time of every play ought to be contrived into
as narrow a compass, as the nature of the plot, the quality of the
persons, and variety of accidents will allow. In comedy, I would
not exceed twenty-four or thirty hours; for the plot, accidents, and
persons, of comedy are small, and may be naturally turned in a little
compass: But in tragedy, the design is weighty, and the persons great;
therefore, there will naturally be required a greater space of time in
which to move them. And this, though Ben Jonson has not told us, yet
it is manifestly his opinion: For you see that to his comedies
he allows generally but twenty-four hours; to his two tragedies,
"Sejanus," and "Catiline," a much larger time, though he draws both
of them into as narrow a compass as he can: For he shews you only the
latter end of Sejanus's favour, and the conspiracy of Catiline already
ripe, and just breaking out into action.

But as it is an error, on the one side, to make too great a
disproportion betwixt the imaginary time of the play, and the real
time of its representation; so, on the other side, it is an oversight
to compress the accidents of a play into a narrower compass than that
in which they could naturally be produced. Of this last error the
French are seldom guilty, because the thinness of their plots prevents
them from it; but few Englishmen, except Ben Jonson, have ever made
a plot, with variety of design in it, included in twenty-four hours,
which was altogether natural. For this reason, I prefer the "Silent
Woman" before all other plays, I think justly, as I do its author, in
judgment, above all other poets. Yet, of the two, I think that error
the most pardonable, which in too strait a compass crowds together
many accidents, since it produces more variety, and, consequently,
more pleasure to the audience; and, because the nearness of proportion
betwixt the imaginary and real time, does speciously cover the
compression of the accidents.

Thus I have endeavoured to answer the meaning of his argument; for, as
he drew it, I humbly conceive that it was none,--as will appear by his
proposition, and the proof of it. His proposition was this:

"If strictly and duly weighed, it is as impossible for one stage to
present two rooms, or houses, as two countries, or kingdoms," &c.
And his proof this: "For all being impossible, they are none of them
nearest the truth or nature of what they present."

Here you see, instead of proof or reason, there