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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
book_n	life_n	world_n	write_v	4,962	5	5.8081	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A28844	Maxims and reflections upon plays (In answer to a discourse, Of the lawfullness and vnlawfullness of plays. Printed before a late play entituled, Beauty in distress.) Written in French by the Bp. of Meaux. And now made English. The preface by another hand.; Maximes et réflexions sur la comédie. English.	Bossuet, Jacques Bénigne, 1627-1704.; Collier, Jeremy, 1650-1726.	1699 (1699)	Wing B3786; ESTC R202902	73,555	157

great if the Name from thenceforth be forgotten If Mons'r Caffaro had the Hardiness to assert a Tract so unworthy his Character his Answerer would not add perhaps to the Scandall when that Shame had been taken to himself with a Remorse becoming the Fact But be this how it will Censures we know are not inslicted upon Indefinite Some-bodies that such were inflicted and a Retractation made the very first Period is peremptory And I hope the Bp. of Meaux and his manner of writing are at least as credible an Evidence of this as the Booksellers can be allowed to be of that Letter being genuine which refers Mr. M's Conscience to the Discourse for Satisfaction I am heartily glad if the Plays written by that ingenious Gentleman are so chast and inoffensive as he declares them to be The rather because the Success he mentions overthrows that frivolous Pretence of the Poets lying under a Necessity of writing lewdly in order to please the Town And if this Gentleman do yet retain the same tenderness of doing nothing for Gain or Glory which does not strictly become him If he be still as desirous to be satisfied what does or does not become him to do with regard to the matter in hand as I ought to presume he was when he consulted his Friend I would make it my request that this Reply may be Seriously and impartially considered And I cannot but hope that it may disabuse him of the Errours the Discourse might lead him into and I am much mistaken if upon these Terms he ever writes for the Stage any more Prejudice and Passion Vain glory and Profit not Reason and Virtue and the Common Good seem but too plainly to support this Practice and the Defence of it as the matter is at present managed among us And a Person of Mr. M's Parts and Attainments cannot be at a loss for much nobler Subjects to employ them upon A Popular one perhaps it may be but sure a wilder Suggestion never was offered to men of Common sense than that if the Stage be damned the Art used by Moses and David and Solomon must be no more Are we fallen into an Age so incapable of distinguishing that there should be no visible difference left between the Excellencies and the Abuse of any Art No. Mr ●…ryden himself hath taught us better We will have all due regard for the Author of Absalom and Achitophel and several other pieces of just renown and should admire him for a rich Vein of Poetry though he had never written a Play in his whole Life Nor shall we think our selves obliged to burn the Translation of Virgil by vertue of that sentence which seems here to be pronounced upon that of the Fourth Book of Lucretius The World I Suppose are not all agreed that there is but One Sort of Poetry and as far from allowing that the Dramatick is that One. They who write after those Divine Patterns of Moses c will be no whit the less Poets though there were not a Theatre left upon the Face of the Earth Their Honours will be more deserved Their Laurells more verdant and lasting when blemished with none of those Reproaches from Others or their own breasts which are due to the Corrupters of Mankind And such are all They who soften men's abhorrence of Vice and cherish their dangerous Passions To tell us then that All even Divine Poetry must be silenced and for ever lost when the Play-houses are once shut up is to impose too grossely upon our Understandings And their Sophistry bears hard methinks upon Profaneness which insinuates the Hymns dictated by the Holy Spirit of God to be so nearly related to the Modern Compositions for the Stage that both must of necessity stand and fall together If Poetry have of late sunk in its credit that misfortune is owing to the degenerate and Mercenary Pens of some who have set up for the great Masters of it No man I presume is for exterminating that noble Art no not even in the Dramatick part provided it can be effectually reformed But if the Reformation of the Stage be no longer practicable reason good that the incurable Evil should be cut off If it be practicable let the Persons concerned give Evidence of it to the World by tempering their Wit so as to render it Serviceable to Virtuous purposes without giving just offence to wise and Good men For it is not the Pretence of a good Design which can free the Undertakers from Blame unless the Goodness of the end and Intention be Seconded with a ●…rudent Management of the Means And if Matters once should come to that Extremity better and much more becoming of the Two no doubt it were that our Maker's Praises should be sunk into Prose as this Ingenious Person phrases it than that in the midst of a Christian City that Maker should be six days in seven publickly insulted and blasphemed in Poetry A TABLE OF THE CHAPTERS Chap. I. THE Occasion and Design of this little Tract Written in reference to a Discourse Concerning the Lawfullness and Unlawfullness of Plays .1 Chap. II. The true State of this Question what 3. Chap. III. Whether our Modern Plays be really so blameless as the Author of the Discourse would make us believe 4. Chap. IV. Whether it be true that the Representation of the pleasing Passions excite the like in us no otherwise than by Accident only 8. Chap. V. Whether the Modern Plays purify Sen suall Love by making it at last conclude in and tend to Marriage 17. Chap. VI. What we ought to think of those Play-house Marriages 24. Chap. VII The Authors own words cited and the Advantage he makes of Confessions 26. Chap. VIII The Publick and Private Faults in Plays Dangerous and imperceptible Dispositions to Vice Concupiscence cherished and diffused through all the Senses 27. Chap. IX That those who frequent Plays ought to be afraid not only of the Evil they do themselve but the Scandal which they give to Others by this means 37. Chap. X. A Difference to be made between the dangers we seek and run into and those which we cannot avoid 39. Chap. XI Whether the Laws which tolerate Plays are a good Argument to be brought in Vindication of them 41. Chap. XII Concerning the Authority of the Fathers 44. Chap. XIII Whether the Laity can be excused in frequenting Plays upon this Pretence that the Canons which prohibit it make mention of the Clergy only A memorable Canon of the Third Council of Tours 52. Chap. XIV An Answer to that Objection that some Diversions are Necessary for Mankind That such Diversions as proceed from a Representation of the Agreable Passions are disallowed by the Philosophers themselves The noble Principles of Plato 53. Chap. XV. The Tragedy of the Antients though much more grave and serious than Ours condemned by the Principles of that Philosopher 56. Chap. XVI Comicall and Ridiculing Compositions disallowed by the Principles of the same