reduced within the limits either of a natural or an artificial day.
So that, as he taught them to amplify what he had shortened, by the
same rule applied the contrary way he taught them to shorten what he
had amplified. Tragedy is the miniature of human life; an epic poem
is the draft at length. Here, my lord, I must contract also, for
before I was aware I was almost running into a long digression to
prove that there is no such absolute necessity that the time of a
stage-action should so strictly be confined to twenty-four hours as
never to exceed them (for which Aristotle contends, and the Grecian
stage has practised). Some longer space on some occasions, I think,
may be allowed, especially for the English theatre, which requires
more variety of incidents than the French. Corneille himself, after
long practice, was inclined to think that the time allotted by the
ancients was too short to raise and finish a great action; and
better a mechanic rule were stretched or broken than a great beauty
were omitted. To raise, and afterwards to calm, the passions; to
purge the soul from pride by the examples of human miseries which
befall the greatest; in few words, to expel arrogance and introduce
compassion, are the great effects of tragedy--great, I must confess,
if they were altogether as true as they are pompous. But are habits
to be introduced at three hours' warning? Are radical diseases so
suddenly removed? A mountebank may promise such a cure, but a
skilful physician will not undertake it. An epic poem is not in so
much haste; it works leisurely: the changes which it makes are
slow, but the cure is likely to be more perfect. The effects of
tragedy, as I said, are too violent to be lasting. If it be
answered, that for this reason tragedies are often to be seen, and
the dose to be repeated, this is tacitly to confess that there is
more virtue in one heroic poem than in many tragedies. A man is
humbled one day, and his pride returns the next. Chemical medicines