From all this I would infer, that let our conception of what we are to speak be ever so just, and the ear ever so true, yet, when we are to deliver it to an audience (I will leave fear out of the question) there must go along with the whole a natural freedom and becoming grace, which is easier to conceive than to describe: for without this inexpressible somewhat, the performance will come out oddly disguised, or somewhere defectively unsurprising to the hearer. Of this defect too, I will give you yet a stranger instance, which you will allow fear could not be the occasion of. If you remember Estcourt, you must have known that he was long enough upon the stage, not to be under the least restraint from fear, in his performance. This man was so amazing and extraordinary a mimic, that no man or woman, from the coquette to the privy-counsellor, ever moved or spoke before him, but he would carry their voice, look, mein, and motion instantly into another company. I have heard him make long harangues, and form various arguments, even in the manner of thinking, of an eminent pleader at the bar, with every the least article and singularity of his utterance so perfectly imitated, that he was the very _alter ipse_, scarce to be distinguished from his original. Yet more; I have seen upon the margin of the written part of Falstaff, which he acted, his own notes and observations upon almost every speech of it, describing the true spirit of the humour, and with what tone of voice, look, and gesture each of them ought to be delivered; yet, in his execution upon the stage, he seemed to have lost all those just ideas he had formed of it, and almost through the character, laboured under a heavy load of flatness. In a word, with all his skill in mimickry, and knowledge of what ought to be done, he never, upon the stage, could bring it truly into practice, but was upon the whole, a languid unaffecting actor. After I have shown you so many necessary qualifications, not one of which can be spared in true theatrical elocution, and have at the same time proved, that with the assistance of them all united, the whole may still come forth defective, what talents shall we say will infallibly form an actor? This, I confess, is one of Nature’s secrets, too deep for me to dive into. Let us content ourselves, therefore, with affirming, that Genius, which Nature only gives, only can complete him. This genius then was so strong in Betterton, that it shone out in every speech and motion of him. Yet voice and person are such necessary supporters to it, that, by the multitude, they have been preferred to genius itself, or at least often mistaken for it. Betterton had a voice of that kind which gave more spirit to terror than to the softer passions; of more strength than melody. The rage and jealousy of Othello became him better than the sighs and tenderness of Castalio: for though in Castalio he only excelled others, in Othello he excelled himself, which you will easily