“As in ancient Greece, generations before the rise of the great dramas of Athens, itinerant companies wandered from village to village, carrying their stage furniture in their little carts, and acted in their booths and tents the grand stories of the mythology—­so in England the mystery players haunted the wakes and fairs, and in barns or taverns, taprooms, or in the farm-house kitchen, played at saints and angels, and transacted on their petty stage the drama of the Christian faith."[29]

THE MYSTERY, OR MIRACLE PLAY.—­The subjects of these dramas were taken from such Old Testament narratives as the creation, the lives of the patriarchs, the deluge; or from the crucifixion, and from legends of the saints:  the plays were long, sometimes occupying portions of several days consecutively, during seasons of religious festival.  They were enacted in monasteries, cathedrals, churches, and church-yards.  The mise en scene was on two stages or platforms, on the upper of which were represented the Persons of the Trinity, and on the lower the personages of earth; while a yawning cellar, with smoke arising from an unseen fire, represented the infernal regions.  This device is similar in character to the plan of Dante’s poem—­Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise.

The earliest of these mysteries was performed somewhere about the year 1300, and they held sway until 1600, being, however, slowly supplanted by the moralities, which we shall presently consider.  Many of these mysteries still remain in English, and notices of them may be found in Collier’s History of Dramatic Poetry.

A miracle play was performed to celebrate the birth of Philip II. of Spain.  They are still performed in Andalusia, and one written within a few years for such representation, was enacted at Seville, with great pomp of scenic effect, in the Holy Week of 1870.  Similar scenes are also witnessed by curious foreigners at the present day in the Ober-Ammergau of Bavaria.  These enable the traveller of to-day to realize the former history.

To introduce a comic element, the devil was made to appear with horns, hoof, and tail, to figure with grotesque malignity throughout the play, and to be reconsigned at the close to his dark abode by the divine power.

MORALITIES.—­As the people became enlightened, and especially as religious knowledge made progress, such childish shows were no longer able to satisfy them.  The drama undertook a higher task of instruction in the form of what was called a morality, or moral play.  Instead of old stories reproduced to please the childish fancy of the ignorant, genius invented scenes and incidents taken indeed from common life, but the characters were impersonal; they were the ideal virtues, morality, hope, mercy, frugality, and their correlative vices.  The mystery had endeavored to present similitudes; the moralities were of the nature of allegory, and evinced a decided progress in popular intelligence.