All For Love | Page 8

have
resolved to have been partial to myself. The faults my enemies have found are rather
cavils concerning little and not essential decencies; which a master of the ceremonies
may decide betwixt us. The French poets, I confess, are strict observers of these
punctilios: They would not, for example, have suffered Cleopatra and Octavia to have
met; or, if they had met, there must have only passed betwixt them some cold civilities,
but no eagerness of repartee, for fear of offending against the greatness of their characters,
and the modesty of their sex. This objection I foresaw, and at the same time contemned;
for I judged it both natural and probable, that Octavia, proud of her new-gained conquest,
would search out Cleopatra to triumph over her; and that Cleopatra, thus attacked, was
not of a spirit to shun the encounter: And it is not unlikely, that two exasperated rivals
should use such satire as I have put into their mouths; for, after all, though the one were a
Roman, and the other a queen, they were both women. It is true, some actions, though
natural, are not fit to be represented; and broad obscenities in words ought in good
manners to be avoided: expressions therefore are a modest clothing of our thoughts, as
breeches and petticoats are of our bodies. If I have kept myself within the bounds of
modesty, all beyond, it is but nicety and affectation; which is no more but modesty
depraved into a vice. They betray themselves who are too quick of apprehension in such
cases, and leave all reasonable men to imagine worse of them, than of the poet.
Honest Montaigne goes yet further: Nous ne sommes que ceremonie; la ceremonie nous
emporte, et laissons la substance des choses. Nous nous tenons aux branches, et

abandonnons le tronc et le corps. Nous avons appris aux dames de rougir, oyans
seulement nommer ce qu'elles ne craignent aucunement a faire: Nous n'osons appeller a
droit nos membres, et ne craignons pas de les employer a toute sorte de debauche. La
ceremonie nous defend d'exprimer par paroles les choses licites et naturelles, et nous l'en
croyons; la raison nous defend de n'en faire point d'illicites et mauvaises, et personne ne
l'en croit. My comfort is, that by this opinion my enemies are but sucking critics, who
would fain be nibbling ere their teeth are come.
Yet, in this nicety of manners does the excellency of French poetry consist. Their heroes
are the most civil people breathing; but their good breeding seldom extends to a word of
sense; all their wit is in their ceremony; they want the genius which animates our stage;
and therefore it is but necessary, when they cannot please, that they should take care not
to offend. But as the civilest man in the company is commonly the dullest, so these
authors, while they are afraid to make you laugh or cry, out of pure good manners make
you sleep. They are so careful not to exasperate a critic, that they never leave him any
work; so busy with the broom, and make so clean a riddance that there is little left either
for censure or for praise: For no part of a poem is worth our discommending, where the
whole is insipid; as when we have once tasted of palled wine, we stay not to examine it
glass by glass. But while they affect to shine in trifles, they are often careless in essentials.
Thus, their Hippolytus is so scrupulous in point of decency, that he will rather expose
himself to death, than accuse his stepmother to his father; and my critics I am sure will
commend him for it. But we of grosser apprehensions are apt to think that this excess of
generosity is not practicable, but with fools and madmen. This was good manners with a
vengeance; and the audience is like to be much concerned at the misfortunes of this
admirable hero. But take Hippolytus out of his poetic fit, and I suppose he would think it
a wiser part to set the saddle on the right horse, and choose rather to live with the
reputation of a plain-spoken, honest man, than to die with the infamy of an incestuous
villain. In the meantime we may take notice, that where the poet ought to have preserved
the character as it was delivered to us by antiquity, when he should have given us the
picture of a rough young man, of the Amazonian strain, a jolly huntsman, and both by his
profession and his early rising a mortal enemy to love, he has chosen to give him the turn
of gallantry, sent him to travel from Athens to Paris, taught him to make love, and
transformed the Hippolytus of Euripides into Monsieur Hippolyte.