The Players Scourge, Part 1 · Act 6 · Scene 11
SCENA VNDECIMA.
THe 11. fruit of popular Stage-playes, is this; that they fill mens mouthes with idle, frothie, scurrilous, lewde, prophane discourses, complements, Histories, Songs, Iests, rEphes. 4.29. cap. 5.3.4. Psal. 45.2.which are odious unto God, yea execrable to all chaste, all modest Christians. Stage-playes sSee Act 3. Scene 1. & Act 7. Scene 3.4.are the Lectures, the Marts, the common treasuries of all ribaldry, scurrility, prophanesse; which furnish their Actors, their Auditors with such plentifull variety of corrupt, irreligious, atheisticall, unchristian and gracelesse discourses, which they communicate to others upon all occasions, that they scarce ever speake of holy things. This Ovid himselfe confesseth; informing us; tIllic & canrant quicquid dedicêre theatris. Inde joci veteres obscaenaque verba canuntur. Nec res hac Veneri gratior ulla fuit. Ovid Fastorum. l. 3 p 51.55that men sing those ribaldrous songs, and utter those amorous verses, discourses at home, which they have learned at the Play-house. What Seneca writes of the words of flatterers and lewde companions, I may well apply to Actors. uHorū sermo multum nocet. Nam etiam si non statim ofsicit, semina in animo relinquit, sequitur que nos etiam cum ab illis discesserimus, resurrecturū postea malū. Quemadmodū qui audierunt symphoniam ferunt secum in auribus modulationem, ac dulcedinem cantus, quae cogitationes impedit, nec ad seria patitur intendi: sed adulatorum & prava laudantium sermo diutius haeret quàm auditur: nec facile est, …nimo dul…em sonū excutere, prosequitur & durat, & ex interuallo recurrit. Ideo claudendae sunt aures malis vocibus, & quidem primis; nam cum initium secerunt, admissae que sunt, plus audent. Seneca Epist. 123.Their speeches doe much hurt. For if they doe men no present harme, yet they leave the seeds of evill in their mindes, and an evill afterwards to arise, followes them even then when as they are departed from them. For as those who heare some pleasant consort carry away with them the sweetnesse of the song in their eares, which hinders their thoughts, and suffers them not to be intent upon serious things: so the obscenities of Stage-players (xDiscit enim citius, meminit que libentius illud Quod quis deridet, quā quod probat & veneretur. Horace. Epist. l. 2. Ep. 1. p. 286. See here, pag. 424. which men are aptest to remember, as most agreeable to their lusts, where as they are extraordinary forgetfull of all the good they heare) sticke longer by men then whiles they heare them. Neither is it an easie matter to shake their pleasant sound out of their mindes: for it followes them, it stayes with them, and recoiles backe againe into their mindes and tongues after some little space. Therefore the eares are to be kept shut against such evill speeches, and that verily against the very first: for when they have made a beginning and gotten entrance, they will make a further attempt. yDe Vero Cultu. c. 20.21.Lactantius, zHomil. De David. & Saule Tom. 1. Col. 510. D. See here p. 424.Chrysostome, aPaedagogi. lib 3. cap. 11.Clemens Alexandrinus, and bExposition on the 7. Commandement. pag. 67.BB. Babington informe us; That Play-haunters carry away with them the Idaeaes and similitudes of the lewde representations they behold in Stage-playes, which sinke deepe into their mindes; that they sucke in the venome of Stage-playes with great delight, & practise the speeches, the convayances of love, which there they see and learne: And having once polluted their speech with the language of the Theater; (for I will never, writes BB. Babington, call it polishing,) they are never better then when they have company to bestow their tales, and Stage-greetings upon: And for this reason among others, they dislike of Stage-playes. As these recited Authors, so our owne experience can suffragate to the truth of this effect: For who so vaine, so frothie, so prophane, so atheisticall, blasphemous, lascivious, scurrilous; who lesse holy, gracious, or edifying in their ordinary discourses, then Players and Play-haunters? *See The 3. Blast of Retrait from Playes & Theaters; and Master Gosson, his Schoole of Abuses, & Playes Confuted: to this purpose.whose tongues are tipt with oathes, execrations, ribaldry, lascivious tales, amorous songs, wanton histories, unseemely jests, adulterous insinuations, invective taunts and scoffes against holinesse, sobriety, chastity, modesty, grace, and goodnesse; with the very language of the Stewes, of Atheists, of Pagans, not of Christians. Seldome shall you heare from such mens mouthes any religious discourses, any conference of God, of Christ, of the Scriptures, of grace, of glory, of practical divinity, of sin, of faith, of repentance, of the meanes or signes of grace and salvation, any praysing or blessing of God for his mercy to us in his Sonne; any bewayling of their owne sinfull conditions, or of thei… slavery under sinne: any exhortation unto goodnesse; any dissuations from any sinne; or the like; cDeut. 6.6, 7, 8, 9. Psal. 71.24 Psal. 77.11, 12. Psal. 105.1, 2. Psal. 119.13, 16.27. Psal. 145.10, 11, 12. Psal. 9.11. Psal. 22.22, 31. Psal. 66.16, 17. Psal. 2….7.the principall things that Christians should conferre off: Their tongues are so accustomed to the theames, the flattering Eloquence, and phrases of the Theater; so taken up with the relations of the things they heare or see at Stage-playes; that they cannot relish the dIsay 19.18.language of Canaan, the dialect of Heaven, *Assueti enim dulcibus & politis, siv… orationibus, sive carminibus divinarum litterarum simplicem communemque sermonem pro sordido, aspernantur. Id enim quaerunt quod sensum demulceat. Lactantius De Vero Cultu. cap. 21. Ita que , miser ego lecturus Tullium, jejunabam, post noctium crebras vigilias, post l…chrymas, quas mihi praeteritorum recordatio peccatorum ex imis visceribus eruebat; Plautus sumebatur in manus, si quando in memetipsum reversus, Prophetas legere caepissem, sermo horrebat incultus. Hi…rom. Epist. 22. cap. 13.nor brooke the Scripture phrase, (whose plainesse they deride and scorne:) much lesse can they spare any vacant time to habituate their unholy lips, to season their fIer. 9.25, 26.uncircumcised hearts and eares, with holy conference. It is Gods owne command to Christians: gEphes. 4.29, 31.That they should put away all vaine, all evill speaking: that no corrupt communication should proceed out of their mouthes, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may administer grace to the hearers: hEphes. 5.3, 4.That fornication and all uncleanesse should not be so much as once named among them, as becommeth Saints: Neither filthinesse, nor foolish talking, nor iesting, which are not convenient, but rather giving of thankes. iCol. 4.6.That their speech should be alwayes gracious seasoned with salt: kDeut. 6.6, 7, 8, 9. c. 11.18, 19.20.And that his Words and his Commandements should be alwayes in their hearts; to teach them diligently unto their Children: to talke of them (not of Play-house passages, or such vaine fruitlesse trifles) when they sit in their houses, and when they walke by the way, and when they lie downe, and when they rise up: that they should binde them for a signe upon their hands, and that they should be as frontlets betweene their eyes: and that they should write them upon the posts of their house, and upon their gates; that so they might lPsal. 1.1, ….meditate and discourse of them day and night upon all occasions. But alas our Stage-playes incorporate themselves so firmely, mPersuadet enim quicquid suave e…t, & animo penitus dum delectat, infidet. Lactantius, De Vero Cultu. cap. 21.and sinke so deepe into our Actors and Play-h…nters mindes, that they quite invert these sacred precepts; suppressing those heavenly Christian conferences which they command; reviving and advancing those vaine lascivious discourses which they prohibite. This the fore-quoted Authors; this present experience testifie. Wherefore I shall end this Scene with this short Syllogisme, being a 37. Argument against Stage-playes.Argument 37.
Those things which banish all holy conferences, all pious discourses out of their Actors and Spectators mouthes, and furnish them with all variety of idle, vaine, unprofitable, lascivious, scurrilous, prophane, atheisticall, irreligious phrases, Play-house conferences, and Stage-discourses, must questionlesse bee unlawfull, yea abominable unto Christians: as the alleadged Scriptures testifie.
But this doe Stage-playes; as the premises and experience manifest.
Therefore they must questionlesse bee unlawfull, yea abominable unto Christians.