and farce or
grotesque. The spectators grew pleased with such an exercise of
their understanding. Steps, motions, attitudes, figures,
positions, now were substituted to speech; and there resulted
from them an expression so natural, images so resembling,
a pathos so moving, or a pleasantry so agreeable, that people
imagined they heard the actions they saw. The gestures alone
supplied the place of the sweetness of the voice, of the energy
of speech, and of the charms of poetry.[*]

[Footnote *: Hanc partem Musicae disciplinae Majores
mutam nominarunt, quae ore clauso loquitur, et quibusdam
gesticulationibus facit intelligi, quod vix narrante
lingua, aut scripturae textu possit agnosci.

_Cassiod_, var. 1. 20.

Loquacissimas manus, linguosos digitos, silentium
clamosum, expositionem tacitam.

_Idem._]

This kind of entertainment, so new, though formed upon a
ground-work already known, planned and executed by genius, and
adopted with a passionate fondness by the Romans, was called the
_Italic dance_; and in the transports of pleasures it caused
them, they gave to the actors of it, the title of _Pantomimes_.
This was no more than a lively, and not at all exagerated
expression, of the truth of their action, which was one
continual picture to the eyes of the spectators. Their motion,
their feet, their hands, their arms, were but so many different
parts of the picture; none of them were to remain idle; but all,
with propriety, were to concur to the formation of that
assemblage, from which result the harmony, and, with pardon for
the expression, the happy _all-together_ of the composition and
performance. A dancer learned from his very name of _pantomime_,
that he could be in no esteem in Rome, but so far as he should
be _all the actor_.

And, in fact, this art was carried to a point of perfection hard
to believe; but for such a number of concurrent and authentic
testimonies.

It appears also clearly from history, that this art, in its
origin, (so favored by an arbitrary prince, and who also made
some use of it, towards establishing his despotism, nay even
primordially introduced by Bathillus, a slave) could no longer
preserve its great excellence, than the spirit of liberty was
not wholly worn out in the Roman breasts; and, like its other
sister arts, gradually decayed and sunk under the subsequent
emperors.

Pilades gave a memorable instance of the (as yet) unextinguished