Imagini ale paginilor
PDF
ePub

[Mercy.]

The quality of mercy is not strain'd;
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath. It is twice blessed;
It blesseth him that gives, and him that takes.
"Tis mightiest in the mightiest; it becomes
The throned monarch better than his crown:
His sceptre shows the force of temporal pow'r,
The attribute to awe and majesty,
Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings.
But mercy is above the sceptred sway;
It is enthroned in the hearts of kings;
It is an attribute to God himself;

And earthly power doth then show likest God's,
When mercy seasons justice. Therefore, Jew,
Though justice be thy plea, consider this-
That, in the course of justice, none of us
Should see salvation: we do pray for mercy;
And that same prayer doth teach us all to render
The deeds of mercy.

Merchant of Venice.

With spectacles on nose, and pouch on side;
His youthful hose well sav'd, a world too wide
For his shrunk shanks; and his big manly voice,
Turning again towards childish treble, pipes
And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all,
That ends this strange eventful history,

Is second childishness, and mere oblivion:
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.
As You Like IL

[Description of Night in a Camp.]

From camp to camp, thro' the foul womb of night,
The hum of either army stilly sounds,
That the fix'd sentinels almost receive
The secret whispers of each other's watch.
Fire answers fire; and through their paly flames,
Each battle sees the other's umber'd face.

Steed threatens steed, in high and boastful neighs,
Piercing the night's dull ear; and from the tents,
The armourers, accomplishing the knights,
With busy hammers closing rivets up,

Give dreadful note of preparation.

The country cocks do crow, the clocks do toll,

[Solitude preferred to a Court Life, and the Advantages And the third hour of drowsy morning name.

of Adversity.]

Now, my co-mates and brothers in exile, Hath not old custom made this life more sweet Than that of painted pomp? Are not these woods More free from peril than the envious court? Here feel we but the penalty of Adam, The season's difference; as the icy fang And churlish chiding of the winter's wind; Which, when it bites and blows upon my body, Even till I shrink with cold, I smile and say, 'This is no flattery; these are counsellors That feelingly persuade me what I am. Sweet are the uses of adversity, Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous, Wears yet a precious jewel in his head:

And this our life, exempt from public haunt,

Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, Sermons in stones, and good in every thing.

I would not change it!

Amiens. Happy is your grace,

That can translate the stubbornness of fortune Into so quiet and so sweet a style!

As You Like It.

[The World Compared to a Stage.]

Thou seest we are not all alone unhappy-
This wide and universal theatre
Presents more woful pageants than the scene
Wherein we play.

Jaques. All the world's a stage,

And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances,
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages. At first, the infant,
Mewling and puking in his nurse's arms:
And then the whining school-boy, with his satchel
And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwillingly to school. And then the lover,
Sighing like furnace, with a woful ballad
Made to his mistress' eye-brow. Then, the soldier,
Full of strange oaths, and bearded like the pard,
Jealous in honour, sudden and quick in quarrel;
Seeking the bubble reputation

Even in the cannon's mouth. And then, the justice,
In fair round belly, with good capon lined,
With eyes severe, and beard of formal cut,
Full of wise saws and modern instances;
And so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts
Into the lean and slipper'd pantaloon,

Proud of their numbers and secure in soul,
The confident and over-lusty French
For the low-rated English play at dice,
And chide the cripple tardy-gaited night,
Who, like a foul and ugly witch, does limp
So tediously away. The poor condemned English,
Like sacrifices, by their watchful fires

Sit patiently, and inly ruminate

The morning's danger: and their gesture sad
(Investing lank lean cheeks and war-worn coats)
Presenteth them unto the gazing moon

So many horrid ghosts. O, now, who will behold
The royal captain of this ruin'd band,
Walking from watch to watch, from tent to tent,
Let him cry praise and glory on his head!
For forth he goes, and visits all his host,
Bids them good-morrow with a modest smile,
And calls them brothers, friends, and countrymen.
Upon his royal face there is no note

How dread an army hath enrounded him;
Nor doth he dedicate one jot of colour
Unto the weary and all-watched night;
But freshly looks, and overbears attaint,
With cheerful semblance and sweet majesty;
That ev'ry wretch, pining and pale before,
Beholding him, plucks comfort from his looks.
A largess universal, like the sun,
His liberal eye doth give to every one,
Thawing cold fear.

[The Blessings of a Shepherd's Life.]

O God! methinks it were a happy life
To be no better than a homely swain;
To sit upon a hill, as I do now,

Henry

To carve out dials quaintly, point by point,
Thereby to see the minutes how they run:
How many make the hour full complete,
How many hours bring about the day,
How many days will finish up the year,
How many years a mortal man may live.
When this is known, then to divide the times:
So many hours must I tend my flock;
So many hours must I take my rest;
So many hours must I contemplate;
So many hours must I sport myself;

So many days my ewes have been with young;
So many weeks ere the poor fools will yean;
So many years ere I shall shear the fleece:

So minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, and years,
Pass'd over, to the end they were created,
Would bring white hairs unto a quiet grave.
Ah! what a life were this! how sweet! how lovely!
Gives not the hawthorn-bush a sweeter shade
To shepherds looking on their silly sheep,
Than doth a rich embroider'd canopy
To kings that fear their subjects' treachery?
O yes, it doth, a thousandfold it doth.

And to conclude, the shepherd's homely curds,
His cold thin drink out of his leather bottle,
His wonted sleep under a fresh tree's shade,
All which secure and sweetly he enjoys,

[blocks in formation]

So farewell to the little good you bear me. Farewell, a long farewell to all my greatness! This is the state of man: To-day he puts forth The tender leaves of hope, to-morrow blossoms, And bears his blushing honours thick upon him; The third day comes a frost, a killing frost, And when he thinks, good easy man, full surely His greatness is a ripening, nips his root, And then he falls as I do. I have ventur'd, Like little wanton boys, that swim on bladders, These many summers in a sea of glory; But far beyond my depth: my high-blown pride At length broke under me; and now has left me, Weary and old with service, to the mercy Of a rude stream, that must for ever hide me. Vain pomp and glory of this world, I hate ye! I feel my heart new open'd. O, how wretched Is that poor man that hangs on princes' favours! There is, betwixt that smile we would aspire to, That sweet aspect of princes, and their ruin, More pangs and fears than wars or women have; And, when he falls, he falls like Lucifer, Never to hope again.

Henry VIII.

[Falstaff's Cowardice and Boasting.]

[Falstaff, who is represented as a monster of fat, a sensualist, and a coward, yet is rendered tolerable by his humour, had accompanied Prince Henry and some other dissolute companions on a predatory expedition to Gad's Hill, where they first robbed a few travellers, and afterwards the Prince and Poins set upon Falstaff and others of the party in the dark, and made them take to flight. The following scene takes place afterwards in their favourite London haunt, the Boar's Head Tavern in Eastcheap.]

TO PRINCE HENRY and POINS, enter FALSTAFF, Gadshill, BARDOLPH, and PETO.

Poins. Welcome, Jack. Where hast thou been? Fal. A plague of all cowards, I say, and a vengeance too! marry, and amen! Give me a cup of sack, boy. Ere I lead this life long, I'll sow nether stocks, and mend them, and foot them too. A plague of all cowards! Give me a cup of sack, rogue. Is there no virtue extant ? He drinks. P. Henry. Didst thou never see Titan kiss a dish of butter?-pitiful-hearted Titan, that melted at the sweet tale of the sun?-if thou didst, then behold that compound.

Fal. You rogue, here's lime in this sack too. There is nothing but roguery to be found in villanous man. Yet a coward is worse than a cup of sack with lime in it a villanous coward. Go thy ways, old Jack ;|

die when thou wilt, if manhood, good manhood, be not forgot upon the face of the earth, then am I a shotten herring. There live not three good men unhanged in England; and one of them is fat, and grows old. God help the while!-a bad world, I say! I would I were a weaver; I could sing all manner of songs. A plague of all cowards, I say still! P. Henry. How now, wool-sack? what mutter

you?

-

Fal. A king's son! If I do not beat thee out of thy kingdom with a dagger of lath, and drive all thy subjects afore thee like a flock of wild geese, I'll never wear hair on my face more. You Prince of Wales !

P. Henry. Why, you whoreson round man !—what's the matter?

Fal. Are you not a coward?-answer me to that; and Poins there? [To Poins. P. Henry. Ye fat paunch, an ye call me coward, I'll stab thee.

Fal. I call thee coward! I'll see thee damn'd ere I call thee coward; but I would give a thousand pound I could run as fast as thou canst. You are strait enough in the shoulders; you care not who sees your back. Call you that backing of your friends? A plague upon such backing!-give me them that will face me. Give me a cup of sack; I am a rogue, if I drunk to-day.

P. Henry. O villain ! thy lips are scarce wiped since thou drunk'st last.

Fal. All's one for that. A plague of all cowards, still say I! [He drinks.

P. Henry. What's the matter? Fal. What's the matter?-here be four of us have ta'en a thousand pound this morning.

P. Henry. Where is it, Jack?—where is it? Fal. Where is it?-taken from us it is: a hundred upon poor four of us.

P. Henry. What, a hundred, man?

Fal. I am a rogue, if I were not at half-sword with a dozen of them two hours together. I have 'scap'd by miracle. I am eight times thrust through the doublet, four through the hose, my buckler cut through and through, my sword hacked like a hand-saw, ecce signum. I never dealt better since I was a man. All would not do. A plague of all cowards! Let them speak: if they speak more or less than truth, they are villains, and the sons of darkness.

P. Henry. Speak, sirs. How was it?
Gads. We four set upon some dozen-
Fal. Sixteen, at least, my lord.
Gads. And bound them.

Peto. No, no, they were not bound.

Fal. You rogue, they were bound, every man of them; or I am a Jew else, an Ebrew Jew.

Gads. As we were sharing, some six or seven fresh men set upon us

Fal. And unbound the rest, and then came in the other.

P. Henry. What! fought you with them all? Fal. All I know not what you call all; but if I fought not with fifty of them, I am a bunch of radish if there were not two or three and fifty upon poor old Jack, then am I no two-legged creature.

Poins. Pray heaven, you have not murdered some of them.

Fal. Nay, that's past praying for; I have peppered two of them: two, I am sure, I have paid; two rogues in buckram suits. I tell thee what, Hal-if I tell thee a lie, spit in my face, call me horse. Thou know'st my old ward; here I lay, and thus I bore my point. Four rogues in buckram let drive at me P. Henry. What! four-thou saidst but two even

now.

Fal. Four, Hal; I told thee four. Poins. Ay, ay, he said four.

[blocks in formation]

Fal. Dost thou hear me, Hal?

P. Henry. Ay, and mark thee too, Jack.

Fal. Do so, for it is worth the list'ning to. These nine in buckram, that I told thee of

P. Henry. So, two more already.

Fal. Their points being broken-
Poins. Down fell their hose.

Fal. Began to give me ground. But I follow'd me close, came-in foot and hand; and with a thought, seven of the eleven I paid.

P. Henry. O monstrous !- eleven buckram men grown out of two!

Fal. But, as the devil would have it, three misbegotten knaves, in Kendal green, came at my back, and let drive at me; for it was so dark, Hal, that thou couldst not see thy hand.

P. Henry. These lies are like the father that begets them; gross as a mountain, open, palpable. Why, thou clay-brain'd guts; thou knotty-pated fool; thou whoreson, obscene, greasy tallow-keech

Fal. What, art thou mad?-art thou mad?-is not the truth the truth?

P. Henry. Why, how couldst thou know these men in Kendal green, when it was so dark thou couldst not see thy hand? Come, tell us your reason? What say'st thou to this?

Poins. Come, your reason, Jack, your reason. Fal. What, upon compulsion? No; were I at the strappado, or all the racks in the world, I would not tell you on compulsion. Give you a reason on compulsion!-if reasons were as plenty as blackberries, I would give no man a reason upon compulsion, I

P. Henry. I'll be no longer guilty of this sin; this sanguine coward, this bed-presser, this horse backbreaker, this huge hill of flesh!

Fal. Away, you starveling, you elf-skin, you dried neat's tongue, you stock-fish. O for breath to utter what is like thee !-you tailor's yard, you sheath, you bow-case, you vile standing tuck;

P. Henry. Well, breathe a while, and then to it again; and when thou hast tired thyself in base comparisons, hear me speak but this.

Poins. Mark, Jack.

P. Henry. We two saw you four set on four; you bound them, and were masters of their wealth. Mark now, how a plain tale shall put you down. Then did we two set on you four; and, with a word, outfaced you from your prize, and have it; yea, and can show it you here in the house; and, Falstaff, you carried your guts away as nimbly, with as quick dexterity, and roared for mercy, and still ran and roared, as ever I heard bull-calf. What a slave art thou, to hack thy sword as thou hast done, and then say it was in fight! What trick, what device, what starting hole, canst thou now find out, to hide thee from this open and apparent shame?

Poins. Come, let's hear, Jack; what trick hast thou

now?

Fal. By the Lord, I knew ye as well as he that made ye. Why, hear ye, my masters. Was it for me to kill the heir-apparent should I turn upon the true prince? Why, thou know'st I am as valiant as Hercules; but beware instinct; the lion will not touch the true prince. Instinct is a great matter; I was a coward on instinct. I shall think the better of myself, and thee, during my life; I, for a valiant

lion, and thou, for a true prince. But, lads, I am glad you have the money. Hostess, clap to the doors; watch to-night, pray to-morrow. Gallants, lads, boys, hearts of gold, all the titles of good fellowship come to you! What! shall we be merry?-shall we have a play extempore?

P. Henry. Content; and the argument shall be thy running away.

Fal. Ah! no more of that, Hal, an thou lov'st me. First Part of Henry IV.

[Falstaff arrested by his hostess, Dame Quickly.]

TO FALSTAFF and HOSTESS, with BARDOLPH and two Sheriff's Officers, enter the CHIEF JUSTICE, attended.

Ch. Just. What's the matter? keep the peace here, ho!

Host. Good, my lord, be good to me! I beseech you, stand to me!

Ch. Just. How now, Sir John! what, are you brawling here?

Doth this become your place, your time, and business? You should have been well on your way to York. Stand from him, fellow! Wherefore hang'st thou on

him?

Host. O my most worshipful lord, an't please your grace, I am a poor widow of Eastcheap, and he is arrested at my suit.

Ch. Just. For what sum ?

Host. It is more than for some, my lord; it is for all, all I have. He hath eaten me out of house and home; he hath put all my substance into that fat belly of his : but I will have some of it out again, or I'll ride thee o' nights, like the mare.

Fal. I think I am as like to ride the mare, if I have any vantage of ground to get up.

Ch. Just. How comes this, Sir John Fie! what man of good temper would endure this tempest of exclamation? Are you not ashamed to enforce a poor widow to so rough a course to come by her own? Fal. What is the gross sum that I owe thee? Host. Marry, if thou wert an honest man, thyself and the money too. Thou didst swear to me upon a

[graphic]

A Goblet from the Boar's-Head Tavern, supposed to
be that alluded to by Dame Quickly.

parcel-gilt goblet, sitting in my Dolphin-chamber, at the round table, by a sea-coal fire, on Wednesday in Whitsun-week, when the prince broke thy head for likening his father to a singing-man of Windsor; thou didst swear to me then, as I was washing thy wound, to marry me, and make me my lady, thy wife. Canst thou deny it? Did not goodwife Keech, the butcher's wife, come in then, and call me gossip Quickly coming in to borrow a mess of vinegar, telling us she had a good dish of prawns; whereby thou didst desire to eat some; whereby I told thee, they were ill for a green wound? And didst thou not, when she was gone down stairs, desire me to be no

[blocks in formation]

Ch. Just. Now, master Gower; what news?
Gower. The king, my lord, and Henry prince of
Wales,

Are near at hand: the rest the paper tells.

Fal. As I am a gentleman

Host. Nay, you said so before.

Fal. As I am a gentleman. Come, no more words of it.

Host. By this heavenly ground I tread on, I must be fain to pawn both my plate and the tapestry of my dining-chambers.

Fal. Glasses, glasses is the only drinking; and for thy walls, a pretty slight drollery, or the story of the prodigal, or the German hunting in water-work, is worth a thousand of these bed-hangings, and these flybitten tapestries. Let it be ten pound, if thou canst. Come, if it were not for thy humours, there is not a better wench in England. Go, wash thy face, and draw thy action. Come, thou must not be in this humour with me ; do'st not know me? Come, come, I know thou wast set on to this.

Host. Pray thee, Sir John, let it be but twenty nobles; I am loath to pawn my plate, in good earnest, la !

Fal. Let it alone; I'll make other shift: you'll be

a fool still.

[blocks in formation]

The second name in the dramatic literature of this period has been generally assigned to BEN JONSON, though some may be disposed to claim it for the more Shakspearian genius of Beaumont and Fletcher. Jonson was born ten years after Shakspeare-in 1574-and appeared as a writer for the stage in his twentieth year. His early life was full of hardship and vicissitude. His father, a clergyman in | Westminster (a member of a Scottish family from Annandale), died before the poet's birth, and his mother marrying again to a bricklayer, Ben was brought from Westminster school and put to the same employment. Disliking the occupation of his father-in-law, he enlisted as a soldier, and served in the Low Countries. He is reported to have killed one of the enemy in single combat, in the view of both armies, and to have otherwise distinguished himself for his youthful bravery. As a poet, Jonson afterwards reverted with pride to his conduct as a soldier. On his return to England, he entered St John's college, Cambridge; but his stay there must have been short-probably on account of his straitened circumstances-for, about the age of twenty, he is found married, and an actor in London. Ben made his debut at a low theatre near

[merged small][graphic]
[ocr errors]

Ben Jonson.

quarrelled with another performer, and on their fighting a duel with swords, Jonson had the misfortune to kill his antagonist, and was severely wounded himself. He was committed to prison on a charge of murder, but was released without a trial. On regaining his liberty, he commenced writing for the stage, and produced, in 1596, his Every Man in his Humour. The scene was laid in Italy, but the characters and manners depicted in the piece were English, and Jonson afterwards recast the whole, and transferred the scene to England. In its revised form, Every Man in his Humour' was brought out at the Globe Theatre in 1598, and Shakspeare was one of the performers in the play. He had himself produced some of his finest comedies by this time, but Jonson was no imitator of his great rival, who blended a spirit of poetical romance with his comic sketches, and made no attempt to delineate the domestic manners of his countrymen. Jonson opened a new walk in the drama: he felt his strength, and the public cheered him on with its plaudits. Queen Elizabeth patronised the new poet, and ever afterwards he was a man of mark and likelihood.' In 1599, appeared his Every Man out of his Humour, a less able performance than its predecessor. Cynthia's Revels and the Poetaster followed, and the fierce rivalry and contention which clouded Jonson's afterlife seem to have begun about this time. He had attacked Marston and Dekker, two of his brother dramatists, in the Poetaster.' Dekker replied with spirit in his 'Satiromastix,' and Ben was silent fortwo years, 'living upon one Townsend, and scorning the world,' as is recorded in the diary of a contemporary. In 1603, he tried if tragedy had a more kind aspect,' and produced his classic drama of Sejanus. Shortly after the accession of King James, a comedy called Eastward Hoe, was written conjointly by Jonson, Chapman, and Marston. Some passages in this piece reflected on the Scottish nation, and the matter was represented to the king by one of his courtiers (Sir James Murray) in so strong a light, that the authors were thrown into prison, and threatened with the loss

of their ears and noses. They were not tried; and when Ben was set at liberty, he gave an entertainment to his friends (Selden and Camden being of the number): his mother was present on this joyous occasion, and she produced a paper of poison, which she said she intended to have given her son in his liquor, rather than he should submit to personal mutilation and disgrace, and another dose which she intended afterwards to have taken herself. The old lady must, as Whalley remarks, have been more of an antique Roman than a Briton. Jonson's own conduct in this affair was noble and spirited. He had no considerable share in the composition of the piece, and was, besides, in such favour, that he would not have been molested; but this did not satisfy him,' says Gifford; and he, therefore, with a high sense of honour, voluntarily accompanied his two friends to prison, determined to share their fate.' We cannot now ascertain what was the mighty satire that moved the patriotic indignation of James; it was doubtless softened before publication; but in some copies of 'Eastward Hoe' (1605), there is a passage in which the Scots are said to be dispersed over the face of the whole earth;' and the dramatist sarcastically adds, 'But as for them, there are no greater friends to Englishmen and England, when they are out on't, in the world, than they are; and for my part, I would a hundred thousand of them were there (in Virginia), for we are all one countrymen now, you know, and we should find ten times more comfort of them there than we do here.' The offended nationality of James must have been laid to rest by the subsequent adulation of Jonson in his Court Masques, for he eulogised the vain and feeble monarch as one that would raise the glory of England more than Elizabeth.* Jonson's three great comedies, Volpone, or the Fox, Epicene, or the Silent Woman, and the Alchemist, were his next serious labours; his second classical tragedy, Catiline, appeared in 1611. His fame had now reached its highest elevation; but he produced several other comedies, and a vast number of court entertainments, ere his star began sensibly to decline. In 1619, he received the appointment of poet laureate, with a pension of a hundred merks. The same year Jonson made a journey on foot to Scotland, where he had many friends. He was well received by the Scottish gentry, and was so pleased with the country, that he meditated a poem, or drama, on the beauties of Lochlomond. The last of his visits was made to Drummond of Hawthornden, with whom he lived three weeks, and Drummond kept notes of his conversation, which, in a subsequent age, were communicated to the world. In conclusion, Drummond entered on his journal the following character of Ben himself :'He is a great lover and praiser of himself; a contemner and scorner of others; given rather to lose a friend than a jest; jealous of every word and action of those about him, especially after drink, which is one of the elements in which he liveth; a dissembler of ill parts which reign in him; a bragger of some good that he wanteth; thinketh nothing well but what either he himself or some of his friends and countrymen hath said or done; he is passionately kind and angry; careless either to gain or keep; vindictive, but, if well answered, at himself; for any religion, as being versed in both ;f interpreteth best

* An account of these entertainments, as essentially connected with English literature, is given at the close of this article.

↑ Drummond here alludes to Jonson having been at one period of his life a Roman Catholic. When in prison, after killing the actor, a priest converted him to the church of Rome, and he continued a member of it for twelve years. At the expiration of that time, he returned to the Protestant communion.

sayings and deeds often to the worst; oppressed with fantasy, which hath ever mastered his reason, a general disease in many poets.'

This character, it must be confessed, is far from being a flattering one; and probably it was, unconsciously, overcharged, owing to the recluse habits and staid demeanour of Drummond. We believe it, however, to be substantially correct. Inured to hardships and to a free boisterous life in his early days, Jonson seems to have contracted a roughness of manner, and habits of intemperance, which never wholly left him. Priding himself immoderately on his classical acquirements, he was apt to slight and condemn his less learned associates; while the conflict between his limited means and his love of social pleasures, rendered him too often severe and saturnine in his temper. Whatever he did was done with labour, and hence was highly prized. His contemporaries seemed fond of mortifying his pride, and he was often at war with actors and authors. With the celebrated Inigo Jones, who was joined with him in the preparation of the Court Masques, Jonson waged a long and bitter feud, in which both parties were to blame. When his better nature prevailed, and exorcised the demon of envy or spleen, Jonson was capable of a generous warmth of friendship, and of just discrimination of genius and character. His literary reputation, his love of conviviauty, and his high colloquial powers, rendered his society much courted, and he became the centre of a band of wits and revellers. Sir Walter Raleigh founded a club, known to all posterity as the Mermaid Club, at which Jonson, Shakspeare, Beaumont and Fletcher, and other poets, exercised themselves with wit-combats' more bright and genial than their wine.* One of the favourite haunts of these bright-minded men was the Falcon Tavern, near the theatre in Bankside, Southwark, of which a sketch has been preserved. The latter days of Jonson were dark and painful. Attacks of palsy confined him to his house, and his necessities compelled him to write for the stage when his pen had lost its vigour, and wanted the charm of novelty. In 1630, he produced his comedy, the New Inn, which was unsuccessful on the stage. The king sent him a present of £100, and raised his laureate pension to the same sum per annum, adding a yearly tierce of canary wine. Next year, however, we find Jonson, in an Epistle Mendicant, soliciting assistance from the lord-treasurer. He continued writing to the last. Dryden has styled the latter works of Jonson his dotages; some are certainly unworthy of him, but the Sad Shepherd, which he left unfinished, exhibits the poetical fancy of a youthful composition. He died in 1637, and was buried in Westminster Abbey, where a square stone, marking the spot where the poet's body was disposed vertically, was long afterwards shown, inscribed only with the words, ' O RARE BEN JONSON!' As a proof of his enthusiastic temperament, it is mentioned, that Jonson drank out the full cup of wine at the communion

[ocr errors]

table, in token of his reconciliation with the church of Eng

land.

* Many were the wit-combats betwixt Shakspeare and Ben Jonson, which two I behold like a Spanish great galleon and an English man-of-war: Master Jonson, like the former, was built far higher in learning; solid, but slow in his performances. Shakspeare, with the English man-of-war, lesser in bulk, but lighter in sailing, could turn with all tides, tack about and take advantage of all winds, by the quickness of his wit and invention.'-Fuller's Worthies.

Besides the Mermaid, Jonson was a great frequenter of a club called the Apollo, at the Old Devil Tavern, Temple Bar, for which he wrote rules-Leges Conviviales—and penned a welcome over the door of the room to all those who approved of the 'true Phobian liquor.' Ben's rules, it must be said, discountenanced excess.

« ÎnapoiContinuă »