erpart to that which our king wears when he
goes to the Parliament-house,--just so full and cumbersome, and set
out with ermine and pearls. And if things must be represented, I see
not what to find fault with in this. But in reading, what robe are we
conscious of? Some dim images of royalty--a crown and sceptre, may
float before our eyes, but who shall describe the fashion of it? Do we
see in our mind's eye what Webb or any other robe-maker could pattern?
This is the inevitable consequence of imitating everything, to make
all things natural. Whereas the reading of a tragedy is a fine
abstraction. It presents to the fancy just so much of external
appearances as to make us feel that we are among flesh and blood,
while by far the greater and better part of our imagination is
employed upon the thoughts and internal machinery of the character.
But in acting, scenery, dress, the most contemptible things, call upon
us to judge of their naturalness.

Perhaps it would be no bad similitude, to liken the pleasure which we
take in seeing one of these fine plays acted, compared with that quiet
delight which we find in the reading of it, to the different feelings
with which a reviewer, and a man that is not a reviewer, reads a fine
poem. The accursed critical habit,--the being called upon to judge and
pronounce, must make it quite a different thing to the former. In
seeing these plays acted, we are affected just as judges. When Hamlet
compares the two pictures of Gertrude's first and second husband, who
wants to see the pictures? But in the acting, a miniature must be
lugged out; which we know not to be the picture, but only to show how
finely a miniature may be represented. This showing of everything,
levels all things: it makes tricks, bows, and curtesies, of
importance. Mrs. S. never got more fame by anything than by the
manner in which she dismisses the guests in the banquet-scene in
_Macbeth_: it is as much remembered as any of her thrilling tones or
impressive looks. But does such a trifle as this enter into the
imaginations of the readers of that wild and wonderful scene? Does not
the mind dismiss the feasters as rapidly as it can? Does it care about
the gracefulness of the doing it? But by acting, and judging of
acting, all these non-essentials are raised into an importance,
injurious to the main interest of the play.

I have confined my observations to the tragic parts of Shakespeare. It
would be no very difficult task to