it; each puts off the artificial man, to become natural and true. The accents of each will be the same in the violence of the same passions or the same sorrows.

Suppose a mother, with her eyes fixed on the empty cradle of a beloved child she has just lost. A sort of stupidity in the features, a few tears flowing down her cheeks, at distant intervals, piercing cries, and convulsive sobs, bursting forth from time to time, will signalize the sorrows of a woman of the people the same as that of a duchess. Suppose, again, a man of the people and a man of the Court to have both fallen into a violent fit of jealousy or vengeance: these two men, so different in their habits, will be the same in their frenzy; they will present in their fury the same expression; their looks, their features, their actions, their attitudes, their movements, will assume, all at once, a terrible, grand, and solemn character, worthy, in both, of the pencil of the painter, and the study of the actor, and, perhaps, even the delirium of passion may inspire the one as well as the other with one of those words one of those sublime expressions-that the poet would present.

The grand movements of the soul elevate man

to an ideal nature, in whatever rank fate may have placed him. The Revolution, which brought so many passions into play, has it not had its popular orators, who have astonished all by sublime traits of an untaught eloquence, and by an expression and accents which Lekain himself would not have been ashamed of?

Lekain felt that the art of declamation did not consist in reciting verse, with more or less warmth or emphasis; and that this art might, by improvement, give, in a degree, reality to the fictions of the scene.

To arrive at this end, it is necessary that the actor should have received from nature an extensive sensibility, and a profound intelligence; and Lekain possessed these qualities in an eminent degree. Indeed, the strong impressions which actors create on the stage, are only the result of the alliance of these two essential faculties. I

must explain what I mean by this. mean by this. In my idea, sensibility is not only that faculty which an actor possesses of being moved himself, and of affecting his being, so far as to imprint on his features, and especially on his voice, that expression, and those accents of sorrow, which awake all the

sympathies of the heart, and bring forth tears in those who listen. I comprise in it, also, the effect it produces, the imagination of which it is the source, and not that imagination which consists in having reminiscences, so that the objects seem actually present:—this, properly speaking, is only memory. But that imagination which, creative, active, and powerful, consists in collecting, in one single fictitious object, the qualities of several real objects ;-which associates the actor with the inspirations of the poet, transports him back to times that are past, and renders him present at the lives of historical personages or those impassioned beings created by genius;reveals to him, as if by magic, their physiognomy, their heroic stature, their language, their habits, all the shades of their character, all the movements of their soul, and even their singularities. I also call sensibility, that faculty of exaltation which agitates an actor, takes possession of his senses, and shakes even his very soul, and enables him to enter into the most tragic situations, and the most terrible of the passions, as if they were his own.

The intelligence, which accompanies sensi

bility, judges the impressions which the latter has made us feel; it selects, arranges them, and subjects them to calculation. If sensibility furnishes the objects, the intelligence brings them into play, it aids us to direct the employment of our physical and intellectual forces, to judge between the relations and connections which there are between the words of the poet and the situation, or the character, of the personages; and to, sometimes, add the shades that are wanting, or that language cannot express; to complete, in fine, their expression by action and physiognomy.

It may be conceived, that such a person must have received from nature a peculiar organization for sensibility, that mutual property of our being. Every one possesses it, in a greater or lesser degree. But in the man whom nature has destined to paint the passions in their greatest excesses, to give them all their violence, and shew them in all their delirium, it may be conceived, that it must have a much greater energy; and as all our emotions are intimately connected with our nerves, the nervous system in the actor must be so mobile and plastic, as to be

moved by the inspirations of the poet as easily as the Eolian harp sounds with the least breath of air that touches it.*

If the actor be not endowed with a sensibility at least equal to that of any of his audience, he can only move them feebly. It is only by an excess of sensibility, that he can succeed in producing deep impressions, and move even the coldest souls. The power that raises must be greater than the power raised. This faculty ought to be ever in the actor, I will not say greater or stronger than in the poet who conceived those movements of the soul, re-produced on the stage, but more lively, more rapid, more powerful in his organs. In fact, the poet or the painter can wait the moment of inspiration to write or paint. In the actor, the inspiration must take place instantaneously, at his will, that he may be able thus to command it. That it may be sudden, lively, and prompt, he must possess an excess of sen

* We have frequently seen actors, on their debuts, give promise of excellence which time has not fulfilled. This frequently arises from the great agitation of the nerves consequent on a first appearance, which makes them enter more naturally into affecting situations. They acquire more confidence in time.