the following:-"a fool's beatitude" (Antonio's Revenge): Note a fool's beatitude: He is not capable of passion; Wanting the power of distinction, He bears an unturn'd sail with every wind: * From wizard's cheeks, who making curious search Thomas Heywood, "a sort of prose Shakespeare," to take Lamb's estimate, was perhaps the most prolific writer of any of the dramatists of this period. He states himself that he was more or less concerned in the immense number of two hundred and twenty pieces, not a tenth part of which have come down to us. In addition to these pieces he was the author of several voluminous works in prose and verse, including two poems, each filling a folio volume! Heywood's plays are full of telling situations, brought about by much dramatic skill; and his language is at times very eloquent and pathetic. His "Woman Kill'd with Kindness" is an example of this last statement, and from it the two following extracts are given. Here is Frankford, the confiding husband, rejoicing too hastily perhaps, in his great felicity, and striking the keynote upon which the terrible interest of the story turns :- Frankford. How happy am I amongst other men, I am a gentleman, and by my birth *i. e. wise men's. † Zany, imitate. HEYWOOD. Companion with a king; a king's no more, Touching my mind, I am studied in all arts; I have a fair, a chaste, a loving wife; 147 As the play draws near its climax Frankford's servant tells him of his wife's infidelity : Frank. Thou hast kill'd me with a weapon whose sharp point Hath prick'd quite through and through my shivering heart. Drops of cold sweat sit dangling on my hairs, Like morning's dew upon the golden flowers; And I am plunged into strange agonies. What dids't thou say? If any word that touch'd It is as hard to enter my belief As Dives into Heaven. Nicholas. I can gain nothing: they are two More by a thousand dangers could not hire me I saw, and I have said. Frank. 'Tis probable; though blunt, yet he's honest. Though I durst pawn my life, and on her faith Hazard the dear salvation of my soul, Yet in my trust I may be too secure. May this be true? Óh, may it? Can it be? Man, woman, what thing mortal can we trust, Nich. Eyes, master, eyes. Frank. Thy eyes may be deceiv'd, I tell thee; Nich. Shall I discuss the same by circumstance? Frank. No more! To supper, and command your fellows To attend us and the strangers. Not a word, I charge thee, on thy life; be secret, then, For I know nothing. Nich. I am dumb. Now that I have eased my stomach, I will go fill Frank. my stomach. Away! begone! She is well born, descended nobly, Is in the general voice of all the country To me, her husband, modest, chaste, and godly. But he, that Judas that hath borne my purse, Shall I trust The bare report of this suspicious groom, Before the double gilt, the well-hatched ore, Of their two hearts? No. I will lose these thoughts; And from my looks exile sad content; Their wonted favours in my tongue shall flow: [Exit. To Ben Jonson, born in 1574, ten years after Shakespeare, a pupil at Westminster School, where his original talents were noticed by the great Camden, has been assigned the second place in our dramatic literature. Jonson, of Scottish origin, (the son of a clergyman, of a Scots family, from Annandale, if we may receive the testimony of Drummond of Hawthornden,) was a learned, serious, heavy writer in his tragedies, transfusing into them not only the spirit but the method of thought of his Latin originals; and in his comedies a humorous, brilliant, painstaking, and thoughtful poet; at times, satirical, biting, savage, and proud to those of his contemporaries who drew down his wrath upon their heads. Jonson has been charged with some of the worst failings of humanity—pride, ill BEN JONSON. 149 nature, irreligion, arrogance, jealousy-and with being continually at war with his fellows. When it is stated that he was the intimate and convivial companion of Shakespeare, Beaumont, Fletcher, Selden, Cotton, Carew, Martin, Donne; that he was ready at all times to forward and assist deserving merit, and that notably he lent his help to Selden, Hacket, Raleigh, Hobbes; that he has spoken in high terms of Selden, Camden, and others; that in his works he always speaks with reverence of the Creator-" the great and good God," as he himself says, whom to think of "must straight my melancholy be," when these statements are considered, the libels that have been cast upon him at once disappear. He has also been charged with wine-bibbing and gluttony. That he indulged to some extent in the enjoyments of life cannot be questioned; but so did Shakespeare, Selden, and others of his friends. The works, however, that he has left us testify to an arduous and laborious life, and give the flattest contradiction possible to these two last calumnies. After a perusal of Jonson's memoir by his ablest editor, this great dramatist appears to us in the light of "the beloved servant' of his prince, the companion and friend of the nobility and gentry, and the acknowledged head of the learned part of society;" to say nothing of the fact that the "distinguished characters of both sexes with whom he had grown old in a constant intercourse of friendship and familiarity, the men of genius and talents who succeeded them, the hope and pride of the coming age, all flocked to Jonson, all desired to become his 'sons,' all looked up to him for encouragement and advice, and all boasted of the pleasure and advantage derived from his society." Jonson took his names of characters from the nature of his puppets-Bobadil, Sir Epicure Mammon, Subtle, Pertinax, Surly, and Old Knowell; and his comedies abound in truthful delineations of the humorous, foibles, affections, and weaknesses common to humanity. His five great comedies, "Every Man in his Humour,” 66 Every Man out of his Humour," "Volpone, or the Fox," "Epicone, or the Silent Woman," and the "Alchemist" are splendid examples of this, and show us, better than any historian possibly can, the sort of people the English were in the days of Elizabeth and James I.; ""The Fox,' 'The Alchemist,' and 'Silent Woman, done by Ben Jonson, and outdone by no man," says Dryden. Hallam ("History of Literature of Europe,") says that his first comedy, written at the early age of twentytwo, "is an extraordinary monument of genius, in what is seldom the possession of youth, a clear and unerring description of human character, various, and not extravagant beyond the necessities of the stage." Jonson had learned his art from Aristophanes, Plautus, and Terence; and it is well to mark the difference between his comedy and that of Shakespeare; it is also well to study English character in his pages. Manly and independent, a humourist, that is, an original man, full of thought, and not fond of travelling in the beaten track; honourable; careless to gain or keep; boisterous, rough, warm-hearted; slow at entering into a quarrel, yet ready to bear himself bravely when in it; loyal to his king, fond of dress, money, show, and extravagance, and, above all, a worshipper of power, the English character had a vigour and a force which must in general command our admiration. One species |