ABSTRACT
Charles Gildon, in addressing the state of the arts in his 1710 publication The Life of Mr. Thomas Betterton, the Late Eminent Tragedian, offered the following observation concerning contemporary music and, in particular, the music of Henry Purcell:
Music, as well as Verse, is subject to that Rule of Horace; He that would have Spectators share his Grief, Must write not only well, but movingly.1
