The stage upon which the clerks performed their plays, according to Strutt, consisted of three platforms, one above another. On the uppermost sat God the Father surrounded by His angels. He was represented in a white robe, and until it was discovered how injurious the process was, the actor who played the part used to have his face gilded. On the second platform were the glorified saints, and on the lowest men who had not yet passed from life. On one side of the lowest platform was hell's mouth, a dark pitchy cavern, whence issued the appearance of fire and flames, and sometimes hideous yellings and noises in imitation of the howlings and cries of wretched souls tormented by relentless demons. From this yawning cave the devils constantly ascended to delight the spectators and afford comic relief to the more serious drama. The three stages were not always used. Archdeacon Rogers, who died in 1595, left an account of the Chester play which he himself saw, and he wrote that the stage was a high scaffold with two rooms, a higher and a lower, upon four wheels. In the lower the actors apparelled themselves, and in the higher they played. But this was a movable stage on wheels. The clerks' stage would, doubtless, be a fixed structure, and of a more elaborate construction. The dresses used by the actors were very gorgeous and splendid, though little care was bestowed upon the appropriateness of the costumes. The words of the play of the Creation differ in the various versions which have come down to us. Strutt thinks that the clerks' play, acted before "the most part of the nobles and gentles in England," was very similar to the Coventry play, which cannot compare in grandeur and vigour with the York play discovered in the library of Lord Ashburnham, and edited by Miss Toulmin Smith[58]. But as the north-country dialect of the York version would have been difficult for the learned clerks of London to pronounce, their version would doubtless resemble more that of Coventry than that of York. The first act represents the Deity seated upon His throne and speaking as follows: _Ego sum Alpha et Omega, principium et finis_. My name is knowyn, God and Kynge; My work to make now wyl I wende; In myselfe resteth my reynenge, It hath no gynnyng, ne no ende, And all that evyr shall have beynge Is closed in my mende;[59] When it is made at my lykynge I may it save, I may it shende[60] After my plesawns."[61] [Footnote 58: Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1885. A portion of this is published in Mr. A.W. Pollard's _English Miracle Plays_.] [Footnote 59: Mind.] [Footnote 60: Destroy.] [Footnote 61: Pleasure.] At the close of this oration, which consists of forty lines, the angels enter upon the upper stage, surround the throne of the Deity, and sing from the _Te Deum_: _Te Deum laudamus, te dominum confitemur_.