Cecca, too, devised mechanisms
for such displays. The spiritual corporations or the quarters of the
city which undertook the charge and in part the performance of these
plays spared, at all events in the larger towns, no trouble and expense
to render them as perfect and artistic as possible. The same was no
doubt the case at the great court festivals, when Mysteries were acted
as well as pantomimes and secular dramas. The court of Pietro Riario
and that of Ferrara were assuredly not wanting in all that human
invention could produce. When we picture to ourselves the theatrical
talent and the splendid costumes of the actors, the scenes constructed
in the style of the architecture of the period, and hung with garlands
and tapestry, and in the background the noble buildings of an Italian
piazza, or the slender columns of some great courtyard or cloister, the
effect is one of great brilliance. But just as the secular drama
suffered from this passion for display, so the higher poetical
development of the Mystery was arrested by the same cause. In the texts
which are left we find for the most part the poorest dramatic
groundwork, relieved now and then by a fine lyrical or rhetorical
passage, but no trace of the grand symbolic enthusiasm which
distinguishes the 'Autos Sacramentales' of Calderon.
In the smaller towns, where the scenic display was less, the effect of
these spiritual plays on the character of the spectators may have been
greater.
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