Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	apostle_n	speak_v	word_n	9,283	5	4.1967	3	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A41298	A Defence of dramatick poetry being a review of Mr. Collier's View of the immorality and profaneness of the stage.	Filmer, Edward, b. ca. 1657.; Settle, Elkanah, 1648-1724.; Rymer, Thomas, 1641-1713.; Vanbrugh, John, Sir, 1664-1726.	1698 (1698)	Wing F905; ESTC R16098	47,476	128

heavy as the Atheist lies upon him still he wipes off the Imputation of Debauchery assuring us That as to the business of Love Aristophanes always declin'd it He never patches up a Play with Courtship and Whining tho' he wrote nothing but Comedy c. 'T is true as to the Atheism of Aristophanes tho' it may appear somewhat a Sin against the Athenian Light of Theology It happen'd to be a Fault on the better side at least in the Christian Scale when only against the Libertine Houshold of Heathen Gods where neither Infidelity nor Apostacy were altogether so Capital Now as such were the Characters of the Ancient Poets and those the very Founders of the Feast in the Theatrical Entertainments in St. Cyprian and Tertullian's Days and some Ages after them I cannot but once more repeat my Amazement at their over-passionate Exclamations against the Stage especially upon the mistaken Topick of Lewdness and Debauchery After all this honest and faithful Review of the Ancient Stage taken even by our kind Author himself I fancy he has given us some more substantial Reasons for the Scriptural Silence against Plays than all these Fathers have done For if such by his own generous Acknowledgment was the Stage Primitive State of Innocence a Confession which we highly stand obliged to him for though like one of Sir Martin Marral's Discoveries considering how little it makes for his Cause I fear we shall thank him for a Favour he never intended us If therefore as I was saying or rather our Author has said for me such was not only the Innocence of the Heathen Stage under all the Restrictions of Chastity Modesty and Decency not only from the native principles of the Authors but also from the Regulation of Publick Authority but even such was the Merit so I may call it of those Theatrick Representations so little tending to the Corruption of Manners That several of them were written with a Genius to speak in his own Language enough to transfuse and inspire a Spirit of Bravery so far from a Check as to be rather an Excitation to Virtue Here upon all these Concessions even from our Author himself provided still that as Stage-Plays are only Humane Institutions and Worldly Diversions and that that Objection shall be found no Bar to this Plea of Innocence as that I hope we shall make out this then being the Stage and these the Plays that faced the whole Travels of the Apostles here 's a very substantial Argument for the Evangelical Silence in not one word against them for the Mouths of those Divine Oracles open'd only to the Correction of Vice Nor will it raise any part of an Objection against this Argument for their Silence c. That the Original innocent Constitution of Plays was sometimes Corrupted their Modesty Debauch'd and Abuses crept in amongst them as this Author often observes against them For as the very Heathens themselves had their Censors and Inspectors appointed to correct and punish those Abuses and to keep the Stage in the bounds of Modesty I hope the Christians needed no particular Scriptural Precept in that Case The Divine Wisdom must then have most truly had a low Opinion of Christians to think they wanted any particular Evangelical Light to follow even where the Ignorant Heathen had led before them And as to the more horrid Representations of the Amphitheater so frequent in the Neronian Reign in which St. Paul died here indeed there wanted no Evangelick Command to warn the Christian from those Execrable Bloody Walls where Murder upon Murder even in cold Blooded Sport was made a Publick Entertainment The Divine Wisdom as St. Cyprian says had had a low Opinion indeed to think the Christian could want a Heavenly Caution of entring those Shambles of Humane Butchery Besides to shew how little the Dramatick Poetry lay under the Gospel Censure our Author tho' upon another occasion is pleas'd to quote that Text of St. Paul Evil Communications corrupt Good Manners as the Expression first of the Comick Poet Menander 290 Years before Christ and afterwards of St. Paul the Apostle Here I would ask whether St. Paul the most Learned of the Apostles in delivering the Divine Oracles of God would have incorporated the saying of a Heathen Poet that possibly had been spoke a hundred times over on the Publick Stage by a Hireling Player into the Gospel of Truth notwithstanding the Morality and Innocence of the Expression it self had Stage-Plays in themselves and that in their worst capacity of Comedies justly lain under St. Cyprian's Character of them viz. That were they not otherwise highly Criminal the Foolery of them is egregious and unbecoming the Gravity of Believers For some other Instances of St. Paul's Respect for the Poets In Acts 17. 28. In him we live and move and have our Being as certain of your own Poets have said for we are also his Ofspring In his Epistle to Titus Chap. 1. ver 14 15. speaking of the People of Crete he says in the words of Epimenides the Poet. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 One of themselves even a Prophet of their own said The Cretians are always Liars evil Beasts slow Bellies This Witness is true c. Here the Apostle has not disdain'd to quote a Heathen Poet nay and honour him with the Title of Prophet Now therefore as the Spirit of God spoke by the inspired Apostles we may venture to boast it gives some Reputation to the Poet and sure a little Vindication of the Innocence of the Profession that the Holy Ghost himself has spoke in the words of a Menander and an Epimenides But to make a little farther Examination into the Reason of this over-violent Zeal and Vehemence of the Primitive Fathers against the Stage We are to consider the forementioned Authority viz. Theophilus Tertullian Clemens Alexandrinus Minutius Foelix and St. Cyprian so faithfully translated by Mr. Collier lived all in the second or third Century in the Mourning Minority of the Church of God under the Heathen Persecutions For Constantine the first Christian Emperor began his Reign but in the beginning of the fourth Century Had not then those Primitive Fathers with Stakes Gibbets Cauldrons Gridirons Racks c. all before their Eyes a just cause of Complaint against the Christian Inclination for Plays Delight and Pleasure at that time of Day Does the Son from his Fathers Death-Bed go to the Musick-House or the Widow from her Husbands Funeral to the Dancing-School Was the Play-house a seasonable Christian Diversion possibly to come from a Laurences Gridiron to a Thyestes Feast I may here joyn with Tertullian In Earnest Christian our Time for Entertainment is not yet ye are too craving and ill manag'd if you are so violent for Delight page 258. Besides was it not a yet greater aggravation to the ill timed Christian Fondness for Plays to herd consort and mix with their Tyrants Persecutors and Murderers the Heathens in their Entertainments and Diversions And

Character into Obscenity all wrapt up so clean his Actions and his Nature the Adulterer and the God all of a piece Good gracious Heaven has not this Enthusiast the whole Zeal of an Oliver's Porter and bids as fair to succeed him in his Moor-field Pallace This is the Innocent and Mr. Drydens the Blasphemous Amphytrion How ingeniously Mr. Collier can out-blow the Satyr in the Fable Mr. Dryden's Amphytrion is all a piece of Blasphemy for giving too much of the God to Iupiter and has no way to mend that fault but by giving him more of it This Blasphemy of Amphytrion nothing but Mr. Dryden's Absolon and Achitophel can out-doe c. Here we have Blasphemy on the top of the Letter without any trouble of Inference or Construction This Poem runs upon all Scripture Names upon suppositions of the true Religion and object of Worship Here are no Pagan Divinities in the Scheme so that all the Athestick Rallery must point upon the true God Absalom was David's natural Son so that there 's a Blot in his Scutcheon and a Blemish upon his Birth The Poet will make admirable use of this Remark presently This Absalom it seems was very extraordinary in his Person and performances Mr. Dryden does not certainly know how this came about and therefore inquires of himself in the first place Whither inspired by a Divinier Lust His Father got him with a greater Gust This is down-right Defiance of the living God! here you have the very Essence and Spirit of Blasphemy and the Holy Ghost brought in upon the most hideous occasion I question whether the Torments and Despair of the Damn'd dare venture at such Flights as these they are bejond Description I pray God they may not be bejond Pardon too Now are here only two unhappy Words that blow the Bellows to all this Fire viz. Inspir'd and Diviner Inspire especially in the Verb is so far from being only appropriated to God that scarce that Human Passion Love Joy or what not nay a meer start of Fancy a sudden lucky thought but shall be said to inspire a Man Is this Gentleman as sworn an Enemy to all Poetry as to the Dramatick that he willfully forgets how the Poets upon all occasions invoked their Muses to inspire them Nay to go a little further what if the Devil himself has had his Inspirations too for as I take it the old Heathen Oracles were of his Inspiring The Spirit of False-shood as well as Truth has had the Inspiring power without intrenching upon the Prerogative of God And though Diviner is here made the Epithite to Lust it makes not all to his purpose 't is true the Expression favours a little too much of the Libertine yet I defie all the Sophistry of Malice it self to mount it up to Blasphemy or to make it bear any tendency to that tremendous signification he has given it For does not this Man of Letters know that Diviner though in the Comparative Degree is here infinitely less then the positive Diviner only comparatively to the common Raptures of Lust. Had it been Written Inspired with a Divine Lust it might have given an overcurious Cynick some Umbrage for so profane a Construction and yet even then too it would not have fully reacht the point unless A Divine had been changed to the more emphatick The Divine But here as Mr. Dryden has worded it and upon the subject he speaks it if any thing of a Deity was either meant or thought of in this Inspiration 't was that of Venus And indeed what can the Genuine Sense of this poor Couplet honestly and fairly construed mean than that his Father Inspired or Animated with a Diviner or sublimer Lust got him with that more then ordinary pleasure and transports that possibly for 't is not affirmatively said to that sprightlier Vivacity to the Generation of his Absalom that young Heir to continue his supposition might owe all those Personal Graces and Beauties and all that innate Bravery and the rest of the uncommon Accomplishments the Poet has occasion afterwards to give him Here I must beg my Reader 's Pardon that my honest Defense of Truth has forced me upon this unseemly Explanation I confess again this Distick carries but a lew'd Idea along with it but so far from a Blasphemy against the Great God and so unpardonable as he fancies it that I doubt not but a profane Oath in his Name is of the two the greater Crimen laesae Majestatis Dei and that upon a fair Tryal in a Court of Justice the Mulct of two good Shillings or as many Hours in the Stocks would be as much as our Law could well give against him Well this Authot has the least reason of Quarrelling with Mr. Dryden's Fairy way of Writing his way of Commenting is so far beyond it that all his own Fairys are Gyants whilst Mr. Dryden in this very Distict is no less then leading up the old Host of Lucifer and charging at the Throne of God himself At this rate of Remarking I dare not say whither this Author be inspired by a Puny or a full grown Sprite But this I must say to come up to all the Heights of that Christian Champion he professes himself undoubtedly he must have a double Portion of Faith and Hope to make up for his Diminitive Talent of Charity FINIS