The Gamester (1753) Part 1

The Gamester (1753).

by Edward Moore.

INTRODUCTION

This reprint of Edward Moore's _The Gamester_ makes available to students of eighteenth century literature a play which, whatever its intrinsic merits, is historically important both as a vehicle for a century of great actors and as a contribution to the development of middle-cla.s.s tragedy which had considerable influence on the Continent.

_The Gamester_ was first presented at the Drury Lane Theatre February 7, 1753 with Garrick in the leading role, and ran for ten successive nights. Up to the middle of the nineteenth century it remained a popular stock piece--John Philip Kemble, Mrs. Siddons, Mrs. Barry, the Keans, Macready, and others having distinguished themselves in it--and in America from 1754 to 1875 it enjoyed even more performances than in England. (J.H. Caskey, _The Life and Works of Edward Moore_, 96-99).

Moore's middle-cla.s.s tragedy is the only really successful attempt to follow Lillo's decisive break with tradition in England in the eighteenth century. His background, like Lillo's, was humble, religious, and mercantile. The son of a dissenting pastor, Moore received his early education in dissenters' academies, and then served an apprenticeship to a London linen-draper. After a few years in Ireland as an agent for a merchant, Moore returned to London to join a partnership in the linen trade. The partnership was soon dissolved, and Moore turned to letters for a livelihood. Among his works are _Fables for the Female s.e.x_ (1744) which went through three editions, _The Foundling_ (1748), a successful comedy, and _Gil Blas_ (1751), an unsuccessful comedy. In 1753, with encouragement and some a.s.sistance from Garrick, he produced _The Gamester_, upon which his reputation as a writer depends.

It is impossible, of course, to review here all the factors involved in the development of middle-cla.s.s tragedy in England in the eighteenth century. However, certain aspects of that movement which concern Moore's immediate predecessors and which have not been adequately recognized might be mentioned briefly. Aside from Elizabethan and Jacobean attempts to give tragic expression to everyday human experience, historians have noted the efforts of Otway, Southerne, and Rowe to lower the social level of tragedy; but in this period middle-cla.s.s problems and sentiments and domestic situations appear in numerous tragedies, long-since forgotten, which in form, setting, and social level present no startling deviations from traditional standards. Little or no attention has been given to some of these obscure dramatists who in the midst of the Collier controversy attempted to ill.u.s.trate in tragedy the arguments advanced in the third part of John Dennis's _The Usefulness of the Stage, to the Happiness of Mankind, to Government, and to Religion_ (1698). Striving to demonstrate the usefulness of the stage, these avowed reformers produced essentially domestic tragedies, by treating such problems as filial obedience and marital fidelity in terms of orthodox theology. The argument that the stage can be an adjunct of the pulpit is widespread, and appears most explicitly in Hill's preface to his _Fatal Extravagance_ (1721), sometimes regarded as the first middle-cla.s.s tragedy in the eighteenth century, and in Lillo's dedication to _George Barnwell_ (1731). The line from these obscure dramatists at the turn of the century to Lillo is direct and clear. Of these forgotten plays we can note here only _Fatal Friendship_ (1698) by Mrs. Catherine Trotter whom John Hughes hailed as "the first of stage-reformers"

(_To the Author of Fatal Friendship, a Tragedy_), an unquestionably domestic tragedy inculcating a theological "lesson". To this play, which was acted with "great applause" (_Biographica Dramatica_, 107), Aaron Hill was, I am convinced, considerably indebted for his _Fatal Extravagance_, which is, in turn, one of the sources of _The Gamester_.

In the early eighteenth century, then, there is clearly discernible a two-fold tendency toward middle-cla.s.s tragedy which reaches its fullest expression in Lillo: the desire to lower the social level of the characters in order to make the tragedy more moving; and the desire to defend the stage by demonstrating its religious and moral utility. In his prologue to _The Fair Penitent_ (l703), Rowe gave expression to the first: the "fate of kings and empires", he argues, is too remote to engage our feelings, for "we ne'er can pity that we ne'er can share"; therefore he offers "a melancholy tale of private woes". In his prologue, Lillo repeats this idea, but in his dedication he shows himself primarily concerned with the second tendency. Specifically challenging those "who deny the lawfulness of the stage", he argues that "the more extensively useful the moral of any tragedy is, the more excellent that piece must be of its kind"; the generality of mankind is more liable to vice than are kings; therefore "plays founded on moral tales in private life may be of admirable use... by stifling vice in its first principles". Dramatists who were concerned only or primarily with the first of these tendencies (the emotional effect), produced domestic or pseudo-domestic tragedies in the manner of Otway and Rowe. But those who stressed the second (moral and religious utility), seeking practical themes of widespread applicability, quite logically moved toward genuine middle-cla.s.s tragedy. Thus Hill's _Fatal Extravagance_ is concerned with the "vice" of gambling; while Charles Johnson's _Caelia, or The Perjur'd Lover_ (1732) attacks fashionable libertinism of the day, telling the story which Richardson was later to retell in seven ponderous volumes.

In _Caelia_ the religious rationalization of the tragic action is subdued, Johnson apparently preferring to stress the social and moral aspects of his subject, and to this end he resolutely refused to expunge or modify the boldly realistic brothel scenes, against which a fastidious audience had protested.

A comparison of _The Gamester_ with its predecessor, _Fatal Extravagance_, reflects certain developments in the intellectual background of the first half of the eighteenth century. Hill antic.i.p.ated Lillo in repeating Rowe's argument for lowering the social level of tragedy and in stating vigorously his desire to defend the stage by demonstrating its religious and moral utility. An admirer of Dennis's critical writings, Hill repeats Dennis's argument that the stage can affect those whom the pulpit falls to reach, and he offers his play as proof that "sound and useful instruction may be drawn from the _Theatre_", challenging the enemies of the stage to test his play "by the rules of religion and virtue" (Preface). Taking a "hint", as he says, from _A Yorkshire Tragedy_, Hill endeavored to show the "private sorrows" that result from gaming.

At the opening of the play, the hero, having gambled away his fortune, faces poverty. His friend who signed his bond is in jail and a kindly uncle has failed to secure the needed relief. In a fit of pa.s.sion growing out of despair, the hero kills the villainous creditor, and decides to poison his (the hero's) wife and children, and then stab himself. In his dying moments he learns that the uncle has subst.i.tuted a harmless cordial for the poison and that a long-lost brother has died leaving him a fortune. This bare outline gives no indication of Hill's careful theological rationalization of character and plot which he promised in his preface. Hill incorporated in his play the teachings of orthodox divines; there is nothing 'revolutionary' in his a.n.a.lytical presentation of human nature. The theological significance of Hill's play has not, to my knowledge, been recognized; thematic pa.s.sages tend to be dismissed as tiresome and gratuitous moralizing and the plot is often regarded as empty melodrama or the representation of some ambiguous 'fate'. It is in this deliberate theological rationalization of his materials that Hill owes most to Mrs. Trotter's domestic tragedy and that he differs significantly from Moore.

As with Hill and Lillo, Moore's desire to write a play with an extensively useful 'moral' led him to middle-cla.s.s realism and prose.

To attack the widespread fashion of gaming which he regarded as a "vice", Moore attempted to present "a natural picture" in language adapted "to the capacities and feelings of every part of the audience" (Preface, 1756). That he should have treated this social problem tragically is to be explained, perhaps, by his sources and by his religious background.

He justified the "horror of its catastrophe" on the grounds that "so prevailing and destructive a vice as Gaming" warranted it. _The Gamester_ has been justly credited with superior dramatic qualities in comparison with Hill's _Fatal Extravagance,_, but we might perhaps note briefly certain aspects of the two plays which reflect changes in the intellectual background. In both plays theological ideas are involved in the treatment of the fall of the hero, partially in Moore's play, completely In Hill's. Not recognizing ideas common to early eighteenth century sermons, the modern reader may perhaps puzzle over the steadily increasing moral paralysis and despondency in Moore's hero, Beverly.

Vice, preached the divines, beclouds the reason, leaving it progressively incapable of controlling the pa.s.sions:

Follies, if uncontroul'd, of every kind, Grow into pa.s.sions, and subdue the mind. (V, 4)

Further each commission of sin causes progressive loss of grace, without which man cannot act rightly. In prison Beverly is incapable of prayer ("I cannot pray--Despair has laid his iron hand upon me, and seal'd me for perdition..."). However, a benevolent deity touches him with the finger of grace, enabling him to repent ("I wish'd for ease, a moment's ease, that cool repentance and contrition might soften vengeance"). He can now pray for mercy and in his dying moments is vouchsafed a.s.surance of forgiveness ("Yet Heaven is gracious--I ask'd for hope, as the bright presage of forgiveness, and like a light, blazing thro' darkness, it came and chear'd me...").

In this aspect Moore is working along the lines laid down by Hill, but there is a significant difference, attributable perhaps to the weakening of orthodox theology and the spreading influence of the Shaftesburian school of ethical theorists. In the older theology, man's progressive loss of grace correspondingly releases his natural propensity for evil, and working in these concepts neither Hill nor Lillo hesitated to show his hero descending to murder. Moore, influenced perhaps by the ethical sentiments of the day, compromised his theological concepts and permitted his hero no really evil act (excluding of course his suicide), and stressed instead Beverly's mistaken trust in Stukely, who is, as Elton has pointed out, a "Mandevillian man" (_Survey of English Literature: 1730-1760_, I, 329-30).

There is another significant difference between the two plays which reflects the development of religious thought in the first half of the eighteenth century. Commenting on the too-late arrival of the news of the uncle's death, Elton remarks that "this _too-lateness_... which is in the nature of an accident, is a common and mechanical device of Georgian tragedy" (I, 330). Hill employed the device, the good news coming as a complete surprise, but he made it part of a carefully ordered plot designed to reveal the direct intervention and mysterious workings of a particular Providence, making characterization and action consistent, and giving his play a precise theological significance. In Moore's day, however, under the impact of deism and the developing rationalism, the concept of a particular Providence in orthodox theology had become so subtilized that the older idea of direct and striking intervention in human affairs all but disappeared. By mid-eighteenth century, deity, as Leslie Stephen points out, "appears under the colourless shape of Providence--a word which may be taken to imply a remote divine superintendence, without admitting an actual divine interference" (_History of English Thought In the Eighteenth Century_, II, 336). The references to Providence in Moore's play are of this type, pious labels on prudential morality. Moore carefully avoids the various devices employed by Hill to indicate direct divine intervention; consequently the late arrival of the news of the uncle's death (which was expected throughout the play) is without special meaning, and serves only as a theatrical device intended to heighten the emotional effect.

_The Gamester_, then, is a clear reflection of the state of English thought in the middle of the eighteenth century, in which a declining theology becomes suffused with the ideas and sentiments of the moralists of the age.

Despite the popularity of their plays, neither Lillo nor Moore inspired any significant followers in England. On the Continent, however, their influence was considerable. In his introduction to his edition of _The London Merchant_, A.W. Ward traces Lillo's influence on the Continent, and Caskey gives a detailed account of Moore's (119-134). _The Gamester_ was translated into German, French, Dutch, Spanish, and Italian. It was first acted at Breslau in 1754 and retained its stage popularity for more than two decades. A German translation appeared in 1754, and for more than twenty years numerous editions and translations continued to appear. In France, Diderot admired the play and translated it in 1760 (not published until 1819); Saurin's translation and adaptation (1767) proved popular on the French stage (he later provided an alternate happy ending which was frequently played).

_The Gamester_ is reproduced, with permission, from a copy owned by the University of Michigan.

Charles H. Peake

University of Michigan

BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE

The first edition of Moore's _The Gamester_ appeared in 1753 shortly after the opening of Garrick's performance of the play on February 7.

This edition is in many respects a good text; it has seemed desirable for several reasons, however, to reprint this work from the 1756 edition of _Poems, Fables, and Plays_ (often referred to as the "Collected Works"). The 1756 text often corrects that of 1753 and is generally superior to later printings; it contains pa.s.sages and improved readings not present in other editions; it aims at formal correctness, employing cla.s.sical scene division; as a "Works" edition it exhibits excellent editorial and typographical treatment; it enjoys a superior general readability advantageous to cla.s.sroom use; and, finally, it contains Moore's vindicatory preface, which, as far as an examination of available copies shows, does not appear in other editions. Inasmuch as the 1756 printing is somewhat late, standing between the fourth and fifth editions of the play, a brief bibliographical account of _The Gamester_ is offered.

The play was printed separately many times in the eighteenth century.

The first edition, in the University of Michigan copy, bears the t.i.tle: THE / GAMESTER. / A / TRAGEDY. / As it is Acted at the / _Theatre-Royal_ in _Drury-Lane_. / [rule] / ornament / [rule] / _LONDON_: / Printed for R. FRANCKLIN, in _Russel-Street_, / _Covent-Garden_; and Sold by R. DODSLEY, / in _Pall-Mall_. M.DCC.LIII. / The anonymity of the t.i.tlepage is half-hearted, for the dedication to Henry Pelham is signed "Edw. Moore." A prologue written by Garrick, an epilogue, and the cast of the original performance precede the eighty-four page text. Francklin and Dodsley brought out a second edition in the same year and a fourth edition in 1755; presumably a third edition had been issued in the interim. In 1771 a fifth and a sixth edition appeared, and in 1776 another London edition came out. In 1784 two more editions made an appearance, the first printed for R. b.u.t.ters (John H. Caskey, _The Life and Works of Edward Moore_, Yale Studies in English, LXXV [New Haven, 1927], p. 174), the second printed for a group of four booksellers--Thomas Davies, W. Nicoll, Samuel Bladon, and John Bew. The same combination of booksellers, with W. Lowndes taking the place of Davies, issued in 1789 an inferior reprinting of their 1784 text. The editions of 1784 and 1789 are interesting because they identify by inverted commas the cuts made in contemporary stage versions. Before the end of the century three editions were printed outside London: two Dublin imprints of 1763 and 1783, and an American imprint of 1791 by Henry Taylor in Philadelphia.

In addition to these separate publications, _The Gamester_ was included in two collections of Moore's works. The 1756 edition has already been noticed. THE DRAMATIC WORKS OF Mr. Edward Moore, as the 1788 t.i.tlepage describes the volume, was issued by the Lowndes-Nicoll-Bladon-Bew group and was actually an a.s.sembled text made up of the 1784 printing of _The Gamester_, the 1786 _The Foundling_, and the 1788 _Gil Blas_.

The play was a favorite in many popular dramatic collections of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century; it appeared in Bell's _British Theatre_ in 1776 and thereafter, in Mrs. Inchbald's _The British Theatre_ in 1808, in Dibdin's _London Theatre_ in 1815, and in c.u.mberland's _British Theatre_ in 1826. According to Caskey and other sources the play was thus reprinted more than a dozen times by the middle of the nineteenth century. Since then it has declined in favor and has seldom been reprinted, even in textbook anthologies covering representative literature of the period.

The 1756 text of the play and the plates from the Davies-Nicoll- Bladon-Bew 1784 edition have been reproduced through the cooperation of the University of Michigan Library from copies of these editions in its possession. Because of its lack of significance, the dedication to Henry Pelham has not been reprinted.

Philip R. Wikelund

University of Michigan

PREFACE.

It having been objected to this tragedy, that its language is prose, and its catastrophe too horrible, I shall entreat the reader's patience for a minute, that I may say a word or two to these objections.

The play of the GAMESTER was intended to be a natural picture of that kind of life, of which all men are judges; and as it struck at a vice so universally prevailing, it was thought proper to adapt its language to the capacities and feelings of every part of the audience: that as some of its characters were of no higher rank than _Sharpers_, it was imagined that (whatever good company they may find admittance to in the world) their speaking blank verse upon the stage would be unnatural, if not ridiculous. But though the more elevated characters also speak prose, the judicious reader will observe, that it is a species of prose which differs very little from verse: in many of the most animated scenes, I can truly say, that I often found it a much greater difficulty to avoid, than to write, _measure_. I shall only add, in answer to this objection, that I hoped to be more interesting, by being more natural; and the event, as far as I have been a witness of it, has more than answered my expectations.

As to the other objection, the horror of its catastrophe, if it be considered simply what that catastrophe is, and compared with those of other tragedies, I should humbly presume that the working it up to any uncommon degree of horror, is the _merit_ of the play, and not its _reproach_. Nor should so prevailing and destructive a vice as GAMING be attacked upon the theatre, without impressing upon the imagination all the horrors that may attend it.

I shall detain the reader no longer than to inform him, that I am indebted for many of the most popular pa.s.sages in this play to the inimitable performer, who, in the character of the_ Gamester, _exceeded every idea I had conceived of it in the writing.

PROLOGUE.

Written and spoken by Mr. GARRICK.

Like fam'd La Mancha's knight, who launce in hand, Mounted his steed to free th' enchanted land, Our Quixote bard sets forth a monster-taming, Arm'd at all points, to fight that hydra--GAMING.

Aloft on Pegasus he waves his pen, And hurls defiance at the caitiff's den.

The _First_ on fancy'd giants spent his rage, But _This_ has more than windmills to engage: He combats pa.s.sion, rooted in the soul, Whose pow'rs, at once delight ye, and controul; Whose magic bondage each lost slave enjoys, Nor wishes freedom, though the spell destroys.

To save our land from this MAGICIAN's charms, And rescue maids and matrons from his arms, Our knight poetic comes. And Oh! ye fair!

This black ENCHANTER's wicked arts beware!

His subtle poison dims the brightest eyes, And at his touch, each grace and beauty dies: Love, gentleness and joy to rage give way, And the soft dove becomes a bird of prey.

May this our bold advent'rer break the spell, And drive the _demon_ to his native h.e.l.l.

Ye slaves of pa.s.sion, and ye dupes of chance, Wake all your pow'rs from this destructive trance!

Shake off the shackles of this tyrant vice: Hear other calls than those of cards and dice: Be learn'd in n.o.bler arts, than arts of _play_, And other debts, than those of _honour_ pay: No longer live insensible to shame, Lost to your country, families and fame.

Could our romantic muse this work atchieve, Would there one honest heart in _Britain_ grieve?

Th' attempt, though wild, would not in vain be made, If every honest hand would lend its aid.