Hence what has been called the classical and
domestic drama. Addison's _Cato_ is a specimen of the one; and would
it were not superfluous to cite examples of the other! To such purposes
poetry cannot be made subservient. Poetry is a sword of lightning,
ever unsheathed, which consumes the scabbard that would contain it.
And thus we observe that all dramatic writings of this nature are
unimaginative in a singular degree; they affect sentiment and passion,
which, divested of imagination, are other names for caprice and
appetite. The period in our own history of the grossest degradation
of the drama is the reign of Charles II., when all forms in which
poetry had been accustomed to be expressed became hymns to the triumph
of kingly power over liberty and virtue. Milton stood alone illuminating
an age unworthy of him. At such periods the calculating principle
pervades all the forms of dramatic exhibition, and poetry ceases to
be expressed upon them. Comedy loses its ideal universality: wit
succeeds to humour; we laugh from self-complacency and triumph, instead
of pleasure; malignity, sarcasm, and contempt succeed to sympathetic
merriment; we hardly laugh, but we smile.
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