or be look'd on as repugnant to good Manners,
might be expung'd.

But if these fair Expectations should be blasted in the Bloom, and
notwithstanding the vigorous Efforts which will be made by this
Reformer, Immorality shall maintain its ground and keep Possession
of the Theatre, some other Expedients may be suggested to procure
a Regulation. It might, perhaps be desirable, that a few Persons
of Importance, Men of Learning, Gravity, and good Taste, might be
commission'd by Authority, as a Check upon the Actors, to censure
and suppress any Dramatick Entertainments that shall offend against
Religion, Sobriety of Manners, or the Publick Peace; and all Persons
should be encourag'd to send them such loose or profane Passages which
they hear from the Stage, or read in the printed Plays: Nor will it
be less expedient, that they should be instructed to peruse the Plays
already publish'd, and which are now publickly acted, and to expunge
all offensive and criminal Mixtures, that hereafter they may become
a clean and innocent Diversion. Besides, this End would the more
effectually be accomplish'd, if the Writers of Comedy, Farce, and
Interludes, were rewarded and supported by Means independent on the
Actors: For while the Poets, who write for a Maintenance, are paid by
the Theatre, they will be under a great Temptation to write as desir'd
and directed by the Actors, which was the Complaint of _Cervantes_
above-cited, concerning the Comick Poets of _Spain_. The Actors, we
may safely conclude, are not restrain'd by such rigorous Precepts
of Vertue, but that they will always be inclin'd to present those
Performances which will best fill the House and promote their
Interest; and therefore they will readily humour the vitiated Taste of
the Audience, by acting the most immoral Plays, while they find their
account in doing so: And that which confirms this Observation is, that
they never, as far as I have heard, rejected any Comedy merely for
its Looseness, tho I believe they have refus'd many for want of
that entertaining Quality. Now were the Comick Writers provided of a
Subsistence some other way, they would be deliver'd from the Necessity
of complying with their Actors, by writing such Plays as they
shall bespeak, or at least approve, as the most likely to invite a
profitable Audience.

It would prove an effectual Remedy for this Evil, if the Ladies would
discountenance these loose Comedies, by expressing their dislike, and
refusin