The
members thereof prefer adopting their fathers' profession rather
than enter another where they would be constantly mortified by being
pointed at as the children of actors.
A little research into the history of the stage in Italy will
enlighten the reader as to the true cause both of the harsh
condemnation of the Church and of the prejudice of society against
this great profession. The plays of the old Romans were proverbially
loose both in their plots and dialogues, and Juvenal has spoken of the
actors of his time with the bitterest contempt. During the Middle Ages
the members of the various religious confraternities monopolized the
stage with their sacred dramas and mysteries, and the "profane stage,"
as an Italian writer calls it, was so degraded that more than once
both the Church and State had to use their influence to put down
performances which were too infamous to be here described. When the
Renaissance came the drama was reinstated in the position it occupied
during the days of Roman civilization, but the plays of this period
were merely imitations of the Latin comedies; and if we may judge by
the most celebrated of them which still exists--the _Mandragora_ of
Macchiavelli, for example--far exceeded their models in obscenity.
When Benedict XIV. ascended the pontifical throne he established a
severe censorship, and inaugurated the harsh system to which I have
already alluded, with the effect of banishing immoral productions
from the stage, though without improving its intellectual tone.
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