compatible with every sort of mental deformity. But I do not throw out these reflections with an intention to apply them to Wordsworth. His fault is not that he participates in such vices, but that he does not keep sufficiently far from the region where they exist. It may be said in his defence, that to accomplish what he has done, it required, besides sensibility, also personal resolution and rigidity of will to persevere, in defiance of what was passing around him. If Wordsworth is sometimes harsh, Milton was sourer in the tendency of his sentiments, and his mind never softened at all into passive love, which sometimes appears, in Wordsworth's poetry, with all the graces of true humility and gentle good-will. The nature of Wordsworth's poetical pursuits must always have hindered him from a wandering freedom of invention; and it is easy to perceive that his mode of imagining is not very graceful or easy. From the third canto of Don Juan, it appears that Lord Byron looks upon him with contempt and disapprobation, especially for this fault. His lordship's mode of thinking and conceiving appears with better effect in Don Juan, than in any former poem. He leans entirely towards natural passions and affections, as opposed to the mind's subjection to the ideal; and, consequently, his most general and absolute sentiment is that of universal relationship with nature, and of the community of substances-a "thorny" creed. In the exercises of fancy, (in which his lordship excels,) he seeks most for a rapid change of colours, and for bold oppositions. The narration of the first intrigue in Don Juan produces a strong sensation. Nevertheless, the successive narrations of amours would require to diminish in warmth, and to increase in philosophical reflections upon the ultimate results of passion, and its various depths; and this, perhaps, is the design of Don Juan, which his lordship promises is to be a moral poem. Such are the opinions I entertain concerning the lines chosen by the poets who now write. But, for myself, I hesitate, not like a student before the two ways of the Samian letter, but rather doubt and wonder, like a mathematician, among the possible radii of a circle. Yours, &c. NOTICES OF OLD ENGLISH COMEDIES. Eastward Hoe-JONSON, CHAPMan, and Marston. In the analytical essays on the old English dramatists, which have made their appearance in the former numbers of our work, our readers will observe the design has been confined exclusively to plays of tragic interest and complexion. We have not yet strayed, or attempted to stray, on the comic ground of our ancient drama. Yet this has been occasioned, not so much by our undervaluing the humour and heartiness of our old comedy, as from a conviction of the surpass ing excellence of those plays which abound most in scenes of passion and high-wrought feeling, from which, if from any thing, our modern tragic drama must be recreated and refreshed. Their scenes of humour none can estimate more highly than we do; and were it not for those absorbing excellencies we have before alluded to, we are satisfied their claim to attention and admiration would have been more frequently noticed and allowed. We have therefore been induced to commence a new series, with reference to this particular object, in which we purpose to bring a few of these productions before the view of our readers; entreating them at the same time to remember, that we do not promise more than a brief and unpretending analysis of the different plays, with a few concluding observations; and that the present series is not in any wise intended to interfere with or conclude the former, of which we hope shortly to give our readers some fresh and valuable specimens. With the faculty of opening the sluices of the heart, and awaking the most sacred sympathies of our being, our early dramatists possessed in an equal degree that keen consciousness of the ridiculous, and graphical force of delineation, which are required for the production of characters and situations of humour. The same natural and intuitive feeling which led them to comprehend and fathom the graver emotions and higher mysteries of our kind, was never wanting when the object was to discern, analyze, and seize hold of the laughter-raising anxieties, strifes, passions, and humours of common life. Nature, in short, lay before them; and whether their inclination prompted them to call up tears or smiles, to harrow the soul with terror, or expand it with lofty and generous ebullitions of feeling—to strike upon the common and catholic sensibilities of which none are devoid, or to give to the heart new workings, aspirations, and fashionings-or, lastly, to entertain, by the ludicrous or comic exhibitions of our specics, their success was ever great, triumphant, and prevailing. Indeed it was impossible they should not be equally potent in the lighter as well as the more serious representations of life, since almost all the qualities of mind which ministered to the one were, as the drama then stood, accessory to the development of the other. Besides, their comprehensiveness of observation was too extensive, their outpouring of faculty too great, to take in only one department of the mighty theatre which lies open for scenical imitation. Like the Roman epicures, they put the whole world in contribution to furnish the magnificence of their table. Human life, not in its fragments, not in its fractured parts, not in its separated portions of hill, dale, champain, or valley, but in its whole chequered and variegated vastness, was the vision it was permitted them to contemplate. The veil of the temple, if our reverence can permit us to make use of the expression, was rent in twain; and thus, with them, those twin-sovereigns, Tragedy and Comedy, which in other times, and with other nations, have risen to life and sunk into extinguishment singly and unallied, with them burst forth into existence at once, and pursued their way, not diversely and apart, but walked together hand in hand, prosecuting their various but not irreconcileable functions, and manifesting at once the approximation of their natures, and the nearness of their relationship. Accordingly we find, that amongst the number of our elder dramatists, a large proportion were at once writers of comedies and tragedies, and in each line unquestionably and paramountly successful. We do not here speak of those plays which are compounded partly of ludicrous and partly of tragic scenes,-such as the histories of Shakespeare,-but of comedies and tragedies, properly so called, in which this chequer-work was not admitted. Middleton, Rowley, Chapman, Heywood, Marston, and Webster, with many others, might be named, amongst these double functionaries of the drama. In none is this exertion of power more remarkable than in Webster.-Who could possibly conceive or imagine the shadowy and awful pencil which delineated the death of the Duchess of Malfy, in scenes which terror has steeped with its darkest colouring, could ever, quitting the province of clouds and tempests in which its master sat enthroned, the very veλnyepera Zeus of the drama, descend to embody forth the lighter and lowlier scenes of comedy? Yet this we see it has done, and in a manner which demonstrates it to have been an easy and uninforced attempt. To attribute this to versatility of talent is ridiculous. It had a much deeper root. It was the result of a connexion between the two orders and characters of composition. It shews that tragedy was then pitched in a proper key,that it had not then forsook the language of common life,-that it had not then interposed a deep gulph between itself and comedy. It shows that a secret and invisible line of communication was then subsisting between them, which, while it served as a connecting chain to both, was the link which bound both to nature. It manifests that no divorce had then taken place, or destroyed that salutary connexion, from which, as neighbouring trees from the intertwining of their roots, each gathered strength. This connexion was indeed the very essence and soul of both. Without it, our ancient drama could not have subsisted, and without it, perhaps, no modern national drama can subsist. As long as they are united by the mutual ties of relationship, tragedy will be check ed in its aberrations from life and na, ture by its less ambitious neighbour, which will, in its turn, borrow dignity from tragedy; but as soon as these are severed, the former will evaporate in bombast, and the latter degenerate into farce. So the event has proved. When, by the introduction of stiff modes of criticism, and superinduced insensibility of feeling, the nice and delicate medium of connexion between these twin powers was lost, then immediately departed the excellence of our drama, and thenceforward we meet no more with those touches of nature, strokes of feeling, bursts of passion, and electrifying energies of expression, which abound in our early tragic scenes; and, in their stead, we have little else but frothy declamation, and cold extravagance. Comedy also has lost its sterling dignity, and degenerated first into witty licentiousness, and next into farcical buffoonery and common-place. The comedies of the time of Vanburgh and Congreve are as little worthy of being compared to the substantially excellent productions of Fletcher and Ben Jonson, as any of the tawdry and despicable performances of the present day. The sickly mixture of sentiment and farce, by which the latter are characterized, is absolutely insufferable, after perusing such plays as The Alchymist,' and Every Man in his Humour.' In them, and in the comedies of their time, all the strong and healthy lineaments of dramatic excellence are manifest and prominent; there is nothing ricketty or unfashioned in their make, and little extravagant or out of place in their situations; they have wit, as it is regulated by nature, and sentiment, as it is controuled by truth. But these considerations are out of the compass of our design, and we will drop them. The play which we have taken, as the first subject of our specimens, is the joint production of Ben Jonson, Chapman, and Marston. Perhaps it is not one of the most excellent of our early comedies, yet is unquestionably, even as a picture of ancient city manners, an interesting piece of writing. Our reverence, however, for the former of those writers has chiefly induced us to give it an examination, and few, we think, can feel indifferent to any thing in which Ben Jonson had a part, whilst yet in the vigour of his strength. As the joint composition of three eminent dramatists, it is still more interesting; nothing is more pleasing about the performances of these writers than their partnerships of fame. Even surly Ben, self-relying and jealous as he was, we see did not scruple to enter into alliances of this kind, and, besides the present instance, has written in conjunction with Middleton and Fletcher. This is a pleasing indication of a common interest, a heartening spirit, in the literature of the time, which was sufficient to raise and dignify the drama of any country. Yet it is painful to remark, that Marston, who, in the comedy before us, is the coadjutor of Ben Jonson, was, within a short time after the writing of it, one of the most violent of his enemies ;so short and insecure is the continuance of literary friendships. The present play is one of the many of which city manners are the subject. With most of the comic writers of the time, they were a favourite theme. The prosperous reign of Elizabeth, and the peaceful one of James, gave full opportunity for industry and perseverance to rise to wealth; and commerce multiplied the means and enlarged the resources. Luxury, and extravagance the attendant of luxury, marched forward with rapid strides, and stocked the metropolis daily with fresh temptations for the prodigal and the unexperienced. Attracted by these allurements, the landed inheritors left the country for the town and the court, and frequently launched into extravagancies which their purses were unable to support, while their hospitable firesides were deserted; and what had been the abiding place of their forefathers, was left comfortless and bare. Thus many ancient families were reduced to beggary. On the ruins of these sprung up the race of opulent citizens and shopkeepers; and gradually increasing in importance, began to shoulder out the better educated and better bred gentlemen of the day. Every method which money could supply of hiding the original obscurity of birth and family was resorted to; and the degree of knighthood, which the hand of James, ever poor in purse and prodigal in honours, extended to all who could pay for it, was gladly caught hold of by opulent upstarts as a factitious means of gentility. Hence the frequent introduction of knights in our old comedies, and particularly in those of Ben Jonson, as the licensed subjects of ridicule. Amongst so many instances, it is reasonable to suppose that exam ples of purse-proud citizens, and would be gentlemen, should be numerous enough in the eastward division of the metropolis; and it is hardly to be imagined that, with such, the vocation of the muses, or the servants of the drama, would meet with much patronage or respect. Still less is it to be believed that this irritabile genus, by whom even the unquestionable prerogatives of rank and station are hardly acknowledged, should endure with content, or tolerate with equanimity, the overbearing insolence of city-pride and pretensions. Accordingly a war was immediately commenced between the two contending powers of the stage and the city in the course of which the latter were, without fear and without scruple, held up to ridicule, as ignorant, uxorious, aping, and conceited; and hence the tribe, varying all occasionally in fea tures, but all with the same generic marks and character of Fungoso's and Master Stephens. But we will now enter upon our account of the play. Golding and Quicksilver, from whom the original hint of Hogarth's idle and industrious apprentices seems to have been taken, are the two shopmen of Touchstone, a wealthy and saving goldsmith in the eity. While the one keeps his hunting nag, and plays at Primero with the gallants of the town, the other, less ambitious of these notable distinctions, attends to his master's interest and shop. The good citizen, who holds dice and ordinaries in abomination, thus parleys with the more dashing appurtenance of his counter. "Sirrah, I tell thee I am thy master, William Touchstone, goldsmith, and thou my 'prentice, Francis Quicksilver, and I will see whither you are running. Work upon that, now. Quick. Why, sir, I hope a man may use his recreation with his master's profit. Touch. 'Prentices' recreations are seldom with their master's profit. Work upon that, now. You shall give up your cloak, though you be no alderman. Hey. day, ruffians!-ha! sword! pumps!. here's a racket indeed! hope I am my father's son; and, by god'slid, 'tis for your worship, and for your commodity, that I keep company. I am entertained among gallants, 'tis true; they call me Cousin Frank-right; I lend them when they are spent, must not they strive monies-good; they spend it-well: But and to whom?-shall not your worship to get more? must not their land fly? ha' the refusal? Well, I am a good member of the city, if I were well considered. How would merchants thrive, if gentlemen would not be unthrifts? how could gentlemen be unthrifts, if their humours were not fed? how should their humours be fed but by white meat, and cunning secondings? Well, the city might consider us. lants fall to play; I carry light gold with I am going to an ordinary now; the galgold for silver: I change; gain by it; me; the gallants call, Cousin Frank, some the gallants lose the gold, and then call, Cousin Frank, lend me some silver. Why Touch. Why? I cannot tell; seven score pound art thou out in the cash; but look to it, I will not be gallanted out of my monies. And as for my rising by other men's fall, Did I gain my wealth God shield me! by ordinaries? no: by exchanging of gold ? no: by keeping of gallants' company? no: I hired me a little shop,fought low, took small gain, kept no debt book; garnished my shop, for want of plate, with good, wholesome, thrifty sentences: as, Touchstone, keep thy shop, and thy shop will keep thee.Light gains make heavy purses.-'Tis good to be merry and wise.' And when I was wived, having something to stick to, I had the horn of suretieship ever before my eyes. You all know the device of the horn, where the young fellow slips in at the buckall: and I grew up; and, I praise butt-end, and comes squeezed out at the Providence, I bear my brows now as high as the best of my neighbours: But thouWell, look to the accounts; your father's bond lies for you: seven score pound is yet in the rear. Quick. Why, 'slid, sir, I have as good, as proper gallants' words for it, as any are in London: gentlemen of good phrase, perfect language, passingly behaved; gallants that wear socks and clean linen, and call me kind Cousin Frank! good Cousin Frank! for they know my father: and, by god'slid, shall not I trust 'em? not trust ?" Probably the character of Touchstone, though common enough in itself, had a reference to some living personage of city consideration, a man perhaps of sufficient substance and notoriety in his time. We are led to conclude this from the statutory words which are continually introduced into his discourse, and which, no doubt, were as well recogniezd by the original auditors of the play, as any of Foote's ludicrous imitations half a century ago. From the same reason we should be inclined to believe that the old usurer Security was of kin to some money lending and accommodating contemporary. Touchstone, the citizen, has likewise two daughters, the elder of whom, Girtred, a proud and ambitious minx, is on the point of marriage with Sir Petronel Flash, a needy adventuring knight. The father gives us their characters in the following pass age. "As I have two 'prentices; the one of a boundless prodigality, the other of a most hopeful industry: so have I only two daughters; the eldest of a proud ambition and nice wantonness; the other of a modest humility and comely soberness. The one must be ladified, forsooth, and be attired just to the court-cut, and long tail. So far is she ill-natured to the place and means of my preferment and fortune, that she throws all the contempt and despite hatred itself can cast upon it. Well, a piece of land she has; 'twas her grandmother's gift; let her, and her Sir Petronel, flash out that: but as for my substance, she that scorns me, as I am a citizen and tradesman, shall never pamper her pride with my industry-shall never use me as men do foxes; keep themselves warm in the skin, and throw the body that bare it to the dunghill. I must go entertain this Sir Petronel. Golding, my utmost care's for thee, and only trust in thee; look to the shop. As for you, Master Quicksilver, think of husks; for thy course is running directly to the prodigal's hogtrough. Husks, sirrah! Work upon that, now." Girtred is an entertaining specimen of the vulgar would-be lady of the city. She sighs for coaches and fashions, stops her ears at the sound of Bow Bells; and, already raised in imagination to the pinnacle of her desires, hardly condescends to look upon her more lowly-minded relatives. She thus vents her scorn upon her humble sis ter. "Gir. For the passion of patience, look if Sir Petronel approach! that sweet, that fine, that delicate, that- -for love's sake, tell me if he come! O, sister Mill, though my father be a low-capt tradesman, yet I must be a lady: and I praise God my mother must call me Madam. Does he come? Off with this gown for shame's sake off with this gown! let not my VOL. X. knight take me in the city-cut, in any hand: tear't! pox on't, (does he come ?) tear't off!Thus whilst she sleeps, Í sorrow for her sake,' &c. Mil. Lord, sister, with what an immodest impatiency and disgraceful scorn do you put off your city tire! I am sorry to think you imagine to right yourself, in wronging that which hath made both you and us. Gir. I tell you, I cannot endure it; I must be a lady: do you wear your quoif, with a London licket; your stamen petticoat, with two guards; the buffin gown, with the tuftaffity cap, and the velvet lace: like some humours of the city dames well: I must be a lady, and I will be a lady. I To eat cherries only at an angel a pound, good; to dye rich scarlet black, pretty; to line a grogram gown clean through with velvet, tolerable; their pure linen, their smocks of three pound a-smock, are to be borne withal: but your mincing niceries, taffeta pipkins, durance petticoats, and silver bodkins-God's my life, as I shall be a lady, I cannot endure it. Is he come yet? Lord, what a long night 'tis !'And ever she cried, Shoot home' -and yet I knew one longer- And ever she cried, Shoot home; fa, la, ly, re, lo, la.' Mil. Well, sister, those that scorn their nest oft fly with a sick wing. Gir. Bow-bell! Mil. Where titles presume to thrust before fit means to second them, wealth and respect often grow sullen, and will not fol low. For sure in this, I would, for your sake, I spake not truth- Where ambition of place goes before fitness of birth, contempt and disgrace follow.' I heard a scholar once say, that Ulysses, when he counterfeited himself mad, yoked cats and foxes and dogs together, to draw his plough, whilst he followed and sowed salt: But sure I judge them truly mad, that yoke citizens and courtiers, tradesmen and soldiers,- -a goldsmith's daughter and a knight. Well, sister, pray God my father sow not salt too. Gir. Alas, poor Mill! when I am a lady, I'll pray for thee yet i'faith: nay, and I'll vouchsafe to call thee Sister Mill, still; for though thou art not like to be a lady, as I am, yet sure thou art a creature of God's making, and may'st, perad venture, be saved as soon as I-(does he come ?)" Even her pains-taking mother, who desires and prays for nothing more than the exaltation of her favourite daughter, is treated with no more ce remony. "Gir. Ay, mother, I must be a lady to-morrow and by your leave, mother, (I speak it not without my duty, but only R |