inviting
treat to the populace, and gains an additional zest and burlesque by
following the already established plan of tragedy; and the first man of
genius who seizes the idea, and reduces it into form,--into a work of
art,--by metre and music, is the Aristophanes of the country.

How just this account is will appear from the fact that in the first or
old comedy of the Athenians, most of the _dramatis personae_ were living
characters introduced under their own names; and no doubt, their ordinary
dress, manner, person and voice were closely mimicked. In less favourable
states of society, as that of England in the middle ages, the beginnings
of comedy would be constantly taking place from the mimics and satirical
minstrels; but from want of fixed abode, popular government, and the
successive attendance of the same auditors, it would still remain in
embryo. I shall, perhaps, have occasion to observe that this remark is not
without importance in explaining the essential differences of the modern
and ancient theatres.

Phenomena, similar to those which accompanied the origin of tragedy and
comedy among the Greeks, would take place among the Romans much more
slowly, and the drama would, in any case, have much longer remained in its
first irregular form from the character of the people, their continual
engagements in wars of conquest, the nature of their government, and their
rapidly increasing empire. But, however this might have been, the conquest
of Greece precluded both the process and the necessity of it; and the
Roman stage at once presented imitations or translations of the Greek
drama. This continued till the perfect establishment of Christianity. Some
attempts, indeed, were made to adapt the persons of Scriptural or
ecclesiastical history to the drama; and sacred plays, it is probable,
were not unknown in Constantinople under the emperors of the East. The
first of the kind is, I believe, the only one preserved,--namely, the
{~GREEK CAPITAL LETTER CHI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER RHO~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER IOTA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER SIGMA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER TAU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON WITH VARIA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER FINAL SIGMA~} {~GREEK CAPITAL LETTER PI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA WITH OXIA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER SIGMA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER CHI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMEGA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER NU~}, or, "Christ in his sufferings," by Gregory
Nazianzen,--possibly written in consequence of the prohibition of profane
lit