The Players Scourge, Part 1 · Act 5 · Scene 5
SCENA QVINTA.
THe second circumstance considerable in the forme of acting Playes, is the severall parts and persons sustained in them: which suggests this twentieth Play-oppugning Argument.Argument. 20.
Those Playes, whose very parts and persons are sinfull, yea, abominable, are certainly unseemely, unlawfull unto Christians.
But hIratus senex, edax Parasitus, sycop…anta impu…ens, avarus leno assidu… agendi sunt mihi, clamore summo, cum labore maxumo. Te…entij Heutontimor, Prologus: p. 85.such are the parts, the persons most frequent in all Stage-playes.
Therefore they are certainly unseemely, unlawfull u…to Christians.
The Maior is irrefragable, because iPartes totum su…m vt constituunt, ita determinant. Kecker… System. Log…. l. 1. c. 22. p. 192. Partis & totius eadem est ratio. Totum sapitnaturam suarum partium. Bed…; Axiomata Philosophica. Tom. 2. Col. 164.such as the parts are, such is the whole, which is composed of them: If the parts then be evill, the intiretie that springs out of them must bee such.
The Minor I shall evidence by this Induction. In all our Stage-playes, we have most vsually the parts and persons of kSee Act. 3. Scene 1. &. 3. Cyprian. & Tertullian de Spectaculis. l. accordingly.Divel-gods and Goddesses; of Iupiter, Mars, Apollo, Venus, Vulcan, Saturne, Cupid, Neptune, Mercurie, Esculapius, Hercules, Pluto, Bacchus, Ceres, Minerva, Diana, Iuno, Proserpina, Flora, Priapus, and others: yea, sometimes the very part and person of the lSee Ludovicus Vives, Notae in August. De Ciuit. Dei. l. 12. c. 25. C. accordingly.Divell himselfe; whose workes, whose pompes and vanities all Christians have renounced in their Baptisme: Adde we to these, the parts and representations of mSaltantes Satyros imitabitur Alphesibaeus, Virgil. Eclog. 5. p. 14.Satyres, Silvanes, Muses, Nymphes, F…ries, Hobgoblins, Fairies, Fates, with such other heathen vanities, which Christians should not name, much lesse resemble; Together with the parts, the persons, nConcil. Constantinop. 6. Can. 62.65 70.…6. & Act. 3. Scene 1. accordingly.of Whores, Whoremasters, Adulterers, Bawdes, Panders, Tyrants, Traitors, Theeves, Murtherers, Paricides, Drunkards, Parasites, Prodigals, Hypocrites, Fooles, Ruffians, Wooers, Epicures, Fantastiques, Pennie-Fathers, Vsurers, Scolds, Drabbes, Ravishers, Wantons, Bedlams, Turkes, Infidels, and oSee the Printed Comaedies and Tragaedies of Aristophanes, Terence, Menander, P…au…us, Euripides, Sophocles, Seneca, and all our moderne Playes: Together with Master Stubs, Master Northbrooke, Master Gosson, and others in their Treatises against Playes acco…dingly.all other desperate wicked persons whatsoever.oVter est in…anior h…r…m? Horace Serm. l. 2. Sat. 3. p. 207. There is sca…c… one Divell in Hell, hardly a notorious sinne or pAspice, Plautus Quo pacto partes tutetur amantis Ephebi, Vt patris attenti, lenonis vt insidiosi? Quantus sit Dorsenus edacibu… in Parasitis, Horace Epist. l. 2. Ep. 1. p. 283.sinner upon earth, either of moderne or ancient times, but hath some part or other in Stage-playes. And can they then be lawfull, be tollerable unto Christians, being consarcinated of such polluted parts and persons as these? Doubtlesse, he who will but cordially, but Christianly survay those filthy Pagan Divel-gods and Goddesses; those outragious beastly lusts, unparalleld abominations, and execrable sinners, which have their Acts, their Scenes, their Parts, in Stage-playes; must necessarily abandon Playes, (as qNihil ex his quae spectaculis d…putantur placitum D…o est, aut congruens Dei servis: omnia propter Diabolum instituta sunt… & ex Diaboli rebus instructa Tertul. De spectac. c. 24. Merito malis voluptatibus vestr…s & pompis abstinemus, quorum & de sacris o…iginem novimus, & vt noxia blandimenta damnamus. Minucius Felix. Octavius p. 123. Isiodor. hisp. Originum l. 18. c. 51 accordingly.all ancient Christians did) as pastimes more fit for Devils than for Christians: else hee must needs justifie, not onelyonly sinne and sinners, but even Hell it selfe… which abounds not with rAmphi…eatrum enim omnium Daemonum templum est: tot illic immundi spiritus considun, quot homines …apit. Tert…l. De Spectac. T…m. 2 p. 392.more polluted Deuils, and Devill-Idols; with more prodigious Monsters of impietie, with more stupendious matchlesse villanies, than the Stage, whose wickednesse oft-times, transcends even that of the infernall Lake. For there, men onelyonly suffer and bewaile with teares, the eternall tortures which their sinnes occasion: Whereas men in Theaters, are so farre from sinne-lamenting sorrow, that they even delight themselves with the representations of those wickednesses, which the originall Authors of them now deplore in Hell. And is not this sProv. 10.23. c. 13.9. 2 Pet. 2.12. Supra omn…m autem monstruosi piaculi execrationem est, scelus s…mmum admi…ere, & pudorem sc…leris non hab…re. Sa…vian. De Guber. Dei, l. 7. p. 263.a desperate matchlesse madnesse, for men, for Christians, to sport themselves with those individuall sinnes upon the Stage, which the parties acted in the very bitternesse of their soules, are condoling now in Hell? To make that their chiefest earthly pleasure, which is now the damned acted parties greatest paine, and without repentance may prove theirs too? To raise up damned soules or Devils out of Hell; with all those horrid sinnes that sunke them thither, to no other end but this, to play them on the Stage for laughter-sake: and yet never cordially to consider the dolefull tSee 2 Pet. 2.4. Iude 6. Isay 66.24. Matth. 25.41, 46. Revel. 2….10, 2 Thess 1.7, …, 9.condition of the persons, nor seriously to lamen… the damnablenesse, the eternall punishment of the sinnes thus acted in their sight? O that our Playe…s, our Play-haunters would now seriously consider, that the persons whose parts, whose sinnes they act and see, are even then ye…ing in the v…ndesinenter medi…and… aeternae damna…ionis supplicium in quo quicquid paenarum excogitari potest, q…icquid etiā n…n potest, s…per adest: cuius vermis immortalis ignis exting…bilis, …aet…r intol…rabilis est: cuius torrentes in picem covertuntur, & humus in sulphur, ardebit que in… sempiternum: cujus lacus fa…guine igneque permixtus est, & quoscu… que sus… pit demergit si…ul & exurit. Ambr…se Praecatio 2. Praetar. ad Missam. Tom. 5. p. 168 E.eternall flames of hell, for these particular sinnes of theirs, even then whiles they are playing of these sinnes, these parts of theirs on the Stage! O that they would now remember the sighes, the groanes, the teares, xRom. 2.5, 9. Mat. 13.42, 50.the anguish, weeping, and gnashing of teeth, the cryes, and shreekes, that these wickednes…es cause in Hell, whiles they are acting, applauding, committing and laughing at them in the Play-house! And this, if there be any Sparke of humanity, of Christianitie; any feare of God, of Sinne, of Hell, remaining in them; would soone embitter the most Sugred Stage-playes to their soules, and engage them to detest them (unlesse they are marked ou… for Hell) for such like torments as these now sustaine. Certainely, he can never have a share in Heaven, that makes a mocke, a Play, a Pastime of the Parts, the Sins of those Devils, Pagans, and flagitious persons who are now in Hell. He who can thus make Sinne, or Hell, or Devils, yQui vult regnar… cum Christo, non potest gaudere cum sae culo. Ambrose Sermo 11.his earthly solace here, shall undoubtedly enjoy no other Heaven but Hell hereafter. Let the consideration therefore of these parts, these persons sustained in our Stage-playes, perswade us to renounce them, as zSee Ioa…nes Langhecrucius, De Vita & honestate Ecclesiasticorum. lib. 2. cap. 21, 22.mis-beseeming Christians to sport themselves withall; From whose hearts they should rather draw mournfull teares, than foolish laughter.