although besotted minds, who are in love with their own opinion, and display their acuteness rather in the censure of others' works than in any productions of their own, never will allow that they are overcome.... Among many absurdities," says the critic to be refuted, "it has most shocked me to observe the impudence with which the poet has transgressed the limits assigned to their art by the inventors of the drama; for though the action required by them is one which is complete in twenty-four hours at the most, he has crowded months into his play, crammed with love adventures; and even that time is not long enough for ladies of rank and education to fall blindly in love with a shepherd, to make him their secretary, and enable him to decipher their real purpose amid the riddles with which it is expressed.... Moreover, I am at a loss to comprehend with what propriety a piece, in which dukes and counts make their appearance, can be called a comedy." So far the malignant censurer proceeds, when he is interrupted by Don Alejo, the other speaker in the Dialogue. "I cannot assent to your opinion, inasmuch as, setting aside the rule that, in common courtesy, the guest is bound not to quarrel with the viands set before him, this particular comedy does comply with the rules which still are valid; and, in my opinion, which is common to all who are free from prejudice with myself, the dramas actually represented in our Spain have a great advantage over those of antiquity, although they depart from the rules laid down by the creators of the stage. If they establish this principle, that a play should only represent such transactions as can by possibility be compressed within the space of twenty-four hours--can there be a more flagrant absurdity than that a man in his senses should, in so short a period, fall passionately in love with a woman equally in possession of hers, and carry the matter on so rapidly, that the love, which is announced in the morning, ends in a marriage at night? Is that time enough to represent jealousy, despair, hope--in short, all the passions and incidents, without which love is a mere word, without any signification? These evils are, according to the judgment of all persons competent to form an opinion, far greater than those arising from the circumstance that the spectators, without moving from their seats, see and hear things which must occupy several days. For as he who reads a history of a few pages, informs himself of events which have occurred in remote countries during many centuries, even so may comedy, which is the image and representation of that on which it is founded, in describing the events which befall two lovers, paint in the most vivid colours all that can take place on such an occasion; and as it is improbable that all these incidents should occur in one day, may feign also for itself the longer time, of which it stands in need. Not improperly has poetry been called a living picture;