Read the passage. excerpt from "Plays and Players"

Interview with Robert G. Ingersoll

New York Dramatic Mirror, December 26, 1891

Question: What place does the theatre hold among the arts?

Nearly all the arts unite in the theatre, and it is the result of the best, the highest, the most artistic, that man can do.

In the first place, there must be the dramatic poet. Dramatic poetry is the subtlest, profoundest, the most intellectual, the most passionate and artistic of all. Then the stage must be prepared, and there is work for the architect, the painter and sculptor. Then the actors appear, and they must be gifted with imagination, with a high order of intelligence; they must have sympathies quick and deep, natures capable of the greatest emotion, dominated by passion. They must have impressive presence, and all that is manly should meet and unite in the actor; all that is womanly, tender, intense and admirable should be lavishly bestowed on the actress. In addition to all this, actors should have the art of being natural.

Let me explain what I mean by being natural. When I say that an actor is natural, I mean that he appears to act in accordance with his ideal, in accordance with his nature, and that he is not an imitator or a copyist—that he is not made up of shreds and patches taken from others, but that all he does flows from interior fountains and is consistent with his own nature, all having in a marked degree the highest characteristics of the man. That is what I mean by being natural.

The great actor must be acquainted with the heart, must know the motives, ends, objects and desires that control the thoughts and acts of men. He must be familiar with many people, including the lowest and the highest, so that he may give to others, clothed with flesh and blood, the characters born of the poet's brain. The great actor must know the relations that exist between passion and voice, gesture and emphasis, expression and pose. He must speak not only with his voice, but with his body. The great actor must be master of many arts.

Then comes the musician. The theatre has always been the home of music, and this music must be appropriate; must, or should, express or supplement what happens on the stage; should furnish rest and balm for minds overwrought with tragic deeds. To produce a great play, and put it worthily upon the stage, involves most arts, many sciences and nearly all that is artistic, poetic and dramatic in the mind of man.

Question: Should the drama teach lessons and discuss social problems, or should it give simply intellectual pleasure and furnish amusement?

Every great play teaches many lessons and touches nearly all social problems. But the great play does this by indirection. Every beautiful thought is a teacher; every noble line speaks to the brain and heart. Beauty, proportion, melody suggest moral beauty, proportion in conduct and melody in life. In a great play the relations of the various characters, their objects, the means adopted for their accomplishment, must suggest, and in a certain sense solve or throw light on many social problems, so that the drama teaches lessons, discusses social problems and gives intellectual pleasure.

The stage should not be dogmatic; neither should its object be directly to enforce a moral. The great thing for the drama to do, and the great thing it has done, and is doing, is to cultivate the imagination. This is of the utmost importance. The civilization of man depends upon the development, not only of the intellect, but of the imagination. Most crimes of violence are committed by people who are destitute of imagination. People without imagination make most of the cruel and infamous creeds. They were the persecutors and destroyers of their fellow-men. By cultivating the imagination, the stage becomes one of the greatest teachers. It produces the climate in which the better feelings grow; it is the home of the ideal. All beautiful things tend to the civilization of man. The great statues plead for proportion in life, the great symphonies suggest the melody of conduct, and the great plays cultivate the heart and brain.

Which quotation from the interview offers details that best support Ingersoll's belief that many art disciplines "unite in the theatre"?

"The great statues plead for proportion in life, the great symphonies suggest the melody of conduct, and the great plays cultivate the heart and brain."

"Dramatic poetry is the subtlest, profoundest, the most intellectual, the most passionate and artistic of all."

"Then the stage must be prepared, and there is work for the architect, the painter and sculptor."

"The great actor must be acquainted with the heart, must know the motives, ends, objects, and desires that control the thoughts and acts of men."