ror.

An influence of a slightly different sort to that exercised by these
writers was that of the theatre. The century had seen the rise of the
middle-class man, and his attempts at self expression. The
coffee-house and the Freemason's lodge gave facilities for
conversation, discussion, opinion; and the increasing number of
gazettes supplied these circles with information as to the course of
political events. But the gazettes themselves might not venture into
the danger-marked field of opinion, and for the fast growing public,
especially in the {21} city of Paris, there was no opportunity for
comment or criticism on the events of the day. In a tentative way the
theatre proved itself a possible medium. In 1730, Voltaire produced
his tragedy Brutus. It fell flat because of the lines

. . . et je porte en mon coeur
La liberte gravee et les rois en horreur.

The audience was too loyal to Bourbonism to accept these sentiments;
there were loud murmurs; and _Brutus_ had to be withdrawn. As late as
1766, a play on the subject of William Tell was given to an empty
house; no one would go to see a republican hero. But from the sixties
matters changed rapidly. Audiences show great enthusiasm over
rivalries of art, of actors, of authors, of opinions, and every once in
a while applaud or boo a sentiment that touches the sacred foundations
of the social and political order. At last an author appears on the
scene, keen, witty, unscrupulous, resourceful, to seize on this growing
mood of the public and to play on it for his own glory and profit.

Beaumarchais, Mirabeau, Dumouriez, Bonaparte, these are the types of
the adventurers of the Revolution, and the first only belongs {22} to
the period of incubation and also to the domain of letters. Thrown
into the war of American independence by his double vocation of secret
diplomatic agent and speculator in war supplies, he had espoused the
cause of the American people with an enthusiasm that always blazed most
brightly when a personal interest was at stake. His enthusiasm for
American liberty was easily converted into enthusiasm for the liberty
of his own class, and to vindicate that, he put Figaro on the stage.

The first public performance of the _Noces de Figaro_, in 1784, was the
culmination of a three years' struggle. Louis XVI had declared the
play subversive, and the author had raised a storm of protest in its
behalf. A special performance was conceded for the C