CHAPTER VIII.

A BRIEF VIEW OF DRAMATIC POETRY, FROM THE BIRTH OF SHAKSPEARE TO THE PERIOD OF HIS COMMENCEMENT AS A WRITER FOR THE STAGE, ABOUT THE YEAR 1590; WITH CRITICAL NOTICES OF THE DRAMATIC POETS WHO FLOURISHED DURING THAT INTERVAL.

It is remarkable that the era of the birth of Shakspeare should occur in almost _intermediate contact_ with those periods which mark the first appearance of what may be termed _legitimate_ tragedy and comedy. In 1561-2, was exhibited the tragedy of _Ferrex and Porrex_, written by Thomas Norton, and Thomas Sackville, Lord Buckhurst, "the first specimen," observes Mr. Warton, "in our language of an heroick tale written in verse, and divided into acts and scenes, and cloathed in all the formalities of a _regular tragedy_[227:A];" in 1564, as is well known, the leading object of our work, the great poet of nature, was born; and, in 1566, was acted at Christ's College, Cambridge, under the quaint title of _Gammer Gurton's Needle_, the first play, remarks Wright, "that looks like a _regular comedy_."[227:B]

Previous to the exhibition of these pieces, the public had been contented with _Mysteries_, _Moralities_, and _Interludes_; the first of these, exclusively occupied by miracles and scriptural narratives, originated with the ecclesiastics so far back as the eleventh century[227:C]; the second, consisting chiefly of allegorical personification, seems to have arisen about the middle of the fifteenth century[227:D]; and the third, a species of farce, or, as Jonson defines them, _something played at the intervals of festivity_, became prevalent during the reign of Henry the Eighth.

The examples, however, which were now furnished by Sackville and Still, in the production of _Gorboduc_[228:A], and _Gammer Gurton_, were not lost upon their age; and to the ideas of legitimate fable emanating from these sources, are also to be added those derived from the now frequent custom of acting plays in the schools and universities, in imitation of the dramas of Plautus and Terence. To these co-operating causes may be ascribed the numerous tragedies and plays which appeared between the years 1566 and 1590, principally written by men who had been educated at the universities, and who, in the serious drama, endeavoured to support the stately and declamatory style of Gorboduc.

It is to this period, also, that we must refer for the epoch of the historical drama, or, what were called, in the language of their times, _Histories_, a gradual improvement, it is true, on the allegorical _Dramatis Personæ_ of the moralities, but which, in the interval elapsing between 1570 and 1590, received a consistency and form, a materiality and organisation, which only required the animating fire of Shakspeare's muse to kindle into life and immortality.

For the prevalence and popularity of this species of play, anterior to the productions of our poet, we are probably indebted to the publication of _The Mirrour for Magistrates_, a poetical miscellany, of which four editions were printed between 1564 and 1590, and where the most remarkable personages in English history are brought forward relating the story of their own disasters.

Another and very popular species of dramatic composition, at this era, may be satisfactorily deduced from the strong attachment still existing for the ancient _moralities_, in which the most solemn and serious subjects were often blended with the lowest scenes of farce and broad humour; for though the taste of the educated part of the public was chastened and improved by the classical tragedy of Sackville, and by the translations also of Gascoigne, who, in 1566, presented his countrymen with _Jocasta_ from Euripides, and _The Supposes_, a regular comedy, from Ariosto, yet the lower orders still lingered for the mingled buffoonery of their old stage, and _tragi-comedy_ became necessary to catch their applause. This apparently heterogenous compound was long the most fascinating entertainment of the scenical world; nor were even the wildest features of the allegorical drama unrepresented; for the _interlude_ and, subsequently, the _masque_, were frequently lavish in the creation of personages equally as extravagant and grotesque as any which the fifteenth century had dared to produce.

To this enumeration of the various kinds of dramatic poetry which preceded the efforts of Shakspeare, one more, of a very singular nature, must be added, the production of Richard Tarleton, the celebrated jester and comedian, who, previous to 1589, or during the course of that year, exhibited a play in two parts, called "The Seven Deadlie Sins."[229:A] The piece itself has perished, but the Platt, or groundwork, of the Second Part, having been preserved, we find that the preceding portion had been occupied in exemplifying the sins of _Pride_, _Gluttony_, _Wrath_, and _Avarice_, while _Envy_, _Sloth_, and _Lechery_, were reserved for its successor. The plan which Tarleton pursued, in illustrating the effects of these sins, was by selecting scenes and passages from the plays of various authors, and combining them into a whole by the connecting medium of chorusses, interlocutors, and pantomimic show. Thus the Second Part is composed from three plays, namely, Sackville's _Gorboduc_, and two, now lost, entitled _Sardanapalus_ and _Tereus_, while the moralisation and connection are introduced and supported by alternate monologues in the persons of Henry the Sixth, and Lidgate, the monk of Bury. This curious specimen of scenic exhibition may not unaptly receive the appellation of the _Composite Drama_.

After this short _general_ sketch of the progress of dramatic poetry from 1564 to 1591, it will be necessary to descend to some _particular_ criticism on the chief productions which graced the stage during this interval; an attempt which we shall conduct chronologically, under the names of their respective authors.

1. SACKVILLE, THOMAS. Though the tragedy of Sackville was exhibited before Queen Elizabeth at Whitehall, on the 18th of January, 1561-2, it did not reach the press until 1565, when a spurious edition was published under the title of _The Tragedie of Gorboduc_. This piracy brought forth a legitimate copy in 1571, from the press of John Daye, which was now called _The Tragedie of Ferrex and Porrex_; but the nomenclature was again altered in a third edition, printed for Edward Alde, in 1590, reassuming its first and more popular denomination of _The Tragedie of Gorboduc_.

The first and third editions inform us in their title-pages, that "three acts were written by Thomas Norton, and the two last by Thomas Sackville," a co-partnership which, but for this intimation, would not have been suspected, for the whole has the appearance, both in matter and style, of having issued from one and the same pen.

If the mechanism of this play, which Warton justly calls the "first genuine English Tragedy[230:A]," approximate in the minor parts of its construction to a classical type, being regularly divided into acts and scenes, with a chorus of British sages closing every act save the last, yet does it evince, in many other respects, the infancy of dramatic art in this country. Every act is preceded by an elaborate _Dumb Show_, allegorically depicting the business of the immediately succeeding scenes, a resource, the crude nature of which sufficiently points out the stage of poetry that gave it birth. Nor is the conduct of the fable less inconsistent with the exterior formalities of the piece, the unities of time and place being openly violated, and the chronological detail of history, or rather of the fabulous annals of the age, closely followed. The plot, too, is sterile and uninteresting, and the passions are touched with a feeble and ineffective hand.

The great merit, indeed, of Gorboduc, is in its style and versification, in its moral and political wisdom, qualities which recommended it to the notice and encomium of Sir Philip Sidney, who tells us, that "Gorboduc is full of stately speeches, and well sounding phrases, climbing to the heighth of Seneca his style, and as full of notable morality, which it doth most delightfully teach."[231:A] Declamation and morality, however, are not the essentials of tragedy; the first, indeed, is a positive fault, and the second should only be the result of the struggle and collision of the passions. We must, therefore, limit the beneficial example of Sackville to purity and perspicuity of diction, to skill in the structure of his numbers, and to truth and dignity of sentiment. If to these virtues of composition, though occasionally encumbered by a too unbending rigidity of style, his contemporaries had paid due attention, we should have escaped that torrent of tumor and bombast which, shortly afterwards, inundated the dramatic world, and which continued to disgrace the national taste during the whole period to which this chapter is confined.

2. EDWARDS, RICHARD. This poet, one of the gentlemen of Queen Elizabeth's chapel, and master of the children there, was the author of two plays, under the titles of _Damon and Pithias_, and _Palamon and Arcite_. The former of these was acted before the Queen, at court, in 1562, and first published in 1571, by Richard Jones, who terms it _The excellent comedie of two the moste faithfullest freendes Damon and Pithias_; it is an early specimen of tragi-comedy, and written in rhyme, the inferior characters exhibiting a vein of coarse humour, and the more elevated, some touches of pathos, which the story, indeed, could scarcely fail to elicit, and some faint attempts at discrimination of character. The versification is singular, consisting generally of couplets of twelve syllables, but frequently intermixed with lines varying upwards from this number, even as far as eighteen. _Palamon and Arcite_, which was considered as far surpassing his first drama, had the honour also of being performed before Elizabeth, at Christ-Church Hall, Oxford, in 1566; it is likewise termed a _comedy_, and is said to have gratified Her Majesty so highly, that, sending for the author, after the play was finished, she greatly commended his talents, thanked him for the entertainment which his muse had afforded her, and promised to befriend him more substantially hereafter, an intention, however, which was frustrated by the death of the poet during the course of that very year.

Edwards appears to have been very popular, and highly estimated as a writer. Puttenham has classed him with those who "deserve the highest price for comedy and interlude[232:A]," and Thomas Twine calls him, in an epitaph on his death,

—— "the flowre of all our realme, And Phœnix of our age,"

assigning him immortality expressly on account of his dramatic productions.[232:B]

3. STILL, JOHN, a prelate to whom is ascribed, upon pretty good foundation, the first genuine comedy in our language. He was Master of Arts of Christ's College, Cambridge, at the period of producing _Gammer Gurton's Needle_, and subsequently became rector of Hadleigh, in the county of Suffolk, archdeacon of Sudbury, master of St. John's and Trinity Colleges, and lastly bishop of Bath and Wells.

_Gammer Gurton's Needle_, which, as we have already remarked, had been first acted in 1566, was committed to the press in 1575, under the following title:—"A ryght pithy, pleasant, and merie Comedy, intytuled Gammer Gurton's Nedle; played on the stage not longe ago in Christes Colledge, in Cambridge. Made by Mr. S. master of art. Imprented at London in Fleetestreat, beneth the Conduit, at the signe of S. John Evangelest, by Thomas Colwell."

The humour of this curious old drama, which is written in rhyme, is broad, familiar, and grotesque; the characters are sketched with a strong, though coarse, outline, and are to the last consistently supported. The language, and many of the incidents, are gross and indelicate; but these, and numerous allusions to obsolete customs, mark the manners of the times, when the most learned and polished of the land, the inmates of an University, could listen with delight to dialogue often tinctured with the lowest filth and abuse. It must be confessed, however, that this play, with all its faults, has an interest which many of its immediate, and more pretending successors, have failed to attain. It is evidently the production of a man of talents and observation, and the second act opens with a drinking song, valuable alike for its humour, and the ease and spirit of its versification.

4. GASCOIGNE, GEORGE. At the very period when Still produced his comedy in _rhyme_, Gascoigne presented the public with a specimen of the same species of drama in _prose_. This is a translation from the Italian, entitled, "_The Supposes_. A comedie written in the Italian tongue by Ariosto, Englished by George Gascoigne of Graies-inn esquire, and there presented, 1566."

"The dialogue of this comedy," observes Warton, "is supported with much ease and spirit, and has often the air of a modern conversation. As Gascoigne was the _first_ who exhibited on our stage a story from Euripides, so in this play he is _the first that produced an English comedy in prose_."[233:A]

The translation from the _Phœnissæ_ of Euripides, or, as Gascoigne termed it, _Jocasta_, was acted in the refectory of Gray's Inn, in the same year with the _Supposes_. It was the joint production of our poet and his friend Francis Kinwelmersh, the first and fourth acts being written by the latter bard. Jocasta is more a paraphrase than a translation, and occasionally aspires to the honours of original composition, new odes being sometimes substituted for those of the Greek chorus. The dialogue of this play is given in blank verse, forming one of the earliest specimens of this measure, and, like Gorboduc, each act is preceded by a dumb show, and closed by a long ode, in the composition of which, both Gascoigne and his coadjutor have evinced considerable lyric powers.

Shakspeare seems to have been indebted to the _Supposes_ of Gascoigne for the name of Petruchio, in the _Taming of the Shrew_, and for the incident which closes the second scene of the fourth act of that play.[234:A]

5. WAGER, LEWIS, the author of an Interlude, called _Mary Magdalen, Her Life and Repentance_, 1567. 4to. This, like most of the interludes of the same age, required, as we are told in the title-page, only four persons for its performance. The subject, which is taken from the seventh chapter of St. Luke, had been a favourite with the writers of the ancient Mysteries, of which pieces one, written in 1512, is still preserved in the Bodleian Library.[234:B]

6. WILMOT, ROBERT, a student of the Inner Temple, the publisher, and one of the writers of an old tragedy, intitled _Tancred and Gismund_ or _Gismonde of Salerne_, the composition of not less than five Templers, and performed before Elizabeth in 1568. Each of these gentlemen, says Warton, "seems to have taken an act. At the end of the fourth is _Composuit Chr. Hatton_, or Sir Christopher Hatton, undoubtedly the same that was afterwards exalted by the Queen to the office of lord keeper for his agility in dancing."[234:C]

Wilmot, who is mentioned with approbation in Webbe's "Discourse of English Poetrie[235:A]," corrected and improved, many years after the first composition, the united labours of himself and his brother Templers, printing them with the following title: "_The Tragedie of Tancred and Gismond_. Compiled by the Gentlemen of the Inner Temple, and by them presented before Her Majestie. Newly revived and polished according to the decorum of these daies. By R. W. London. Printed by Thomas Scarlet, and are to be solde by E. C. R. Robinson. 1592."

In a dedication to his fellow-students, the editor incidentally fixes the era of the first production of his drama: "I am now bold to present Gismund to your sights, and unto your's only, for therefore have I conjured her by the love that hath been these _twenty-four years_ betwixt us, that she wax not so proud of her fresh painting, to straggle in her plumes abroad, but to contain herself within the walls of your house; so am I sure she shall be safe from the tragedian tyrants of our time, who are not ashamed to affirm that there can no amorous poem favour of any sharpness of wit, unless it be seasoned with scurrilous words."

From a fragment of this play as _originally_ written, and inserted in the Censura Literaria, it appears to have been composed in alternate rhyme, and, we may add, displays both simplicity in its diction, and pathos in its sentiment. An imperfect copy of Wilmot's revision, and perhaps the only one in existence, is in the Garrick Collection.[235:B]

7. GARTER, THOMAS. To this person has been ascribed by Coxeter, _The Commody of the moste vertuous and godlye Susanna_; it was entered on the Stationers' books in 1568, and probably first performed about that period; its being in black letter, in metre, and not divided into acts, are certainly strong indications of its antiquity. It was reprinted in 4to. 1578.

8. PRESTON, THOMAS, was master of arts, and fellow of King's College, Cambridge, and afterwards doctor of laws, and master of Trinity-Hall. Taking a part in the performance of John Ritwise's Latin tragedy of _Dido_, got up for the entertainment of the Queen when she visited Cambridge in 1564, Her Majesty was so delighted with the grace and spirit of his acting, that she conferred upon him a pension of _twenty pounds a year_, being rather more than _a shilling a day_; a transaction which Mr. Steevens conceives to have been ridiculed by Shakspeare in his _Midsummer-Night's Dream_, where Flute, on the absence of Bottom, exclaims, "O sweet bully Bottom! Thus hath he lost sixpence a-day during his life; he could not have 'scaped sixpence a-day: an the duke had not given him sixpence a-day for playing Pyramus, I'll be hanged; he would have deserved it: sixpence a-day, in Pyramus, or nothing."[236:A]

Nor was this the only sly allusion which Preston experienced from the pen of Shakspeare. Langbaine, Theobald, and Farmer consider the following speech of Falstaff as referring to a production of this writer:—"Give me a cup of sack," says the Knight, "to make mine eyes look red, that it may be thought I have wept; for I must speak in passion, and I will do it in king Cambyses' vein."[236:B]

The play satirised under the name of this monarch, is entitled, "A Lamentable Tragedy, mixed ful of pleasant Mirth, conteyning the Life of Cambises, King of Percia, from the beginning of his Kingdome, unto his Death, his one good deed of execution; after that many wicked deeds, and tirannous murders committed by and through him; and last of all, his odious Death, by God's justice appointed. Don in such order as followeth, by Thomas Preston." Imprinted at London, by Edwarde Allde. 4to. B. L.

This curious drama, which was written and published about 1570, being in the old metre, a species of ballad stanza, the allusion in Shakspeare must have been rather to the effect, than to the form, of _King Cambyses' vein_, perhaps referring solely, as Dr. Farmer observes, to the following marginal direction,—"At this tale tolde, let the queen weep."[237:A]

From the _Division of the Partes_, as given by Mr. Beloe, this very scarce tragi-comedy seems to have been partly allegorical, and, from the specimen produced in the Biographia Dramatica, to have justly merited the ridicule which it was its fate to excite.[237:B]

9. WAPUL, GEORGE, the author of a play called "_Tide Tarrieth for No Man_. A most pleasaunte and merry Comedie, ryght pithy and fulle of delighte." It was entered on the Stationers' books in October, 1576, and reprinted in 1611, 4to. B. L. This drama appears to be irrecoverably lost, as we can find no trace of it, save the title.

10. LUPTON, THOMAS. Of this writer nothing more is known, than that he wrote one play, which is to be found in the Collection of Mr. Garrick, and under the appellation of "_A Moral and Pitieful Comedie, entitled All for Money_. Plainly representing the Manners of Men and Fashion of the World nowe adaies. Compiled by T. Lupton. At London, printed by Roger Warde and Richard Mundee, dwelling at Temple Barre. Anno 1578." It is written in rhyme, printed in black letter, the pages unnumbered, and the style very antique and peculiar. The characters are altogether figurative and allegorical, and form one of the most grotesque examples of _Dramatis Personæ_ extant. We have _Learning with Money_, _Learning without Money_, _Money without Learning_, and _Neither Money nor Learning_; we have also _Mischievous Helpe_, _Pleasure_, _Prest for Pleasure_, _Sinne_, _Swift to Sinne_, _Damnation_, _Satan_, _Pride_, and _Gluttonie_; again, _Gregoria Graceless_, _William with the two Wives_, _St. Laurence_, _Mother Crooke_, _Judas_, _Dives_, and _Godly Admonition_, &c. &c. Like many other dramatic pieces of the same age, it is evidently the offspring of the old Moralities, an attachment to which continued to linger among the lower classes for many subsequent years.

11. WHETSTONE, GEORGE. To this bard, more remarkable for his miscellaneous than his dramatic poetry, we are indebted for one play, viz. "_The right excellent and famous Historye of Promos and Cassandra_. Devided into two Commicall Discourses." 4to. B. L. 1578.

An extrinsic importance affixing itself to this production, in consequence of its having furnished Shakspeare with several hints for his _Measure for Measure_, has occasioned its re-publication.[238:A] "The curious reader," remarks Mr. Steevens, "will find that this old play exhibits an almost complete embryo of _Measure for Measure_; yet the hints on which it is formed are so slight, that it is nearly as impossible to detect them, as it is to point out in the acorn the future ramifications of the oak."[238:B]

The fable of _Promos and Cassandra_ furnishes little interest, in the hands of Whetstone; nor are the diction and versification such as can claim even the award of mediocrity. It is chiefly written in alternate rhyme, with no pathos in its serious, and with feeble efforts at humour in its comic, parts.

12. WOOD, NATHANIEL, a clergyman of the city of Norwich, and only-known as the producer of "_An Excellent New Comedie_, entitled, _The Conflict of Conscience_, contayninge a most lamentable example of the doleful desparation of a miserable worldlinge, termed by the name of _Philologus_, who forsooke the trueth of God's Gospel for feare of the losse of lyfe and worldly goods." 4to. 1581. This is another of the numerous spawn which issued from the ancient Mysteries and Moralities; the _Dramatis Personæ_, consisting of a strange medley of personified vices and real characters, are divided into six parts, "most convenient," says the author, "for such as be disposed either to shew this Comedie in private houses or otherwise." It is in the Garrick Collection, and very rare.

13. PEELE, GEORGE, the first of a train of play-wrights, who made a conspicuous figure just previous to the commencement, and during the earlier years, of Shakspeare's dramatic career. Educated at the University of Oxford, where he took his degree of Master of Arts in 1579, Peele shortly afterwards removed to London, and became the city poet, and a conductor of the pageants. His dramatic talents, like those which he exhibited in miscellaneous poetry, have been rated too high; the latter, notwithstanding Nash terms him "the chief supporter of pleasance, the atlas of poetrie, and _primus verborum artifex_," with the exception of two or three pastoral pieces, seldom attain mediocrity; and the former, though Wood has told us that "his plays were not only often acted with great applause in his life-time, but did also endure reading, with due commendation, many years after his death[239:A]," are now, and perhaps not undeservedly, held in little estimation. The piece which entitles him to notice in this chapter was printed in 1584, under the appellation of _The Arraignment of Paris_; it is a pastoral drama, which was performed before the Queen, by the children of her chapel, and has had the honour of being attributed, though without any foundation, to the muse of Shakspeare.[239:B] Peele, who is supposed to have died about 1597, produced four additional plays, namely, _Edward the First_, 4to. 1593; _The Old Wive's Tale_, 4to. 1595; _King David and Fair Bethsabe_, published after his death in 1599, and _The Turkish Mahomet and Hyron the Fair Greek_, which was never printed, and is now lost. From this unpublished play Shakspeare has taken a passage which he puts into the mouth of Pistol, who, in reference to Doll Tearsheet, calls out, _Have we not Hiren here[239:C]?_ a quotation which is to be detected in several other plays, _Hiren_ as we find, from one of our author's tracts, named _The Merie Conceited Jests of George Peele_, being synonymous with the word courtezan.[240:A] These allusions, however, mark the popularity of the piece, and his contemporary Robert Greene classes him with Marlowe and Lodge, "no less deserving," he remarks, "in some things rarer, in nothing inferior."[240:B] From the specimens, however, which we possess of his dramatic genius, the opinion of Greene will not readily meet with a modern assent; the pastoral and descriptive parts of his plays are the best, which are often clothed in sweet and flowing verse; but, as dramas, they are nerveless, passionless, and therefore ineffective in point of character.[240:C]

14. LILLY, JOHN. This once courtly author, whom we have had occasion to censure for his affected innovation, and stilted elegance in prose composition, was, says Phillips, "a writer of several old-fashioned Comedies and Tragedies, which have been printed together in a volume, and might perhaps when time was, be in very good request."[241:A]

The dramas here alluded to, but of which Phillips has given a defective and incorrect enumeration, are—

1. Alexander and Campaspe, 1584, 4to. Tragi-comedy. 2. Sappho and Phaon, 1584, 4to. Comedy. 3. Endimion, 1591, 4to. Comedy. 4. Galatea, 1592, 4to. Comedy. 5. Mydas, 1592, 4to. Comedy. 6. Mother Bombie, 1594, 4to. Comedy. 7. The Woman in the Moon, 1597, 4to. Comedy. 8. The Maid her Metamorphosis, 1600. 9. Love his Metamorphosis, 1601. 4to. Pastoral.

The volume mentioned by Phillips was published by Edward Blount in 1632, containing six of these pieces, to which he has affixed the title of "Sixe Court Comedies."

Notwithstanding the _encomia_ of Mr. Blount, the genius of this "insufferable Elizabethan coxcomb," as he has been not unaptly called, was by no means calculated for dramatic effect. Epigrammatic wit, forced conceits, and pedantic allusion, are such bad substitutes for character and humour, that we cannot wonder if fatigue or insipidity should be the result of their employment. _Campaspe_ has little interest, and no unity in its fable, and though termed a _tragi_-comedy, is written in prose; _Sappho and Phaon_ has some beautiful passages, but is generally quaint and unnatural; _Endimion_ has scarcely any thing to recommend it, and disgusts by its gross and fulsome flattery of Elizabeth; _Galatea_ displays some luxuriant imagery, and _Phillida_ and _Galatea_ are not bad copies from the _Iphis_ and _Ianthe_ of Ovid; _Mydas_ is partly a political production, and though void of interest, has more simplicity and purity both of thought and diction than is usual with this writer; _Mother Bombie_ is altogether worthless in a dramatic light; _The Woman in the Moon_ is little better; _The Maid her Metamorphosis_, the greater part of which is in verse, is one of the author's experiments for the refinement of our language,—an attempt which, if any where more peculiarly absurd, must be pronounced to be so on the stage; _Love his Metamorphosis_, of which the very title-page pronounces its condemnation, being designated as "A _Wittie_ and _Courtly_ Pastoral."[242:A]

Though only two or three of Lilly's earlier dramas fall within the period allotted to this chapter, yet, in order to prevent a tiresome repetition of the subject, we have here enumerated the whole of his comedies; a plan that we shall pursue with regard to the remaining poets of this era.

It may be necessary to remark, that we must not estimate the _poetical_ talents of Lilly from his failure as a dramatist; for in the _Lyric_ department he has shown very superior abilities, whether we consider the freedom and melody of his versification, or the fancy and sentiment which he displays. His plays abound with songs alike admirable for their beauty, sweetness, and polish.[242:B]

Lilly, who had received an excellent classical education, and was a member of both the Universities, died about the year 1600.

15. HUGHES, THOMAS, the author of a singular old play, entitled "_The Misfortunes of Arthur_ (Uther Pendragon's sonne) reduced into tragical notes by Thomas Hughes, one of the Societie of Graye's Inne." 12mo. 1587.

In conformity with some prior examples, this production has an argument, a dumb show, and a chorus to each act; "it is beautifully printed in the black letter," observes the editor of the Biographia Dramatica, "and has many cancels consisting of single words, half lines, and entire speeches; these were reprinted and pasted over the cancelled passages; a practice, I believe, very rarely seen."[243:A] _Arthur_ was performed before the Queen at Greenwich, on the 28th of February, and in the thirtieth year of her reign, and exhibits in its title-page a remarkable proof of the licence which actors at that time took in curtailing or enlarging the composition of the original author, informing us that the play "was set downe as it passed from under his (the poet's) hands, and as it was presented, _excepting certain words and lines, where some of the actors either helped their memories by brief omission, or fitted their acting by alteration_." The writer appears to have been familiar with the Roman classics, but the rarity of his piece is much greater than its merit.[243:B]

16. KYD, THOMAS, to whom has been ascribed four plays, viz.: _Jeronimo_; _The Spanish Tragedy_; _Solyman and Perseda_, and _Cornelia_. Of these the first, which appeared on the stage about the year 1588, seems to have been given to Kyd, in consequence of his resuming the name and story in his Spanish tragedy; it is a short piece not divided into acts and scenes, of little value, and was printed in 1605, under the title of "_The First Part of Jeronimo_. With the Warres of Portugal, and the Life and Death of Don Andrea." 4to.[243:C]

"_The Spanish Tragedy_, or, Hieronimo is mad again, Containing the lamentable end of Don Horatio and Belimperia. With the pitifull Death of Hieronimo," is supposed to have been first acted in 1588, or 1589, immediately following up the elder Jeronimo which had been well received.

Though this drama was an incessant object of ridicule to the contemporaries and immediate successors of its author, it nevertheless acquired great popularity, and long maintained possession of the stage. The consequence of this partiality was shown in a perversion of the public taste, for nothing can exceed the bombast and puerilities of this play and of those to which it gave almost instant birth. Kyd, in fact, whilst aspiring to the delineation of the most tremendous incidents, and the most uncontrolled passions, seems totally unconscious of his own imbecillity; and the result, therefore, has usually been, either unqualified horror, unmitigated disgust, or the most ludicrous emotion. There is neither symmetry, consistency, nor humanity, in the characters; they are beings not of this world, and the finest parts of the play, which occur in the fourth act, possess a tone of sorrow altogether wild and preternatural. The catastrophe is absurdly horrible.

Such were the attractions, however, of this sanguinary tragedy, that Ben Jonson, who, according to Decker, originally performed the character of Jeronimo, was employed by Mr. Henslow, in 1602, to give it a fresh claim on curiosity by his additions.[244:A]

"_The Tragedie of Solyman and Perseda_, wherein is laide open Love's Constancy, Fortune's Inconstancy, and Death's Triumphs," is conjectured by Mr. Hawkins to have been the production of [244:B]Kyd. Like _Jeronimo_, it is not divided into acts, and was entered on the stationers books in the same year with the _Spanish Tragedy_, a circumstance which leads us to suppose, that its date of performance was nearly contemporary with that production. Its style and manner, too, are such as assimilate it to the peculiar genius which breathes through the undisputed writings of the tragedian to whom it has been ascribed.

_Cornelia_, thus named when first published in 4to. 1594, but reprinted in 1595, under the enlarged title of "_Pompey the Great his Fair Cornelia's Tragedy_, effected by her Father and Husband's Downcast, Death, and Fortune," 4to. This play being merely a translation from the French of _Garnier_, and consequently an imitation of the ancients through a third or fourth medium, requires little notice. The dialogue is in blank verse, and the choruses in various lyric metres.[245:A]

Kyd died, oppressed by poverty, about the year 1595.

17. MARLOWE, CHRISTOPHER, as an author, an object of great admiration and encomium in his own times, and, of all the dramatic poets who preceded Shakspeare, certainly the one who possessed the most genius. He was egregiously misled, however, by bad models, and his want of taste has condemned him, as a writer for the stage, to an obscurity from which he is not likely to emerge.

This "famous gracer of tragedians," as he is termed by Greene, in his Groatsworth of Wit, produced eight plays:—

1. _Tamburlaine the Great_, or the Scythian Shepherd. _Part the First._ 4to.

2. _Tamburlaine the Great. Part the Second_. 4to.

Of this tragedy, in two parts, which was brought on the stage about the year 1588, though not printed until 1590, it is impossible to speak without a mixture of wonder and contempt; for, whilst a few passages indicate talents of no common order, the residue is a tissue of unmingled rant, absurdity, and fustian: yet strange as it may appear, the most extravagant flights of this eccentric composition were the most popular, and numerous allusions to its moon-struck reveries, are to be found in the productions of its times. That it should be an object of ridicule to Shakspeare, and of quotation to Pistol, are alike in character.[245:B]

3. _Lust's Dominion_, or the _Lascivious Queen_ a Tragedy. 12mo.

This, like the two former plays, is tragedy run mad, and its spirit may be justly described in the words of one of its characters; Eleazor the Moor, who exclaims,—

"—— Tragedy, thou minion of the night, ——————— to thee I'll sing Upon an harp made of dead Spanish bones, The proudest instrument the world affords; "Whilst" thou in crimson jollity shall bathe Thy limbs, as black as mine, in springs of blood Still gushing."

Its _horrors_, however, for this is the only epithet its incidents can claim, are often clothed in poetical imagery, and even luscious versification; it has also more fine passages to boast of than Tamburlaine, and it has, likewise, more developement of character; but all these are powerless in mitigating the disgust which its fable and conduct inspire.

4. _The Troublesome Raigne and Lamentable Death of Edward the Second, King of England._ 4to.

_Edward the Second_ is a proof, that, when Marlowe chose to drop the barbarities of his age, and the bombast of "King Cambyses' Vein," he could exert an influence over the heart which has not often been excelled. There is a truth, simplicity, and moral feeling in this play which irresistibly attracts, and would fain induce us to hope, that its author could not have exhibited the impious and abandoned traits of character which have usually been attributed to him. The death-scene of Edward is a master-piece of pity and terror.

5. "_The Massacre of Paris_, with the Death of the Duke of Guise. 8vo." A subject congenial with the general cast of Marlowe's gloomy and ferocious style of colouring, nor is it deficient in his wonted accumulation of horrors. It possesses, however, a few good scenes, and may be classed midway between the author's worst and best productions.

6. _The Rich Jew of Malta_, 4to. The prejudice against the Jews, during the reign of Elizabeth, was excessive; none were suffered to reside in the kingdom, and every art encouraged that could stimulate the hatred of the people against this persecuted race. No engine was better calculated for this purpose than the stage, and no characters were ever more relished, or more malignantly enjoyed, than the _Barabas_ of Marlowe, and the _Shylock_ of Shakspeare. The distance, however, between them, as well with regard to truth of delineation, as to poetical vigour of conception, is infinite; for whilst the Jew of Marlowe can be considered in no other light than as the mere incarnation of a fiend, that of Shakspeare possesses, with all his ferocity and cruelty, such a touch of humanity as classes him distinctly with his species, and renders him, if not a very probable, yet a very possible being.

7. "_The Tragical Historie of the Life and Death of Doctor Faustus._" 4to. This, in point of preternatural wildness, and metaphysical horror, is the _chef d'œuvre_ of Marlowe. It unfolds not only genius of a sublimated and exotic cast, but seems to have been the product of a mind inflamed by unhallowed curiosity, and an eager irreligious desire of invading the secrets of another world, and so far gives credence to the imputations which have stained the memory of its author; for this play breathes not a poetic preternaturalism, if we may use the expression, but looks like the creature of an atmosphere emerging from the gulph of lawless spirits, and vainly employed in pursuing the corruscations which traverse its illimitable gloom.

The catastrophe of this play makes the heart shudder, and the hair involuntarily start erect; and the agonies of Faustus on the fast-approaching expiration of his compact with the Devil, are depicted with a strength truly appalling.

Yet amidst all this diabolism, there occasionally occur passages of great moral sublimity, passages on which Milton seems to have fixed his eye. Thus, the reply of the Demon _Mephostophilis_ to the enquiry of Faustus, concerning the locality of Hell, bears a striking analogy to the descriptions of Satan's internal and ever-present torments at the commencement of the fourth book of Paradise Lost. "Tell me," exclaims the daring necromancer, "where is the place that men call Hell?"

"_Mephostophilis._ Hell hath no limits, nor is circumscribed In one self place; but _where we are is hell, And where hell is, there we must ever be_, And, to be short, when all the world dissolves, And every creature shall be purified, All places shall be hell that are not heaven."

8. _The Tragedie of Dido, Queene of Carthage._—This drama was written in conjunction with Thomas Nash, and printed in 1594.[248:A]

Marlowe has been lavishly panegyrised by Jonson, Heywood, Drayton, Peele, Meres, Nash, &c.; but by none so emphatically as by Phillips, who, at the very opening of his article on this poet, calls him "a kind of a second Shakspeare." This seems, however, to have been done rather with a reference to the similarities arising from his having, like Shakspeare, been actor, player, and author of a poem on a congenial subject with Venus and Adonis, namely, his Hero and Leander, than from any approximation in the value of their dramatic works.[249:A]

The death of Marlowe, which took place before the year 1593, was violent and premature, the melancholy termination of a life rendered still more melancholy by vice and infidelity.[249:B]

18. LODGE, THOMAS. Two dramatic pieces have issued from the pen of this elegant miscellaneous poet. Of these the first was written in conjunction with Robert Greene, and entitled _A Looking-Glass for London and England_, a tragi-comedy, acted in 1591[249:C], though not published until 1598. The second is called "_The Wounds of Civil War_. Lively set forth in the true tragedies of Marius and Scilla," and probably performed in the year following the representation of the former play. It was printed in 1594. These dramas, though not the best of Dr. Lodge's productions, were not unpopular, nor deemed unworthy of his talents; the _Looking-Glass_ appears to have been acted four times at the Rose theatre, in about the space of fifteen months.

19. GREENE, ROBERT. This pleasing, but unfortunate poet, was the author of six plays, independent of that which he wrote as the coadjutor of Lodge. 1. "_The Honorable Historie of Frier Bacon and Frier Bongay._" 4to. As Greene died in September, 1592, there can be no doubt that all his dramas were written, if not all performed, before Shakspeare's commencement as a writer for the stage; we find, from Henslowe's List, that _Frier Bacon_ was performed at the Rose theatre, in February, 1591, and repeated thrice in the course of the season[250:A]; it was printed in 1594, and being founded on a popular story, had considerable success. 2. "_The Historie of Orlando Furioso_, one of the twelve Peers of France." This piece was likewise performed at the same theatre, in February, 1591, and also printed in 1594; the fable is taken, with little or no alteration, from the Orlando of Ariosto. 3. "_The Scottish Historie of James the Fourth, slaine at Flodden._ Entermixed with a pleasant Comedie presented by _Oboram_ King of the Fayeries." Greene, says Oldys, in plotting plays, was his craft's master, and it would be curious and interesting to ascertain how he has conducted a subject which has obtained so much celebrity in our own days, and more especially in what manner he has combined it with the romantic superstition attendant on Oberon and his fairies.[250:B] 4. "_The Comicall Historie of Alphonsus, King of Arragon._" 5. "_The History of Jobe._" This play, which was never printed, and it is supposed never performed, although it was entered on the Stationers' books, in 1594, was unfortunately, with many others, destroyed by the carelessness of Dr. Warburton's servant. 6. "_Fair Emm_, the Miller's Daughter of Manchester, with the Love of William the Conqueror," a comedy which has been ascribed to Greene, by Phillips and Winstanley; the former, after enumerating some pieces which upon no good grounds had been attributed to the joint pens of our author and Dr. Lodge, adds, "besides which, he wrote alone the comedies of Friar Bacon and _Fair Emme_."[251:A] It is the more probable that this drama was the composition of Greene, as it was represented at the same theatre and by the same company which brought forward his avowed productions.

We must, with Ritson, express our regret, that the dramatic works of Greene have not hitherto been collected and published together.[251:B]

20. LEGGE, THOMAS, twice vice-chancellor of Cambridge, and the author of two plays which, though never printed, were acted with great applause, not only in the University which gave them birth, but on the public theatres. The first of these is named _The Destruction of Jerusalem_, and appears from Henslowe's List to have been performed at the Rose theatre, on the 22d of March, 1591; the second is entitled, _The Life of King Richard the Third_, a subject which induces us to regret, that it should not have been submitted to the press, especially when the character of Legge for dramatic talent is considered; for Meres informs us in 1598, that "Doctor Leg of Cambridge" was esteemed among the "best for tragedie," adding, that "as M. Anneus Lucanus writ two excellent tragedies, one called Medea, the other de Incendio Troiæ cum Priami calamitate: so Doctor Leg hath penned two _famous_ tragedies, y{e} one of Richard the 3, the other of the destruction of Jerusalem."[251:C] The death of Dr. Legge took place in July, 1607.

To this catalogue of dramatic writers who preceded Shakspeare, it will be necessary to annex the names, at least, of those _anonymous_ plays which, as far as any record of their performance has reached us, were the property of the stage anterior to the year 1594, under the almost certain presumption, that they must have been written before Shakspeare had acquired any celebrity as a theatrical poet.

These, with the exception of the plays ascribed to Shakspeare, a few Interludes and Moralities, the tragi-comedy of _Appius and Virginia_, printed in 1576, and the tragedy of _Selimus, Emperor of the Turks_, must, and perhaps without danger of any very important omission, be limited to the following enumeration of dramas performed at the Rose theatre during the years 1591, 1592, and 1593; from which, however, we have withdrawn all those pieces that may be found previously noticed under the names of their respective authors:—

1. Muly Mulocco, or the Battle of Alcazar[252:A], 1591. 2. Spanish Comedy of Don Horatio, —— 3. Sir John Mandeville, —— 4. Henry of Cornwall, —— 5. Chloris and Orgasto[252:B], —— 6. Pope Joan, —— 7. Machiavel, —— 8. Ricardo[252:C], —— 9. Four Plays in One, —— 10. Zenobia, —— 11. Constantine, —— 12. Brandymer, —— 13. Titus Vespasian —— 14. The Tanner of Denmark, 1592. 15. Julian of Brentford, —— 16. The Comedy of Cosmo, —— 17. God Speed the Plough, 1593. 18. Huon of Bourdeaux, —— 19. George a Green[253:A], —— 20. Buckingham, —— 21. Richard the Confessor, —— 22. William the Conqueror, —— 23. Friar Francis, —— 24. The Pinner of Wakefield[253:B], —— 25. Abraham and Lot, —— 26. The Fair Maid of Italy, —— 27. King Lud, —— 28. The Ranger's Comedy[253:C], ——

In order accurately to ascertain how far Shakspeare might be indebted to his predecessors, it would be highly desirable to possess a printed collection of all the dramas which are yet within the reach of the press, from the days of Sackville, to the year 1591. Such a work, so far from diminishing the claim to originality with which this great poet is now invested, would, we are convinced, place it in a still more indisputable point of view; and merely prove, that, without any servility of imitation, or even the smallest dereliction of his native talent and creative genius, he had absorbed within his own refulgent sphere the few feeble lights which, previous to his appearance, had shed a kind of twilight over the dramatic world.

The models, indeed, if such they may be called, which were presented to his view, are, as far as we are acquainted with them, so grossly defective in structure, style, and sentiment, that, if we set aside two or three examples, little or nothing could be learned from them. In the course of near thirty years which elapsed between Sackville and Shakspeare, the best and purest period was perhaps that which immediately succeeded the exhibition of Gorboduc, but which was speedily terminated by the appearance of Preston's _Cambyses_ in or probably rather before the year 1570. From this era we behold a succession of playwrights who, for better than twenty years, deluged the stage as tragic poets with a torrent of bombastic and sanguinary fiction, alike disgraceful to the feelings of humanity and common sense; or as comic writers, overwhelmed us with a mass of quaintness, buffoonery, and affectation. The worthy disciples of the author of Cambyses, _Whetstone_, _Peele_, _Lilly_, _Kydd_, and _Marlowe_, seem to have racked their brains to produce what was unnatural and atrocious, and having, like their leader, received a classical education, misemployed it to clothe their conceptions in a scholastic, uniform, and monotonous garb, as far, at least, as a versification modulated with the most undeviating regularity, and destitute of all variety of cadence or of pause could minister to such an effect.

That so dark a picture should occasionally be relieved by gleams of light, which appear the more brilliant from the surrounding contrast, was naturally to be expected; and we have accordingly seen that the very poets who may justly be censured for their general mode of execution, for the wildness and extravagancy of their plots, now and then present us with lines, passages, and even scenes, remarkable for their beauty, strength, or poetical diction; but these, so unconnected are they, and apart from the customary tone and keeping of the pieces in which they are scattered, appear rather as the fortuitous irradiation of a meteor, whose momentary splendour serves but to render the returning gloom more heavy and oppressive, than the effect of that sober, steady, and improving light which might cheer us with the prospect of approaching day.

Of the twenty poets who have just passed in review before us, Marlowe certainly exhibits the greatest portion of genius, though debased with a large admixture of the gross and glaring faults of his contemporaries. Two of his productions may yet be read with interest; his _Edward the Second_, and his _Faustus_; though the latter must be allowed to deviate from the true tract of tragedy, in presenting us rather with what is horrible than terrible in its incidents and catastrophe.

We must not be surprised, therefore, that the dramatic fabrics of these rude artists should have met with the warmest admiration, when we recollect, that, in the infancy of an art, novelty is of itself abundantly productive of attraction, and that taste, neither formed by good models, nor rendered fastidious by choice, can have little power to check the march of misguided enthusiasm.

It is necessary, however, to record an event in dramatic history, which, coming into operation just previous to the entrance of our poet into the theatric arena as an author, no doubt contributed powerfully not only to chasten his muse, but, through him, universally the national taste. In 1589 commissioners were appointed by the Queen for the purpose of reviewing and revising the productions of all writers for the stage, with full powers to reject and strike out all which they might deem unmannerly, licentious, and irreverent; a censureship which, it is evident, if properly and temperately executed, could not fail of conferring almost incalculable benefit on a department of literature at that time not much advanced in its career, and but too apt to transgress the limits of a just decorum.

This regulation ushers in, indeed, by many degrees the most important period in the annals of our theatre, when Shakspeare, starting into dramatic life, came boldly forward on the eye, leaving at an immeasurable distance behind him, and in groupes more or less darkly shaded, his immediate predecessors, and his earliest contemporaries in the art.

FOOTNOTES:

[227:A] Warton's Hist. of English Poetry, vol. iii. p. 355.

[227:B] Vide Historia Histrionica.

[227:C] Reed's Shakspeare, vol. iii. p. 6. 11. See, also, Percy and Warton.

[227:D] Reed's Shakspeare, vol. iii. p. 29; and Warton's Hist. of English Poetry, vol. ii. p. 199.

[228:A] See Ancient British Drama, vol. i. both for this play and Gammer Gurton's Needle, as edited by Walter Scott.

[229:A] Reed's Shakspeare, vol. iii. p. 404.

[230:A] Warton's Hist. of English Poetry, vol. iii. p. 210.

[231:A] Defence of Poesie, pp. 561, 562.—Vide Countess of Pembroke's Arcadia, folio, 7th. edit. 1629.

[232:A] Arte of English Poesie, reprint, p. 51.

[232:B] Chalmers's English Poets, vol. ii. Turberville's Poems, p. 620.

[233:A] History of English Poetry, vol. iii. p. 474.

[234:A] Reed's Shakspeare, vol. ix. p. 144. note by Farmer.

[234:B] MS. Digb. 133.

[234:C] Hist. of English Poetry, vol. iii. p. 376. note.

[235:A] Sign. C 4.

[235:B] Vide Censura Literaria, vol. vii. p. 305. et seq.; and Dodsley's Old Plays, by Reed, vol. ii. p. 154.

[236:A] Reed's Shakspeare, vol. iv. p. 461. Act iv. sc. 2.

[236:B] Ibid. vol. xi. p. 301.

[237:A] Reed's Shakspeare, vol. xi. p. 302. note.

[237:B] Vide Beloe's Anecdotes of Literature, vol. i. p. 323.; and Biographia Dramatica apud Reed, vol. i. p. 362.

[238:A] Among "Six Old Plays, on which Shakspeare founded his Measure for Measure, Comedy of Errors," &c. &c.; reprinted from the original editions, 2 vols. 8vo. 1779.

[238:B] Reed's Shakspeare, vol. vi. p. 184.

[239:A] Biographia Dramatica, vol. i. p. 351.

[239:B] Ibid. vol. ii. p. 21.

[239:C] Reed's Shakspeare, vol. xii. p. 90.

[240:A] Vide Reprint, 1809, p. 22.

[240:B] Vide Greene's Groatsworth of Witte bought with a Million of Repentance, reprint.

[240:C] Of the sweetness of versification and luxuriancy of imagery which Peele occasionally exhibits, we shall quote an instance from "The Love of King David and Fair Bethsabe. With the Tragedie of Absalon;" a play which Mr. _Hawkins_ has re-printed in his _Origin of the Drama_, 3 vols.; observing, that the genius of Peele seems to have been kindled by reading the Prophets, and the Song of Solomon:—

"_Bethsabe._ Come gentle Zephyr trick'd with those perfumes That erst in Eden sweetened Adam's love, And stroke my bosom with thy silken fan: This shade (sun-proof) is yet no proof for thee, Thy body smoother than this waveless spring, And purer than the substance of the same, Can creep through that his lances cannot pierce. Thou and thy sister soft and sacred Air, Goddess of life, and governess of health, Keeps every fountain fresh and arbor sweet: No brazen gate her passage can repulse, Nor bushy thicket bar thy subtle breath. Then deck thee with thy loose delightsome robes, And on thy wings bring delicate perfumes, To play the wantons with us through the leaves."

[241:A] Theatrum Poetarum, apud Brydges, pp. 199, 200.

[242:A] For these plays, Blount's republication being scarce, the reader may consult Dodsley's _Old Plays_, 1780; Hawkins's _Origin of the English Drama_; _Ancient British Drama_ apud Walter Scott; and Old Plays, vols. 1 and 2. 8vo. 1814.

[242:B] Numerous specimens of these Songs, in case the dramas are not at hand, will be found in Ellis's Specimens of the Early English Poets, vol. ii.; and in Beloe's Anecdotes of Literature and Scarce Books, vol. ii.

[243:A] Biographia Dramatica, vol. ii. p. 237.

[243:B] See a further account of this play, and a specimen of the chorus, in Beloe's Anecdotes, vol. i. p. 386.

[243:C] Vide Ancient British Drama, vol. i. p. 459.

[244:A] Reed's Shakspeare, vol. iii. p. 394.

[244:B] Vol. ii. p. 197.

[245:A] "There is particularly remembered," remarks Phillips, "his tragedy Cornelia." Theatrum Poetarum, apud Brydges, p. 206.

[245:B] Reed's Shakspeare, vol. xii. p. 92. Henry the Fourth, Part II.,