A10335:54
Th'overthrow of stage-plays, by the way of controversy betwixt D. Gager and D. Rainoldes…Th'overthrow of stage-playes, by the way of controversie betwixt D. Gager and D. Rainoldes…
Th'overthrow of stage-plays, by the way of controversy betwixt D. Gager and D. Rainoldes wherein all the reasons that can be made for them are notably refuted; th'objections answered, and the case so cleared and resolved, as that the judgement of any man, that is not froward and perverse, may easily be satisfied. Wherein is manifestly proved, that it is not only unlawful to be an actor, but a beholder of those vanities. Whereunto are added also and annexed in th'end certain latin letters betwixt the said Master Rainoldes, and D. Gentiles, reader of the civill law in Oxford, concerning the same matter.Th'overthrow of stage-playes, by the way of controversie betwixt D. Gager and D. Rainoldes wherein all the reasons that can be made for them are notably refuted; th'objections aunswered, and the case so cleared and resolved, as that the iudgement of any man, that is not froward and perverse, may easelie be satisfied. Wherein is manifestly proved, that it is not onely vnlawfull to bee an actor, but a beholder of those vanities. Wherevnto are added also and annexed in th'end certeine latine letters betwixt the sayed Maister Rainoldes, and D. Gentiles, reader of the civill law in Oxford, concerning the same matter.
Middelburg: printed by Richard Schilders, 1599
Title page typeset from the transcription.
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
Wherein, first and foremost, if your conscience tell you, that your self (for whom else you associate to you by we are masters, I know not) are touched in Saint Cyprian's reproof of the stage-player: I can no way help it, save with that of Scripture, cIf your heart condemn you, God is greater then your heart, and knoweth all things. But whether I might not ⟨p. 38⟩allege Saint Cyprian's words, to show that somewhat more then time is cast away and spilt by such stage-plays as make boys effeminate: let our betters judge. Who, I trust, will not condemn the poor swallows for chattering and using their voice, agreeably to nature, because dBessus surmised they cried against him that he had killed his father. Next, in that you charge me with insinuating of your young men, that both time and them selves are cast away altogether by those exercises, and add, it is no marvel that I imply so ill a conceit of them: truly, it is marvel, that you, professing so much good will to me as you do, should in so few words use so many tricks of calumniation to breed a misliking of me in your young men. One, by making me to speak of them at large, and indefinitely: whereas I noted only such as played the Women, and of them such only, as were taught to counterfeit unhonest wanton gestures, that is, as played unchaste women. An other, by adjoining the particle 8Altogether, as if I had judged them dead, dead, past all recovery: whereas the 9terms I used imported that they were in spilling, not spilt, much less spilt altogether, but like ethe things in Sardis which were ready to dye. A third, by suppressing the means of their spilling, to wit, the making of them effeminate, which I specified; and by setting down a word of more honest and common signification in steed thereof, to wit, 1exercises: as who say that peremptory sentence had been given of all, even them who played mens parts, yea the best mens; where I censured only the filth of playing wanton queans so with Cyprian. A fourth, by rehearsing it as absolutely pronounced: where I with a