The British Press; or, Morning Literary Advertiser.
London, England, 1818-07-08 00:00:00

1113.9 cr N EFL L.

(Prom a Pruritic la/ Paper.)
. . .
the impression Miss O'Neill's acting has
upon the minds of all who have witnessed her aStu-
molting powers. is a higher eillogium than any thing
I cm) say in her praise. I shall therefore follow her
no further in the characters she has appeared in,
than as it will he necessary to substatitiste llns
claims I make on her part of being the most iserfect
actress that the age. petits'ss the world. ever pro.
duced. If it he said that other octres.es have too-
duced still greater apparent elfrets. 1 reply. that
grief IS seldom noisy. and the heart that sympathises
with it is always silent : a frantic maniac will
frighten women Into convulsions, without exciting
the smallest sympathy ; while the crocked heatt,
pressed down with a load of grief. may sink into the
grave without starring a sob to escape from it.
If Miss O'Neill would rant and tear more, she
might probably produce all this violent rifect. but
she would cease to delight us; she might harrow
the soul. but we should shed no tears; nor would
site, I nos persuaded. draw such crowded houses d 4

The studied actor is at best but a superior mimic,
and must often commit inistakes. The mots who
speaks and move* in such a way, because he has
seen others in similar circumst nicer spent( and move
in the seine way, eininot, its the nature of things,
be so perfect as he who acts from the impulse of
the very same (retitle, which ceased the s rola-
tions in real life. That Miss O'Neill acts entirely
from the impulse of feelings it beyond a dispute ;
she sews no artifice whatever! her face on the stage
is just what Nature made it ; tbe tears run in par.
rents down her eltreks, and her face coosequeuttiv
becomes flushed and red ; yet it changes deatlly
pale whenever the occasion r.-quirrs it s'4lniltl do =qt.
In Juliet she blushes at the rinses of her loser, in
the very moment the poet would have a ished her ;
and I believe too woniats either tat or on the Ma g.'
11116 it in her power to bluish whets she his is mind :
in a word, her action, her voiee, her freisves, all are
in unison with the sense; all give life and colouring
to the character she puoirtrmyts.
The variety of her power% it as wonderful us
their excellence : never perhaps was there united iii
one person so much softness amid so much stretigth
of character. lu Bekidrra weber distress depicted
in almost every circumstance; and at last, wheat
she has reached the top of human misery, it finishes
in madness. In every scene she goes as far us our
imaginations can lead at, and yet its sin one instance
can we stand forward and say this is lint in mature;
in no one instance do our hearts • to heat re-
sponsive to her distress. The moonier in which she
sopraids her husband for !emelt% her in the power
of common slabbers, and her rehtike and contempt
of the villain Slukeley, are beautiful specimens of
that true dignity of nature I have before attempted
to describe. Iler Juliet is the most charming pic-
ture
of virtuous love that the
mindCAll possibly
conceive ; it has all the warmth and fervour of the
passion, without any of its grossness: like Amelbs,
in The Seososs, " supremely happy in time awaken..
ed power of giving joy," her lever is her dearer self;
nothing selfish seems to enter into its composition ;
it is a love that Eve might have felt before the
' Fall, that angels might look down °poll from
[leaven with delight. Iler mental agony at the
apprehension of awaking in the tomb, unwounded
by the ghosts of her relations, is touching to the
soul ; and if 1 had never been delighted with her
Mrs. Oakley, her I f I jo.ay.u. coaxing of her nurse
would have convinced me she might be as much
the darling of Thalia us she is the litvotnite
the Tragic Muse. Mrs. Beverley is Beleitlera
brought more home to the feelings, mid all that
have said of the one is applic.ittle to the other; hut
I will here notice an excellence which is peculiar
to Miss O'Neill, and that is, that she gives force
to the most trifling sentences, which others are in
the habit of slurring over as insigisificaot : this and
her by-play are so excellent, that we may say of
liar, and her only (except Mr. Kean), she is always
the character, never lwrself. Iler penitence iii
Mrs. Haller is so lively expressed—het gentle de-
meanour, her subdued and bewitching lance, take
such hold upon the heart—that in spite of preju-
dice, in spite of ourselves, we forgive and love her ;
and when she looks up to [leaven with her eyes
bathed its tears, she is so divinely beautiful, that
a !baptisel might here find the st perfect muds I
for a repentant Magdalen; land we are so touched

with her distress, that, like St. Cecilia, we wish
to see angels come .lowa and conilort brr.
IVliether Miss O'Neill would excel in what is
commonly but Wisely called the higher walks of
tragedy ; where a discontenied selfish spirit would
wrap the world iii flames, and give her eternal soul
in purchase of the breath of Nine; is a question yet
to be deterinnied. If 1 might form a judgment of
her character from what I have seen of her acting,
1 should imagine, 1 could almost hope, she would
slot excel. To me she appears as if she could look
down upon those baubles as contemptible trifles,
which others estimate so highly ; and consequently
could hardly feel those workings of ambition which
would be necessery to give life and spirit to such a
character as Ludy Macbeth. At the swine time it
is not to be inferred that aw attentive mind may
not, fur the time, embody itself iii the feelings of
an ambitions Character, without bring any ways dis-
posed to wade through slaughter to a throne, or
purchase- its wishes at the expruse of viitur. In
the third act of that horrid and unnatural play,
The Fatal Marriage, Isabella forgets all her love
and softness, and in fact a Ludy Macbeth without
her majesty ; the one would have murdered her
husband had he stood in the way of a throne, the
other strose to do it to save her reputation from the
blasts of infamy. Her wild and ferocious joy at
the return of her litisbaild, soil the workings of the
coutending passions of love and false shame, are ao
powerfully but naturally isouttrayed by Miss
O'Neill, that even now I shudder at the remem-
brance of them ; and when she lifts up the dagger,
and exclaims, " 'Tis but a blow," she has sit the
majesty and that ambition that Ludy !Macbeth her-
self could have exhibited. Hut however wrong may
be 'ter critical:6mi of those characters, however cor-
rect her delineations, slw will always labour undcr a
great diradvaillage, and have to tight against pre-
conceived opini iii her exhibitiiiii of them ;
strong masculnw • dis seldom the inhabitant of
a delicate female form ; her' softness of
ahtl the diorama, we delight to see her to, are to

•
blipovste. to what ee expect to see in a Lady aide.
high, that we could hardly Iseliove (air. se.e es even
if she dill excel ; stud sfter till slw would only
w•tonittli /14 ; she 'night hurrow np the t I with
horror, but would hardly snake on ionitro+ upon
the heath. Perfer',itlll I ,tot Ilse lot of lomow
ns-
tore : Mos 4 ENrill min possession of doe most in-
terestnig sad the most extriatcve range of Inc
drums; Irt her b contented with wk.. she has, snit
not hos4lll the Lone she tle..erci dly poosesr,,, •by
raining tit—.what never can lie the lot oho mortal—
the clistacter of so ninvemil genius.

" If powers of Last and sitieninfisi'd,
If fewe-t finite with greaiept hr,ntir. j.)II1A;
UStrUllit capic.isiiiis, and 'strange pow'st II .l lie
Within thr magic Circle the eye;
If ferlitio whiels few hvaria like here I'sitl
And a Lich no fake so all as Suss call ;
Restive she preference, 'Neill, lA. the chair/
blur yea Ii Sill )con plate an (vial shire!'
All thi, much her tine as ever it was est-
; but it is not wing half no flinch as stir de-
er' vet ; the greatest charm of tier neting. /11111, what
is the greatest perfection to human Home, the nos-
esagement of her voice. Only be wr!olierivrd but
among he tierersbeil. In tlw It one quality, 01 writ
as her trildrroesa, she never has had, and will never
have II ; to go 164101111 her 1..91$10ei.1111C: 1 (*MI
VO'lertire iiiii king better, and coimiluristly tun wink
for twilling better.
PHILO-DRAMA.