The Criterion by which I judge an Actor...

... is the degree of power he has of making me forget that he is one. This Mrs. Cibber possessed in a greater degree than any one I ever saw. I have often thought her actually mad; -- and when she breathed the soft and distressful accents of unhappy love; -- she occupied my whole heart, and so fascinated my eyes, that I always imagined myself in the scene, and viewing the very spot where the poet had placed her.

I have felt the highest admiration when I have seen you in your capital parts: but it has been only admiration. Nothing but nature could well exceed many of your imitations; -- and Mrs. Cibber was nature.

She felt the passions in the highest degree; they tuned her voice and shaped her countenance. You model yours by an art; but you do so like an able artist. Hence the difference in the universality of your talents. She entered only on those parts for which nature had formed her; and expressed the passions which she felt.

Your heart was very differently formed: you had no passions which could restrain your imitative faculty: nature had given you a good voice; features which you could throw into various forms; and an eye which, especially at a distance, you could manage to vast advantage. Like a capital artist, you could imitate all around you; and the imitations were often truly wonderful: -- but you could not actually express what you never felt; and Mrs. Cibber saying from her heart,

'Where is the beauteous majesty of Denmark?'

was, to a person of real sensibility, worth all the happy grimace which was ever made by man.

You may now doubt your diligence in injuring the memory of this excellent Actress. I suspect you have been thus employed; for it has some time been the language of those wits who take their sentiments from you, 'Mrs. Cibber had great powers but she whined at last; and she walked with her elbows stuck to her sides.' -- She might have tied her hands behind her, as boys do in engagements at schools, and yet excelled all the world.

A Letter to David Garrick, Efq.

on his Conduct as Principal Manager and Actor at Drury Lane (1772)