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In nature of a vice, to wrest and turn

The good aspect of those that shall sit near him,
From what they do behold! O, 'tis most vile.
Mit. Nay, Asper.

Asp. Peace, Mitis, I do know your thought;
You'll say, your guests here will except at this:
Pish! you are too timorous, and full of doubt.
Then he, a patient, shall reject all physick,
'Cause the physician tells him, you are sick:
Or, if I say, that he is vicious,

You will not hear of virtue. Come, you are fond."
Shall I be so extravagant, to think,

That happy judgments, and composed spirits,
Will challenge me for taxing such as these?
I am ashamed.

Cor. Nay, but good, pardon us;

We must not bear this peremptory sail,
But use our best endeavours how to please.

Asp. Why, therein I commend your careful thoughts, And I will mix with you in industry

To please: but whom? attentive auditors,

Such as will join their profit with their pleasure,
And come to feed their understanding parts:
For these I'll prodigally spend myself,
And speak away my spirit into air;
For these I'll melt my brain into invention,
Coin new conceits, and hang my richest words

As polish'd jewels in their bounteous ears.?

Come, you are fond.] You are foolish, simple, injudicious. In this sense fond is used by our earliest writers. Thus Chaucer:

The riche man ful fond is, iwis,

That weneth that he loved is.

Rom. of the Rose, v. 5367.

And so it is found in Spenser, Shakspeare, and almost every dramatist and poet of this age.

WHAL.

hang my richest words

As polish'd jewels in their bounteous cars.] The comparison

But stay, Ilose myself, and wrong their patience;
If I dwell here, they'll not begin, I see.
Friends, sit you still, and entertain this troop
With some familiar and by-conference,
I'll haste them sound. Now, gentlemen, Igo
To turn an actor, and a humorist,

Where, ere I do resume my present person,
We hope to make the circles of your eyes
Flow with distilled laughter: if we fail,
We must impute it to this only chance,
Art hath an enemy call'd ignorance.*
Cor. How do you like his spirit, Mitis?
Mit. I should like it much better, if he were less
confident.

Cor. Why, do you suspect his merit ?

[Exit.

Mit. No; but I fear this will procure him much

envy.

Cor. O, that sets the stronger seal on his desert: if he had no enemies, I should esteem his fortunes most wretched at this instant.

Mit. You have seen his play, Cordatus: pray you,

how is it?

Cor. Faith, sir, I must refrain to judge; only this I

alludes to the custom then in vogue, of men wearing rings and jewels in their ears. So Marston: "Give me those jewels of 66 your ears, to receive my inforced duty."

And Beaumont and Fletcher:

Malecontent, A. I. S. 6.

Prithee, tell me,

ear.

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"Where hadst thou that same jewel in thine
King and no King, A. I. WHAL.

Art hath an enemy, &c.] Alluding to the old proverb, Ars non habet inimicum nisi ignorantem. Though this may be true, it would come with more propriety from the spectator than the actor; but Jonson knew little of the golden curb which discretion hangs on self-opinion.

VOL. II.

D

can say of it, 'tis strange, and of a particular kind by itself, somewhat like Vetus Comoedia; a work that hath bounteously pleased me; how it will answer the general expectation, I know not.

Mit. Does he observe all the laws of comedy in it?
Cor. What laws mean you?

Mit. Why, the equal division of it into acts and scenes, according to the Terentian manner; his true number of actors; the furnishing of the scene with Grex or Chorus, and that the whole argument fall within compass of a day's business.

Cor. O no, these are too nice observations.

Mit. They are such as must be received, by your favour, or it cannot be authentic.

Cor. Troth, I can discern no such necessity.
Mit. No!

Cor. No, I assure you, signior." If those laws you speak of had been delivered us ab initio, and in their present virtue and perfection, there had been some reason of obeying their powers; but 'tis extant, that that which we call Comoedia, was at first nothing but a simple and continued song, sung by one only person, till Susario invented a second; after him, Epicharmus a third; Phormus and Chionides devised to

2 Cor. No, I assure you, signior. &c.] I have already observed, that the author has afforded no hints to enable us to guess at the person of his friend Cordatus: he has, however, supplied him with a considerable degree of accuracy and learning; and I suspect that few, either on or off the stage, could have furnished, in those days, a better epitome of dramatic history than is here put into his mouth. It must, however, have been caviare to the general. The scholar knows that the first part of this narrative admits of some dispute; a note, however, is not the place to treat of a question which occupies a considerable portion of the profound and acute Dissertation upon Phalaris, by the great Bentley.

3

Upton supposes that Jonson wrote Phormus from 66 a lapse of memory," and therefore tells us to correct the text into

have four actors, with a prologue and chorus; to which Gratinus, long after, added a fifth and sixth: Eupolis, more; Aristophanes, more than they; every man in the dignity of his spirit and judgment supplied something. And, though that in him this kind of poem appeared absolute, and fully perfected, ret how is the face of it changed since, in Menander, Philemon, Cecilius, Plautus, and the rest! who have utterly excluded the chorus, altered the property of the persons, their names, and natures, and augmented it with all liberty, according to the elegancy and disposition of those times wherein they wrote. I see not then, but we should enjoy the same license, or free power to illustrate and heighten our invention, as they did; and not be tied to those strict and regular forms which the niceness of a few, who are nothing but form, would thrust upon us. Mit. Well, we will not dispute of this now: but what's his scene?

Cor. Marry, Insula Fortunata, sir.

Mit. 0, the Fortunate Island: mass, he has bound himself to a strict law there.

Cor. Why so?

Mit. He cannot lightly alter the scene, without crossing the seas.

Cor. He needs not, having a whole island to run through, I think.

Mit. No! how comes it then, that in some one

Phormis; but there is no need; Jonson had a better memory than his critic. He well recollected the spelling of Athenæus and Suidas, in whom, particularly in the former, he found most of what he here delivers.

+ Mit. No! how comes it then, &c.] Against this passage, Theobald has written, in the margin of his copy, a furt on Shakspeare. This jealousy of our great poet, commenced under such respectable auspices, has since become epidemical, and infected almost all his critics. The charge, in the present case, is too absurd for serious notice, or indeed for any notice at

all.

play we see so many seas, countries, and kingdoms, passed over with such admirable dexterity?

Cor. O, that but shews how well the authors can travel in their vocation, and outrun the apprehension of their auditory. But leaving this, I would they would begin once: this protraction is able to sour the bestsettled patience in the theatre. [The third sounding. Mit. They have answered your wish, sir; they

sound.

Cor. O, here comes the Prologue.

Enter PROLOGUE.

Now, sir, if you had staid a little longer, I meant to have spoke your prologue for you, i'faith.

Prol. Marry, with all my heart, sir, you shall do it yet, and I thank you.

Cor. Nay, nay, stay, stay; hear you?

[going.

I

- Prol. You could not have studied to have done me a greater benefit at the instant; for I protest to you, am unperfect, and, had I spoke it, I must of necessity have been out.

Cor. Why, but do you speak this seriously? Prol. Seriously! ay, wit's my help, do I; and esteem my self indebted to your kindness for it. Cor. For what?

Prol. Why, for undertaking the prologue for me. Cor. How! did I undertake it for you?

Prol. Did you! I appeal to all these gentlemen, whether you did or no. Come, come, it pleases you to cast a strange look on't now; but 'twill not serve. Cor. 'Fore me, but it must serve; and therefore speak your prologue.

Prol. An I do, let me die poisoned with some ve nomous hiss, and never live to look as high as the two-penny room again."

5

[Exit.

and never live to look as high as the two-penny room again.] The cost of admission to the theatres (such of them,

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