gross and open obscenities. In a play of The Old and New Testament, Adam and Eve are both exhibited on the stage naked,' and conversing about their nakedness; this very pertinently introduces the next scene; in which they have coverings of fig-leaves. This extraordinary spectacle was beheld by a numerous assembly of both sexes with great composure: they had the authority of scripture for such a representation, and they gave matters just as they found them in the third chapter of Genesis. It would have been absolute heresy to have departed from the sacred text in personating the primitive appearance of our first parents, whom the spectators so nearly resembled in simplicity; and if this had not been the case, the dramatists were ignorant what to reject and what to retain."

"I must not omit," adds Mr. Warton," " an anecdote entirely new, with regard to the mode of playing the Mysteries at this period, [the latter part of the fifteenth century,] which yet is perhaps of much higher antiquity. In the year 1487, while Henry the Seventh kept his residence at the castle of Winchester, on occasion of the birth of prince Arthur, on a Sunday, during the time of dinner, be was entertained with a religious drama called Christi Descensus ad inferos, or Christ's Descent into Hell. It was represented by the Pueri Eleemosynarii, or choir-boys, of Hyde Abbey, and Saint Swithin's

This kind of primitive exhibition was revived in the time of King James the First, several persons appearing almost entirely naked in a pastoral exhibited at Oxford before the King and Queen, and the ladies who attended her. It is, if I recollect right, described by Winwood.

• Warton's History of English Poetry, Vol. I. pp. 242, et

seq.

"History of English Poetry, Vol. II. p. 206.

VOL. III.

Priory, two large monasteries at Winchester. This is the only proof I have ever seen of choir-boys acting the old Mysteries: nor do I recollect any other instance of a royal dinner, even on a festival, accompanied with this species of diversion.' The story of this interlude, in which the chief characters were Christ, Adam, Eve, Abraham, and John the Baptist, was not uncommon in the ancient religious drama, and I believe made a part of what is called the LUDUS PASCHALIS, or Easter Play. It occurs in the Coventry Plays acted on Corpus Christi day,"

7" Except, that on the first Sunday of the magnificent marriage of King James of Scotland with the princess Margaret of England, daughter of Henry the Seventh, celebrated at Edinburgh with high splendour, after dynnar a MORALITE was played by the said Master Inglyshe and his companions in the presence of the kyng and qweene.' On one of the preceding days, after soupper the kynge and qweene beynge togader in byr grett chamber, John Inglysh and hys companions plaid." This was in the year 1503. Apud. Leland, Coll. iii. p. 300. Append. edit. 1770."

See an account of the Coventry Plays in Stevens's Monasticon, Vol. I. p. 238. "Sir W. Dugdale, speaking of the Grayfriars or Franciscans at Coventry, says, before the suppression of monasteries this city was very famous for the pageants that were played therein upon Corpus-Christi day; which pageants being acted with mighty state and reverence by the friers of this house, had theatres for the several scenes, very large and high, placed upon wheeles, and drawn to all the eminent parts of the city, for the better advantage of the spectators.-An ancient manuscript of the same is now to be seen in the Cottonian Library, sub. effig. Vesp. D. 8. Sir William cites this manuscript by the title of Ludus Coventriæ; but in the printed catalogue of that library, p. 113, it is named thus: A collection of plays in old English Metre; b. e. Dramata sacra, in quibus exhibentur historia Veteris & N. Testamenti, introductis quasi in scenam personis illic memoratis, quas secum invicem colloquentes pro ingenio fingit poeta. Videntur olim coram populo, sive ad instruendum, sive ad placendum, à fratribus mendicantibus repræsentata. It appears by the latter end of the prologue, that these

and in the Whitsun-plays at Chester, where it is called the HARROWING OF HELL. The representa

plays or interludes were not only played at Coventry, but in other towns and places upon occasion. And possibly this may be the same play which Stow tells us was played in the reign of Henry IV. which lasted for eight days. The book seems by the character and language to be at least 300 years old. It begins with a general prologue, giving the arguments of forty pageants or gesticulations, (which were as so many several acts or scenes,) representing all the histories of both testaments, from the creation to the choosing of St. Mathias to be an apostle. The stories of the New Testament are more largely expressed, viz. The Annunciation, Nativity, Visitation; but more especially all matters relating to the Passion very particularly, the Resurrection, Ascension, the choice of St. Mathias: after which is also represented the Assumption, and last Judgment. All these things were treated of in a very homely style, as we now think, infinitely below the dignity of the subject: But it seems the gust of that age was not nice and delicate in these matters; the plain and incurious judgment of our ancestors, being prepared with favour, and taking every thing by the right and easiest handle: For example, in the scene relating to the Visitation:

· Maria. But husband of on thyng pray you most mekeley, I have knowing that our cosyn Elizabeth with childe is, That it please yow to go to her hastyly,

If ought we myth comfort her, it wer to me blys. 'Joseph. A Gods sake, is she with child, sche?

Than will her husband Zachary be mery.

In Montana they dwelle, fer hence, so mory the,
In the city of Juda, I know it verily;

It is hence, I trowe, myles two a fifty;

'We are like to be wery or we come at the same.
I wole with a good will, blessyd wyff Mary;
Now go we forth then in Goddys name,' &c.

A little before the resurrection.

• Nunc dormient milites, & veniet anima Christi de inferno, cum Adam & Eva, Abraham, John Baptist, et aliis.

'Anima Christi. Come forth, Adam, and Eve with the, And all my fryndes that herein be,

In paradys come forth with me

In blysse for to dwelle.

tion is, Christ entering hell triumphantly, delivering our first parents, and the most sacred characters of the old and new testaments, from the dominion of Satan, and conveying them into paradise. The composers of the Mysteries did not think the plain and probable events of the new testament sufficiently marvellous for an audience who wanted only to be surprised. They frequently selected their materials from books which had more of the air of romance. The subject of the Mysteries just mentioned was borrowed from the Pseudo-Evangelium, or the fabulous Gospel, ascribed to Nicodemus: a book, which together with the numerous apocryphal narratives, containing infinite innovations of the evangelical history, and forged at Constantinople by the early writers of the Greek church, gave birth to an endless variety of legends concerning the life of Christ and his apostles; and which, in the barbarous ages, was better esteemed than the genuine gospel, on account of its improbabilities and absurdities."

The fende of hell that is yowr foo,

He shall be wrappyd and woundyn in woo:
Fro wo to welth now shall ye go,

With myrth ever mor to melle.

• Adam. I thank, the, Lord, of thy grete grace, That now is forgiven my gret trespace, 'Now shall we dwellyn in blyssful place,' &c. "The last scene or pageant, which represents the day of Judgement, begins thus:

Michael. Surgite, All men aryse,

• Venite ad Judicium;

• For now is set the High Justice,

• And hath assignyd the day of dome;
Kepe you readyly to this grett assyse,
Both gret and small, all and sum,

And of your answer you now advise,

• What you shall say when that yow com," &c.

Historia Histrionica, 8vo. 1699, pp. 15, 17, 18, 19.

:

"But whatsoever was the source of these exhibitions, they were thought to contribute so much to the information and instruction of the people on the most important subjects of religion, that one of the popes granted a pardon of one thousand days to every person who resorted peaceably to the plays performed in the Whitsun week at Chester, beginning with the creation, and ending with the general judgement; and this indulgence was seconded by the bishop of the diocese, who granted forty days of pardon the pope at the same time denouncing the sentence of damnation on all those incorrigible sinners who presumed to interrupt the due celebration of these pious sports. It is certain that they had their use, not only in teaching the great truths of scripture to men who could not read the Bible, but in abolishing the barbarous attachment to military games, and the bloody contentions of the tornament, which had so long prevailed as the sole species of popular amusement. Rude and even ridiculous as they were, they softened the manners of the people, by diverting the public attention to spectacles in which the mind was concerned, and by creating a regard for other arts than those of bodily strength and savage valour.'

I may add, that these representations were so far from being considered as indecent or profane, that even a supreme pontiff, Pope Pius the Second, about the year 1416, composed and caused to be acted before him on Corpus Christi day, a Mystery, in which was represented the court of the king of heaven.'