I, therefore, will begin:-Soul of the age, Pacuvius, Accius, him of Cordova dead, Of all that insolent Greece, or haughty Rome, This is an allusion to the following lines in a commendatory poem on Shakespeare by William Basse: Renowned Spenser, lie a thought more nigh To earned Chaucer; and rare Beaumont lie A little nearer Spenser; to make room For Shakespeare, in your three-fold tour-fold tomb. But antiquated and deserted lie, And such wert thou. Look, how the father's face Of Shakespeare's mind and manners brightly shines In each of which he seems to shake a lance To see thee in our waters yet appear; And make those flights upon the banks of Thames, Advanc'd, and made a constellation there:- night, And despairs day, but for thy Volume's light! BEN JONSON. In short, in the praise which Jonson bestows on Shakespeare we see rather the full and un restrained homage of unfeigned affection than the niggardly payment of latent envy and con * A Comet in 1618, very conspicuous, perhaps contributed to suggest this imagery. I cealed detraction. The commendation is not destroyed by any qualifying clause nor any artifice of invidious extenuation. Many years after Shakespeare's death Ben with warmth exclaimed, I loved the man and do honour his memory on this side idolatry as much as any. He was indeed honest and of an open and free nature, had an excellent phantasy, brave notions, and gentle expressions, wherein he flowed with that facility that sometimes it was necessary he should be stopped; sufflaminandus erat, as Augustus said of Harterius.' We have distinct and incontrovertible proof that Ben Jonson did profess to esteem the worth and to venerate the genius of Shakespeare, and not a particle of proof has been adduced to shew that he professed what he did not feel; and that like some of his commentators, he secretly calumniated whom he affected to praise."-Crit. Rev. July 1808. AND THEIR EXPLANATION. Slight Alteration. † Addition. ↑ Greater Alteration. + Change of Grammar. Aphoristic Basis extracted, and the Aphorism conveyed in new Expression. ¶ Accommodation of the Words to a different Meaning. Aphorism applied in the Original to a particular occasion; but detacht as an Expression of a General Truth. Only Dramatically true. Ironical. Where Figures, 2, 3, &c. follow at the Head of successive Aphorisms, they indicate that the same Character is to be understood until another be introduced. N. B. Where any of these Marks have Notes with corresponding Marks, they are in that case used as mere References. |