erature to the Christians by the apostate Julian. In the West, however,
the enslaved and debauched Roman world became too barbarous for any
theatrical exhibitions more refined than those of pageants and
chariot-races; while the spirit of Christianity, which in its most corrupt
form still breathed general humanity, whenever controversies of faith were
not concerned, had done away the cruel combats of the gladiators, and the
loss of the distant provinces prevented the possibility of exhibiting the
engagements of wild beasts.

I pass, therefore, at once to the feudal ages which soon succeeded,
confining my observation to this country; though, indeed, the same remark
with very few alterations will apply to all the other states, into which
the great empire was broken. Ages of darkness succeeded;--not, indeed, the
darkness of Russia or of the barbarous lands unconquered by Rome; for from
the time of Honorius to the destruction of Constantinople and the
consequent introduction of ancient literature into Europe, there was a
continued succession of individual intellects;--the golden chain was never
wholly broken, though the connecting links were often of baser metal. A
dark cloud, like another sky, covered the entire cope of heaven,--but in
this place it thinned away, and white stains of light showed a half
eclipsed star behind it,--in that place it was rent asunder, and a star
passed across the opening in all its brightness, and then vanished. Such
stars exhibited themselves only; surrounding objects did not partake of
their light. There were deep wells of knowledge, but no fertilizing rills
and rivulets. For the drama, society was altogether a state of chaos, out
of which it was, for a while at least, to proceed anew, as if there had
been none before it. And yet it is not undelightful to contemplate the
education of good from evil. The ignorance of the great mass of our
countrymen was the efficient cause of the reproduction of the drama; and
the preceding darkness and the returning light were alike necessary in
order to the creation of a Shakespeare.

The drama re-commenced in England, as it first began in Greece, in
religion. The people were not able to read,--the priesthood were unwilling
that they should read; and yet their own interest compelled them not to
leave the people wholly ignorant of the great events of sacred history.
They did that, therefore, by scenic representations, which in after ages
it has been attempted t