He had the temperament of the great actors,--that of the elder Kean
and the elder Booth, not of Kemble and Macready,--and, like them, had
the power of almost instantly passing into the nature and thought and
emotion of another, and of not only absolutely realizing them, but of
realizing them all the more completely because he had at the same
time perfect self-direction and self-control. The absurd question is
often asked, whether an actor is ever the character he represents
throughout a whole play. He could be so, only if insane. But every
great actor and orator must be capable of instantaneous abandonment
to his part, and of as instantaneous withdrawal from it,--like the
elder Booth, joking one minute at a side-scene and in the next having
the big tears of a realized Lear running down his cheeks. An eminent
critic says,--"Genius always lights its own fire,"--and this constant
double process of mind,--one of self-direction and self-control, the
other of absolute abandonment and identification,--each the more
complete for the other,--the dramatic poet, the impassioned orator,
and the great interpretative actor, all know, whenever the whole mind
and nature are in their highest action.
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