and offeaded him sometimes as a Catholic and sometimes as a Protestant. But they reappeared after his death, and were sanctioned by such high authority, that the young king, Edward VI., himself composed a piece against the Papists, entitled “The Whore of Babylon;” and Queen Mary, in her turn, commanded the performance, in the churches, of popular dramas favorable to Popery. Finaliy, in 1569, we find the choristers of St. Paul’s, “clothed in silk and satin,” playing profane pieces in Elizabeth’s chapel, in the different royal houses; and they were so well skilled in their profession, that, in Shakspeare’s time, they constituted one of the best and most popular troops of actors in London.
Far, therefore, from opposing or seeking to change the taste of the people for theatrical representations, the English clergy hastened to gratify it. Their influence, it is true, gave to the works which they brought on the stage a more serious and moral character than was possessed in other countries by compositions dependent upon the whims of the public, and cursed by the anathemas of the Church. Notwithstanding its coarseness of ideas and language, the English drama, which became so licentious in the reign of Charles II., appears chaste and pure in the middle of the sixteenth century, when compared to the first essays of dramatic composition in France. But it did not the less continue to be popular in its character, ignorant of all scientific regularity, and faithful to the national taste. The clergy would have lost much by endeavoring to suppress theatrical performances. They possessed no exclusive privilege; and numerous competitors vied with them for applause and success. Robin Hood and Maid Marian, the Lord of Misrule and the Hobby-Horse, had not yet disappeared. Traveling actors, attached to the service of the
