It must not be supposed, however, that the introduction of scenery was hailed unanimously as a vast improvement upon the former condition of the stage.  There was, no doubt, abundance of applause; a sufficient number of spectators were well pleased to find that now their eyes were to be addressed not less than their ears and their minds, and were satisfied that exhibitions of the theatre would be presently much more intelligible to them than had hitherto been the case.  Still the sages shook their heads, distrusting the change, and prophesying evil of it.  Even Mr. Payne Collier has been moved by his conservative regard for the Elizabethan stage and the early drama to date from the introduction of scenery the beginning of the decline of our dramatic poetry.  He holds it a fortunate circumstance for the poetry of our old plays, that “painted movable scenery” had not then been introduced.  “The imagination only of the auditor was appealed to, and we owe to the absence of painted canvas many of the finest descriptive passages in Shakespeare, his contemporaries, and immediate followers.”  Further, he states his opinion that our old dramatists “luxuriated in passages descriptive of natural or artificial scenery, because they knew their auditors would have nothing before their eyes to contradict the poetry; the hangings of the stage made little pretensions to anything but coverings for the walls, and the notion of the place represented was taken from what was said by the poet, and not from what was attempted by the painter.”

It need hardly be stated that the absence of scenes and scene-shifting had by no means confined the British drama to a classical form, although regard for “unity of place,” at any rate, might seem to be almost logically involved in the immovable condition of the stage-fittings.  Some two or three plays, affecting to follow the construction adopted by the Greek and Roman stage, are certainly to be found in the Elizabethan repertory, but they had been little favoured by the playgoers of the time, and may fairly be viewed as exceptions proving the rule that our drama is essentially romantic.  Indeed, our old dramatists were induced by the absence of scenery to rely more and more upon the imagination of their audience.  As Mr. Collier observes:  “If the old poets had been obliged to confine themselves merely to the changes that could at that early date have been exhibited by the removal of painted canvas or boarding, we should have lost much of that boundless diversity of situation and character allowed by this happy absence of restraint.”  At the same time, the liberty these writers permitted themselves did not escape criticism from the devout adherents of the classical theatre.  Sir Philip Sidney, in his “Apology for Poetry,” 1595, is severe upon the “defectious” nature of the English drama, especially as to its disregard of the unities of time and place.  “Now,” he says, three ladies “walk to gather flowers, and then we must believe the stage to be a garden;