" Gosson expresses himself with much quaint
force, but he is not absolutely intolerant. He was a student of Oxford
University, had in his youth written poems and plays, and even
appeared upon the scene as an actor. Although he had repented of these
follies, he still viewed them without acrimony. To his pamphlet we are
indebted for certain interesting details in regard to the manners and
customs of the Elizabethan playgoers. A further attack upon the
theatre was led by Dr. Reynolds, of Queen's College, who was greatly
troubled by the performance of a play at Christchurch, and who
published, in 1593, "The Overthrow of Stage Plays," described by
Disraeli as "a tedious invective, foaming at the mouth of its text
with quotations and authorities." Reynolds was especially severe upon
"the sin of boys wearing the dress and affecting the airs of women;"
and thus unconsciously helped on a change he would have regarded as
still more deplorable--the appearance of actresses upon the stage. But
a fiercer far than Reynolds was to arise. In 1633 Prynne produced his
"Histriomastix; or, The Player's Scourge," a monstrous work of more
than a thousand closely-printed quarto pages, devoted to the most
searching indictment of the stage and its votaries.
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