| "There's one Thing more to acquaint the Reader
with;
'tis that I have ventured to change the Terms of Mistress
and
Lover, for others somewhat more plain,
but much more
proper. I don't look upon this as any Failure
in Civility.
As
Good and Evil are different
in themselves,
so they
ought to be differently mark'd. To confound them in Speech
is the Way to confound
them in Practice. Ill Qualities
ought to have ill Names,
to prevent their being Catching.
Indeed Things are in a great Measure govern'd
by Words:
To guild over a foul Character, serves only to perplex
the Idea,
to encourage the Bad, and mislead the Unwary.
To treat Honour
and Imfamy alike, is an Injury to
Virtue, and a Sort of Levelling in Morality.I confess, I have
no Ceremony for Debauchery. For to compliment Vice, is
but one Remove from worshipping
the Devil."—Jeremy
Collier, Preface to A Short View of the Profaneness and Immorality
of the English Stage. (March, 5, 1697/8)
"Play-houses, the seminaries of vice and impiety, erected in the principal cities of the nation, and stage players, commonly among the most abandoned of mankind, escape with impunity. Yea, this pagan entertainment of the stage is countenanced by the members and office-bearers of this church, and that to such a degree, that one of the ministers thereof has commenced author of a most profane play, called The Tragedy of Douglas, wherein immorality is promoted, and what is sacred, exposed to ridicule. Oh! how astonishing! that a minister in the once famous church of Scotland should be guilty of such abominations, and yet not immediately sentenced to bear the highest of all church censure!"—Act, Declaration, and Testimony for the whole of our Covenanted Reformation, (1761). |