to introduce the Roman measures into English verse, in a duodecimo
entitled, "Observations in the Art of English Poesie, by THOMAS
CAMPION, wherein it is demonstratively proved, and by example
confirmed, that the English toong will receive eight severall kinds of
numbers, proper to itselfe, which are all in this book set forth, and
were never before this time by any man attempted." London; printed by
Richard Field, for Andrew Wise. 1602.
The object of this tract, which is dedicated to Lord Buckhurst, whom
he terms, "the noblest judge of poesie," was not only to recommend the
adoption of classical metres, but to abolish, if possible, the use
of rhime. "For this end," says he in his preface, "have I studyed to
induce a true forme of versefying into our language, for the vulgar
and unartificial custome of riming hath, I know, detered many excellent
wits from the exercise of English Poesy."
In consequence of this determination, he has enforced his
"Observations" by examples on the classic model, without rhime; and
among them, at p. 12. is a specimen of what he calls _Lincentiate
Iambicks_, which is, in fact, our present blank verse.
This systematic attack upon rhime speedily called forth a consummate
master of the art in its defence; for in 1603 appeared, "A Defence of
Ryme, against a pamphlet intituled, Observations in the Art of Poesie,
wherein is demonstratively proved that ryme is the fittest harmonie of
wordes that comports with our language." By Samuel Daniel.
It need scarcely be said that the elegant and correct poet has obtained
a complete victory over his opponent, whom he censures, not so much for
attempting the introduction of new measures, as for his abuse of rhime;
he might have shown his skill, he justly and eloquently observes,
"without doing wrong to the honour of the dead, wrong to the fame of
the living, and wrong to England, in seeking to lay reproach upon her
native ornaments, and to turn the fair stream and full course of her
accents, into the shallow current of a loose uncertainty, clean out of
the way of her known delight.—Therefore here stand I forth," he adds
in a subsequent paragraph, "only to make good the place we have thus
taken up, and to defend the sacred monuments erected therein, which
contain the honour of the dead, the fame of the living, the glory of
peace, and the best power of our speech, and wherein so many honourable
spirits have sacrificed to memory their dearest passions, showing by
what divine influence they have been moved, and under what stars they
lived."[469:A]
Great modesty and good sense distinguish this pamphlet, in which the
author candidly allows that rhime has been sometimes too lavishly
used and where blank verse might have been substituted with better
effect, and he concludes his "Defence" with some excellent remarks on
affectation in the choice and collocation of words, a vice from which
he was more free than any of his contemporaries, simplicity and purity,
in fact, being the leading features of his style.
The last critic of the era to which we are limited, is EDWARD BOLTON,
whose "_Hypercritica_; Or a Rule of Judgment for writing or reading
our Historys," a small collection of tracts or essays, "occasioned,"
says Warton, "by a passage in Sir Henry Seville's Epistle prefixed to
his edition of our old Latin historians, 1596,"[470:A] was supposed by
Wood, in a note on the MS. preserved in the Ashmolean Museum, to have
been written about 1610. But that this date is too early is evident
from the work itself; for in the fourth essay, which is entitled "Prime
Gardens for gathering English: according to the true gage or standard
of the tongue about fifteen or sixteen years ago," King James's poetry
is spoken of in the following manner:—"I dare not presume to speak of
his Majesty's exercises in this heroick kind, because I see them all
left out in that which Montague lord bishop of Winchester hath given us
of his royal writings."[470:B] Now Bishop Montague's edition of James's
Works was not published until 1616.
The principal writers in prose and poetry, anterior to 1600, are
noticed in this fourth division of the _Hypercritica_, and the judgment
passed upon them is, in general, correct and satisfactory, and does
credit to the "sensible old English critic," as Warton emphatically
terms him.[470:C]
It is remarkable that the _Hypercritica_ should have been suffered to
continue in its manuscript state until 1722, at which period it was
printed by Anthony Hall at the end of Trivet's "Annalium Continuatio."
Oxford, 8vo.
Bolton, whom Ritson calls "a profound scholar and eminent
critic[470:D]," was certainly a man of considerable learning, and
occupied no small space in the public eye as an historian, philologer,
and antiquary.
To this enumeration it may be necessary to add some notice of that
industrious race of critics, termed _Commentators_; a species which,
for the last half century, has been employed as laboriously on old
English, as formerly were the German Literati on ancient classical,
literature. Of this mode of illustration, which has lately thrown so
much light on the manners and learning of our poet's age, two early and
very ingenious specimens may be mentioned under the reign of Elizabeth
and James. The first is the Commentary of E. K. on the Shepheards
Calender of Spenser, in 1579; and the second, the learned Notes of
Selden on the first eighteen Songs of the Polyolbion of Drayton,
1612; both productions of great merit, but especially the last, which
exhibits a large portion of acumen and research, united to an equal
share of discrimination and judgment.
Such are the chief critics on English literature who flourished during
the life-time of Shakspeare. That some of them contributed very
materially towards the improvement of polite literature, and especially
of poetry, by stimulating the genius and guiding the taste of their
contemporaries, must be readily granted, and more particularly may
these benefits be attributed to the labours of _Webbe_, _Puttenham_,
_Sidney_, and _Meres_. How far the manuscripts of _Spenser_ and
_Bolton_, at the commencement and termination of our critical era,
assisted to enlighten the public mind, cannot now be ascertained; but
as the circulation of works in this state is generally very confined,
we cannot suppose, even admitting the industry and admiration of their
favoured readers to have been strongly excited, that their effect could
have been either widely or permanently felt.
It would be a subject of still greater curiosity, could we determine,
with any approach towards precision, in what degree Shakspeare was
indebted, for his progress in English literature, to the authors whom
we have just enumerated, under the kindred branches of _philology_ and
_criticism_.
Of his assiduity as a reader of English books, whether original or
translated, his works afford the most positive and abundant proofs;
and that he was peculiarly attentive to the philology of his native
language is to be learnt from the same source. We have already
noticed his satirical allusion to Florio and Lilly in the character
of Holofernes, and a similar stroke on the innovating pedantry of
the times, will be found in his _Much Ado about Nothing_, which was
probably directed against another equally bold attempt to alter the
whole system of orthography. The experiment was made by Bullokar, of
whose Brief Grammar a slight mention has been given, in a book entitled
an _Amendment of Orthographie_ for _English Speech_, 1580; in which
the author proposes not only an entire change in the established mode
of spelling, but a total revolution also in the practice of printing.
To level a sarcasm at the head of this daring innovator may have been
the aim of the poet, where he represents Benedict complaining of
Claudio, that "_he was wont to speak plain, and to the purpose, like an
honest man, and a soldier; and now he is turned ORTHOGRAPHER; his words
are a very fantastical banquet, just so many strange dishes_."[472:A]
In a former part of this work we have mentioned some of the books to
which our great poet must have had recourse in the progress even of
his limited education in the country; and on his settlement in London,
we cannot, with any probability, conceive, that a mind so active,
comprehensive, and acute, would sit down content with its juvenile
acquisitions, and hesitate to inspect those treatises on philology and
criticism which had acquired the popular approbation, and were adapted
to the years of manhood. Not only, indeed, did he peruse with avidity
the _Arte of Rhetoricke_ of Wilson, and the _Scolemaster_ of Ascham,
but we are convinced, from a thorough study of his writings, that so
extensive was his range of reading, that not a translation from the
_Greek_, the _Latin_, the _Italian_, _Spanish_, or _French_ appeared,
but what was soon afterwards to be found in the hands of Shakspeare.
His dramas, in fact, even without the aid of his indefatigable
commentators, assure us, in almost every page, that, if not erudite
from the possession of many languages, he was truly and substantially
learned in every other sense; in the vast accumulation of materials
drawn through the medium of translation, from the most distant and
varied sources.
That he had not only read, but availed himself professionally of
Wilson's Rhetoric, will be evident, we think, from a passage quoted
by Mr. Chalmers, from this critic, in support of a similar opinion.
Wilson has mentioned Timon of Athens in such a manner as _might_ lead
Shakspeare to select this misanthrope for dramatic exhibition; but the
very character and language of _Dogberry_ seem to be anticipated in
the following sketch:—"Another good fellow of the countrey, being an
officer and mayor of a toune, and desirous to speak like a fine learned
man, having just occasion to rebuke a runnegate fellowe, said after
this wise, in a greate heate:—Thou _yngraine_ and _vacation_ knave,
if I take thee any more within the _circumcision_ of my _dampnation_;
I will so _corrupt_ thee, that all other _vacation_ knaves shall take
_ilsample_ by thee."[473:A]
We cannot, however, coalesce with Mr. Chalmers, in considering the
character of Holofernes as founded on the Scholemaster of Ascham, and
that in drawing the colloquial excellence ascribed to the pedagogue
by Sir Nathaniel, the poet had in his _minds-eye_ the conversation at
Lord Burleigh's table, so strikingly recorded by Ascham in his preface.
We have not the smallest doubt but that our author had read, and with
much pleasure and profit, the invaluable treatise of that accomplished
scholar; but the general folly and pedantry of Holofernes are such,
notwithstanding the eulogium of his clerical companion, as to preclude
all idea that the character could have been sketched from such a
model;—it is, in fact, a broad caricature of some well known pedant
of the day, and we must agree with the commentators in fixing upon
_Florio_ as the most probable prototype.
It will readily be granted, that, if Shakspeare were the assiduous
reader which we have supposed him to be, and no judge, indeed, of his
works can doubt it, he must have perused with peculiar interest the
critical treatises on poets and poetry which were published during
his march to fame. It will be considered, therefore, scarcely as
an assumption to conclude, that the works of _Webbe_, _Puttenham_,
_Sidney_, and _Meres_ were familiar to his mind; and though he must
have written with too much haste, and with too much attention to
the gratifications of the _million_, to carry their precepts, and
especially the strictures of Sidney, into perfect execution, yet it is
very reasonable to conceive that even his early works may have been
rendered less imperfect by the perusal of Webbe and Puttenham; and
that, as he advanced in his professional career, the improved mechanism
of his dramas, and his greater attention to the unities, may have been
in some degree derived from the keen invectives of Sir Philip.
That Shakspeare, in return, contributed, more than any other poet, to
enrich and modulate his native language, is now freely admitted; but
that he was held in similar estimation by his contemporaries, and even
at an early period of his poetical progress, may be inferred from what
_Markham_ has said of the "poets of his age" in 1595, when Shakspeare
had published some of his poems, and had produced his "Romeo," and from
what _Meres_, in 1598, more specifically applies to our author; the
former observing, in the Dedication of his _Gentleman's Academie_, with
reference to the Booke of St. Albans, originally published in 1486,
that "our tong being not of such puritie then, _as at this day the
Poets of our age have raised it to: of whom, and in whose behalf I wil
say thus much, that our Nation may only thinke herselfe beholding for
the glory and exact compendiousnes of our longuage_;" and the latter
expressly terming our poet, from the superiority of his diction and
versification, "_mellifluous and hony-tongued Shakspeare_."[475:A]
Reverting to the subject of National Literature, we proceed to notice
the progress which HISTORY, GENERAL, LOCAL AND PERSONAL, may be deemed
to have made, during the era to which we are limited.
History appears in every country to have been late in acquiring its
best and most legitimate form, and to have been usually preceded by
annals or chronicles, which, aspiring to no unity in arrangement,
and void of all political or philosophical deduction, were confined
to a bare chronological detail of facts. Such was the state of this
important branch of literature on the accession of Elizabeth; numerous
chroniclers had flourished from Robert of Gloucester to Fabian and
Hall, but with little to recommend them, except the minuteness of their
register, and the occasional illustration of manners and customs; and
more distinguishable for credulity and prolixity than for any other
characteristics.
The chronicle of _Holinshed_, however, which appeared in 1577, and a
second edition in 1587, merits a higher title. It is more full and
complete than any of its predecessors, and less loaded with trifling
matter. We are much indebted to Reginald Wolfe, the Queen's printer,
for stimulating the historian to the undertaking, who was assisted, in
his laborious task, by several able coadjutors, and particularly by the
Rev. _William Harrison_, whose _Description of England_, prefixed to
the first volume, is the most interesting and valuable document, as a
picture of the country, and of the costume, and mode of living of its
inhabitants, which the sixteenth century has produced.
The example of Holinshed was followed, towards the close of our period,
by _Stowe_ and _Speed_, writers more succinct in their narrative, more
correct in their style, and more philosophical in their matter. The
"History of Great Britain" by Speed, the second edition of which was
printed under the author's care in 1620, is, in every respect, a work
of very great merit, whether we consider its authorities, or the mode
in which it is written. It is in fact a production which may be read
with great pleasure and profit at the present day, and makes a nearer
approach, than any former chronicle, to the tone of legitimate history.
In the mean time, the more classical form of this branch of literature
was making a rapid progress. Numerous attempts were published,
partaking of a mixed character, neither assuming the dignity of
history, nor descending to the minuteness of the chronicle; Newton's
History of the Saracens[476:A] and Fulbeck's Account of the Roman
Factions, previous to the reign of Augustus[476:B], may be mentioned as
specimens; but the great historians of this period, who condescended
to use their native tongue, were Raleigh, Hayward, Knolles, Bacon,
and Daniel, writers who in this province still hold no inferior rank
among the classics of their country. The "History of the World," by
Sir Walter, exhibits great strength of style, and much solidity of
judgment; Hayward's Lives of the three Norman Kings, and of Henry the
IV. and Edward the VI., contain many curious facts to which sufficient
attention has not yet been paid; his diction is neat and smooth, but
he adopts too profusely the classical costume of framing speeches for
his principal characters. Knolles's "General History of the Turks" is
an elaborate and useful work, and its language is clear, nervous, and
often powerfully descriptive. Bacon's Henry the VIIth betrays too much
of the apologist for arbitrary power, but it is otherwise of great
value; it is written from original, and now lost, materials, with
vigour and philosophical acuteness. But these historians are excelled,
in purity of style and perspicuity of narration, by Daniel, whose
"History of England," closing with the reign of Edward the Third, is
a production which reflects great credit on the age in which it was
written.
We must not omit to mention, however, two historians, who, by rejecting
their vernacular language, and adopting that of ancient Rome, acquired
for a time a more extended celebrity in this department. Buchanan
and Camden are, or should be, familiar to all lovers of history and
topography. The "Rerum Scoticarum Historia" of the first of these
historians, and the "Annales Rerum Anglicanarum et Hibernicarum" of
the second, are productions in deserved estimation; the former for the
classical purity and taste exhibited in its composition, the latter for
its accuracy and impartiality.
Of that highly interesting and useful branch of History which is
included under the title of Voyages and Travels, the era of which we
are treating affords a most abundant harvest. The two great collectors,
_Hakluyt_ and _Purchas_, appear within its range, compilers, whose
industry and research need fear no rivalry. Hakluyt's first collection
was published in a small volume in 1582; was increased to a folio
in 1589, and to three volumes of the same size in 1598, containing
upwards of two hundred voyages. The still more ample work of Purchas
was commenced in 1613, by the publication of the first volume folio,
with the title of "Purchas, his Pilgrimage, or Relations of the World,
and the Religions observed in all Ages and Places discovered, from the
Creation unto this present; in four parts." This elaborate undertaking
was greatly augmented in subsequent editions, of which the fourth and
best was published in 1626, in five volumes folio, the last four being
entitled "_Hakluytus Posthumous_, or Purchas, his Pilgrims; containing
a history of the world, in sea-voyages, and land-travels, by Englishmen
and others." Purchas professes to include, in this immense compilation,
the substance of _above twelve hundred authors_; it contains also the
maps of Mercator and Hondius, and numerous engravings.
These vast and valuable collections are an honour to the reigns of
Elizabeth and James; and, notwithstanding the industry and research of
the moderns, have not yet been superseded.
To the gigantic labours of these writers, which include almost every
previous book on the subject of voyage or travel, may be added the
publications of two or three contemporaries of singular or useful
notoriety. In 1611, _Thomas Coryate_ printed the most remarkable of his
eccentric productions, under the quaint title of "Crudities hastily
gobbled up in five Months Travels, in France, Savoy, Italy, Rhetia,
Helvetia, some Parts of High Germany, and the Netherlands." Lond. large
4to. Coryate was a man of consummate vanity, of some learning, but of
no judgment. Inflamed with an inextinguishable desire of travelling,
he walked over a great part of Europe and Asia, terminating his life,
"in the midst of his Indian travail," about the year 1617. Nothing
can be more ridiculous than the style, and often the matter of his
book, which is preceded by nearly sixty copies of what Fuller calls
_mock-commending verses_. "Prince _Henry_," says the same writer,
"allowed him a pension, and kept him for his servant. _Sweet-meats_
and _Coriat_ made up the _last course_ at all _Court-entertainments_.
Indeed he was the courtier's _anvil_ to trie their witts upon, and
sometimes this _anvil_ returned the _hammers_ as hard knocks as it
received, his bluntnesse repaying their abusivenesse."[478:A]
A still greater pedestrian than even Coryate lived, at this time, in
the person of _William Lithgow_, who published his "Travels" in 1614.
His peregrinations were extended through Europe, Asia, and Africa, and
he declares, at the close of his book, that in his three voyages "his
painful feet have traced over (besides passages of seas and rivers)
thirty-six thousand and odd miles, which draweth near to twice the
circumference of the whole earth." His sufferings through the tyranny
of the Spanish governor of Malaga, who had tortured, robbed, and
imprisoned him, excited so much pity and indignation, that, on his
arrival in England, he was conveyed to Theobalds on a feather-bed,
being unable to stand, that King James might be an eye-witness of his
"martyred anatomy," as he terms the miserable condition to which his
body had been reduced. Lithgow's "Travels" are entertaining, and not
ill written, but they abound in the marvellous, and too often excite
the smile of incredulity.
The "Itinerary, or Ten Yeares Travell through Germany, Italy, England,"
&c. a folio volume by _Fines Moryson_, is a production of a far
different cast. Moryson is a sober-minded and veracious traveller,
and that part of his book which relates to the manners and customs of
England and Scotland is peculiarly useful and interesting. He was a
native of Lincolnshire, and fellow of Peter-house, Cambridge. "He began
his Travels," relates Fuller, "May the first, 1591, over a great part
of Christendome, and no small share of Turky, even to Jerusalem, and
afterwards printed his observations in a _large book_, which, for the
truth thereof, is in good reputation, for of so great a traveller, he
had nothing of a traveller in him, as to stretch in his reports. At
last he was _Secretary_ to _Charles Blunt_, Deputy of Ireland, saw and
wrote the conflicts with, and conquest of _Tyrone_, a discourse which
deserveth credit, because the writer's _eye_ guides his _pen_, and
the privacy of his place acquainted him with many secret passages of
importance. He dyed about the year of our Lord 1614."[479:A]
In that department of history which may be termed _local_, including
topography and antiquities, the latter half of the sixteenth century
had many cultivators. "Persons of greatest eminence in this sort of
learning under queen Elizabeth," remarks Nicolson, "were Humphrey
Lhuyd, John Twyne, William Harrison, and William Camden."[479:B]
Lluyd possessed unrivalled celebrity in his day, for Camden calls him
"a learned Briton, who, for knowledge in antiquities, was reputed
to carry, after a sort, with him, all the credit and honour." He
wrote a variety of tracts, among which is a fragment of a Commentary
on Britain; a Description of the Island of Mona; a Description of
the Coasts of Scotland; a Chorography of England and Wales; and a
Translation of Caradoc's History of Wales, subsequently published by
Powel, and again by Wynn. Lluyd practised physic at Denbigh in Wales,
and died there about the year 1570. His friend _John Twyne_, the
translator of his Commentarioli Britannicæ, under the title of The
Breviary of Britain, Lond. 1573, has been extolled also both by Lee
and Nicolson for his knowledge of the history and antiquities of his
country. He died in 1581, leaving behind him two books of Commentaries
on British History[480:A], which reached the press in 1590, and various
Collectanea relative to the antiquities of Britain.
We must here add to Bishop Nicolson's enumeration the name of _William
Lambarde_, the learned author of _Archaionomia, sive de priscis
Anglorum Legibus_, and of the _Perambulation of Kent_. This last
production, which was printed in 1570, is the prolific parent of our
county histories, works which have in our days very rapidly increased,
and which exhibit the estimation in which they are held, by the high
price annexed to their publication.
Of _Harrison_'s "Historical Description of the Island of Britain" we
have already taken due notice, and it would be superfluous, in this
place, to do more than mention the _Britannia_ of _Camden_. Proceeding
therefore to the reign of James, we have to increase the catalogue with
the names of _Stowe_, _Norden_, _Carew_, and _Burton_. The _Survey of
London_ by _Stowe_, is one of the most early, valuable, and interesting
of our topographical pieces; and on it has been founded the subsequent
descriptions of Hatton, Seymour, Maitland, Noorthouck, Pennant, and
Malcolm. _John Norden_ is well known to the lovers of topography by
his _Speculum Britanniæ_, which was meant to include the chorography
of England, but unfortunately extends no farther than the counties of
Middlesex and Hertfordshire. Norden was the projector of those useful
works familiarly termed _Guides_, having written a "Guide for English
Travellers," and a "Surveyor's Guide," both works of singular merit. He
died about the year 1625. _Richard Carew_, the author of the "Survey of
Cornwall," first printed in 1602, and termed, by Fuller, "the pleasant
and faithfull description of Cornwall," was educated at Christ-Church,
Oxford, where, at the early age of fourteen, though of three years'
standing in the University, "he was called out to dispute _extempore_,
before the Earls of _Leicester_ and _Warwick_, with the matchless Sir
_Philip Sidney_."[481:A] The Cornwall of Carew, though now superseded
by the more elaborate history of Dr. Borlase, is a compilation of great
merit, and makes a nearer approach than Lambarde's Kent to a perfect
model for county topography. Carew died in 1620.
_William Burton_, the last writer whom we shall mention under this
head, though contemporary with Shakspeare for more than forty years,
was not an author until six years after the poet's death, when he
published his "Description of Leicestershire," folio; a book which,
independent of its own utility, had the merit of stimulating Sir
William Dugdale to the composition of his admirable "History of
Warwickshire." Burton's work was justly considered as carrying forward,
on an improved scale, the plan of Lambarde and Carew; it is now,
however, thrown into the shade by the most copious, and, in every
respect, the most complete county history which this kingdom has
hitherto produced, the "Leicestershire" of Mr. Nichols. Burton was
the friend of Drayton, and brother to the author of the Anatomy of
Melancholy.
The third branch of History, the _personal_ or biographical, cannot
boast of any very celebrated cultivator during the period to which we
are confined. Many ephemeral sketches, it is true, were given of the
naval and military commanders of the day, at a time when enterprise
and adventure enjoyed the marked protection of government; but no
classical production in biography, properly so called, no enduring
specimen of personal history seems to have issued from the press; at
least we recollect no example, worth notice, in a separate form, and of
the general compilers in this province, we are reduced to mention the
names of _Fox_ and _Pits_. The "Acts and Monuments of the Church," by
the first of these writers, commonly called "Fox's Book of Martyrs," is
a mixed composition; but as consisting principally of personal detail
and anecdote, more peculiarly belonging to the department of biography.
The first edition of the "Martyrology" was published in London in 1563,
in one thick volume folio, and the fourth in 1583, four years before
the death of the author, in two volumes folio. This popular work, which
was augmented to three volumes folio in 1632, has undergone numerous
editions, and perhaps no book in our language has been more universally
read. "It may regarded," remarks Granger, "as a vast Gothic building:
in which some things are superfluous, some irregular, and others
manifestly wrong: but which, altogether, infuse a kind of religious
reverence; and we stand amazed at the labour, if not at the skill, of
the architect. This book was, by order of Queen Elizabeth, placed in
the common halls of archbishops, bishops, deans, archdeacons, and heads
of colleges; and was long looked upon with a veneration next to the
Scriptures themselves."[482:A]
John Pits, who died in 1616, was a writer, in not inelegant Latin, of
the lives of the Roman Catholic authors of England. His work, which was
published after his death, at Paris, in 1619, 4to. is usually known and
quoted by the title of _De illustribus Angliæ scriptoribus_. He is a
bold plagiarist from Bale, partial from religious bigotry, and often
inaccurate with regard to facts and dates.
To this summary of historical literature it will be necessary to add
a few remarks on the translations which were made, during the era
in question, from the Greek and Roman historians, as these would
necessarily have much influence on the public taste, and would throw
open to Shakspeare, and to those of his contemporaries who could not
readily appeal to the originals, many sources of imagery and fable. It
appears then, that from the year 1550 to the year 1616, all the great
historians of Greece and Rome, had been either wholly or in part,
familiarized in our language. That the Grecian classics were translated
with any large portion of fidelity and spirit, will not easily be
admitted, when we find their sense frequently taken from Latin or
French versions; but they still served to stimulate curiosity, and to
excite emulation. The two first books of _Herodotus_, 4to. appeared
in 1584; _Thucydides_ from the French of Claude de Seyssel, by Thomas
Nicolls, folio, in 1550; a great part of _Polybius_, by Christopher
Watson, 8vo. in 1568; _Diodorus Siculus_, by Thomas Stocker, 4to. in
1569; _Appian_, 4to. in 1578; _Josephus_, by Thomas Lodge, folio, in
1602; _Ælian_, by Abraham Fleming, 4to. in 1576; _Herodian_, from the
Latin version of Politianus, by Nycholas Smyth, 4to. in 1591; and
_Plutarch's Lives_, from the French of Amyot, by Sir Thomas North,
folio, in 1579.
The Roman writers were more generally naturalized, without the aid of
an intermediate version. _Livy_ and _Florus_ were given to the world
by Philemon Holland, folio, in 1600; _Tacitus_, by Sir Henry Saville
and Richard Grenaway, 4to. and folio, in 1591 and 1598; _Sallust_, by
Thomas Paynell, 4to., and by Thomas Heywood, folio, in 1557 and 1608;
_Suetonius_, by Philemon Holland, folio, 1606; _Cæsar_, by Arthur
Golding, 4to., 1565, and by Clement Edmundes, folio, 1600; _Justin_, by
Arthur Golding, 4to., 1564, and by Holland, 1606; _Quintus Curtius_, by
John Brande, 8vo., 1561; _Eutropius_, by Nic. Haward, 8vo., 1564, and
_Marcellinus_, by P. Holland, folio, 1609.
Such are the chief authors, original and translated, which, in the
province of History, general, local, and personal, added liberally to
the mass of information and utility which was rapidly accumulating
throughout the Shakspearean era.
That our great poet amply availed himself of these stores, more
particularly in those dramas which are founded on domestic and foreign
history, every attentive reader of his works must have adequate proof.
Several, indeed, of the writers that we have enumerated, though
exclusively belonging to our period, and throwing much light on the
manners, customs, and literature of their age, came rather too late
for the poet's purpose; but of those who published sufficiently early,
he has made the best use. Traces of his footsteps may be discerned in
many of the authors that we have mentioned, but his greatest inroads
seem to have been made through the compilations of _Holinshed_ and
_Hakluyt_, and through the version of _Plutarch_ by _North_. All that
was necessary in the _minutiæ_ of fact, was derivable from the labours
of the faithful _Holinshed_; much illustration was to be acquired from
the manners-painting pen of _Harrison_; a knowledge of the globe and
its marvels, was attainable in the narratives of _Hakluyt_; and the
character and costume of Greece and Rome were vividly delineated in the
delightful, though translated, pages of _Plutarch_. From these sources,
and from a few which existed previous to the commencement of the poet's
age, such as the _Froissart_ of _Lord Berners_, and the _Chronicle_ of
_Hall_, were drawn and coloured those exquisite pictures of manners,
history, and individual character, which fix and enrapture attention
throughout the dramatic annals of Shakspeare. Indeed, from whatever
mine the poet procured his ore, he uniformly purified it into metal
of the finest lustre, and it may truly be added, that on the study of
the "Histories" of Shakspeare, a more intimate acquaintance with human
nature may be founded, than on any other basis.
Whilst on the subject of _History_, we must deviate in a slight degree
from our plan, which excludes the detail of science, to notice two
works in _Natural History_, from which our bard has derived various
touches of imagery and description; I mean the Roman and the Gothic
Pliny, rendered familiar to our author by the labours of Holland,
and Batman; the former having published his Translation of Pliny's
immense collection in 1601, folio, and the latter his Commentary upon
Bartholome, under the title of "Batman uppon Bartholome his booke De
proprietatibus rerum," in 1582, folio. "Shakspeare," says Mr. Douce,
speaking of Batman's Bartholome, "was extremely well acquainted with
this work;" an assertion which he has sufficiently established in the
course of his "Illustrations."[485:A] Few, indeed, were the popular
books of his day, to which our author had not access, and from which he
has not derived some slight fact or hint conducive to his purpose.
We now approach the last branch of our present subject, _Miscellaneous
Literature_; a topic which, were we not restricted by various other
demands, might occupy a volume; for in no era of our annals have
miscellaneous writers been more abundant than during the reign of
Elizabeth.
A set of men at this time infested the town, in a high degree
dissipated in their manners, licentious in their morals, and vindictive
in their resentments, yet possessing a large share of native and
acquired talent. These adventurers, who hung loose upon society,
appear to have seized upon the press for the purpose of indulging an
unbounded love of ridicule and raillery, sometimes excited by the mere
spirit of badinage and frolic, more frequently stimulated by malignity
and revenge, and often goaded to the task by the pressure of deserved
poverty. The fertility of these writers is astonishing; the public was
absolutely deluged with their productions, which proved incidentally
useful, however, in their day, by the exposure of folly, and are
valuable, at this time, for the illustrations which they have thrown
upon the most evanescent portion of our manners and customs.
Another description of miscellaneous authors, consisted of those who,
attached to the discipline of the puritans, employed their pens in
inveighing with great bitterness against the dress and amusements of
the less rigid part of the community; and a third, equally distant from
the levity of the first, and the severity of the second, class, was
occupied in calmly discussing the various topics which morals, taste,
and literature supplied.
As examples of the first species, no age can produce more extraordinary
characters than _Nash_, _Decker_, and _Greene_; men intimately
acquainted with all the crimes, follies, and debaucheries of a
town-life, indefatigable as writers, and possessing the advantages
of learning and genius. _Thomas Nash_, whose character as a satirist
and critic, we have already given in a quotation from Dr. Lodge, died
about the year 1600, after a life spent in controversy and dissipation.
He had humour, wit, and learning, but debased by a plentiful portion
of scurrility and buffoonery; he was born at Leostoffe in Suffolk,
educated at Cambridge, where he resided as a Member of St. John's
College, nearly seven years, and obtained great celebrity, as the
confuter and silencer of the puritanical _Mar-prelates_, a service that
merited the reputation which it procured him. He was the boon companion
of _Robert Greene_, whose vices he shared, and with whom he acted as
the unrelenting scourge of the Harveys.
This terror of his opponents, this Aretine of England, though most
remarkable for his numerous prose pamphlets, was also a dramatic
poet. His productions, as enumerated by Mr. Beloe, amount to five and
twenty.[486:A]
_Thomas Decker_, an author still more prolific, began his career as a
dramatic poet about the year 1597, and as a prose writer in 1603. His
plays, now lost, preserved, or written in conjunction with others,
amount to twenty-eight; but it is in his capacity as a miscellanist
that we have here to notice him.
His tracts, of which thirty have been attributed to him, and near
five and twenty may be considered as genuine, clearly prove him to
have been an acute observer of the fleeting fashions of his age,
and a participator in all its follies and vices. His "Gul's Horne
Booke, or Fashions to please all sorts of Guls," first printed in
1609, exhibits a very curious, minute, and interesting picture of the
manners and habits of the middle class of society, and on this account
will be hereafter frequently referred to in these pages.[487:A] That
experience had tutored him in the knaveries of the metropolis, the
titles of the following pamphlets will sufficiently evince. "THE BELMAN
OF LONDON, bringing to Light the most notorious Villanies that are now
practised in the Kingdome," 1608; one of the earliest books professing
to disclose the slang of thieves and vagabonds; and remarks Warton,
from a contemporary writer, the most witty, elegant, and eloquent
display of the vices of London then extant.[487:B] "LANTHERN AND CANDLE
LIGHT: Or, The Bell-Man's Second Night's Walke. In which he brings
to light a Brood of more strange Villanies than ever were till this
Yeare discovered" 4to. 1612. "Villanies discovered by Lanthorn and
Candle Light, and the Helpe of a new Crier called O-per-se-O. Being an
Addition to the Belman's second Night's Walke, with canting Songs never
before printed." 4to. 1616. It will occasion no surprise, therefore,
if we find this describer of the arts and language of thieving himself
in a jail; he was, in fact, confined in the King's Bench prison from
1613 to 1616, if not longer. The most remarkable transaction of his
life appears to have been his quarrel with Ben Jonson, who, no doubt
sufficiently provoked, satirizes him in his _Poetaster_, 1601, under
the character of _Crispinus_; a compliment which Decker amply repaid
in his "Satiromastix, or the Untrussing of the humorous Poet," 1602,
where he lashes Ben without mercy, under the designation of Horace
Junior. Jonson replied in an address to the Reader, introduced in the
4to. edition of his play, in place of the epilogue, and points to
Decker, under the appellation of the _Untrusser_. Decker was an old
man in 1631, for in his _Match me in London_, published in that year,
he says: "I have been a priest in Apollo's Temple many years, my voice
is decaying with my age;" he probably died in 1639, the previous year
being the date of his latest production.
Of _Robert Greene_, the author of near fifty productions[488:A], the
history is so highly monitory and interesting as to demand more than
a cursory notice. It affords, indeed, one of the most melancholy
proofs of learning, taste, and genius being totally inadequate,
without a due control over the passions, to produce either happiness
or respectability. This misguided man was born at Norwich, about the
middle of the sixteenth century, of parents in genteel life and much
esteemed. He was sent to St. John's College, Cambridge, from whence, at
an early period of his education, he was, unfortunately for his future
peace of mind, induced to absent himself, on a tour through Italy and
Spain. His companions were wild and dissolute, and, according to his
own confession[488:B], he ran headlong with them into every species of
dissipation and vice.
On his return to England, he took his degree of Batchelor of Arts
at St. John's, in 1578, and afterwards, removing to Clare-hall, his
Master of Arts degree in that college, 1583. We learn, from one of his
numerous tracts, that, immediately after this event, he visited the
metropolis, where he led a life of unrestrained debauchery. Greene
was one of those men who are perpetually sinning and perpetually
repenting; he had a large share of wit, humour, fancy, generosity,
and good-nature, but was totally deficient in that strength of mind
which is necessary to resist temptation; he was conscious, too, of his
great abilities, but at the same time deeply conscious of the waste of
talent which had been committed to his care. When we find, therefore,
that he was intended for the church, and that he was actually
presented to the vicarage of Tollesbury, in Essex, on the 19th of
June, 1584[489:A], we may easily conceive how a man of his temperament
and habits would feel and act; he resigned it, in fact, the following
year, no doubt shocked at the disparity between his profession and
his conduct; for we find, from his own relation, that a few years
previous to this incident, he had felt extreme compunction on hearing
a sermon "preached by a godly learned man," in St. Andrew's Church,
Norwich.[489:B]
It was shortly after this period that he married; and, if any thing
could have saved Greene from himself, this was the expedient; for the
lady he had chosen was beautiful in her person, amiable and moral in
her character, and we know, from the works of this unhappy man, that
_his_ heart _had_ been the seat of the milder virtues, and that he
possessed a strong relish for domestic life.
The result of the experiment must lacerate the feelings of all who hear
it; for it exhibits, in a manner never surpassed, the best emotions
of our nature withering before the touch of Dissipation. The picture
is taken from a pamphlet of our author's, entitled "Never Too Late,"
printed in 1590, where his career is admirably and confessedly shadowed
forth under the character of the _Palmer Francesco_. It would appear
from this striking narrative, if the minutiæ, as well as the outline
of it, are applicable to Greene, that he married his wife contrary
to the wishes of her father; their pecuniary distress was great, but
prudence and affection enabled them to realize the following scene of
domestic felicity:—"Hee and Isabel joyntly together taking themselves
to a little cottage, began to be as Ciceronicall as they were amorous;
with their hands thrift coveting to satisfy their hearts thirst, and
to be as diligent in labours, as they were affectionate in loves; so
that the parish wherein they lived, so affected them for the course of
their life, that they were counted the very mirrors of methode; for
he being a scholer, and nurst up in the universities, resolved rather
to live by his wit, than any way to be pinched with want, thinking
this old sentence to be true, _the wishers and woulders were never
good householders_; therefore he applied himselfe in teaching of a
schoole, where by his industry, hee had not onely great favour, but
gate wealthe to withstand fortune. Isabel, that shee might seeme no
lesse profitable, then her husband carefull, fell to her needle, and
with her worke sought to prevent the injurie of necessitie. Thus they
laboured to maintain their loves, being as busie as bees, and as true
as turtles, as desirous to satisfie the world with their desert, as
to feede the humours of their own desires. Living thus in a league of
united virtues, out of this mutuall concord of conformed perfection,
they had a sonne answerable to their owne proportion, which did
increase their amitie, so as the sight of their young infant was a
double ratifying of their affection. Fortune and love thus joyning in
league, to make these parties to forget the stormes, that had nipped
the blossom of their former yeres."[490:A]
The poetry of Greene abounds still more than his prose with the most
exquisite delineations of rural peace and content, and the following
lines feelingly paint this short and only happy period of his life:—
"Sweet are the thoughts that savour of content,
The quiet minde is richer than a crowne:
Sweete are the nights in carelesse slumber spent,
The poor estate scornes Fortune's angry frowne:
Such sweete content, such mindes, such sleepe, such blis,
Beggers injoy, when princes oft doe mis.
The homely house that harbours quiet rest,
The cottage that affoords no pride nor care,
The meane that grees with country musicke best,
The sweete consort of mirth and musick's fare,
Obscured life sets downe a type of blis,
A minde content both crowne and kingdome is."[491:A]
Deeply is it to be lamented, and with a sense, too, of humiliation for
the frailty of human nature, that, with such inducements to a moral
and rational life, with sufficient to support existence comfortably,
for he had some property of his own, and his wife's dowry had been
paid[491:B], and with a child whom he loved, and with a wife whom
he confesses was endowed with all that could endear and dignify her
sex, he could suffer his passions so far to subdue his reason, as to
throw these essentials towards happiness away! In the year 1586 he
abandoned this amiable woman and her son, to revel in all the vicious
indulgences of the metropolis. The causes of this iniquitous desertion
may be traced in his works; from these we learn that, in the first
place, she had endeavoured, and perhaps too importunately for such
an irritable character, to reform his evil propensities[491:C], and
secondly that on a visit to London on business, he had been fascinated
by the allurements of a courtesan[491:D], and on this woman, whose name
was Ball, and on her infamous relations, for her brother was afterwards
hanged[491:E], he squandered both his own property and that of his wife.
It is almost without a parallel that during the remainder of Greene's
life, including only six years, he was continually groaning with
anguish and repentance, and continually plunging into fresh guilt; that
in his various tracts he was confessing his sins with the deepest
contrition, passionately apostrophizing his injured wife, imploring her
forgiveness in the most pathetic terms, and describing, in language the
most touching and impressive, the virtue of her whom he had so basely
abandoned.
He tells us, under the beautifully drawn character of Isabel, by
whom he represents his wife, that upon her being told, by one of his
friends, of his intended residence in London, and by another, of the
attachment which had fixed him there, she would not at first credit the
tale; but, when convinced, she hid her face, and inwardly smothered
her sorrows, yet grieving at his follies, though unwilling to hear him
censured by others, and at length endeavouring to solace her affliction
by repeating to her cittern some applicable verses from the Italian of
Ariosto. He then adds, that she subsequently hinted her knowledge of
the amour to him in a letter, saying "the onely comfort that I have in
thine absence is the child, who lies on his mother's knee, and smiles
as wantonly as his father when he was a wooer. But, when the boy sayes,
'Mam where is my dad, when wil he come home;' then the calm of my
content turneth to a present storm of piercing sorrow, that I am forced
sometime to say, 'unkinde Francesco that forgets his Isabell. I hope
Francesco it is thine affaires, not my faults, that procure this long
delay."[492:A]
The following pathetic song seems to have been suggested to Greene
by the scene just described, and is a further proof of the singular
disparity subsisting between his conduct and his feelings:—
"BY A MOTHER TO HER INFANT.
WEEPE not, my Wanton, smile upon my knee,
When thou art old theres griefe enough for thee.
Mothers wagge, prettie boy,
Fathers sorrow, fathers joy;
When thy father first did see
Such a boy by him and me,
He was glad, I was woe,
Fortune changd made him so,
When he had left his prettie boy,
Last his sorrow, first his joy.
Weepe not, my Wanton, smile upon my knee,
When thou art old theres griefe enough for thee.
Streaming teares that never stint,
Like pearle drops from a flint,
Fell by course from his eies,
That one anothers place supplies.
Thus he grieved in every part,
Teares of bloud fell from his heart,
When he left his prettie boy,
Fathers sorrow, fathers joy.
Weep not, my Wanton, smile upon my knee,
When thou art old theres griefe enough for thee.
The wanton smilde, father wept,
Mother cried, babie lept;
Now he crow'd more he cride,
Nature could not sorrow hide;
He must goe, he must kisse
Childe and mother, babie blisse,
For he left his prettie boy,
Fathers sorrow, fathers joy.
Weep not, my Wanton, smile upon my knee,
When thou art old theres griefe enough for thee."[493:A]
In the mean time he pursued his career of debauchery in Town, whilst
his forsaken wife retired into Lincolnshire. In July 1588, he was
incorporated at Oxford, at which time, says Wood, he was "a pastoral
sonnet maker, and author of several things which were pleasing to men
and women of his time: they made much sport, and were valued among
scholars."[493:B] In short, such had been the extravagance of Greene,
that he was now compelled to write for his daily support, and his
biographers, probably without any sufficient foundation, have chosen to
consider him as the first of our poets who wrote for bread. It should
be recorded, however, that his pen was employed not only for himself
but for his wife; for Wood tells us, and it is a mitigating fact which
has been strangely overlooked by every other writer, that he "_wrote
to maintain his wife_, and that high and loose course of living which
poets generally follow."[494:A] We have reason, indeed, to conclude,
that the income which he derived from his literary labours was
considerable, for his popularity as a writer of prose pamphlets, which,
as Warton observes, may "claim the appellation of satires[494:B]," was
unrivalled. Ben Jonson alludes to them in his _Every Man out of his
Humour_[494:C], and Sir Thomas Overbury, describing a chamber-maid,
says "_she reads Greenes works over and over_; but is so carried away
with the Mirror of Knighthood, she is many times resolv'd to run out of
herself, and become a lady-errant."[494:D]
It must be confessed that many of the prose tracts of Greene are
licentious and indecent; but there are many also whose object is useful
and whose moral is pure. They are written with great vivacity, several
are remarkable for the most poignant raillery, all exhibit a glowing
warmth of imagination, and many are interspersed with beautiful and
highly polished specimens of his poetical powers. On those which are
employed in exposing the machinations of his infamous associates, he
seems to place a high value, justly considering their detection as an
essential service done to his country; and he fervently thanks his
God for enabling him so successfully to lay open the "most horrible
Coosenages of the common Conny-Catchers, Cooseners and Crosse Biters,"
names which in those days designated the perpetrators of every species
of deception and knavery.[494:E]
But the most curious and interesting of his numerous pieces, are those
which relate to his own character, conduct, and repentance. The titles
of these, as they best unfold the laudable views with which they were
written, we shall give at length.
1. _Greene's Mourning Garment_, given him by Repentance at the Funerals
of Love, which he presents for a Favour to all young Gentlemen that
wishe to weane themselves from wanton Desires. Both pleasant and
profitable. By R. Greene, Utriusque Academiæ in Artibus Magister. Sero
sed serio. Lond. 1590.
2. _Greene's Never Too Late._ Sent to all youthful Gentlemen,
decyphering in a true English Historie those particular vanities,
that with their frosty vapours nip the Blossomes of every Braine from
attaining to his intended perfection. As pleasant as profitable, being
a right Pumice Stone, apt to race out Idlenesse with delight and Folly
with admonition. By Robert Greene, In Artibus Magister. Lond. 1590.
3. _Greene's Groatsworth of Wit._ Bought with a million of Repentance,
describing the Folly of Youth, the Falshood of make-shift Flatteries,
the Miserie of the Negligent, and Mishaps of deceyving Courtezans.
Published at his dying Request, and newly corrected and of many errors
purged. Felicem fuisse infaustum. Lond. 1592.
4. _Greene's Farewell to Follie._ Sent to Courtiers and Scholers, as a
President to warne them from the vaine Delights that drawe Youth on to
Repentance. Sero sed serio. By Robert Greene.
5. _The Repentance of Robert Greene_, Maister of Artes. Wherein, by
himselfe, is laid open his loose Life, with the Manner of his Death.
Lond. 1592.
6. _Greene's Vision._ Written at the instant of his death, conteyning
a penitent Passion for the folly of his Pen. Sero sed serio. By Robert
Greene.
In these publications the author has endeavoured to make all the
reparation in his power, by exposing his own weakness and folly, by
detailing the melancholy effects of his dissipation, and by painting in
the most impressive terms the contrition which he so bitterly felt.
In what exquisite poetry he could deplore his vicious habits, and by
what admirable precepts he could direct the conduct of others, will be
learnt from two extracts taken from his "Never Too Late," in the first
of which the Penitent Palmer, the intended symbol of himself, repeats
the following ode:
"Whilome in the Winter's rage,
A Palmer old and full of age,
Sate and thought upon his youth,
With eyes, teares, and hart's ruth,
Beeing all with cares yblent,
When he thought on yeeres mispent,
When his follies came to minde,
How fond love had made him blinde,
And wrapt him in a fielde of woes,
Shadowed with pleasures shoes,
Then he sighed, and sayd, alas!
Man is sinne, and flesh is grasse.
I thought my mistres hairs were gold,
And in her locks my harte I folde;
Her amber tresses were the sight
That wrapped me in vaine delight:
Her ivorie front, her pretie chin,
Were stales that drew me on to sin:
Her starry lookes, her christall eyes,
Brighter than the sunnes arise:
Sparkling pleasing flames of fire,
Yoakt my thoughts and my desire,
That I gan cry ere I blin,
Oh her eyes are paths to sin.
Her face was faire, her breath was sweet,
All her lookes for love was meete:
But love is folly this I know,
And beauty fadeth like to snow.
Oh why should man delight in pride,
Whose blossome like a dew doth glide:
When these supposes taught my thought,
That world was vaine, and beautie nought,
I gan to sigh, and say, alas!
Man is sinne, and flesh is grasse."[496:A]
The second extract, entitled _The Farewell of a friend_, is supposed to
be addressed to Francesco the Palmer, "by one of his companions;" such
an one, indeed, as might have saved him from ruin, had he sought for
the original in real life.
"Let God's worship be thy morning's worke, and his wisdome the
direction of thy dayes labour.
"Rise not without thankes, nor sleepe not without repentance.
"Choose but a few friends, and try those; for the flatterer speakes
fairest.
"If thy wife be wise, make her thy secretary; else locke thy thoughts
in thy heart, for women are seldome silent.
"If she be faire, be not jealous; for suspition cures not womens
follies.
"If she be wise, wrong her not; for if thou lovest others she will
loath thee.
"Let thy children's nurture be their richest portion: for wisdome is
more precious than wealth.
"Be not proude amongst thy poore neighbours; for a poore mans hate is
perillous.
"Nor too familiar with great men; for presumption winnes
disdaine."[497:A]
The virtues of Greene were, it is to be apprehended, confined to his
books, they were theoretical rather than practical; for, however
sincere might be his repentance at the moment, or determined his
resolution to reform, the impression seems to have been altogether
transient; he continued to indulge, with few interruptions, his vicious
course, until a death, too accordant with the dissipated tissue of his
life, closed the melancholy scene. He died, says Wood, about 1592,
of a surfeit taken by eating pickled herrings and drinking Rhenish
wine.[497:B] It appears that his friend Nash was of the party.
Of the debauchery, poverty, and misery of Greene, Gabriel Harvey,
with whom he had carried on a bitter personal controversy, has left us
a highly-coloured description. If the last scene of his life be not
exaggerated by this inveterate opponent, it presents us with a picture
of distress the most poignant and pathetic upon record.
"I once bemoned," relates Harvey, "the decayed and blasted estate of
_M. Gascoigne_, who wanted not some commendable parts of conceit, and
endevour: but unhappy _M. Gascoigne_, how lordly happy, in comparison
of most unhappy _M. Greene_? He never envyed me so much as I pitied him
from my hart; especially when his hostesse _Isam_, with teares in her
eies, and sighes from a deeper fountaine (for she loved him deerely)
tould me of his lamentable begging of a penny pott of Malmesie;—and
how he was faine poore soule, to borrow her husbandes shirte, whiles
his owne was a washing: and how his dublet, and hose, and sworde were
sold for three shillings: and beside the charges of his winding sheete,
which was four shillinges, and the charges of his buriall yesterday in
the New-church yard neere Bedlam, which was six shillinges and foure
pence; how deeply hee was indebted to her poore husbande: as appeered
by hys owne bonde of tenne poundes: which the good woman kindly shewed
me: and beseeched me to read the writing beneath; which was a letter to
his abandoned wife, in the behalfe of his gentle host: not so short as
persuasible in the beginning, and pittifull in the ending.
_Doll_,
_I charge thee by the love of our youth, and by my soules rest,
that thou wilte see this man paide: for if hee and his wife had
not succoured me, I had died in the streetes._
ROBERT GREENE."[498:A]
The pity which Harvey assumes upon this occasion may justly be
considered as hypocritical; for the pamphlet whence the above extract
has been taken, abounds in the most rancorous abuse and exaggerated
description of the vices of Greene, and contains, among other
invectives, a sonnet unparalleled, perhaps, for the keen severity
of its irony, and for the dreadful solemnity of tone in which it is
delivered. It is put into the mouth of _John Harvey_, the physician,
who had been dead some years, but who had largely participated of the
torrent of satire which Greene had poured upon his brothers, Gabriel
and Richard. If it be the composition of Gabriel, and there is reason
to suppose this to be the case, from the tract in which it appears, it
must be deemed infinitely superior, in point of poetical merit, to any
thing else which he has written.
JOHN HARVEY THE PHYSICIAN'S WELCOME TO ROBERT GREENE!
"COME, fellow _Greene_, come to thy gaping grave,
Bid Vanity and Foolery farewell,
That overlong hast plaid the mad-brained knave,
And overloud hast rung the bawdy bell.
Vermine to vermine must repair at last;
No fitter house for busie folke to dwell;
Thy conny-catching pageants are past,
Some other must those arrant stories tell:
These hungry wormes thinke long for their repast;
Come on; I pardon thy offence to me;
It was thy living; be not so aghast!
A Fool and a Physitian may agree!
And for my brothers never vex thyself;
They are not to disease a buried elfe."[499:A]
We have entered thus fully into the character and writings of Greene,
from the circumstance of his having been the most popular miscellaneous
author of his day, from the striking talent and genius which his
productions display, and from the moral lesson to be drawn from his
conduct and his sufferings. It may be useful to remark here, that a
well chosen selection from his pamphlets, now all extremely rare,
would furnish one of the most elegant and interesting volumes in the
language.[500:A]
Of the next class of miscellaneous writers, those derived from that
part of the community which adhered to the tenets and discipline
of the Puritans, and who employed their pens chiefly in satirizing
their less enthusiastic neighbours, it will be sufficient to notice
two, who have attracted a more than common share of attention, as
well for the rancour of their animadversion, as for their rooted
antipathy to the stage. The first of these, _Stephen Gosson_, was
educated at Christ Church, Oxford; on leaving the University, he went
to London, where he commenced poet and dramatist, and, according to
Wood, "for his admirable penning of pastorals, was ranked with Sir
P. Sidney, Tho. Chaloner, Edm. Spencer, Abrah. Fraunce, and Rich.
Bernfield."[500:B] His dramatic writings, which consist of a tragedy,
founded on Cataline's conspiracy, a comedy, and a morality, were
never printed. Of his devotion to the Muses, however, he soon after
heartily repented, as of a most heinous sin; for, imbibing the sour
severity of the Puritans, he left the metropolis, became tutor in a
gentleman's family, in the country, and subsequently took orders,
declaiming in a style so vehement against the amusements of his early
days, as to acquire a great share of popular notoriety. The work by
which he is best known is entitled "_The Schoole of Abuse_. Conteining
a pleasaunt Invective against Poets, Plaiers, Jesters, and such like
Caterpillers, of a Comonwelth; setting up the Flagge of Defiance
to their mischievous exercise, and overthrowing their Bulwarkes by
prophane Writers, naturall Reason and common experience. A Discourse
as pleasaunt for Gentlemen that favour learning, as profitable for all
that wyll follow vertue. By Stephen Gosson, Stud. Oxon." London, 1597.
This was speedily followed by another attack in a pamphlet termed,
"_Playes confuted in five Actions_, &c. Proving that they are not to
be suffred in a christian common weale, &c.[501:A];" a philippic which
he dedicated to Sir Francis Walsingham, as he had done his _Schoole_
to Sir Philip Sidney; both of whom considered the liberty which he had
taken, rather in the light of an insult than a compliment.
The warfare of Gosson, however, was mildness itself, compared with that
which _Philip Stubbes_ carried on against the same host of poetical
sinners. This puritanical zealot, whose work we have repeatedly quoted,
commenced his attack upon the public in the year 1583, by publishing
in small 8vo. the first edition of his "_Anatomie of Abuses_:
contayning a discoverie, or briefe summarie of such notable vices and
imperfections as now rayne in many Christian Countreyes of the Worlde:
but (especiallie) in a verie famous Ilande called Ailgna: &c." A second
impression, which now lies before me, was printed in 1595, 4to. and
both it and the octavo are among the scarcest of Elizabethan books.
"Stubbes," remarks Mr. Dibdin, "did what he could, in his _Anatomy of
Abuses_, to disturb every social and harmless amusement of the age. He
was the forerunner of that snarling satirist, Prynne; but I ought not
thus to cuff him, for fear of bringing upon me the united indignation
of a host of black-letter critics and philologists. A _large and clean_
copy of his sorrily printed work, is among the choicest treasures of a
Shakspearean virtuoso." He subjoins, in a note, commencing in the true
spirit of bibliomaniacism, that "Sir John Hawkins calls this 'a curious
and very scarce book;' and so does my friend, Mr. Utterson; who revels
in his morrocco-coated copy of it—'_Exemplar olim Farmerianum!_'" Then
proceeding more soberly, he adds, "Let us be candid, and not sacrifice
our better judgments to our book-passions. After all, Stubbes's work
is a caricatured drawing. It has strong passages, and a few original
thoughts; and is, moreover, one of the very few works printed in days
of yore, which have running titles to the subjects discussed in them.
These may be recommendations with the bibliomaniac: but he should be
informed that this volume contains a great deal of puritanical cant,
and licentious language: that vices are magnified in it in order to be
lashed, and virtues diminished that they might not be noticed. Stubbes
equals Prynne in his anathemas against Plays and Interludes; and in his
chapters upon 'Dress' and 'Dancing,' he rakes together every coarse
and pungent phrase in order to describe 'these horrible sins' with due
severity. He is sometimes so indecent, that, for the credit of the age,
and of a virgin reign, we must hope that every virtuous dame threw the
copy of his book, which came into her possession, behind the fire. This
may reasonably account for its present rarity."[502:A]
Of the tone in which Stubbes book is written no inaccurate judgment
may be formed from the various passages which we have already quoted;
but the following short extract will more fully develope perhaps,
the acrimony of his pen than any paragraph that has yet been brought
forward. He is speaking of the neglect of Fox's Book of Martyrs,
"whilst other toyes, fantasies and bableries," he adds, "wherof the
world is ful, are suffered to be printed. Then prophane schedules,
sacraligious libels, and hethnical pamphlets of toyes and bableries
(the authors whereof may vendicate to themselves no smal commendations,
at the hands of the devil for inventing the same) corrupt men's mindes,
pervert good wits, allure to baudrie, induce to whordome, suppresse
virtue and erect vice: which thing how should it be otherwise? for
are they not invented and excogitat by Belzebub, written by Lucifer,
licensed by Pluto, printed by Cerberus, and set a broche to sale by the
infernal furies themselves to the poysning of the whole world."[502:B]
The works of Gosson and Stubbes are now chiefly valuable for the
numerous illustrations which they incidentally give of the manners,
customs, dress, and diversions, of their age, and especially for the
light which they throw on the character and costume of the stage.
The progress of discussion has at length brought us to the _third_
class of Miscellaneous Writers, who may be considered as possessing a
more decorous and philosophic cast in composition than the authors who
have just fallen beneath our notice. The individuals of this genus,
too, are numerous, but we shall content ourselves with the mention
of three, who were more than usually popular in their day, _Thomas
Lodge_, _Abraham Fleming_, and _Gervase Markham_. Lodge was educated at
Oxford, which he entered about 1573; he took his degree of Doctor of
Medicine at Avignon, and practised as a physician in London, where he
died in 1625. He was a dramatic poet as well a miscellaneous writer,
and was considered by his contemporaries as a man of uncommon genius.
He appears to have been, not only a scholar, but a man of the world, to
have possessed no small share of wit and humour, and to have uniformly
wielded his pen in support of morality and good order. Of his pieces
no doubt many have perished; in his professional capacity, only one
remains, a _Treatise on the Plague_; but the productions which acquired
him most celebrity were written to expose the follies and vices of the
times, and of these, about half a dozen are preserved. He is now best
known by his "_Wits Miserie and the Worlds Madnesse_. Discovering the
Devils incarnate of this Age. Lond. 1596:" a tract which, although
so extremely rare as to be in the possession of only one or two
collectors, has been frequently quoted, owing to its containing some
interesting notices of contemporary writers. The principal faults in
the literary character of Lodge seem to have been a love of quaintness
and affectation; the very titles of his pamphlets indicate the former;
the alliteration in the one just transcribed is notorious, and
another is termed "Catharos. Diogenes in his Singularitie. Wherein
is comprehended his merrie baighting fit for all men's benefits:
Christened by him, A Nettle for Nice Noses, 1591." From a passage in
_The Returne from Pernassus_ it is evident that he was thought to be
deeply tainted with Euphuism, the literary folly of his time. The poet
is speaking of Lodge and Watson, both, he says,
—— "subject to a crittick's marginall.
_Lodge_ for his oare in every paper boate,
He that turnes over Galen every day,
To sit and simper Euphue's legacy."[504:A]
_Abraham Fleming_, the corrector and enlarger of the second edition
of Holinshed's Chronicle in 1585, was prodigiously fertile, both as
an original writer and a translator. In the latter capacity he gave
versions of the Bucolics and Georgics of Virgil, both in rhyme of
fourteen feet, 1575, and in the regular Alexandrine without rhyme,
1589; of Ælian's Various History in 1576; of Select Epistles of Cicero,
1576, and in the same year, a _Panoplie of Epistles from Tully,
Isocrates, Pliny, and others_; of the Greek Panegyric of Synesius,
and of various Latin works of the fifteenth century. As an original
miscellaneous writer, his pieces are still more numerous, and, for the
most part, occupied by moral and religious subjects; for example, one
is called _The Cundyt of Comfort_, 1579; a second, _The Battel between
the Virtues and Vices_, 1582, and a third _The Diamond of Devotion_,
1586. This last is so singularly quaint both in its title-page and
divisions, so superior, indeed, in these departments, to the titles
of his contemporary Lodge, and so indicative of the curious taste of
the times in the methodical arrangement of literary matter, as to call
for a further description. The complete title runs thus: "The Diamond
of Devotion: Cut and squared into sixe severall pointes: namelie, 1.
The Footepath of Felicitie. 2. A Guide to Godlines. 3. The Schoole
of Skill. 4. A swarme of Bees. 5. A Plant of Pleasure. 6. A Grove of
Graces. Full of manie fruitfull lessons availeable unto the leading
of a godlie and reformed life." The _Footepath of Felicitie_ has
ten divisions, concluding with a "looking glasse for the Christian
reader;" the _Guide to Godlines_, is divided into three branches,
and these branches into so many blossoms; the first branch containing
four blossoms, the second thirteen, and the third ten; the _Schoole
of Skill_ is digested into three sententious sequences of the A. B.
C.; the _Swarme of Bees_ is distributed into ten honeycombs, including
two hundred lessons; the _Plant of Pleasure_ bears fourteen several
flowers, in prose and verse; the _Grove of Graces_ exhibits forty-two
plants, or Graces, for dinner and supper, and the volume concludes with
"a briefe praier."
From the specimens which we have seen of Fleming's composition, it
would appear, that his affectation was principally confined to his
title pages and divisions: for his prose is more easy, natural, and
perspicuous, than most of his contemporaries. He was rector of Saint
Pancras, Soper-lane, and died in 1607.[505:A]
_Gervase Markham_, whom we have incidentally mentioned in various parts
of this work, was the most indefatigable writer of his era. He was
descended of an ancient family in Nottinghamshire, and commenced author
about the year 1592. The period of his death is not ascertained; but he
must have attained a good old age, for he fought for Charles the First,
and obtained a Captain's commission in his army. His education had been
very liberal, for he was esteemed a good classical scholar, and he was
well versed in the French, Italian, and Spanish languages. As he was
a younger son it is probable that his finances were very limited, and
that he had recourse to his pen as an additional means of support. "He
seems," remarks Sir Egerton Brydges, "to have become a general compiler
for the booksellers, and his various works had as numerous impressions
as those of Burn and Buchan in our days."[505:B] No subject, indeed,
appears to have been rejected by Markham; _husbandry_, _huswifry_,
_farriery_, _horsemanship_, and _military tactics_, _hunting_,
_hawking_, _fowling_, _fishing_, and _archery_, _heraldry_, _poetry_,
_romances_, and the _drama_:—all shared his attention and exercised
his genius and industry.[506:A] His popularity, in short, in all
these various branches was unrivalled; and such was his reputation as
a cattle doctor, that the booksellers, aware of the value of his works
of this kind in circulation, got him to sign a paper in 1617, in which
he bound himself not to publish any thing further on the diseases of
"horse, oxe, cowe, sheepe, swine, goates, &c." His books on agriculture
were not superseded until the middle of the eighteenth century, and
the fifteenth impression of his _Cheap and Good Husbandry_, which
was originally published in 1616, is now before us, dated 1695. Nor
were his works on rural amusements less relished; for his _Country
Contentments_, the first edition of which appeared in 1615, had reached
the eleventh in 1675. The same good fortune attended him even as a
poet, for in _England's Parnassus_, 1600, he is quoted thirty-four
times, forming the largest number of extracts taken from any minor
bard in the book. He appears to have been an enthusiast in all that
relates to field-sports, and his works, now becoming scarce, are, in
many respects, curious and interesting, and display great versatility
of talent. By far the greater part of them, as is evident from their
dates, was written before the year 1620, though many were subsequently
corrected and enlarged.
Having thus given a sketch of three great classes of miscellaneous
writers, it will be necessary to add some notice of a few circumstances
which more peculiarly distinguished this branch of literature during
the life-time of our poet.
It is to the reign of Elizabeth, that we have to ascribe the origin
of genuine printed _Newspapers_, a mode of publication which has now
become absolutely essential to the wants of civilised life. The epoch
of the Spanish invasion forms that of this interesting innovation,
for, previous to the daring attempt of Spain, all public news had
been circulated in manuscript, and it was left to the sagacity of
Elizabeth and the legislative prudence of Burleigh to discover,
how highly useful, in this agitated crisis, would be a more rapid
circulation of events, through the medium of the press. Accordingly,
in April 1588, when the formidable Armada approached the shores of
old England, appeared the first number of _The English Mercury_. That
it was published very frequently, is evident from the circumstance
that No. 50, the earliest number now preserved, and which is in the
British Museum, Sloane MSS., No. 4106, is dated the 23d of July 1588.
It resembles the London Gazette of the present day, with respect to
the nature of its articles, one of which presents us with this curious
information:—"Yesterday the Scotch Ambassador had a private audience
of Her Majesty, and delivered a letter from the King his master,
containing the most cordial assurances of adhering to Her Majesty's
interests, and to those of the protestant religion; and the young King
said to Her Majesty's minister at his court, that all the favour he
expected from the Spaniards was, the courtesy of Polyphemus to Ulysses,
that he should be devoured the last."[508:A]
So rapid was the progress of newspapers after this memorable
introduction, that towards the close of the reign of James, Ben
Jonson, in his _Staple of News_, alludes to them, as fashionable among
all ranks of people, and as sought after with the utmost avidity,
one consequence of which was, that the greater part of what was
communicated was fabricated on the spot. To this grievance the poet
refers in an address to his readers, where, speaking of spurious
news, he calls it "news made like the Times news, (a weekly cheat
to draw money,) and could not be fitter reprehended, than in raising
this ridiculous office of the Staple, wherein the age may see her own
folly, or _hunger and thirst after published pamphlets of news, set
out every Saturday_, but made all at home, and no syllable of truth in
them."[509:A]
Another branch of miscellaneous literature which may be said to
have originated at this period, was that employed in the writing
of _Characters_; a species of composition which, if well executed,
necessarily throws much light on the manners and customs of its age.
A claim to the first legitimate collection of this kind, may be
allotted, on the authority of Fuller, to Sir Thomas Overbury; "he was,"
says that entertaining compiler, "the first writer of _Characters_
of our nation, so far as I have observed."[509:B] With the exception
of two small tracts, descriptive of the characters of rogues and
knaves[509:C], this assertion appears to be correct. Few works have
been more popular than Overbury's volume; it was printed several times,
according to Wood, before the author's death in 1613; but the earliest
edition now usually met with, is dated 1614, and is, with great
probability, supposed to be the fifth impression, for the sixth, which
is not uncommon, was published the subsequent year. Various alterations
took place in the title-page of this miscellany, but that of 1614 is
as follows:—"A Wife now the Widdow of Sir Thomas Overbury. Being a
most exquisite and singular Poem of the Choice of a Wife. Whereunto are
added many witty Characters, and conceited Newes, written by himselfe
and other learned Gentlemen his friends.
Dignum laude virum musa vetat mori,
Cælo musa beat.
Hor. Car. lib. iii.
London, Printed for Lawrence Lisle, and are to bee sold at his shop
in Paule's Church-yard, at the signe of the Tiger's head. 1614.
4to."[510:A] The characters in this edition amount to twenty-two,
but were augmented in the eleventh, printed in 1622, to eighty.
So extensive was the sale of this collection, that the sixteenth
impression appeared in 1638.
Both the poem and the characters exhibit no small share of talent
and discrimination. In Overbury's Wife, observes Mr. Neve, "the
sentiments, maxims, and observations with which it abounds, are such
as a considerable experience and a correct judgment on mankind alone
could furnish. The topics of jealousy, and of the credit and behaviour
of women, are treated with great truth, delicacy and perspicuity.
The nice distinctions of moral character, and the pattern of female
excellence here drawn, contrasted as they were with the heinous and
flagrant enormities of the Countess of Essex, rendered this poem
extremely popular, when its ingenious author was no more."[510:B] The
prose characters, though rather too antithetical in their style, are
drawn with a masterly hand, and are evidently the result of personal
observation.
Numerous imitations of both were soon brought forward; in 1614 appeared
"The Husband. A poeme expressed in a compleat man;" small 8vo.: and in
1616, "A Select Second Husband for Sir Thomas Overburie's Wife; now
a matchlesse Widow:" small 8vo.; which were followed by many others.
The prose characters established a still more durable precedent, for
they continued to form a favourite mode of composition for better than
a century. Of these the most immediate offspring were, "Satyrical
Characters" by John Stephens, 8vo. 1615, and "The Good and the Badde,
or Description of the Worthies and Unworthies of this Age. Where the
Best may see their Graces, and the Worst discerne their Basenesse,"
by Nicholas Breton, 4to. 1616. Perhaps the most valuable collection
of characters, previous to the year 1700, is that published by Bishop
Earle, in 1628, under the title of _Microcosmography_, and which may
be considered as a pretty faithful delineation of many classes of
characters as they existed during the close of the sixteenth, and
commencement of the seventeenth, century.[511:A]
One of the earliest attempts at miscellaneous _Essay-writing_, since
become a most fashionable and popular species of literary composition,
may likewise very justly be ascribed to a similar epoch. In 1601,
Thomas Wright published in small octavo a collection of Essays, on
various subjects, which he entitled _The Passions of the Minde_.
This volume, consisting of 336 pages independent of the preface, was
re-issued from the press in 1604, enlarged by nearly as much more
matter, and in a quarto form; and a third edition in the same size
appeared in 1621.
The work is divided into six books, and, from the specimens which
we have seen, is undoubtedly the production of a practised pen and
a discerning mind. It is termed by Mr. Haslewood, "an amusing and
instructive collection of philosophical essays, upon the customary
pursuits of the mind;" and he adds, "though a relaxation of manners
succeeded the gloomy history of the cowl, and the abolition of the dark
cells of superstition; it was long before the moralist ventured to draw
either example, or precept, from any other source than Scripture, and
the writings of the fathers. Genius run riot in some instances from
excess of liberty, but the calm, rational, and universal essayist was a
character unknown. In the present work there are passages that possess
no inconsiderable portion of ease, spirit, and freedom, diversified
with character and anecdote that prove the author mingled with the
world to advantage; and could occasionally lighten the hereditary
shackles that burthened the moral and philosophical writer."[512:A]
It is, however, to the profound genius of _Lord Bacon_ that we must
attribute the _earliest legitimate_ specimen of essay-writing in this
country; for though his "Essays on Councils, Civil and Moral," were
not completed until 1612, the first part of them was printed in 1597;
and in the intended dedication to Prince Henry of this second edition,
he assigns his reason for adopting the term _essay_. "To write just
treatises," he observes, "requires leisure in the writer, and leisure
in the reader, and therefore are not so fit, neither in your Highness's
princely affairs, nor in regard of my continual service, which is
the cause that hath made me chuse to write certain brief notes, set
down rather significantly than curiously, which I have called Essays.
The word is late, but the thing is ancient; for Seneca's Epistles to
Lucilius, if you mark them well, are but essays, that is, dispersed
meditations, though conveyed in the form of epistles."[512:B] This
invaluable work, in a moral and prudential light, perhaps the most
useful which any English author has left to posterity, has been the
fruitful parent of a more extensive series of similar productions,
collectively or periodically published, than any other country can
exhibit.
The age of Shakspeare was fertile, also, in what may be termed
_Parlour-window Miscellanies_; books whose aim was to attract the
attention of the idle, the dissipated, and the gossipping, by
intermingling with the admonitions of the sage, a more than usual
share of wit, narrative, and anecdote. Two of these, as exemplars
of the whole class, it may be necessary to notice. In 1589, Leonard
Wright published "_A Display of dutie, dect with sage sayings, pythie
sentences, and proper similies: Pleasant to reade, delightfull
to heare, and profitable to practise_;" a collection which Mr.
Haslewood calls "an early and pleasing specimen" of this species of
miscellaneous writing. It contains observations and friendly hints
on all the principal circumstances and events of life; "certaine
necessarie rules both pleasant and profitable for preventing of
sicknesse, and preserving of health: prescribed by Dr. Dyet, Dr.
Quiet, and Dr. Merryman;" and concludes with "certaine pretty notes
and pleasant conceits, delightfull to many, and hurtfull to none."
The author closes "A friendly advertisement touching marriage," by
enumerating the infelicities of the man who marries a shrew, where "hee
shall finde compact in a little flesh, a great number of bones too
hard to digest.—And therefore," adds he, "some do thinke wedlocke to
be that same purgatorie, which learned divines have so long contended
about, or a sharpe penance to bring sinnefull men to heaven. A merry
fellow hearing a preacher say in his sermon, that whosoever would be
saved, must take up and beare his cross, ran straight to his wife, and
cast her upon his back. . . . .
"Finally, he that will live quiet in wedlocke, must be courteous in
speech, cheareful in countinance, provident for his house, carefull
to traine up his children in vertue, and patient in bearing the
infirmities of his wife. Let all the keyes hang at her girdle, only the
purse at his own. He must also be voide of jelosie, which is a vanity
to thinke, and more folly to suspect. For eyther it needeth not, or
booteth not, and to be jelious without a cause is the next way to have
a cause.
"This is the only way, to make a woman dum:
To sit and smyle and laugh her out, and not a word, but
mum."[513:A]
In 1600, appeared the first edition of "_The Golden-grove, moralized
in three books: A worke very necessary for all such, as would know how
to governe themselves, their houses, or their countrey. Made by W.
Vaughan, Master of Artes, and Graduate in the Civill Law_." A second
edition, "reviewed and enlarged by the Authour," was printed in 1608.
Each book of this work, which displays considerable knowledge both
of literature and of mankind, is divided, after a ridiculous fashion
of the time, into plants, and these again into chapters. The first
book, on the Supreme Being, and on man, contains eleven plants, and
eighty-four chapters; the second, on domestic and private duties, five
plants, and thirty chapters; and the third, upon the commonwealth, nine
plants and seventy-two chapters.
Great extent of reading, and much ingenuity in application, are
discoverable in the _Golden Grove_, accompanied by many curious tales,
and local anecdotes. It is one of the books, also, which has thrown
light upon the manners and diversions of its age, and will hereafter be
quoted on this account. Vaughan, though he professes himself attached
to poetry from his earliest days, and has devoted a chapter to its
praise, was too much of the puritan to tolerate the stage, against
which he inveighs with more acrimony than discrimination. The passages
which allude to our old English poets, we shall throw together, as a
specimen of his style and composition.
"Jeffery Chaucer, the English poet, was in great account with King
Richard the Second, who gave him in reward of his poems, the mannour
of Newelme in Oxfordshire.—King Henry the eighth, her late Maiesties
father, for a few psalms of David turned into English meeter by
Sternhold, made him groome of his privie chamber, and rewarded him with
many great giftes besides. Moreover, hee made Sir Thomas More Lord
Chauncelour of this realme, whose poeticall workes are as yet in great
regard.—Queene Elizabeth made Doctour Haddon, beyng a poet, Master of
the Requests.—Neither is our owne age altogether to bee dispraysed.
Sir Philip Sydney excelled all our English poets, in rareness of stile
and matter. King James, our dread Soveraigne, that now raigneth, is
a notable poet, and hath lately set out most learned poems, to the
admiration of all his subjects.
"Gladly I could go forward in this subject, which in my stripling
yeeres pleased me beyond all others, were it not I delight to bee
briefe: and that Sir Philip Sydney hath so sufficiently defended it
in his Apology of Poetry; and if I should proceede further in the
commendation thereof, whatsoever I write would be eclipsed with the
glory of his golden eloquence. Wherefore, I stay myselfe in this place,
earnestly beseeching all gentlemen, of what qualitie soever they
bee, to advaunce poetrie, or at least to admire it, and not bee so
hastie shamefully to abuse that, which they may honestly and lawfully
obtayne."[515:A]
We shall conclude these observations on the miscellaneous literature of
Shakspeare's time, by noticing one of the earliest of our _Facetiæ_,
the production of an author who may be termed, in allusion to this _jeu
d'esprit_, the _Rabelais_ of England. Had the subject of this satire
been less exceptionable in its nature, the popularity which it acquired
for a season might have been permanent; but its grossness is such as
not to admit of adequate atonement by any portion of wit, however
poignant. It is entitled "_A New Discourse of a Stale Subject, called
the Metamorphosis of Ajax. Written by Misacmos to his friend and cosin
Philostilpnos_." London, 1596; and is said to have originated from the
author's invention of a water-closet for his house at Kelston.[515:B]
The conceit, or pun upon the word Ajax, or a _jakes_, appears to have
been a familiar joke of the time, and had been previously introduced
by Shakspeare in his _Love's Labour's Lost_, when Costard tells Sir
Nathaniel, the Curate, on his failure in the character of Alexander,
"you will be scraped out of the painted cloth for this: your lion, that
holds his poll-ax sitting on a close-stool, will be given to A-jax: he
will be the ninth worthy."[515:C] A similar allusion is to be found in
Camden and Ben Jonson.
The _Metamorphosis_, for which Sir John published a witty apology,
under the appellation of _An Anatomie of the Metamorphosed Ajax_,
abounds with humour and sarcastic satire, and is valuable as an
illustration of the domestic manners of the age. Either from its
indecency, however, or its severity upon her courtiers, the facetious
author incurred the displeasure of Elizabeth, and was banished for
some time from her presence. It is probably to the latter cause that
his exile is to be attributed; for in a letter addressed to the knight
by his friend, Mr. Robert Markham, and dated 1598, he says:—"Since
your departure from hence, you have been spoke of, and with no ill
will, both by the nobles and the Queene herself. Your book is almoste
forgiven, and I may say forgotten; but not for its lacke of wit or
satyr. Those whome you feared moste are now bosoming themselves in
the Queene's grace; and tho' her Highnesse signified displeasure in
outwarde sorte, yet did she like the marrowe of your booke. Your great
enemye, Sir James, did once mention the Star-Chamber, but your good
esteeme in better mindes outdid his endeavours, and all is silente
again. The Queen is minded to take you to her favour, but she sweareth
that she believes you will make epigrams and write _misacmos_ again on
her and all the courte; she hath been heard to say, 'that merry poet,
her godson, must not come to Greenwich, till he hath grown sober,
and leaveth the ladies sportes and frolicks.' She did conceive much
disquiet on being tolde you had aimed a shafte at Leicester."[516:A]
The genius of Harrington was destined to revive, with additional
vigour, in the person of Swift, who, to an equal share of physical
impurity, united a richer, and more fertile vein of coarse humour and
caustic satire.
That Shakspeare was well acquainted with the various works which we
have noticed in this class of literature, and probably with most
of their authors, there is much reason to infer. We have already
found[517:A] that he was justly offended with Robert Greene, for the
notice which he was pleased to take of him in his _Groat's Worth of
Witte bought with a Million of Repentance_, and there can be no doubt
that the philippics of Gosson and Stubbes, being pointedly directed
against the stage, would excite his curiosity, and occasionally
rouse his indignation. The very popular satires also of Nash and
Decker must necessarily have attracted his notice, nor could a mind
so excursive as his, have neglected to cull from the varied store
which the numerous miscellanies, characters, and essays of the age
presented to his view. It can be no difficult task to conceive the
delight, and the mental profit, which a genius such as Shakspeare's, of
which one characteristic is its fertility in aphoristic precept, must
have derived from the study of Lord Bacon's Essays! The apothegmatic
treasures of Shakspeare have been lately condensed into a single
volume by the judgment and industry of Mr. Lofft, and it may be safely
affirmed, that no uninspired works, either in our own or any other
language, can be produced, however bulky or voluminous, which contain
a richer mine of preceptive wisdom than may be found in these two
books of the philosopher and the poet, the _Essays_ of Bacon, and the
_Aphorisms_ of Shakspeare.
FOOTNOTES:
[426:A] Chalmers's Supplemental Apology, p. 269.
[429:A] Ascham's Works, Bennet's edit. p. 242. speaking of Windsor.
[429:B] Warton's History of English Poetry, vol. iii. p. 491.
[430:A] Holinshed's Chronicles, edit. 1807, vol. i. p. 330.
[430:B] The 1st edit. of Burton's Anatomy of Melancholy was published
in 1617.
[431:A] Burton's Anatomy of Melancholy, fol. edit. p. 84.
[432:A] Holinshed's Chronicles, vol. i. p. 331.
[432:B] "The reader is referred to an account of a preciously bound
diminutive godly book (once belonging to Q. Elizabeth), in the first
volume of my edition of the British _Typographical Antiquities_,
p. 83.; for which, I understand, the present owner asks the sum of
150_l._ We find that in the 16th year of Elizabeth's reign, she was in
possession of 'One Gospell booke, covered with tissue and garnished on
th' inside with the crucifix and the Queene's badges of silver guilt,
poiz with wodde, leaves and all, cxij oz." Archæologia, vol. xiii. 221.
"I am in possession of the covers of a book, bound (A. D. 1569) in
thick parchment or vellum, which has the whole length portrait of
Luther on one side, and of Calvin on the other. These portraits, which
are executed with uncommon spirit and accuracy, are encircled with
a profusion of ornamental borders of the most exquisite taste and
richness." Bibliomania, p. 158.
[432:C] "In the PRAYER BOOK which goes by the name of QUEEN
ELIZABETH'S, there is a portrait of Her Majesty kneeling upon a superb
cushion, with elevated hands, in prayer. This book was first printed
in 1575; and is decorated with wood-cut borders of considerable spirit
and beauty; representing, among other things, some of the subjects of
Holbein's Dance of Death."
[432:D] Dibdin's Bibliomania, 2d edit. 1811, p. 329-331. This book,
the most fascinating which has ever been written on Bibliography, is
already scarce. It is composed in the highest tone of enthusiasm for
the art, and its dialogue and descriptions are given with a mellowness,
a warmth and raciness, which absolutely fix and enchant the reader.
[433:A] Strype's Life of Parker, p. 415. 529.
[433:B] Ibid. p. 528.
[433:C] Britannia in Monmouthshire.
[434:A] Fuller's Worthies, part ii. p. 13.
[434:B] Vide Dibdin's Bibliomania, p. 347, 348.
[434:C] Burton's Anatomy of Melancholy, p. 177. 8th edit. folio.
[434:D] Vide Hearne's Benedictus, Abbas, p. iv.
[434:E] Anatomy of Melancholy, Democritus to the Reader, p. 5.
[435:A] Anatomy of Melancholy, p. 176, 177.
[436:A] Earl's Microcosmography, p. 74.
[436:B] Reed's Shakspeare, vol. v. p. 257, 258. Act i. sc. 4.
[436:C] Ibid. vol. xx. p. 43. Act i. sc. 3.
[437:A] The Compleat Gentleman, 2d edit. p. 54, 55.
[437:B] Dibdin's Typographical Antiquities, Preliminary Disquisition,
p. 35.
[438:A] Reed's Shakspeare, vol. xii. p. 13.
[438:B] Ibid. vol. i. p. 44, 45.
[439:A] Ascham's Works, Bennet's edit. p. 57.
[440:A] Wilson's Arte of Rhetorike, fol. 85, 86.
[441:A] Wilson, book iii. fol. 82.
[441:B] Puttenham's Arte of English Poesie, 1589, reprint, p. 121.
[441:C] Berkenhout's Biographia Literaria, p. 377. note _a_.
[442:A] Webbe's Discourse of English Poetrie, 4to. 1586. Vide Oldys's
British Librarian, p. 90. from which this quotation is given.
[442:B] Apology of Pierce Pennilesse, 4to. 1593.
[442:C] Wit's Miserie and Word's Madness, 4to. 1596, p. 57.
[442:D] Palladis Tamia, Wits Treasurie, being the second part of Wit's
Commonwealth, 1598. Meres terms him "eloquent and wittie John Lillie."
[443:A] Chalmers's English Poets, vol. iv. p. 399.
[443:B] British Librarian, p. 90. et seq.
[443:C] Whalley's Works of Ben Jonson: Every Man Out of His Humour, act
v. sc. 10.
[445:A] Sir Philip Sidney's Works, 7th edit., 1629, fol., p. 619, 620.
[445:B] Reed's Shakspeare, vol. vii. p. 86. note.
[446:A] Reed's Shakspeare, vol. vii. p. 93. 134.
[447:A] Peacham's Compleat Gentleman, 4to. 2d edit. p. 43. 53.
[448:A] For specimens of the prose writers of this period, the
introduction of which would be too digressive for the plan of this
work, I venture to refer the reader to my Essays on the Tatler,
Spectator, and Guardian, 1805, vol. ii. part 3. Essay II. on the
Progress and Merits of English Style; or to Burnett's Specimens of
English Prose-Writers, vol. ii. 1807.
[449:A] Vide Preface to Baret's Alvearie, or Quadruple Dictionary,
English, Latin, Greek, and French, bl. l. folio, London, 1580.
[449:B] Warton's History of English Poetry, vol. iii. p. 492.
[450:A] Britannici belli exitus exspectatur: constat enim aditus insulæ
esse munitos mirificis molibus. Etiam illud jam cognitum est, neque
argenti scrupulum esse ullum in illa insula, neque ullam spem prædæ,
nisi ex mancipiis: ex quibus nullos puto te literis, aut musicis
eruditos exspectare. Cic. lib. iv. Epist. ad Attic. ep. 16.
[450:B] Vide Cic. Offic. lib. iii. cap. 17.
[450:C] Ascham's Works, Bennet's edit. 4to. p. 338.
[451:A] Park's edition of Lord Orford's Royal and Noble Authors, vol.
i. article Elizabeth.
[451:B] Chalmers's Apology, p. 218. note.
[452:A] Ascham's Works, Bennet's edit. 4to. p. 253. 255, 256.
[453:A] "Galateo of Maister John Della Casa, Archbishop of Beneuenta,
or rather a treatise of the mañers and behauiours it behoveth a man to
uze and eschewe, in his familiar conversation. A worke very necessary
and profitable for all gentlemen or other. First written in the Italian
tongue, and now done into English by Robert Paterson of Lincolnes Inne
Gentleman. Satis si sapienter. Imprinted at London for Raufe Newbery,
dwelling in Fleete streate, a little above the Conduit. An. Do. 1576.
4to. 68 leaves, b. l."
[453:B] "The Courtier of Count Baldessar Castilio, devided into foure
bookes. Verie necessarie and profitable for young Gentlemen and
Gentlewomen abiding in Court, Pallace, or Place. Done into English by
Thomas Hobby. London: Printed by John Wolfe, 1588. 4to. pp. 616."
[454:A] Lord Orford's Royal and Noble Authors apud Park, vol. i. p. 93.
[456:A] Walton's History of English Poetry, vol. iii. p. 346, 347.
[456:B] The Italian Taylor and his Boy. By Robert Armin, Servant to the
King's most excellent Majestie, 1609.
[457:A] Troia Britannica; or Great Britaine's Troy. A Poem divided into
xvij sevrall Cantons, intermixed with many pleasant Poeticall Tales.
Concluding with an Universall Chronicle from the Creation, untill these
present Times. Written by Tho. Heywood. 1609.
[458:A] One of his specimens of "our Englishe reformed Versifying," as
he terms it, is entitled _Encomium Lauri_, and commences thus:—
"What might I call this Tree? A Laurell? O bonny Laurell:
Needes to thy bowes will I bow this knee, and vayle my bonetto;"
lines which Nash, in his _Foure Letters confuted_, 1593, has most
happily ridiculed, representing Harvey walking under the "ewe-tree at
Trinitie Hall," and addressing it in similar terms, and making "verses
of weather cocks on the top of steeples, as he did once of the weather
cocke of Allhallows in Cambridge:—
"O thou weathercocke, that stands on the top of All-hallows,
Come thy waies down, if thou dar'st for thy crowne, and take the
wall of us!"
Vide Todd's Spenser, vol. i. p. xliii.
[459:A] See a copious and interesting account of the controversy
between Nash and Harvey, in D'Israeli's Calamities of Authors, vol. ii.
p. 1. ad 49.
[459:B] The Returne from Parnassus; or the Scourge of Simony,
publiquely acted by the Students in St. John's College in Cambridge,
1606.—Vide Ancient British Drama, vol. i. p. 49.
[460:A] Wits Miserie And The Worlds Madnesse. Discovering the Devils
incarnate of this Age. 1596.—Vide Beloe's Anecdotes of Literature and
Scarce Books, vol. ii. p. 164, 165.
[462:A] For a further and more minute account of James's "Essayes,"
I refer the reader to Pinkerton's Ancient Scotish Poems, vol. i. p.
cxix.; to Park's Royal and Noble Authors, vol. i. p. 120; to Censura
Literaria, vol. ii. p. 364; and to Beloe's Anecdotes of Literature and
Scarce Books, vol. i. p. 230.
[463:A] Spenser's Works apud Todd, vol. i. p. 161. See also, vol. i. p.
vii. and p. clviii.
[463:B] One in the King's Library, one in the late Mr. Malone's
collection, and one purchased by the Marquis of Blandford, at the
Roxburgh Sale, for 64_l._!
[464:A] Vide Nash's "Four Letters Confuted," and his "Have with ye to
Saffron-Walden," and D'Israeli's Calamities of Authors, vol. i.
[464:B] Vide Oldys's British Librarian, p. 86, and Beloe's Anecdotes of
Literature and Scarce Books, vol. i. p. 234.
[464:C] Warton's History of English Poetry, vol. iii. p. 406.
[465:A] Warton's History, vol. iii. p. 275.
[465:B] "Mr. Wanley, in his Catalogue of the Harley Library, says he
had been told, that Edm. Spencer was the author of that book, which
came out anonymous." Vide Todd's Spenser, vol. i. p. clviii.
[465:C] Wood's Athenæ Oxon. edit. 1691. vol. i. col. 184.
[466:A] Haslewood's Reprint, 1811. p. xi.
[466:B] Censura Literaria, vol. i. p. 339.
[467:A] Haslewood's Puttenham, p. x.
[468:A] "The Schole of Abuse; containing a pleasant invective against
poets, pipers, players, jesters, &c. and such like caterpillars of
the commonwealth, by Ste. Gossen, Stud. Oxon. dedicated to M. Philip
Sidney, Esquier, 1579."
[468:B] "Palladis Tamia. Wits Treasury. Being the second part of Wits
Common Wealth. By Francis Meres, Maister of Artes of both Universities.
Vivitur ingenio, cætera mortis erunt. At London printed by P. Short,
for Cuthbert Burbie, and are to be solde at his shop at the Royall
Exchange. 1598." Small 8vo. leaves 174. We are under many obligations
to Mr. Haslewood for reprinting the whole of the "Comparative
Discourse" in the ninth volume of the Censura Literaria, as it must
necessarily be to us a subject of frequent reference.
[469:A] Chalmers's English Poets, vol. iii. p. 558, 559.
[470:A] Warton's History of English Poetry, vol. iii. p. 278.
[470:B] Hypercritica. Addresse iv. sect. 3. p. 237.
[470:C] Warton's History, vol. iii. p. 275.
[470:D] Bibliographia Poetica, p. 135.
[472:A] Reed's Shakspeare, vol. vi. p. 62, 63. Act ii. sc. 3.
[473:A] Wilson's Art of Rhetoric, p. 167, and Chalmers's Apology, p.
160.
[475:A] Meres's Palladis Tamia, in Censura Literaria, vol. ix. p. 46.
[476:A] A notable history of the Saracens. Lond. 4to. 1575.
[476:B] An historical collection of the continued factions, tumults,
and massacres of the Romans before the peaceable empire of Augustus
Cæsar. Lond. 1600. 8vo. 1601. 4to.
[478:A] Fuller's Worthies of England, part iii. p. 31.
[479:A] Fuller's Worthies, part iii. p. 167, 168.
[479:B] Bishop Nicolson's Historical Library, vol. i. p. 8.
[480:A] De Rebus Albionicis, Britannicis atque Anglicis Commentariorum,
lib. duo. Lond. 1590. 8vo.
[481:A] Fuller's Worthies, part i. p. 205.
[482:A] Granger's Biographical History of England, 2d edit. 1775. vol.
i. p. 222.
[485:A] As Batman's Bartholome, continues Mr. Douce, "is likely
hereafter to form an article in a Shakspearean Library, it may be worth
adding that in a private diary written at the time the original price
of the volume appears to have been eight shillings."—Illustrations,
vol. i. p. 9.
I have lately seen a copy of Batman, marked, in a Sale Catalogue, at
three guineas and a half!
[486:A] Beloe's Anecdotes of Literature and Scarce Books, vol. i. p.
260-274.
[487:A] We are much obliged to Dr. Nott, for a most elegant reprint of
this interesting tract; the accompanying notes are highly valuable and
illustrative.
[487:B] Vide Warton's Hist. of English Poetry, Fragment of vol. iv. p.
28-64.
[488:A] For a catalogue of these, as far as they have hitherto been
discovered, we refer the reader to Mr. Beloe's Anecdotes of Literature,
vol. ii., and to Censura Literaria, vol. viii.
[488:B] In his pamphlet, entitled _The Repentance of Robert Greene_,
he informs us, that "wags as lewd" as himself "drew him to march into
Italy and Spaine," where he "saw and practised such villanie as is
abhominable to declare."
[489:A] See Gilchrist's Examination of the Charges of Ben Jonson's
enmity to Shakspeare, p. 22.
[489:B] Beloe's Anecdotes of Literature, vol. ii. p. 180.
[490:A] Censura Literaria, vol. viii. p. 11, 12.
[491:A] From Greene's Farewell to Follie. Vide Beloe's Anecdotes, vol.
vi. p. 7.
[491:B] We learn these circumstances—his having squandered his
paternal inheritance and his marriage portion—from his two tracts,
_Never Too Late_, and _Repentance_, where all the prominent events of
his life are detailed.
[491:C] Oldys says, that "he left his wife, for her good advice, in the
year 1586." Berkenhout's Biographia Literaria, p. 390. note _d_.
[491:D] See Censura Literaria, vol. viii. p. 13.
[491:E] Berkenhout, p. 390. note _d_.
[492:A] "Never Too Late." See Censura Literaria, vol. viii. p. 15.
[493:A] Greene's Arcadia, 1587. Beloe's Anecdotes, vol. ii. p. 191.
[493:B] Berkenhout's Biographia Literaria, p. 389. note _b_.
[494:A] Wood's Athenæ Oxonienses, vol. i. col. 136.
[494:B] History of English Poetry, Fragment of vol. iv. p. 81.
[494:C] Act ii. sc. 3.
[494:D] Vide New and choice Characters of severall Authors, together
with that exquisite and unmatcht poeme, The Wife; written by Syr Thomas
Overburie. Lond. 1615. p.
[494:E] His "trifling pamphlets of Love," as he himself terms them,
(see Repentance of Robert Greene,) we shall not notice; but there are
two, under the titles of "Penelope's Webb," and "Ciceronis Amor," which
deserve mention, as exhibiting many excellent precepts and examples for
the youth of both sexes.
[496:A] Vide Beloe's Anecdotes of Literature, vol. vi. p. 9.
[497:A] Never Too Late, part ii. See Censura Literaria, vol. viii. p.
135, 136.
[497:B] Wood's Athenæ Oxon. vol. i. p. 137.
[498:A] Four Letters and Certaine Sonnets. Especially touching Robert
Greene, and other Poets by him abused. Lond. 1592. Vide Beloe's
Anecdotes, vol. ii. p. 201, 202.
[499:A] Vide D'Israeli's Calamities of Authors, vol. ii. p. 17, 18.
[500:A] This article has been chiefly drawn up from documents
afforded by _Wood_, _Berkenhout_, _Beloe's Anecdotes of Literature_,
_D'Israeli_, and the _Censura Literaria_. The extracts selected from
his pamphlets by Mr. Beloe, in the opening of his sixth volume, will
enable the reader to form a pretty good estimate of the poetical genius
of Greene.
[500:B] Wood's Athenæ Oxon. vol. i.
[501:A] Warton's Hist. of English Poetry, vol. iii. p. 288. note _t_.
[502:A] Dibdin's Bibliomania, p. 366, 367, and note.
[502:B] Anatomie of Abuses, sig. P, p. 7.
[504:A] Ancient British Drama, vol. i. p. 49.
[505:A] For catalogues of Fleming's Works, see Herbert's Typographical
Antiquities; Warton's Hist. of English Poetry, vol. iii. p. 402 ad 405.
Tanner's Bibliotheca, p. 287, 288, and Censura Literaria, No. viii. p.
313, et seq.
[505:B] Censura Literaria, vol. ii. p. 218.
[506:A] As no complete catalogue of this ingenious author's productions
is to be found in any one writer, I have thought it desirable to
endeavour to form one, noticing only the first editions, when
ascertained, and referring, for the full titles, to the works cited at
the close of this note.
1. A Discource of Horsemanshippe, 4to. 1593.
2. Thyrsys and Daphne, 1593.
3. The Gentleman's Academie, or Booke of St. Albans, 4to. 1595.
4. The poem of poems, or Sions muse, contayning the divine song of king
Salomon, devided into eight eclogues, 8vo. 1595.
5. The most honourable tragedie of Sir Richard Grenvill knight, a
heroick poem, in eight-line stanzas, 8vo. 1595.
6. Devoreux. Vertues tears for the losse of the most christian king
Henry, third of that name, king of Fraunce: and the untimely death of
the most noble and heroicall gentleman, Walter Devoreux, &c., 4to. 1597.
7. Ariosto's Rogero and Rodomantho, &c. paraphrastically translated.
1598.
8. The Teares of the beloved, or the Lamentation of Saint John, &c.
4to. 1600.
9. Cavelarice, or the English Horseman, 4to. 1607.
10. England's Arcadia, alluding his beginning from Sir Philip Sydney's
ending, 4to. 1607.
11. Ariosto's Satyres, 4to. 1608.
12. The Famous Whore, or Noble Courtezan, 4to. 1609.
13. Cure of all diseases, incident to Horses, 4to. 1610.
14. The English Husbandman in two parts, 1613.
15. The Art of Husbandry, first translated from the Latin of Conr.
Heresbachius, by Barnaby Googe, 4to. 1614.
16. Country Contentments; or the Husbandman's Recreations, 4to. 1615.
17. The English Huswife, 4to. 1615.
18. Cheap and Good Husbandry, 4to. 1616.
19. Liebault's Le Maison Rustique, or the Country Farm, folio. 1616.
20. The English Horseman, 4to. 1617.
(8. How To Chuse, Ride, Traine, And Diet Both Hunting Horses And
Running Horses, 1599.)
22. The Inrichment of the Weald of Kent, 4to.
23. Markham's Farewel to Husbandry, 4to. 1620.
24. The Art of Fowling, 8vo. 1621.
25. Herod and Antipater, a Tragedy, 4to. 1622.
26. The Whole art of Husbandry, contained in Four Bookes, 4to. 1631.
27. The Art of Archerie, 8vo. 1634.
28. The Faithful Farrier, 8vo. 1635.
29. The Soldiers Exercise, 3d edit. 1643.
30. The Way to Get Wealth, 4to. 1638.
31. The English Farrier, 4to. 1649.
32. Epitome concerning the Diseases of Beasts and Poultry, 8vo.
34. His Masterpiece, concerning the curing of Cattle, 4to. an edition
1662.
(10. Marie Magdalen's Lamentations, 4to. 1601.)
Numerous editions of many of these works, with alterations in the
title-pages, were published to the year 1700. See _Censura Literaria_,
vol. ii. p. 217-225. _Ritson's Bibliographia Poetica_, p. 273, 274.
Beloe's Anecdotes of Literature, vol. ii. p. 244, et seq. and vol.
ii. p. 339. _Bridges's Theatrum Poetarum_, p. 278-285. _Biographia
Dramatica._ _British Bibliographer_, No. iv. p. 380, 381. Warton's
Hist. of Engl. Poetry, vol. iii. p. 485.
[508:A] See Chalmers's Life of Ruddiman, 8vo. p. 106. Nichols's
Literary Anecdotes, vol. iv. p. 34, and Andrew's History of Great
Britain, vol. i. p. 145, 156.
[509:A] Act ii., at the close.
[509:B] Fuller's Worthies, p. 359.
[509:C] "_The Fraternitye of Uacabondes_," 1565, and "_A Caveat for
common Cursetors vulgarely called Uagabones, set forth by Thomas
Herman, Esq._" 1567.
[510:A] Three editions were probably published in 1614; for Mr. Capel,
in his _Prolusions_, 8vo., notices one in 8vo., and one in 4to. stated
in the title-page to be the fourth. Vide Bliss's edition, of the
Microcosmography, p. 258, and Censura Literaria, vol. v. p. 363.
[510:B] Cursory Remarks on Ancient English Poets, 1789. p. 27, et seq.
[511:A] For an accurate Catalogue of the various Writers of Characters
to the year 1700, consult Bliss's edition of Earle's Microcosmography,
1811.
[512:A] Censura Literaria, vol. ix. p. 168.
[512:B] Bacon's Works, folio edit. 1740, vol. iv. p. 586.
[513:A] British Bibliographer, No. VI. p. 49. 51.
[515:A] British Bibliographer, No. VIII. p. 272, 273.
[515:B] Nugæ Antiquæ, vol. i. p. xi. edit. 1804.
[515:C] Reed's Shakspeare, vol. vii. p. 187. Act v. sc. 2.
[516:A] Nugæ Antiquæ, vol. i. p. 239, 240.
[517:A] Part II. chap. i.
CHAPTER III.
VIEW OF ROMANTIC LITERATURE DURING THE AGE OF
SHAKSPEARE—SHAKSPEARE'S ATTACHMENT TO AND USE OF ROMANCES,
TALES, AND BALLADS.
That a considerable, and perhaps the greater, portion of Shakspeare's
Library consisted of Romances and Tales, we have already mentioned as
a conclusion fully warranted, from the extensive use which he has made
of them in his dramatic works. What the precious tomes specifically
were which covered his shelves, we have now no means of _positively_
ascertaining; but it is evident that we shall make a near approximation
to the truth, if we can bring forward the _library of a contemporary
collector_ of romantic literature, and at the same time _contemporary
authority_ for the romances then most in vogue.
Now it fortunately happens, that we have not only a few curious
descriptions, by the most unexceptionable authors of the reigns
of Elizabeth and James, of the popular reading of their day, but
we possess also a catalogue of the collection of one of the most
enthusiastic hoarders of the sixteenth century, in the various branches
of romantic lore; a document which may be considered, in fact, as
placing within our view, a kind of _fac simile_ of this, the most
copious, department of Shakspeare's book boudoir.
The interesting detail has been given us by Laneham, in his _Account
of the Queen's Entertainment at Killingworth Castle_, 1575. The author
is describing the Storial Show by a procession of the Coventry men, in
celebration of Hock Tuesday, when he suddenly exclaims,—"But aware,
keep bak, make room noow, heer they cum.
"And fyrst _Captain Cox_, an od man I promiz yoo; by profession a
Mason, and that right skilfull; very cunning in fens, and hardy az
_Gavin_; for hiz ton-sword hangs at hiz tablz eend; great oversight
hath he in matters of storie: For az for _King Arthurz_ book, _Huon_
of _Burdeaus_, the foour sons of _Aymon_, _Bevys_ of _Hampton_, The
_Squyre_ of lo degree, The _Knight_ of _Courtesy_, and the _Lady
Faguell_, _Frederick_ of _Gene_, _Syr Eglamoour_, _Syr Tryamoour_,
_Syr Lamwell_, _Syr Isenbras_, _Syr Gawyn_, _Olyver_ of the _Castl_,
_Lucres_ and _Curialus_, _Virgil's Life_, the _Castl_ of _Ladiez_, the
_Wido Edyth_, the _King_ and the _Tanner_, _Frier Rous_, _Howleglas_,
_Gargantua_, _Robinhood_, _Adam Bel_, _Clim_ of the _Clough_ and
_William_ of _Clondsley_, the _Churl_ and the _Burd_, the _Seven Wise
Masters_, the _Wife_ lapt in a _Morels Skin_, the _Sak full of Nuez_,
the _Seargeaunt_ that became a _Fryar_, _Skogan_, _Collyn Clout_, the
_Fryar_ and the _Boy_, _Elynor Rumming_, and the _Nutbrooun Maid_,
with many moe then I rehearz heere; I believe hee have them all at hiz
fingers endz.
"Then in Philosophy, both morall and naturall, I think hee be az
naturally overseen; beside _Poetrie_ and _Astronomie_, and oother
hid _Sciencez_, az I may gesse by the omberty of his books; whearof
part, az I remember, The _Shepherd'z Kalender_, The _Ship_ of _Foolz_,
_Danielz Dreamz_, the _Booke_ of _Fortune_, _Stans puer ad Mensam_,
The by way to the _Spitl-house_, _Julian_ of _Brainford's Testament_,
the _Castle_ of _Love_, the _Booget_ of _Demaunds_, the _Hundred Mery
Talez_, the _Book_ of _Riddels_, the _Seaven Sororz_ of _Wemen_, the
_Prooud Wives Pater Noster_, the _Chapman_ of a _Peneworth_ of _Wit_:
Beside hiz Auncient Playz, _Yooth_ and _Charitee_, _Hikskorner_,
_Nugizee_, _Impacient Poverty_, and herewith _Doctor Boords Breviary_
of _Health_. What should I rehearz heer, what a bunch of Ballets and
Songs, all auncient; as _Broom broom on Hill_, _So Wo iz me begon,
troly lo_, _Over a Whinny Meg_, _Hey ding a ding_, _Bony lass upon
a green_, _My hony on gave me a bek_, _By a bank as I lay_: and a
hundred more he hath fair wrapt up in parchment, and bound with a whip
cord. And az for Almanacks of Antiquitee (a point for Ephemeridees), I
ween he can sheaw from _Jazper Laet_ of _Antwarp_ unto _Nostradam_ of
_Frauns_, and thens untoo oour _John Securiz_ of _Salsbury_. To stay
ye no longer heerin, I dare say hee hath az fair a Library for theez
Sciencez, and az many goodly monuments both in prose and poetry, and
at after noonz can talk az much with out book, az ony inholder betwixt
_Brainford_ and _Bagshot_, what degree soever he be."[520:A]
Of the library of this military bibliomaniac, who is represented as
"marching on valiantly before, clean trust and gartered above the
knee, all fresh in a velvet cap, flourishing with his _ton_ sword,"
Mr. Dibdin has appreciated the value when he declares, that he should
have preferred it to the extensive collection of the once celebrated
magician, Dr. Dee. "How many," he observes, "of Dee's magical books he
had exchanged for the pleasanter magic of _Old Ballads_ and _Romances_,
I will not take upon me to say: but that this said bibliomaniacal
Captain had a library, which, even from Master Laneham's imperfect
description of it, I should have preferred to the four thousand volumes
of Dr. John Dee, is most unquestionable."
He then adds in a note, in reference to the "_Bunch of Ballads and
Songs, all ancient!—fair wrapt up in parchment, and bound with a whip
cord!_" "it is no wonder that Ritson, in the historical essay prefixed
to his collection of _Scotish Songs_, should speak of some of these
ballads with a zest, as if he would have sacrificed half his library
to untie the said 'whip cord' packet. And equally joyous, I ween,
would my friend Mr. R. H. Evans, of Pall-Mall, have been—during his
editorial labors in publishing a new edition of his father's collection
of Ballads—(an edition, by the bye, which gives us more of the
genuine spirit of the COXEAN COLLECTION than any with which I am
acquainted)—equally joyous would Mr. Evans have been, to have had the
inspection of some of these 'bonny' songs. The late Duke of Roxburgh,
of never-dying bibliomaniacal celebrity, would have parted with half
the insignia of his order of the Garter, to have obtained _clean
original copies_ of these fascinating effusions!"[520:B]
Though the Romances and Ballads in Captain Cox's Library are truly
termed "ancient," yet it appears, from unquestionable contemporary
authority, that these romances, either in their original dress or
somewhat modernised, were still sung to the harp, in Shakspeare's days,
as well in the halls of the nobility and gentry, as in the streets and
ale-houses, for the recreation of the multitude: thus Puttenham, in his
"Arte of English Poesie," published in 1589, speaking of historical
poetry adapted to the voice, says, "we our selves who compiled this
treatise have written for pleasure a little brief _Romance_ or
historicall ditty in the English tong of the Isle of great _Britaine_
in short and long meetres, and by breaches or divisions to be more
commodiously song to the harpe in places of assembly, where the company
shal be desirous to heare of old adventures and reliaunces of noble
knights in times past, as are those of king _Arthur_ and his knights
of the round table, Sir _Bevys_ of _Southampton_, _Guy_ of _Warwicke_
and others like;" and he afterwards notices the "blind harpers or such
like taverne minstrels that give a fit of mirth for a groat, their
matter being for the most part stories of old time, as the tale of Sir
_Topas_, the reportes of _Bevis_ of _Southampton_, _Guy_ of _Warwicke_,
_Adam Bell_, and _Clymme_ of the _Clough_ and such other old Romances
or historicall rimes, made purposely for recreation of the com̄on
people at Christmasse diners and bride ales, and in tavernes and
ale-houses and such other places of base resort."[521:A]
Bishop Hall, likewise, in his Satires printed in 1598, alluding to the
tales that lay
"In chimney-corners smok'd with winter fires,
To read and rock asleep our drowsy sires,"
exclaims,—
"No man his threshold better knowes, than I
Brute's first arrival, and first victory;
St. George's sorrel, or his crosse of blood,
Arthur's round board, or Caledonian wood,
Or holy battles of bold Charlemaine,
What were his knights did Salem's siege maintaine:
How the mad rival of faire Angelice
Was physick'd from the new-found paradise!"[522:A]
and even so late as Burton, who finished his interesting work just
previous to our great poet's decease, we have sufficient testimony
that the major part of our gentry was employed in the perusal of these
seductive narratives: "If they read a book at any time," remarks this
eccentric writer, "'tis an English Chronicle, _Sr. Huon of Bordeaux_,
Amadis de Gaul &c.;" and subsequently, in depicting the inamoratoes
of the day, he accuses them of "reading nothing but play books, idle
poems, jests, _Amadis de Gaul_, the _Knight of the Sun_, the _Seven
Champions_, _Palmerin de Oliva_, _Huon of Bordeaux_, &c."[522:B]
These contemporary authorities prove, to a certain extent, what were
considered the most popular romances in the reigns of Elizabeth and
James; but it will be satisfactory to enquire a little more minutely
into this branch of literature.
The origin of the metrical Romance may be traced to the fostering
influence of our early Norman monarchs, who cultivated with great
ardour the French language; and it was from the courts of these
sovereigns that the French themselves derived the first romances in
their own tongue.[522:C] The gratification resulting from the recital
or chaunting of these metrical tales was then confined, and continued
to be for some centuries, to the mansions of the great, owing to the
vast expense of maintaining or rewarding the minstrels with whom,
at that time, a knowledge of these splendid fictions exclusively
rested. No sooner, however, was the art of printing discovered, than
the wonders of romance were thrown open to the eager curiosity of
the public, and the presses of Caxton and Winkin de Worde groaned
under the production of prose versions from the romantic poesy of the
Anglo-Norman bards.
So fascinating were the wild incidents and machinery of these volumes,
and so rapid was their consequent circulation, that neither the varied
learning nor the theological polemics of the succeeding age, availed to
interrupt their progress; and it was not until towards the close of the
seventeenth century, that the feats of the knight and the spells of the
enchanter ceased to astonish and exhilarate the halls of our fathers.
In the whole course of this extensive career, from the era of the
conquest to the age of Milton, a poet whose youth, as he himself
tells us, was nourished "among those lofty fables and romances, which
recount, in sublime cantos, the deeds of knighthood[523:A]," perhaps
no period can be mentioned in which a greater love of romantic fiction
existed, than that which marks the reign of Elizabeth; and this, too,
notwithstanding the improvement of taste, and the progress of classical
learning; for though the national credulity had been chastened by the
gradual efforts of reason and science, yet was the daring imagery of
romance still the favourite resource of the bard and the novelist, who,
skilfully blending its potent magic with the colder but now fashionable
fictions of pagan antiquity, flung increasing splendour over the union,
and gave that permanency of attraction which only the peculiar and
unfettered genius of the Elizabethan era could bestow.
Confining ourselves at present, however, chiefly to the consideration
of the _prose_ romance, we may observe, that five distinct classes of
it were prevalent in the age of Shakspeare, which we may designate by
the appellations of _Anglo-Norman_, _Oriental_, _Italian_, _Spanish_,
and _Pastoral_, Romance.
Under the first of these titles, the _Anglo-Norman_, we include all
those productions which have been formed on the metrical romances of
the feudal or Anglo-Norman period, and to which the terms _Gothic_ or
_Chivalric_ have been commonly, though not exclusively, applied. These
are blended not only with much classical fiction, but with a large
portion of oriental fable, derived from our commerce with the East
during the period of the Crusades, and are principally occupied either
in relating the achievements of Arthur, Charlemagne, and the knights
engaged in the holy wars, or in chivalarising, if we may use the word,
the heroes of antiquity, or in expanding the wonders of oriental
machinery.
The most popular prose romance of this class was undoubtedly _La Morte
D'Arthur_, translated from various French romances by Sir Thomas
Malory, and printed by Caxton in 1485, a work which includes in a
condensed form the most celebrated achievements of the knights of the
Round Table.[524:A] This "noble and joyous book," as it is termed by
its venerable printer, was the delight of our ancestors until the
age of Charles the First; and in no period more decidedly so than in
the reign of Elizabeth, when probably there were few lordly mansions
without a copy of this seducing tome, either in the great hall or in
the ladies bower. Such were its fascinations, indeed, as to excite the
apprehensions, and call forth the indignant, and somewhat puritanical,
strictures of Ascham and Meres; the former in his _Schoole master_
1571, when, reprobating the inordinate attachment to books of chivalry,
instancing "as one for example, _Morte Arthur_, the whole pleasure
of which booke," he says, "standeth in two specyall poyntes, in open
mans slaghter and bolde bawdrie: in which booke, those be counted
the noblest knights that doe kill most men without any quarrell, and
commit fowlest adoultries by sutlest shifts: as, Syr Lancelote with
the wife of King Arthure, his maister: Syr Tristram with the wife of
King Marke, his uncle: Syr Lameroche with the wife of King Lote, that
was his own aunte. This is good stuffe for wise men to laughe at,
or honest men to take pleasure at. Yet I knowe when God's Bible was
banished the court and Morte Arthure receaved into the princes chamber,
what toyes the dayly reading of such a booke may worke in the will of
a yong gentleman, or a yong maide, that liveth welthely and idlely,
wise men can judge, and honest men do pittie[525:A];" and the latter
declaring in his "Wits' Commonwealth," that "as the Lord de la Nonne in
the sixe discourse of his politike and military discourses censureth
of the bookes of Amadis de Gaule, which he saith are no less hurtfull
to youth, than the workes of Machiavell, to age; so these bookes are
accordingly to be censured of, whose names follow; Bevis of Hampton,
Guy of Warwicke, _Arthur of the Round Table_," &c.[525:B]