MORALITIES.--As the people became enlightened, and especially as religious
knowledge made progress, such childish shows were no longer able to
satisfy them. The drama undertook a higher task of instruction in the form
of what was called a _morality_, or _moral play_. Instead of old stories
reproduced to please the childish fancy of the ignorant, genius invented
scenes and incidents taken indeed from common life, but the characters
were impersonal; they were the ideal virtues, _morality, hope, mercy,
frugality_, and their correlative vices. The _mystery_ had endeavored to
present similitudes; the _moralities_ were of the nature of allegory, and
evinced a decided progress in popular intelligence.
These for a time divided the interest with the mysteries, but eventually
superseded them. The impersonality of the characters enabled the author to
make hits at political circumstances and existent follies with impunity,
as the multitude received advice and reproof addressed to them abstractly,
without feeling a personal sting, and the government would not condescend
to notice such abstractions.
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