them in a note to Ben Jonson's "Alchemist," "who acted with little
discrimination, and were always more ready to prove their authority
than their judgment, the most hateful of them all being Sir Henry
Herbert," appointed by Charles I. to an office which naturally expired
when the Puritans suppressed the stage and did their utmost to
exterminate the players. At the Restoration, however, Herbert resumed
his duties; but he found, as Chalmers relates, "that the recent times
had given men new habits of reasoning, notions of privileges, and
propensities to resistance. He applied to the courts of justice for
redress; but the verdicts of judges were contradictory; he appealed to
the ruler of the state, but without receiving redress or exciting
sympathy: like other disputed jurisdictions, the authority of the
Master of the Revels continued to be oppressive till the Revolution
taught new lessons to all parties."

It is to be observed, however, that the early severities and arbitrary
caprices to which the players were subjected, were not attributable
solely to the action of the Masters of the Revels. The Privy Council
was constant in its interference with the affairs of the theatre. A
suspicion was for a long time rife that the dramatic representations
of the sixteenth century touched upon matters of religion or points of
doctrine, and oftentimes contained matters "tending to sedition and to
the contempt of sundry good orders and laws." Proclamations were from
time to time issued inhibiting the players and forbidding the
representation of plays and interludes. In 1551 even the actors
attached to the households of noblemen were not allowed to perform
without special leave from the Privy Council; and the authorities of
Gray's Inn, once famous for its dramatic representations, expressly
ordered that there should be "no comedies called interludes in this
house out of term time, but when the Feast of the Nativity of our Lord