The fewer gestures, he said, the better; frequent gesticulation impairs energy and destroys nobleness.

It is the countenance, the eyes, it is the whole body that ought to move, and not the arms.[280] There is no maxim more forgotten by poets than that which says that great passions are mute.

It depends on the player to produce a greater effect by silence than the poet can produce by all his fine speeches.[281] Above all, the player is to study tranquil scenes, for it is these that are the most truly difficult.

He commends a young actress to play every morning, by way of orisons, the scene of Athalie with Joas; to say for evensong some scenes of Agrippina with Nero; and for Benedicite the first scene of Phaedra with her confidante.

Especially there is to be little emphasis--a warning grievously needed by ninety-nine English speakers out of a hundred--for emphasis is hardly ever natural; it is only a forced imitation of nature.[282] Diderot had perceived very early that the complacency with which his countrymen regarded the national theatre was extravagant.