And blushing evening, when she goes to bed; Yet such as shall outshine the glimmering light, With which all stars shall gild the follow ing night, Nor think it much (since all thy eaglets may Endure the sunny trial) if we say This hath the stronger wing, or that doth shine, Tricked up in fairer plumes, since all are thine: Who hath his flock of cackling geese compared With thy tuned quire of swans? or else who dared To call thy births deformed? but if thou bind, By city custom or by gavel-kind In equal shares thy love on all thy race, We may distinguish of their sex and place; Though one hand form them, and though one brain strike Souls into all, they are not all alike. Why should the follies then of this dull age Draw from thy pen such an immodest rage, As seems to blast thy else-immortal bays, When thine own tongue proclaims thy itch of praise? Such thirst will argue drought. No, let be hurled Upon thy works, by the detracting world, What malice can suggest: let the rout say, "The running sands that, ere thou make a play, Count the slow minutes, might a Godwin frame, " To swallow, when thou hast done, thy shipwrecked name.' Let them the dear expense of oil upbraid, Sucked by thy watchful lamp, "that bath betrayed To theft the blood of martyred authors, spilt Into thy ink, whilst thou grow'st pale with guilt." Repine not at the tapers thrifty waste, too valuable to be kept from the readers of Shakspeare, and therefore they are treated with it by Messrs. Steevens and Malone in a hundred different places. ODE TO BEN JONSON, UPON HIS ODE TO HIMSELF. That sleeks thy terser poems; nor is haste Praise, but excuse; and if thou overcome A knotty writer, bring the booty home: Nor think it theft if the rich spoils, so torn From conquered authors, be as trophies worn. Let others glut on the extorted praise The abortive offspring of their hasty hours. Thou art not of their rank; the quarrel lies Within thine own verge: then let this suffice, The wiser world doth greater thee confess Than all men else, than thyself only less. ODE TO BEN JONSON, PROCEED in thy brave rage, Whose greatest senators did silent sit, Hear and applaud the wit, Against his supposed fault; That from that full vein did so freely flow: The Graces jointly strove to make that breast A temple for their rest,1 We must not make thee less Than Aristophanes : 389 He got the start of thee in time and place, But thou hast gained the goal in art and grace. But if thou make thy feasts For the high-relished guests, And that a cloud of shadows shall break in, It were almost a sin To think that thou shouldst equally delight Though Art and Nature strive Thou art our whole Menander,2 and dost look3 Like the old Greek; think, then, but on his Cook.4 If thou thy full cups bring And there are some foul mouths had rather drink Out of the common sink; There let them seek to quench th' hydropic thirst, Till the swoln humour burst. From thy most precious meals, Since thy strange plenty finds no loss by it, Feed himself with the fragments of thy wit. And let those silken men That know not how or when To spend their money, or their time, maintain With their consumed no-brain, Their barbarous feeding on such gross base stuff As only serves to puff And strive t' engage the scene with their damned oaths, As they do with the privilege of their clothes. 1 This alludes to the well-known distich of ture we have of Menander, taken from an ancient Plato, which is thus rendered by Scaliger: Invenêre tuum pectus, Aristophanes." 2" Cæsar called Terence' Menander halfed,' because he wanted so much of his grace and sharpness. Ben Jonson may well be called our Menander whole, or more: exceeding him as much in sharpness and grace, as Terence wanted of him."-I. C. medal."-I. C. Comedies, makes his cook speak after this man"Menander in a fragment of one of his ner of the diversity of tastes, viz. : What is his usual fare? These things 'tis meet the cook should scan: "Ben Jonson s said to be very like the pic-But taste them with fastidious appetite.”—I. C. 390 ODE TO BEN JONSON, UPON HIS ODE TO HIMSELF. Whilst thou tak'st that high spirit, Well purchased by thy merit : Great Prince of Poets, though thy head be gray, Crown it with Delphic bay, Sing, English Horace, sing Whilst his triumphant chariot runs his whole Bright course about each pole: And from the chief [pin] in Apollo's quire, Sing down the Roman harper; he shall Take down thy best tuned lyre, It shall strike out the star, Which fabulous Greece durst fix in heaven, whilst thine, With all due glory, here on earth shall shine. The Magnetic Lady; or, Humours "It THE MAGNETIC LADY.] This comedy was brought out at the Black Friars in 1632, the licence for performing it bearing date the 12th October of that year. was generally accounted (Langbaine says) an excellent play, though in the poet's days it found some enemies." So indeed did everything written by Jonson: for "the envious Ben" (who was nevertheless more liberal, not to say lavish, of his praise than any writer before or since his time), was unremittingly pursued by a hostile party who sickened at his triumphs and insulted over his calamities. Among Howell's Letters there is one to our author, which notices this play. "Father Ben.-Nullum fit magnum ingenium sine mixtura dementia; there's no great wit without some mixture of madness, so saith the philosopher, nor was he a fool who answered, Nec parvum sine mixtura stultitiæ; nor small wit without some allay of foolishness. Touching the first it is verified in you, for I find that you have been oftentimes mad: you were mad when you writ your Fox, and madder when you writ your Alchemist; you were mad when you writ Catiline, and stark mad when you writ Sejanus; but when you writ your Epigrams and the Magnetic Lady you were not so mad. Insomuch that I perceive there be degrees of madness in you. Excuse me that I am so free with you. The madness I mean is that divine fury, that heating and heightening spirit which Ovid speaks of." This letter, which is dated West., 27th Jan. 1629, nearly two years previous to the date already assigned to the Magnetic Lady, might contribute to weaken our confidence in the official documents of Sir H. Herbert, were not the discrepancy satisfactorily accounted for by Oldys. He tells us in his manuscript notes to Langbaine, that Howell first published his letters without any dates, and that when he attempted to subjoin them in his subsequent editions he confounded the time: "hence," says he, "so many errors in their dates." There is yet another circumstance to be mentioned respecting this play. On its first appearance it gave great offence by its oaths. For these the actors were called before the High Commission Court, and severely censured. As the author was sick in bed, they boldly laid the fault on him; Jonson, however, completely justified himself from this atrocious charge, as did the Master of the Revels, on whom they had next the audacity to lay it; and the players then "humbly confessed that they had themselves interpolated the offensive passages." For this curious circumstance, which is important on many accounts, we are indebted to the Office-book of Sir Henry Herbert.-See Shak. vol. ii. p. 380. The Magnetic Lady was first published in the second fol., and bears date 1640, three years at least after Jonson's death: when the editor, as I should have remarked of all the plays collected in that volume, had forgotten how the author spelt his name. It had originally this motto subjoined to the title, to which it is not ill adapted: DRAMATIS Compass, a scholar mathematic. Sir Diaphanous Silkworm, a courtier. Sir Moth Interest, an usurer, or money- PERSONE. Bias, a vi-politic, or sub-secretary. Lady Loadstone, the Magnetic Lady. Pleasance, her waiting-woman. Servant to Sir Moth, Serjeants, &c. The Chorus (Probee, Damplay, and Boy of the house) by way of Induction. The Induction, or Chorus. The Stage. Enter Master Probee and Master Damplay, met by a Boy of the house. Dam. And tie us two to you for the gentle office. Pro. We are a pair of public persons (this gentleman and myself) that are sent thus coupled unto you upon state business. Boy. It concerns but the state of the stage, I hope. Boy. What do you lack,' gentlemen, what is't you lack? any fine fancies, figures, humours, characters, ideas, definitions of Dam. O, you shall know that by lords and ladies? Waiting-women, para-degrees, boy. No man leaps into a busisites, knights, captains, courtiers, lawyers?ness of state without fording first the state what do you lack? of the business. Pro. A pretty prompt boy for the poetic shop! Dam. And a bold! Where's one of your masters, sirrah, the poet? Boy. Which of them, sir? we have divers that drive that trade now: poets, poetaccios, poetasters, poetitos Dam. And all haberdashers of small wit, presume; we would speak with the poet of the day, boy. Boy. Sir, he is not here. But I have the dominion of the shop for this time, under him, and can shew you all the variety the stage will afford for the present. Pro. Therein you will express your own good parts, boy. What do you lack ?] The boy uses the language of the petty traders of the time, and the others continue the allusion. * Sir, he is not here.] Jonson always attended Pro. We are sent unto you, indeed, from the people. Boy. The people! which side of the people? Dam. The venison side, if you know it, boy. |