when it shall be brought nearer to perfection. In short, that agreeable
turn, that gaiety, which yet maintains the delicacy of its character,
without falling into dulness or into buffoonery; that elegant raillery,
which is the flower of fine wit, is the qualification which comedy
requires. We must, however, remember that the true artificial ridicule,
which is required on the theatre, must be only a transcript of the
ridicule which nature affords. Comedy is naturally written, when, being
on the theatre, a man can fancy himself in a private family, or a
particular part of the town, and meets with nothing but what he really
meets with in the world; for it is no real comedy in which a man does
not see his own picture, and find his own manners, and those of the
people among whom he lives. Menander succeeded only by this art among
the Greeks: and the Romans, when they sat at Terence's comedies,
imagined themselves in a private party; for they found nothing there
which they had not been used to find in common company. The great art of
comedy is to adhere to nature, without deviation; to have general
sentiments and expressions, which all the world can understand; for the
writer must keep it always in his mind, that the coarsest touches after
nature will please more, than the most delicate, with which nature is
inconsistent. However, low and mean words should never be allowed upon
the stage, if they are not supported with some kind of wit. Proverbs and
vulgar smartnesses can never be suffered, unless they have something in
them of nature and pleasantry. This is the universal principle of
comedy; whatever is represented, in this manner must please, and nothing
can ever please without it. It is by application to the study of nature
alone, that we arrive at probability, which is the only infallible guide
to theatrical success: without this probability, every thing is
defective, and that which has it, is beautiful; he that follows this,
can never go wrong; and the most common faults of comedy proceed from
the neglect of propriety, and the precipitation of incidents. Care must,
likewise, be taken, that the hints, made use of to introduce the
incidents, are not too strong, that the spectator may enjoy the pleasure
of finding out their meaning; but commonly the weak place in our comedy
is the untying of the plot, in which we almost always fail, on account
of the difficulty which there is in disentangling of what has been
perplexed. To p