CIBBER, COLLEY, was born, according to his own statement, on the 6th of November, o.s., 1671, in Southampton-street, Covent Garden. In 1682 he was sent to the Free School at Grautham, Lin colnshire. In 1687 he returned to London, and in 1688 was at his father's request received as a volunteer in the forces raised by the Earl of Devonshire in support of the Prince of Orange. In 1689 he indulged an early conceived inclination for the stage, by fixing upon it seriously as his profession ; and after performing gratuitously for about eight or nine mouths, obtained an engagement at a salary of ten shillings per week, which was afterwards increased to fifteen shillings ; but a feeble voice aud a meagre person were considerable obstacles to his progress, and the trifling part of the Chaplain in Otway's ' Orphan' was the first in which he attracted any attention. His performance of Lord Touchwood at a very short notice, in consequence of Mr. Kynas ton's illness, obtained him the commendatious of Congreve and fivo additional shillings per week. At this time, being scarcely twenty two years of age, after a very short courtship, he married Miss Shore, to the great auger of her father, who immediately spent the greatest part of his property in the erection of a little retreat upon the Thames, which ho called Shore's Folly. Mr. Cibber's professioual progress was very slow for some years, notwithstaudiug his having turned author, and the success of his comedies, Love's Last Shift," Love makes a Man," She Would and She Would Not," The Careless Husband,' &e. In 1711 however he became joint patentee with Collier, Wilks, and Dogget, in the management of Drury Lane, and afterwards with Booth, Wilke, and Sir Richard Steele ; which latter partnership con tinued till the death of Mr. Eusden, the poet leaureat, in 1730, when
Cibber was appointed to succeed him, and sold out, having become duriug his nineteen years' management so great a favourite with the public in the performance of fops and feeble old meu, that after he had retired from the stage he was occasionally tempted back to it by the offer of fifty guineas for one night's performauce. In 1745 ho played Pandulph iu his own tragedy of ' Papal Tyranny.' He died suddenly on the 12th of December 1757.
Mr. Cibber has described himself with considerable candour in his well-known and very amusing 'Apology' for his life. Vain, incon sistent, and negligent, he was withal a quick-witted, good-humoured, and elegant gentleman. As a writer of comedy, he is inferior perhaps only to Congreve, Wycherly, and Vanbrugh ; but his Birth day Odes are by no means exceptions to the usual dulness of such compositions. His best comedy is ' The Careless Husband,' the dialogue of which is easy and polished; but the play which brought him the most money was his adaptation of Moliere's Tartuffe; entitled The Nonjuror,' ou which Biekerstaff afterwards founded his 'Hypocrite.' For this play King George I., to whom it was dedicated, sent him 200/. He was the author and adapter of nearly thirty dramas of various descriptions, amongst which, besides those already meutioued, we may record Tho Provoked Husband,' written in conjunction with Sir John Vaebrugh, and tho modern acting version of Shakspere'e 'Richard 1111 His ' Apology' is published in two vols. 12mo, and his dramatic works in five vols. 12mo.