Sir Richard Steele's The Conscious Lovers

Steele goes on to defend the sometimes tearful sentiment of the recognition scene between inch and her longlost father as valid significant for comedy, noting that he "must . . . contend that the tears which were shed on that occasion flowed from reason and good sense" (Steele 444). In opposite words, the recognition scene is the culmination of good human psychology, or the good that ought to be human psychology. The intended Lovers, on this view, explains to the universe the nature and details of such psychology. Gassner and Allen characterize the victimize as "almost unreadable today," but they also take bring up of Steele's preface "as a broad a pronunciamento of the sentimental school, and as such it has historical importance." Further, when Gassner and Allen say that The Conscious Lovers "exerted considerable influence on the development of Denis Diderot's middleclass dramas" (Gassner and allen 443), they are essentially noting the historical case for a kind of drama that might be familiar to anyone who is familiar with the milieu of Leave It to Beaver, Family, or Father Knows Best.

The occasion for Steele's defense of his play may be discerned from its action. The plot concerns the dilemma faced by Bevil, Junior, a prudent and genteel young man who is engaged to Lucinda Seala

Gassner, John, and Allen, Ralph G. "The Comedy of Wit and the

Jones. refreshing York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1931. 54850.

the Making. Ed. John Gassner and Ralph G. Allen. 2 vols. Boston:

Comedy of Sentiment." Theatre and gaming in the Making. Ed. John

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