The theatres had been closed, all amusements checked, and even poetry and the fine arts placed under a ban.

In the reign of Charles I., Prynne had written his _Histrio Mastix_, or Scourge of the Stage, in which he not only denounced all stage plays, but music and dancing; and also declaimed against hunting, festival days, the celebration of Christmas, and Maypoles.

For this he was indicted in the Star Chamber for libel, and was sentenced to stand in the pillory, to lose his ears, to pay the king a fine of L5000, and to be imprisoned for life.

For his attack there was much excuse in the license of the former period; but when puritanism, in its turn, was brought under the three spears, the drama was to come back tenfold more injurious and more immoral than before.
From the stern and gloomy morals of the Commonwealth we now turn to the debaucheries of the court,--from cropped heads and dark cloaks to plumes and velvet, gold lace and embroidery,--to the varied fashions of every kind for which Paris has always been renowned, and which Charles brought back with him from his exile;--from prudish morals to indiscriminate debauchery; from the exercisings of brewers' clerks, the expounding of tailors, the catechizing of watermen, to the stage, which was now loudly petitioned to supply amusement and novelty.

Macaulay justly says: "The restraints of that gloomy time were such as would have been impatiently borne, if imposed by men who were universally believed to be saints; these restraints became altogether insupportable when they were known to be kept up for the profit of hypocrites! It is quite certain that if the royal family had never returned, there would have been a great relaxation of manners." It is equally certain, let us add, that morals would not have been correspondingly relaxed.