These reasons are
sufficiently displayed by the writers of the second, third, and fourth
centuries; and as they are alluded to by the Quakers, though never
quoted, I shall give them to the reader. He will judge by these, how far
the ancient coincide with the modern christians upon this subject; and
how for these arguments of antiquity are applicable to modern times.
The early christians, according to Tertullian, Menucius Felix, Cyprian,
Lactantius, and others, believed, that the "motives for going to these
amusements were not of the purest sort. People went to them without any
view of the improvement of their minds. The motive was either to see or
to be seen."
They considered the manner of the drama as objectionable. They believed
"that he who was the author of truth, could never approve of that which
was false, and that he, who condemned hypocrisy, could never approve of
him, who personated the character of others; and that those therefore,
who pretended to be in love, or to be angry, or to grieve, when none of
those passions existed in their minds, were guilty of a kind of adultery
in the eyes of the Supreme Being."
They considered their contents to be noxious. They "looked upon them as
consistories of immorality.
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