LECTURE

SESSIONAL OPENING

PHILOSOPHICAL INSTITUTION

EDINBURGH

8 NOVEMBER 1881




THE STAGE AS IT IS.


LADIES AND GENTLEMEN,

You will not be surprised that, on this interesting occasion, I have
selected as the subject of the few remarks I propose to offer you,
"The Stage as it is." The stage--because to my profession I owe it
that I am here, and every dictate of taste and of fidelity impels me
to honor it; the stage as it is--because it is very cheap and empty
honor that is paid to the drama in the abstract, and withheld from the
theatre as a working institution in our midst. Fortunately there is
less of this than there used to be. It arose partly from intellectual
superciliousness, partly from timidity as to moral contamination. To
boast of being able to appreciate Shakespeare more in reading him than