[5] _Voyage to Lisbon_.
CHAPTER IV
POLITICAL PLAYS
"Whoever attempteth to introduce corruption into any community, doth much the same thing, and ought to be treated in much the same manner with him who poisoneth a fountain."
--Dedication of the _Historical Register_.
A prolonged retirement into Dorsetshire, however pleasant were the banks of Stour with a beautiful young wife, and a sufficient estate, could scarce be expected of Fielding"s restless genius. He was now thirty-five; his splendid physique was as yet unimpaired by the gout that was so soon to attack him; his powers were still hardly revealed; and, as far as we can discover, he was, at the moment, under no pressure for money. Still, the hunting choruses of the Squire Westerns of Dorsetshire can hardly have long sufficed for one whom Lyttelton declared to have had "more wit than any man I ever knew"; and the social and political conditions of the country were increasingly calculated to inflame into practical activity that "enthusiasm for righteousness," which Mr Gosse has so well detected in Fielding. [1] The distracted state of the London stage, divided by the factions of players and managers, afforded moreover an excellent opportunity for a dramatist of some means to essay an independent venture.
And accordingly, at the beginning of 1736, we find the Harry Fielding of the green-room and the poet"s garret, the Henry Fielding Esqre of East Stour, suddenly throwing the full force of his energies into political life, as the manager of, and writer for, a theatre with indisputable political aims. For the next eight years of his short life Fielding was largely occupied in the lively turmoil of eighteenth-century politics; and here, first by means of the stage, and later as journalist, he played a part which has perhaps been somewhat unduly overshadowed by the surpa.s.sing achievements of his genius as father of the English novel. But if we would perceive the full figure of the man this time of boisterous political warfare is of no mean account. In the dedication of his first party play, the amazingly successful _Pasquin_, Fielding subscribes himself as "the most devoted Servant of the public"; and no more appropriate keyword could be found for the energies which he threw into those envenomed political struggles of 1736-41.
At the date of his first plunge into these struggles England stood sorely in need of a pen as biting, as witty and as fearless, as that of Henry Fielding. For over ten years the country had been ruled by one of those "peace at any price" Ministers who have at times so successfully inflamed the baser commercial instincts of Englishmen. Sir Robert Walpole, the reputed organiser of an unrivalled system of bribery and corruption, the Minister of whom a recent apologist frankly declares that to young members of Parliament who spoke of public virtue and patriotism he would reply "you will soon come off that and grow wiser," the autocrat enamoured of power who could brook no colleague within measurable distance, the man of coa.r.s.e habits and illiterate tastes, above all the man who induced his countrymen to place money before honour, and whose administration even an admirer describes as one of unparalleled stagnation--such a man must have roused intense antagonism in Fielding"s generous and ardent nature. For, from the days of his first boyish satires to the last energetic acts of his life as a London magistrate, for Fielding to see an abuse was to set about reforming it. To his just sense of the true worth of money, the wholesale corruption of English political life accredited to Walpole, the poisoning, to adopt his own simile, of the body politic, must have seemed the vilest national crime. There could never have been the least sympathy between the mercenary and apathetic methods of Walpole and the open-hearted genius of Fielding. And, added to such fundamental opposition of character, the influence of Fielding"s old school friend, George Lyttelton, would, at this juncture especially, draw him into the active ranks of the Opposition.
Lyttelton was then rising into celebrity as a ready parliamentary speaker; a celebrity as yet not wholly eclipsed by the youthful oratory of William Pitt, the young cornet of the horse, who also had lately taken his seat on the Opposition benches. It was the burning patriotism, the lofty character and the towering genius of Pitt, the fluency and personal integrity of Lyttelton, that led the younger members of the Opposition in the House of Commons; while in the Lords another friend from whom Fielding was to receive "princely benefactions," the young Duke of Bedford, a man of "inflexible honesty and goodwill to his country," attacked Walpole"s alleged corrupt practices in the election of Scottish peers. With leaders such as William Pitt and Lyttelton on the one hand, and the corrupt figure of Walpole on the other, there is no wonder that Fielding flung all his generous force into the effort to free England from so degrading a domination. Accordingly, in 1736, when the young Pitt"s impa.s.sioned eloquence was soon to alarm the _Great Man_--"we must muzzle that terrible Cornet of the Horse," Sir Robert said--and when fierce and riotous hostility to the government had broken out in the country over an attempted Excise Bill, Fielding appears as a frankly political manager of the "New Theatre" in the Haymarket. This small theatre stood precisely adjoining the present Palladian structure, as may be seen from a print of 1820, showing the demolition of the old building and the adjacent facade of the modern "Haymarket." According to Tom Davies, who, as an actor in Fielding"s company and as an author of some pretensions should be reliable, Fielding was a managing partner of this "New Theatre," in company with James Ralph, "about the year 1735." [2] And apparently early in 1736 [3] his political, theatrical, and social satire of _Pasquin_ appeared on the little stage, and immediately captured the town.
In _Pasquin_ a perfectly outspoken attack on Walpole"s corrupt methods is united with a comprehensive onslaught on abuses in the stage, law, divinity, physic, society, and on the odes of Colley Cibber, sufficient one might suppose to satisfy even Fielding"s zeal. In an exuberant newspaper advertis.e.m.e.nt of the 5th of March Mr Pasquin is announced as intending to "lay about him with great impartiality," and throughout the play Fielding"s splendid figure may be felt, swinging his satiric club with a boisterous enjoyment. The immediate success achieved by the piece was certainly not due to any great dramatic excellence; and that so loosely knit a medley as _PASQUIN, a Dramatic Satire on the Times: Being the Rehearsal of Two Plays, viz. A Comedy call"d THE ELECTION and a Tragedy, call"d The Life and Death of COMMON-SENSE_ should have achieved almost as long a run as the _Beggars Opera_, shows that the public heartily sympathised with the satirist. _Pasquin_ begins with the rehearsal of a comedy, called _The Election_, consisting of a series of broadly humorous scenes in which the open and diverse bribery at elections, the equally open immorality of fashionable town life, the connivance of country dames, and the inanity of the beau monde, are satirised. The country Mayor, the Ministerial candidates and the Opposition squire drink, bribe and are bribed with complete impartiality.
A scene devoted to the political young lady of the day affords opportunity for a hit at the sickly and effeminate Lord "f.a.n.n.y" Hervey, that politician whom Pope described as a "mere white curd of a.s.se"s milk," and of whom Lady Mary Wortley Montagu observed that "the world consisted of men, women, and Herveys." Pope had stigmatised Hervey as _Lord f.a.n.n.y_, and Fielding obviously plays on the nickname by references to the value attached by certain young ladies to their fans. "Faith," says his comic author, "this incident of the fan struck me so strongly that I was once going to call this comedy by the name of the Fan." The comedy ends with the successful cooking of the election returns by Mr Mayor in favour of the Ministerial candidates, for which "return" he is promised a "very good turn very soon"; and by the precipitate marriage of one of the said candidates to the Mayor"s daughter "to strengthen his interest with the returning officer."
Having settled the business of the corrupt and corrupting Ministry in his comedy, Mr Pasquin proceeds to exhibit the rehearsal of his tragedy, _The Life and Death of Common Sense_. Here the satirist, leaving politics, applies his cudgel mainly to the prevailing taste for pantomime, a form of entertainment introduced it was said some thirty years previously by one Weaver, a country dancing master, and already lashed by Sir Richard Steele in his couplet:
"Weaver, corrupter of the present age, Who first taught silent sins upon the stage."
That the Covent Garden manager, John Rich, [4] could engage four French dancers, and a German with two dogs, taught to dance the _Louvre_ and the _Minuet_, at ten pounds a night, and clear thereby "above 20 good houses,"
while the Oth.e.l.lo of Booth and the Wildair of Wilkes were neglected, was sufficient to rouse the indignation alike of moralists, dramatists and playgoers. Fielding in turn took the matter up with all his natural warmth; and in _Pasquin_ he represents the kingdom of the Queen of Common Sense as invaded by a vast army of "singers, fidlers, tumblers, and ropedancers," who moreover fix their standard in Covent Garden, the headquarters of Rich.
Not content with a.s.sailing this public folly, the "Tragedy" of _Pasquin_ strikes a higher note by ranging among the foes of Common Sense three unworthy professors of Law, Medicine, and Religion; callings, as Fielding is careful to point out,
"in themselves designed To shower the greatest blessings on Mankind."
Queen Common Sense seemingly receives her deathblow; but her ghost finally rises victorious, and so justifies the author"s contention that his "is almost the only play where she has got the better lately." The vigour with which Mr Pasquin here "laid about him," in such matters as the legal abuses relating to imprisonment for debt, may be inferred from the following pa.s.sage. Queen Common Sense is speaking to the representative of _bad_ Law, and tells him she has heard that men
"unable to discharge their debts At a short warning, being sued for them, Have, with both power and will their debts to pay, Lain all their lives in prison, for their costs.
_Law_. That may perhaps be some poor person"s case Too mean to entertain your royal ear.
_Q.C.S_. My Lord, while I am Queen I shall not think One man too mean, or poor, to be redress"d."
So too, the great genius of Fielding, when in long after years harnessed to the drudgery of a London magistrate, held no porter"s brawl or beggar"s quarrel too mean "to be redress"d."
The immediate success of _Pasquin_ attests, as we have said, the readiness of London audiences in 1736 to applaud an honest and humorous presentation of wicked Ministers, corrupt clergy, lawyers, and doctors, inane Laureates, and degrading public entertainments. Mrs Delany, gathering London news for Dean Swift, writes on April 22, "When I went out of Town last Autumn, the reigning madness was Farinelli; I find it now turned on _Pasquin_, a dramatic satire on the times. It has had almost as long a run as the Beggar"s Opera; but in my opinion not with equal merit, though it has humour." [5] We are told how the piece drew numerous enthusiastic audiences "from _Grosvenor_, _Cavendish_, _Hanover_, and all the other fashionable Squares, as also from _Pall Mall_ and the _Inns of Court_" And on the 26th of May a benefit performance for the author was announced as the "60th. Day." The vogue of the satire even demanded a key, as may be seen in an advertis.e.m.e.nt in the _London Daily Post_ for May 17: _This Day is published, Price Four-Pence. A Key to Pasquin, address"d to Henry Fielding Esqre._
Mr Pasquin"s own advertis.e.m.e.nts for his little theatre are not without the zest with which our beef-eating ancestors attacked politics, social abuses and one another. The announcement for March 5, ran as follows:--
"_By the_ Great Mogul"s _Company of_ English _Comedians, Newly Imported_. At the New Theatre in the Haymarket, this Day, March 5, will be presented
PASQUIN,
A Dramatick SATYR on the times.
Being a Rehearsal of two PLAYS, viz. a Comedy call"d The ELECTION; and a Tragedy, call"d The Life and Death of COMMON SENSE....
N.B.--Mr Pasquin intending to lay about him with great Impartiality, hopes the Town will all attend, and very civilly give their Neighbours what the find belongs to "em.
N.B.--The Cloaths are old, but the Jokes entirely new...."
In the following month the Opposition was busy over the marriage of their chief supporter, the Prince of Wales; and Mr Pasquin duly chronicles the event in his advertis.e.m.e.nts of the 28th of April, observing that his company "by reason of the Royal Wedding expecting no Company but themselves, are obliged to defer Playing till tomorrow." A few days later, on the 12th of May, Sir Robert Walpole celebrated the royal marriage by a grand evening entertainment given at his house in St James Park; and on the same night "Pasquin" had the audacity to advertise a special performance, in the following terms (the "country party," it should be understood, was a usual name for Walpole"s opponents):--
"For the Benefit of Miss Burgess, who has so zealously espoused the Country Interest.... Miss Burgess hopes all Patriots and Lovers of their Country will appear in her favour and give all encouragement to one who has so early distinguished herself on the side of Liberty." In Pasquin"s _Election_ scenes, this lady played the part of Miss St.i.tch, a political damsel, opposed to Walpole"s candidate. Next day appeared an ironic counter-advertis.e.m.e.nt of a performance for "the Benefit of Miss Jones (the Mayor"s daughter who hath so furiously espoused the Court [_i.e._ Walpole"s] Interest....) _N.B._--Miss Jones does not doubt that all true loyal People will give her all Encouragement in their Power, as she has engaged in so unpopular a Side and even given away her FAN (which very few young ladies would) for the service of the Country: she hopes the Courtiers will not let her be out of pocket by the Bargain." Here, again, is doubtless a hit at Lord "f.a.n.n.y" Hervey; as well as a plain hint that those who espoused Walpole"s cause might expect ample payment for their trouble.
Is there any wonder that a wrathful and uneasy Minister, not yet overthrown, shortly took stringent measures against the "liberty" of the stage; measures by which a political stage censorship was formally established, and the topical gaiety of our theatre, and the pungency of our theatrical announcements, henceforth immeasurably dulled.
A few further points of minor interest remain to be noted concerning that popular and scathing personage Mr Pasquin. By May the company styled themselves "Pasquin"s Company of Comedians"; a fresh indication of the credit attaching to the performance. In the previous month a contributor to _The Grub Street Journal_ tells "Dear Grub" that he has seen Pope applauding the piece; and, although the statement was promptly denied, a rare print by Hogarth lends some colour to a very likely story; for the great Mr Pope, the terror of his enemies, the autocrat of literature, was warmly on the side of the Opposition. Hogarth depicts the stage of Fielding"s theatre, and thereon a scene in the fifth act of _Pasquin_, in which the foes of Queen Common Sense are for the moment triumphant. The side boxes are well filled; and in one of them Mr Pope"s deformed figure, apparently, turns away, declaring: "There is no whitewashing this stuff."
The curious may find another plate by Hogarth in which Pope _is_ busy whitewashing Lord Burlington; but the drift of the remark for the Opposition drama of _Pasquin_ seems obscure. The gains that accrued to Fielding from the success of _Pasquin_ are indicated by another rare print, that ent.i.tled the _Judgement of the Queen o" Common Sense.
Addressed to Henry Fielding Esqre._ Here, again, it is _Pasquin"s_ satire on the prevailing furore for pantomime that is chiefly ill.u.s.trated; as Common Sense gives to Rich, the harlequin, a halter, while to Fielding she accords an overflowing purse. Supporting Fielding are a long lean Shakespeare, and two figures, possibly the distinguished players Kitty Clive and Quin; on the opposite side, behind Harlequin, are figures representing the bad clergy, lawyers, and doctors satirised in the _Tragedy_; and the whole is balanced by the emergence of the ghost in Hamlet, from a trap door in the foreground. Doggerel verses, at the foot of the print, celebrate the arrival of a bard, "from ye Great Mogul,"
bringing with him _Wit, Humour, and Satyr_, and receiving the Queen"s "honest favour," in "show"rs of gold."
Under those golden showers, and with the applause of "all the fashionable Squares" ringing in his ears, we may leave Mr Pasquin. Fielding"s first venture as political dramatist and theatrical manager had proved brilliantly successful; his little theatre, like his own Tom Thumb, had a.s.sailed a dozen giant abuses, an all-powerful Minister among them, and the town had applauded the courage and wit of the performance. In the following season, those same boards were to witness the author of _Pasquin_ "laying about him" with an even greater political audacity.
Content, doubtless, with the success of _Pasquin_, Fielding does not seem to have launched any further political attacks during the remaining months of 1736. A newspaper advertis.e.m.e.nt of June announces the intention of the "Great Mogul"s Company of Comedians" to continue "playing twice a week during the summer season," and _Pasquin_ remained occasionally in the bills as late as the 2nd of July. The public were advised that "This is much the coolest House in Town"; and audiences must have been drawn even in August, for in that month one small and presumably party play was performed, the _New Comi-Tragical Interlude call"d the Deposing and Death of Queen Gin_. This little piece consisted of only two scenes, and was probably a skit on a Bill "against spirituous liquors" which Walpole had supported earlier in the year. The measure met with violent opposition, including pet.i.tions from the Liverpool and Bristol merchants; and in view of Sir Robert"s own notorious excesses with the bottle a temperance Bill from his hands may well have roused Fielding"s ironic laughter. The authorship of the satire is unknown; but the moral appears to have been unexceptionable, as _Queen Gin_, in the final scene, "drinks a great quant.i.ty of liquor and at last dies."
Fielding clearly began his second year at the "little theatre" with some social or political exhortation, as the following bill appears for January:--"By a Company of Comedians, At the New Theatre in the Haymarket, this Day, January 26, will be presented a Dramatick Satire on the Times (never performed before) call"d The Mirrour." By February "the Original Company who perform"d _Pasquin_" are notified on the bills; and on the 2nd of March a performance is announced of a _Dramatick Tale of the King and the Miller of Mansfield_, presumably the same _Miller of Mansfield_ openly declared by one of Walpole"s "hired scribblers" to be aimed at the overthrow of the Ministry. [6] All such preliminary skirmishes, however, served but to introduce the grand attack of the _Historical Register for the Tear 1736_, the first performance of which may be a.s.signed to the end of March 1737. [7]
In the _Register_ we have the most complete display of Fielding"s vigour as a fighting politician. Here, to recur to Mr Pasquin"s characteristic phrase, he "lays about him" with a gusto and honest frankness quite lost among our own tepid conventions. But however hard the hitting, however boisterous the broad humour, however biting the irony, it is noteworthy that in this his chief political satire, written moreover for a yet unregulated stage, Fielding never stoops to the shameless personalities of his day. The fashion of the eighteenth-century permitted even the great and cla.s.sical genius of Pope to hurl lines at the persons of his opponents that, to modern ears, scarcely bear quotation. Fielding, as we know, constantly a.s.serted his intention of throwing not at the vicious but at vice; and accordingly, even in this party play, flung openly in the face of the Minister, there is but one reference (and that only a fling at his "lack of any the least taste in polite literature") to the notorious personal failings of Sir Robert. It is against the Minister, and not the man, that the hot-blooded Opposition dramatist directs his humour and his irony. Fielding"s manly and generous nature here permitted no virulent personalities to blacken his pages. [8]
The irony of the _Register_ is chiefly reserved for the _Dedication to the Public_, designed for the reader at leisure; though here Walpole is indicated broadly enough, first in the figure of an a.s.s hung out on a signpost, and again as "Old Nick," for "who but the devil could act such a part." Here the attacks of the Ministerial papers are parried by ironic explanations that "The Register is a ministerial pamphlet calculated to infuse into the minds of the people a great opinion of their ministry,"
explanations full of admirable fencing and excellent hits. And in these dedicatory pages Fielding utters a sonorous warning to his countrymen concerning the insidious policy that was undermining their very const.i.tution: "... Here is the danger, here is the rock on which our const.i.tution must, if it ever does split. The liberties of a people have been subdued by conquests of valour and force, and have been betrayed by the subtle and dexterous arts of refined policy, but these are rare instances; for geniuses of this kind are not the growth of every age, whereas if a general corruption be once introduced, and those, who should be the guardians and bulwarks of our liberty, once find or think they find an interest in giving it up, no great capacity will be required to destroy it. On the contrary the meanest, lowest, dirtiest fellow, if such an one should ever have the a.s.surance in future ages to mimick power, and browbeat his betters, will be as able as Machiavel himself could have been, to root out the liberties of the bravest people." From the solemnities of the _Dedication_ we come to the "humming deal of satire,"
and the boisterous action, of the play itself. As in the case of _Pasquin_ the form of the drama is that of a rehearsal, a form which affords excellent opportunities for such explanatory asides as that addressed to the critic who complains of the attempt to review a year"s events in a single play: "Sir," says the author, "if I comprise the whole actions of a year in half an hour, will you blame me, or those who have done so little in that time?" The long years of Walpole"s power were admittedly "years without parallel in our history, for political stagnation." Scene one discovers five "blundering blockheads" of politicians, in counsel with one silent "little gentleman yonder in the chair;" who knows all and says nothing, and whose politics lie so deep that "nothing but an inspir"d understanding can come at "em." The blockheads, however, have capacity enough to s.n.a.t.c.h hastily at the money lying on their council table.
Walpole"s jealousy of power, it may be remembered, had driven almost every man of ability out of his ministry. Then comes a vivacious parody on the fashionable auctions of the day. Lots comprising "a most curious remnant of Political Honesty," a "delicate piece of Patriotism," and a "very clear Conscience which has been worn by a judge and a bishop" and on which no dirt will stick, go for little or nothing, while Lot 8, "a very considerable quant.i.ty of Interest at Court," excites brisk bidding, and is finally knocked down for one thousand pounds. From the excellent fooling of the auction, the action suddenly changes to combined satire on the Ministry and on the two Cibbers, father and son. The Ministry are ingeniously implied to have been d.a.m.n"d by the public; to give places with no attention to the capacity of the recipient; and to laugh at the dupes by whose money they live. A like weakness for putting blockheads in office and for giving places to rogues, and a like contempt of the public, is allegorically conveyed in the third act, in which "Apollo" casts the parts for a performance among sundry unworthy actors, and declares that the people may grumble "as much as they please, as long as we get their money." "There sir," cries the author to the critic of the rehearsal, "is the sentiment of a great man." The _Great Man_ was a phrase, to use Pope"s words, "by common use appropriated to the first minister"--that is, to Walpole. In the next scene the effrontery of the piece culminates in a ballet where the Prime Minister appears, leading a chorus of false patriots, who, to use Fielding"s own words, are set in the "odious and contemptible light" of a set of "cunning self-interested fellows who for a little paltry bribe would give up the liberties and properties of their country." These worthy patriots are of four types, the noisy, the cautious, the self-interested (he whose shop is his country) and the indolent ("who acts as I have seen a prudent man in company, fall asleep at the beginning of a fray and never wake "till the end o"t"). To them enters Quidam, unblushingly announced in the play bill as "Quidam, Anglice a Certain Person," in other words Walpole himself. Quidam pours gold into the pockets of the four patriots, drinks with them, and then, when the "bottle is out" (a too frequent occurrence at Sir Robert"s table) takes up his fiddle, strikes up a tune and dances off, the patriots dancing after him. But even this is not all. "Sir," says the author, "every one of these patriots have a hole in their pockets as Mr Quidam the fiddler there knows; so that he intends to make them dance "till all the money is fall"n through, which he will pick up again and so not lose one halfpenny by his generosity...." We may suppose that the final scene lost nothing in breadth by the acting of Quidam; and it is not surprising that the immediate result was the subjugation not, alas! of the Ministry, but of the liberty of the stage. Walpole"s fall was delayed for three years; the destruction of the political stage was accomplished in three months.
It is difficult to imagine that any party, in those days of comparatively arbitrary power, would venture a public satire so unveiled and so menacing as that of the _Register_, unless supported by some confidence in the immediate fall of their opponents. Without such confidence the political tactics of such an onslaught would be simple foolhardiness. Signs of these false hopes are not wanting in the slight, but equally bold, satire on the sycophants represented as composing Walpole"s _levee_, which was shortly added to the _Register_. This little sketch, in which a protest concerning the d.a.m.ning, early in the year, of Fielding"s ballad farce _Eurydice_ is combined with the political satire, was advertised as follows:--
"EURYDICE HISS"D: or, a Word to the Wise, giving an Account of the Rise, Progress, Greatness, and Downfal of Mr Pillage, ... with the dreadful Consequence and Catastrophe of the whole." [9]
We have the authority of Tom Davies, at7 this time a member of Fielding"s company, for the statement that "Fielding in his _Eurydice Hiss"d_ had brought on the Minister [Walpole] in a _levee_ scene" [10]; and as Pillage is the "very great man" who holds the _levee_ in the fragment, the above allusion to an expected downfall of Walpole"s Ministry seems obvious.
Pa.s.sages of similar import to the advertis.e.m.e.nt occur in the piece itself.
Thus the play is declared to convey a "beautiful image of the instability of human greatness"; and the spectacle is promised of the "author of a mighty farce" at the pinnacle of human greatness and adored by a crowd of dependants, become by a sudden turn of fortune, scorned, "deserted and abandon"d."
The single scene of the play opens when Pillage is at the zenith of his power; a stage direction orders that "The Levee enters, and range themselves to a ridiculous tune"; a part.i.tion of places ensues under the allegory of the business arrangements of a theatrical manager; and the author explains that by this _levee_ scene he hopes that persons greater than author-managers may learn to despise sycophants. Close on the heels of the _levee_ comes the catastrophe. Not one honest man, Pillage sadly admits, is on his side; as his "shallow plot" opens out the first applause changes to hisses; his farce is d.a.m.n"d; and he himself is left consoling the solitude of his downfall by getting exceedingly drunk on a third bottle.
The figure of a fallen Minister boozing away his own intolerable reflections, was not calculated to pacify that notoriously hard drinker, Sir Robert, already soundly pilloried in the _Register_, and severely indited by _Pasquin_. By the end of April the _Register_ had reached its thirty-first performance, a good run at that date; and according to an advertis.e.m.e.nt in the _Craftsman_ the satire was still being played on the 7th of May. In little more than four weeks, and after the alleged perpetration of a treasonable and profane farce called _The Golden Rump_, a Bill for stifling the liberty of the stage under a censorship was introduced, had pa.s.sed through both Houses, and received the royal a.s.sent.
Well might Lord Chesterfield exclaim in the brilliant speech which, in Smollet"s words, "will ever endear his character to all the friends of genius and literature, to all those who are warmed with zeal for the liberties of their country," that the Bill was not only "of a very extraordinary nature, but has been brought in at a very extraordinary season and pushed with very extraordinary despatch." Concerning the nature of the measure Chesterfield had no doubt. He saw its tendency towards restraining the "liberty of the Press which will be a long stride towards the destruction of Liberty itself"; he pointed out that a Minister who has merited the esteem of the people will neither fear the wit nor feel the satire of the theatre; he denounced the subjugation of the stage under "an arbitrary Court license" which would convert it into a ca.n.a.l for conveying the vices and follies of "great men and Courtiers" through the whole kingdom; he protested against the Bill as an encroachment not only on liberty but also on property, for "Wit, my Lords, is a sort of property; it is the property of those that have it, and too often the only property that they have to depend on."
As a manager of the intrepid little theatre in the Haymarket, as well as the author of the most successful of the offending plays, the Licensing Act fell with double weight on Fielding. "When I speak against the Bill,"