the
commonwealth that this very powerful engine, (acting as it does upon our
youth through the delightful medium of amusement, and by the
instrumentality of every circumstance that can lay hold of the fancy,
and through the senses fascinate the heart) should be kept under the
control of a systematic, a vigilant and a severe, but a just criticism.

To the formation of that rare compound "a finished man" there belong,
besides the higher requisites of moral character, an infinite number of
minor accomplishments, which are materially affected either for the
better or the worse, by a frequent and studious attendance on dramatic
representations. MANNERS, which constitute so important a part of the
character of every people, are considerably fashioned by a constant
observation of the pictures of human life exhibited in the theatre: on
the action, the utterance and the general deportment, the effects of the
stage have ever been materially felt and are unequivocally acknowledged.
The most eloquent men of antiquity, and the most eloquent men in
England, have owned themselves indebted to actors for perfecting them in
oratory. Roscius, the actor of Rome, is immortalized by Cicero, and
Garrick by lord Chatham and Edmund Burke. If then the stage has been
felt to produce such weighty effects in the more arduous part of human
improvement, how ponderous in its operation must it not of necessity be,
on the other hand, in the promotion of evil, if it exhibit to the
growing generation corrupt examples and defective models, not only
unrestrained and uncensured, but sanctioned with the applause of an
uninstructed and misjudging multitude. Every plaudit which a vitious
play, or a bad actor receives is a blow to the public morals, and the
public taste. Man is an imitative animal, and insensibly conforms to the
models and examples before him. Young men who excessively admire a
favourite actor, will insensibly imitate him, without scanning the man's
merits or defects; and without ever reflecting upon the ultimate
influence which their partiality, if it should be misplaced, may have
upon their lives, fortunes and characters, will adopt his manner, his
action, his enunciation, nay, his worst defects, and in short every
thing that is imitable about him.

Those who dissent from us on other propositions, will agree with us at
least in this, that the highest degree of attention ought to be paid to
the morals, the manners, the address and the languag