedies: he had said better, that they should have pulled down their Theaters, and shut the Comedians out of the Citty ga • es. For saith Seneca. there is nothing more contrary to good manners, then to haunt Plays. And therefore Philip Augustus King of France, did by a public Edict, banish all Players out of his Realm. If any one will say, that both Greeks and Romans did allow of Plays: I answer, that it was for a superstition they had unto their gods: but the wisest have always blamed them. For although a Tragedy hath something in it more stately and heroike, and which doth make the hearts of men less effeminate: yet Solon having seen the Tragedy of Thespis played, did much mislike it; and whereas Thespis excusing himself, said, it was but a Play: No ( replied Solon) but this Play turns to earnest. Much more had he blamed Comedies, which were then unknown: and now always they put at the end of every Tragedy (as poison into meat) a Comedy or Iigge. And although that Comedies were more tolerable among those that dwell in the Southerne parts, being more heavy and melancholy by nature, and for their natural constancy less subject to change, yet should they be utterly denied to those that live toward the North, being of a sanguine complexion, light and inconstant; having in a manner all the force of their soul in the common and brutall sense: But there is no hope to se • Plays forbidden by the Magistrates, for commonly they are the first at them. Thus far these Foreigners. To pass by Carolus Sigonius, who enumerates the frequenting, tolerating, and countenancing of Stage-plays both by Prince and people, as the inevitable forerunner, and chief occasion both of th • destruction and overthrow of the Roman Empire, by the Goths and Vandals: and • uevara, his Dial of Princes. l. 3. c. 43. to 48. I come now to our own domestic Plays, to see what our Writers, our Divines, in their daily Sermons; what our Universities, Magistrates, and our whole State have determined of them, in confirmation of my Minors truth.
For our Writers. To pass by those of more ancient times, as Beda, Anselm, Alexander Fabritius, H • lkot, Bradwardi • , Ioannis de Burgo, Alexander de Ales, Edmundus Cantuariensis, Ioannis Saresberiensis, Petrus Blesensis Math • w Paris, Polychronicon, Ludovicus Vives, Thomas Waldensis, and others hereafter quoted, who all condemn these Stage-plays as intolerable corruptions. Master Northbro • ke, an eminent learned Divine, in his excellent Treatise against Vain Plays and Interludes, Imprinted by Authority, London 1579 • writes thus of Stage-plays. To speak my mind and conscience plainly and in the fear of God, I say, that Players and Plays are not tolerable nor sufferable in any Common-weal, especially where • he Gospel is preached ; (which he there proves at large by sundry testimonies of Fathers, Councils, moderne Divines, and others; and by many arguments,) because they are the occasions of much sin and wickedness, corrupting both the minds and manners of their Actors and Spectators. The Author of the third Blast of Retrait from Plays and Theaters, (once a Playerly Play-poet himself, till being pricked in conscience for it, he renounced his profession) d • livers his experimental resolution of Stage-plays in these very terms. Such doubtless is mine opinion of common Plays, that in a Common-weal they are not sufferable. My reason is, because they are public enemies to virtue and religion, allurements to sin, corrupters of good manners, mere Brothel houses of Bawdery, and bring both the Gospel into slander, the Sabbath into contempt, men's souls into da • ger, and finally the whole Common-weal into disorder: all which particulars he there confirms at large. The title of which Book is very observable: viz. A second and third Blast of Retrait from Plays and Theaters: the one whereof was sounded by a reverend Bishop, dead long since; the other by a worshipful and zealous Gentleman now alive: one showing the filthiness of Plays in times past; the other the abomination of Theaters in the time present: both expressly proving, that that Common-weal is nigh unto the curse of God, wherein either Players be made of or Theaters maintained: Set forth and allowed by Authority. Anno 1580. A pregnant Authorized evidence of my Minors truth. Master Stephen Gosson, another great Play-poet before his conversion, (for which he afterw • rds shed many a bitter tear ;) in his School of Abuse; containing a pleasant invective against Poets, Pipers, Players, Iesters, and such like Caterpillars of a Common-wealth, setting up a • lagge of Defiance against their mischievous exercise, and overthrowing their Bulwarks by Profane Writers, Natur • ll Reason, and Common Experience; printed by Allowance, and Dedicated to Sir Philip Sidney. Anno 1578. And in his Plays Confuted, Dedicated to Sir Francis Walsingham ; which Book is thus entitled: Plays Confuted in five Actions: Proving that they are not to be suffered in a Christian Common-weal, &c. Imprinted at London, about the year 1581. doth positively affirm, and copiously demonstrate upon unanswerable grounds; That Stage-plays and common Actors are no ways tolerable in any Christian, or Well-governed Common-weal; because they occasion much wickedness, lewdness, and disorder, and exce • dingly corrupt the minds, the manners both of their Auditors and Spectators: as the Perusers of these Tractates shall more at large discern. The self-same Assertion and Conclusion we shall find, in Master Stubs, his Anatom • of Abuses: in reverend B B. Babington, his Exposition upon the 7. Commandment ; in Master John Field, his Declaration of God's Judgment at Paris Garden ; published by Authority. Anno 1583. In a Book entitled, The Church of evil m • n and women, &c. printed by Richard Pinson. Anno 1580. In Matthew Parker Archbishop of Canterbury, De Antiqu. Ecclesiae Brittanicae. Lo • dini 1572. fol. ult. In M. George Whetston, his Mirror for Magistrates of Cities. London 1586. fol. 24. In Holling shed, his Chronicle. Anno 1549. pag. 1028. Numb. 25.30. Col. 2. Anno 1559. Col. 1184. Anno 1576. Col. 1209. In Doctor John Case, Ethicorum. lib. 4. cap. 8. pag. 307.308. & Politicorum. lib. 5. cap. 8. pag. 474.475, 476. where he condemns all Popular, though he allows of Academical Stage-plays, as Doctor Gager, and Doctor Gentiles likewise do. In reverend B B. Halls Epistles, De • ad. 6. Epist. 6. In the Rich Cabinet. London 1616. pag. 116.117, 118. In Master Samuel Purchas, his Pilgrim. cap. 51. pag. 490. In M. Doctor Sparkes, his Rehearsall Sermon at Paul's Cross, the 29. of April. Anno 1579. In the Anonymous Treatise of Dances. London 1581. showing, that they are dependents or things annexed unto whoredom; wherein it is also proved by the way, that Plays are joined and knit together in a rank with them. In incomparable Doctor Reinolds, his Overthrow of Stage-plays, printed 1597. and reprinted at Oxford, 1629. and in his Preface to the University of Oxford before his 6. Theses. pag. 45.46. London 1612. In Doctor John White, his Sermon at Paul's Cross, March 24. 1615. sect. 11. In D r . Bond of the Sabbath. London 1595. p. 134.135.136.137.138. In I. G. his Refutation of the Apology for Actors. London 1615. pag 13. & 48. to 60. In Master John Brinsly • his 3. part of the True Watch chapter 11. Abomination 30. pag. 302. In Master Osmund Lake, his Probe Theological upon the Comma • dements. London 1612. pag 167. to 272. In Master William Perkins, his Exposition upon the 7. Commandment, in his Works. vol. 1. p. 60. D. In his Treatise of Conscience. cap. 3. Tom. 1. pag. 538. In his Cases of Conscience. Book 3. chap. 4. sect. 4. Question 2. vol. 2. pag. 140.141. and in his Commentary on Galatians 3. vol. 2. pag. 239. In I. P. his Covenant between God and man: Exposition on the 7. Commandment. In B B. Bailey, his Preface to the Practice of Piety. In Master Dod, Master Cleav • r, M. El • on. and B B. Andrew's, on the 7. Commandment. In Master Thomas Gatiker, of the Lawfull use of Lots. pag. 216. In Doctor Layton, his Speculum Be •• i Sacri. cap. 45. In Master John Downh • m, his Sum of Divinity. Book 1. chap. 11. pag. 203. and in his Guide to Godliness. lib. 3. chap. 21. sect. 5. In Master Rebert Bolton, his Discourse of True Happiness. pag. • 3.34. In a Short Treatise against Stage-plays Dedicated to the Parliament. Anno 1625. In Richard Rawlidge, his Monster lately found out, &c. London 1628. pag. 2.3.4. In Doctor Ames, De Iure Conscientiae. lib. 5. •• p. 34. pag. 271. In Master Richard Brathwait, his English Gentlewoman. London 1631. pag. 53.54. In Doctor Thomas Beard, his Theater of God's Judgments. Edition 2. London 1631. Book 2. chap. 36. pag. 435.436. who in these their several Writings, unanimously condemn all Stage-plays, as unsufferable pernicious abominations and corruptio • s in a Christian State, which desperately deprave men's minds and manners, by drawing them on to idleness, wantonness, profaneness, whoredom, dissoluten • sse, effemi • acy, and all kinke of vice and wickedness whatsoever ; as these their Writings, with sundry others will more largely testify; which fully suffragate to my present Assumption.
That our godly Divines in their zealous daily Sermons, have likewise declaimed against Stage-plays, both in former and latter times, as these our Writers do, it is evident, not only by our own daily experience; (there being not one godly faithful Minister where these Play-houses, Plays and Players are admitted, but hath oft cyred out against them in the Pulpit, as the very Schools, the Tutors of Bawdery and Abuse; The nests of the Devil; the chair of pestilence, the sinks of all sin, the pomps and sovereign places of Satan; the poison of men's souls and manners, the plagues and overtures of the Commonwealth, &c. ) but by the testimony of the Prefacer to the 2. and 3. Blast of Retrait from Plays and Theaters. Anno 1580. who in • ormes us; that in his time many godly Preachers day by day, in all places of greatest resort, did deno • nce the vengeance of God to those, be th • y high or low, that favored Plays, Theaters, or Players. That in all ages th • most excellent men for learning have condemned them by th • force of eloquence and power of God's Word: and that many in the principal places of this Land have, and daily, yea openl • do speak against Plays, Players, and Theaters; as neither warranted by God's Word, nor liked of Christians, but disallowed utterly, by Script • re, by reason, by Doctors, by Bishops, by their very Authors themselves, yea and by all other good men, as the enemies to godliness, the corruption of the well-disposed: and so consequently a spe • iall engine to subvert all religion, and to overthrow the good State of that Common-weal wherein they are tolerated. By the suffrage of Master Stephen Gosso • . Anno 1581. who acquaints us • That it is a shame to frequent Plays, impudency to defend them: it is sin in the Gentiles to set o • t Plays, in Christians it is a presumptuous sin; because we see better ways and yet take the worse: we know their corruptions and allow them. All this hath been sufficiently proved by ancient Writers, and daily revealed by learned Preachers; yet will n • t my Country-men leave their Plays, because Plays are the nourishers of delight. By the express averment of M. George Whetston. An. 1586. who records: That godly Divines, in p • blike Sermons, and others in printed Books, have (of late) very sharply invayed against Stage-plays • (improperly called Tragedies, Comedies and Morals) as the springs of many vices, and the stumbling-blocks of godliness and virtue. Truly, the use of them on the Sabbath day, and the abuse of them at all times, with scurrility and unchaste convaiance, ministers matter sufficient for them to blame, and the Magistrate to reform. To which I might add D. Rainolds, Overthrow of Stage-plays. Epistle to the Reader, & pag. 93.94. I. G. his Apology for Actors, with sundry others who concur in this.
That our two famous Universities have passed the self same doom of condemnation against Stage-plays; is most apparent; both by the testimony of M. Stephen Gosso • . Anno 1581. who upon his own knowledge a • firmes: That many famous men in his time in both our Universities, had made open out-cries of the inconveniences bred by Plays; and that they held this opinion; That Plays are not to be suffered in a Christian Common-weal: but (saith he) they do not thoroughly prosecute the same, by printing any full discovery against them, because that • inding the ears of the hearers stopped with the deaf Adder, they begin to shak • the dust of their shoes against them; and follow the Counsel of God himself; Which biddeth them, throw no Pearls to Swine. By the testimony of learned D. Rainolds, who a • firmes; that the best and gravest D • vines in the University of Oxford, condemned Stage-plays by an express Statute made in a full Convocation of the whole University, in the year of our Lord 1584. whereby the use of all common Plays was expressly prohibited in the University, lest the younger sort (who are prone to imitate all kind • of vice) being spectators of so many lewd & evil sports as in them are practiced, should be corrupted by them: answerable to which the University of Cambridge (as I have been credibly informed) enacted a public Statute; that no common Actors should be suffered to play within the Precincts of the Universities Jurisdiction, for fear they should deprave the Scholars manners. Which Statutes though perchance they are not always so strictly observed as they ought, yet they are ofttimes put in execution, by such Vice-chancelers, and Proctors as are most conscionably vigilant and careful in their places. All which being put together, sufficiently discovers our Universities judgment of common Players and Actors, what unsufferable mischiefs and corruptions they are. If any here Object; That our Universities approve of private Stage-plays acted by Scholars in private Colleges: therefore these Plays are not so intolerably evil in their opinions. I answer; that our Universities though they tolerate and connive at, yet they give no public approbation to these private Ent • rlud • s, which are not generally received into all Colleges, but only practiced in some private houses, (perchance once in three or four years;) and that by the particular Statutes of those houses made in times of Popery, which require some Latin Comedies, for learning-sake only, to be acted now and then: Which Plays, as they are composed for the most part by idle brains, who affect not b • tter studies; and acted (as I. G. ) informs us, by Gentle-bloods, and lusty Swash-bucklers, who prefer an ounce of vain-glory, oftentati • n and str • tting on the Stage, before a pound of learning; or by such who are sent to the University, not so much to obtain knowledge, as to keep them from the common riot of Gentlemen in these days; like little Children whom their Parents send to School, the rather to keep them from under feet in the streets, which careful Mothers greatly fear: their spectators for the most part being such as both Poets and Actors are; even such as reckon no more of their studies, then spend-all Gentlemen of their cast-suites: So the graver, better, and more studious sort (especially Divines, who by sundry Councils are prohibited from acting or beholding any public or private Stage-plays, and therefore dare not to a approach them) condemn them, censure them, come not a • them, (especially when they transgress the rules of modesty and decency as ought times they do:) Neither are these Plays so frequent now as they have been in former times, by reason of those mischiefs, those expenses of time and money which they occasion, and that affinity they have with common Stage-plays, which all ages, all Christian, all profane Authors of note, and these our Universities have solemnly condemned. Descend we from our Universities to our Magistrates. The Magistrates of the Citty of London, as M. John Field records, obtained from Queen Elizabeth, of famous memory, about the year 1580. that all Heathenish Plays and Interludes should be banished upon Sabbath days: and not long after many godly Citizens, and well-disposed Gentlemen of London, considering that Play-houses and Dicing-houses, were traps for young Gentlemen and others; and perceiving the many inconveniences, and great damage that would ensue upon the long suffering of the same, not only to particular persons, but to the whole Citty; and that it would also be a great disparagement unto the Governors, and a dishonor to the government of this honorable Citty, if they should any longer continue; acquainted some pious Magistrates therewith, desiring them to take some speedy course for the suppression of common Play-houses and Dicing-houses within the Citty of London and Liberties thereof. Who thereupon made humble suite to Queen