_Milton._ See Milton’s prefatory note to _Samson Agonistes_.
46. _Veneration for Shakespear._ Cf. Dennis’s letter to Steele, 26th
March, 1719: “Ever since I was capable of reading Shakespear, I have
always had, and have always expressed, that veneration for him which is
justly his due; of which I believe no one can doubt who has read the Essay
which I published some years ago upon his Genius and Writings.”
_Italian Ballad._ Cf. Dennis’s _Essay on the Operas after the Italian
Manner_, 1706.
Alexander Pope.
48. _His Characters._ The same idea had been expressed by Gildon in his
_Essay on the Stage_, 1710, p. li.: “He has not only distinguish’d his
principal persons, but there is scarce a messenger comes in but is visibly
different from all the rest of the persons in the play. So that you need
not to mention the name of the person that speaks, when you read the play,
the manners of the persons will sufficiently inform you who it is speaks.”
Cf. also Addison’s criticism of Homer, _Spectator_, No. 273: “There is
scarce a speech or action in the _Iliad_, which the reader may not ascribe
to the person that speaks or acts, without seeing his name at the head of
it.”
50. _To judge of Shakespear by Aristotle’s rules._ This comparison had
appeared in Farquhar’s _Discourse upon Comedy_: “The rules of English
Comedy don’t lie in the compass of Aristotle, or his followers, but in the
Pit, Box, and Galleries. And to examine into the humour of an English
audience, let us see by what means our own English poets have succeeded in
this point. To determine a suit at law we don’t look into the archives of
Greece or Rome, but inspect the reports of our own lawyers, and the acts
and statutes of our Parliaments; and by the same rule we have nothing to
do with the models of Menander or Plautus, but must consult Shakespear,
Johnson, Fletcher, and others, who by methods much different from the
Ancients have supported the English Stage, and made themselves famous to
posterity.” Cf. also Rowe, p. 15: “it would be hard to judge him by a law
he knew nothing of.”—Is it unnecessary to point out that there are no
“rules” in Aristotle? The term “Aristotle’s rules” was commonly used to
denote the “rules of the classical drama,” which, though based on the
_Poetics_, were formulated by Italian and French critics of the sixteenth
and seventeenth centuries.
51. _The Dates of his plays._ Pope here controverts Rowe’s statement, p.
4.
_blotted a line._ See note, p. 43. Though Pope here controverts the
traditional opinion, he found it to his purpose to accept it in the
_Epistle to Augustus_, ll. 279-281:
And fluent Shakespear scarce effac’d a line.
Ev’n copious Dryden wanted, or forgot,
The last and greatest art, the art to blot.
52. Pope’s references to the early editions of the _Merry Wives_ and other
plays do not prove his assertions. Though an imperfect edition of the
_Merry Wives_ appeared in 1602, it does not follow that this was “entirely
new writ” and transformed into the play in the Folio of 1623. The same
criticism applies to what he says of _Henry V._, of which pirated copies
appeared in 1600, 1602, and 1608. And he is apparently under the
impression that the _Contention of York and Lancaster_ and the early play
of _Hamlet_ were Shakespeare’s own work.
53. _Coriolanus and Julius Caesar._ Pope replies tacitly to Dennis’s
criticism of these plays.
_those Poems which pass for his._ The seventh or supplementary volume of
Rowe’s and Pope’s editions contained, in addition to some poems by
Marlowe, translations of Ovid by Thomas Heywood. Like Rowe, Pope has some
doubt as to the authorship of the poems, but on the score of the
dedications he attributes to him _Venus and Adonis_ and the _Rape of
Lucrece_. Both editors ignored the Sonnets. It is doubtful how far
Shakespeare was indebted to Ovid in his _Venus and Adonis_. He knew
Golding’s translation of the _Metamorphoses_ (1565-67); but _Venus and
Adonis_ has many points in common with Lodge’s _Scillaes Metamorphosis_
which appeared in 1589. See, however, J. P. Reardon’s paper in the
“Shakespeare Society’s Papers,” 1847, iii. 143-6, where it is held that
Lodge is indebted to Shakespeare.
_Plautus._ Cf. Rowe, p. 9. Gildon had claimed for Shakespeare greater
acquaintance with the Ancients than Rowe had admitted, and Pope had both
opinions in view when he wrote the present passage. “I think there are
many arguments to prove,” says Gildon, “that he knew at least some of the
Latin poets, particularly Ovid; two of his Epistles being translated by
him: His motto to _Venus and Adonis_ is another proof. But that he had
read Plautus himself, is plain from his _Comedy of Errors_, which is taken
visibly from the _Menæchmi_ of that poet.... The characters he has in his
plays drawn of the Romans is a proof that he was acquainted with their
historians.... I contend not here to prove that he was a perfect master of
either the Latin or Greek authors; but all that I aim at, is to shew that
as he was capable of reading some of the Romans, so he had actually read
Ovid and Plautus, without spoiling or confining his fancy or genius”
(1710, p. vi).
_Dares Phrygius._ The reference is to the prologue of _Troilus and
Cressida_. See the note in Theobald’s edition, and Farmer, p. 187.
_Chaucer._ See Gildon’s remarks on _Troilus and Cressida_, 1710, p. 358.
54. _Ben Johnson._ Pope is here indebted to Betterton. Cf. his remark as
recorded by Spence, _Anecdotes_, 1820, p. 5. “It was a general opinion
that Ben Jonson and Shakespeare lived in enmity against one another.
Betterton has assured me often that there was nothing in it; and that such
a supposition was founded only on the two parties, which in their lifetime
listed under one, and endeavoured to lessen the character of the other
mutually. Dryden used to think that the verses Jonson made on
Shakespeare’s death had something of satire at the bottom; for my part, I
can’t discover any thing like it in them.”
_Pessimum genus_, etc. Tacitus, _Agricola_, 41.
_Si ultra placitum_, etc. Virgil, _Eclogues_, vii. 27, 28.
55. _Dryden._ _Discourse concerning Satire, ad init._ (ed. W. P. Ker, ii.,
p. 18).
_Enter three Witches solus._ “This blunder appears to be of Mr. Pope’s own
invention. It is not to be found in any one of the four folio copies of
_Macbeth_, and there is no quarto edition of it extant” (Steevens).