University of California, Los Angeles

A LETTER TO
A.H.  Esq;
Concerning the STAGE.

LONDON,
Printed for A. Baldwin, near the Oxford-Arms in Warwick-Lane,
1698.

(I)

TO A.H.  Esq; &c.

SIR,

Forgive me if I think it Ill-nature in you to leave the Town, at a Time when it wants your Company, and seems to beg your Assistance:  How can you propose to live at Ease in the Country, when so many of your Friends, the Wits, are engag’d here in open War?  Let Mr. Collier say what he pleases of Mr. Dryden, I begin to think ’twas his prophetick Genius mov’d him to declaim against Priests; and there is great reason to complain of their being the Incendiaries of the People, when they set the World on fire by Preaching, which they were only sent to warm.  But what can Mr. Collier mean by exposing the Stage so? he wou’d not surely have it silenc’d:  That wou’d be a little too barbarous, and too much like Cant to be entertain’d by Men of Thought or Ingenuity.  I wou’d rather suppose he design’d a Reformation; and that is so reasonable, I wonder any Man should put his Face in disorder, or study a Revenge for the Attempt.  But it may be ask’d, Cou’d he not have done that without exposing so many great Genius’s?  Had it not been better to have let Mr. Durfey alone?  Tho’ even this Method wou’d not have pleas’d every body; for whate’er Effect it has had on Mr. Vanbroug and Congreve; Motteux and Guildon resent it to the last degree.  Is their nothing in their Works Illustrious, or that cou’d merit Censure?  Indeed some People are not to be reclaim’d by Ridicule; and Mr. Collier knowing their Vertues, with how much Compos’dness and Resignation they can bear a Hiss, out of Compassion, took Example by the Town and neglected both.

It is the Observation of some, That whereever the State flourishes, the Theatre has never fail’d of Encouragement; and that ’tis hardly possible the State shou’d suffer without the others sinking in its Reputation.  It is Pity that England shou’d be the only Exception, and since we have some of our Nobility, who have a Taste of Eloquence, and all those Vertues which adorn the Stage, that It shou’d want their Assistance by whom it was at first rais’d, and since maintain’d:  If it has fallen from its Purity, or never arriv’d to what they fully lik’d, let it not want their Countenance, without whom ’tis impossible to be any thing at all, and by whom it may become all that we can wish.  They alone can free it from Contempt and Censure, by maintaining such an Awe, that the least Glymps of Profaneness and Immorality shou’d not dare to appear on the Stage; and this may be done by encouraging none but those who write well:  for when a good Poet takes on him to instruct, we need fear no Immodesty; for ’tis impossible in a Regular Play, he shou’d find