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Lucescit hoc jam. This is spoken with the eyes lifted up towards heaven; hoc has reference to cœlum, which is understood. Thus Plautus in his Curculio. Nam hoc quidem edepol haud multò post luce lucebit.

It is beyond all doubt that this play was acted at two different and distinct times; the two first acts at night, after sun-set; and the three remaining acts the next morning, at break of day: the time between the second and third act was taken up with the carousal and supper given by Chremes. Menander, upon account of the feasts then celebrating, had a right to divide his comedy in this manner: Terence took the same liberty, and with the same justice, since his plays were represented at Rome upon the like solemn occasions. Eugraphius, who wrote notes upon this comedy, was of opinion that this method was without precedent; but he is mistaken. Aristophanes did the very same thing; the two first acts of his Plutus were performed in the evening, the three last early the next morning, and the time between the second and third act is employed by Plutus in paying a visit to the temple of Æsculapius, where he passes the whole night. If we could precisely tell the hour, at which Aristophanes opens his play, we should undoubtedly find he had not transgressed the unity of time (twelve hours) which is requisite to dramatick pieces. It is at least certain that Terence has not exceeded it here, and that he is as exact in this particular as in every other. The play begins a little after eight at night. The two first acts do not last above two hours; they then go to supper; this makes an interval of six or seven hours. The third act begins at the break of day, as Terence has taken care to point out, lucescit hoc jam;—'tis now just day-break.—So that the three acts, which could not last three hours, must have ended about seven in the morning. But what is chiefly remarkable is, that this third interval is interwoven with the subject matter of the play, as well as it is in Aristophanes. Chremes, during that time, observes the freedoms which pass between Clitipho and Bacchis; and this creates great part of the business of the third act. The critics were little attentive to this, when they cry out,—Vasta & hians & inanis comœdia est;—there is a void, a gap, an emptiness in this comedy.—Which is far, very far from being true; for what they call so, has a very material connection with the play, and may be said to be almost the very ground-work of it. Had Terence divided it so, that this interval had not entered into the subject, it would indeed have been ridiculous and insupportable. Were we to act one of Moliere's plays thus by piece-meal, the beginning to-night, and the end to-morrow morning, every body would laugh at the partition; but Terence and Menander, who were perfect masters of the drama, attempted it with success. And indeed it might even now a-days be done with propriety, nay would become necessary, provided it could be executed with equal judgment and address.

The idea of the above note, as well as of several others of Madam Dacier, was first suggested by Scaliger, who, in the sixth book of his Poeticks, first broached the notion of this division of the comedy in the representation, in order to vindicate our author from the imputation of having left an unwarrantable chasm between the second and third acts. And it is something whimsical, that this great critick, after having depreciated our author's merit in the gross, more than any of his predecessors, should take it into his head to justify him against every objection that had been made to any particular passage in his works. But though Scaliger was ever dogmatical and positive in his opinion, yet that opinion was not always uncontrovertible: In the present instance I am so far from assenting with Madam Dacier that the fact is beyond all doubt, that I will venture to say there is not the least ground for such an assertion. Donatus, who mentions this play in his preface to the Phormio, does not afford the least colour to such an argument; nor do I believe there is any more countenance given to it by the scholiasts on Aristophanes: whose comedies it would be an extremely difficult task to reconcile to an agreement with the Unities.

One of the chief points in dispute between Hedelin and Menage, about this comedy, relates to this interval; and great part of the controversy turns upon a very obscure and uncertain part of literature, viz. whether the Athenian month Anthesterion be agreeable to our April or January. Both agree that a night elapses between the second and third act; but Hedelin, who is followed by Madam Dacier in the above note, contends that according to the time of year, and circumstances of the piece, it is an interval of six or seven hours, which Menage extends to thirteen or fourteen. Each of them lays out a deal of learning on this question, but in my mind to very little purpose. It is agreed on all hands, that a whole night certainly passes, and the spectator has not time to enter into a minute disquisition, whether 'tis in June or December: nor indeed could any thing tend to make the observation of the Unities appear ridiculous, so much as such a trifling consideration.—As to what Madam Dacier says of this interval's being interwoven with the subject; and of the supposed employments of the characters, in their absence from the stage, being made conducive to the fable; it is perfectly just, and every skilfull playwright should contrive his intervals with the like art. But to fill up those chasms by occupying the audience also in the same manner, is, I think, a more curious device than any in the Rehearsal. Madam Dacier herself could not be insensible of the difficulty, and confesses that a play of Moliere's, so divided in the representation, would appear very ridiculous; yet is willing to imagine that even a modern drama might be thus exhibited with propriety. Let us suppose therefore that, at the first opening of the theatre in the Haymarket, Sir John Vanburgh had written a comedy, in which he had introduced a masquerade at the end of the second act. The spectators assemble: two acts are played: then comes the masquerade; and the spectators, in order to fill up the interval, slip on their dominos, game, drink, dance, and intrigue 'till day-light. With what appetite would they return to the representation of the three last acts? However such a partition might be received at Rome or Athens, I think it would never go down at Paris or London: and, were it not for the example of Madam Dacier, I should imagine that even the most rigid French critick would think it more reasonable to be wafted from shore to shore by Shakespeare's chorus, than to adopt this extraordinary method of preserving the Unities.