Playhouses were opened and plays produced without any kind of license.

At the Haymarket, under the management of Fielding, who styled his actors "The Great Mogul's Comedians," the bills announcing that they had "dropped from the clouds" (in mockery, probably, of "His Majesty's Servants" at Drury Lane, or of another troop describing themselves as "The Comedians of His Majesty's Revels"), the plays produced had been in the nature of political lampoons.

Walpole and his arts of government were openly satirised, Fielding having no particular desire to spare the prime minister, whose patronage he had vainly solicited.

In the play entitled "Pasquin, a Dramatic Satire on the Times; being the rehearsal of two plays, viz., a Comedy, called The Election, and a Tragedy, called the Life and Death of Common Sense," the satire was chiefly aimed at the electoral corruptions of the age, the abuses prevailing in the learned professions, and the servility of place-men who derided public virtue, and denied the existence of political honesty.

"Pasquin," it may be noted, was received with extraordinary favour, enjoyed a run of fifty nights, and proved a source of both fame and profit to its author.