Shakspeare and His Times [Vol. 1 of 2] / Including the Biography of the Poet; criticisms on his genius and writings; a new chronology of his plays; a disquisition on the on the object of his sonnets; and a history of the manners, customs, and amusements, superstitions, poetry, and elegant literature of his age

It has, indeed, been surmised, by a very intelligent critic, that this poem may have been written while its author "felt the powerful incentive of love," and consequently "before he had sallied from Stratford;" "certainly," he adds, "before he was known to [426:A]fame." The first suggestion we may dismiss as a mere supposition; the second must be acknowledged as founded on truth.

All the commentators agree in fixing on the year 1591, as the LATEST period for our author's commencement as a dramatic poet: for this obvious reason, that both Greene and Chettle have mentioned him as a writer of plays in 1592, and in such a manner, likewise, as proves that he was even then possessed of some degree of notoriety, the latter mentioning his "facetious grace in writing," and the former, after calling him, "an upstart crow beautified with our feathers," and parodying a line from the Third Part of King Henry VI., concludes by telling us, that he "is in his own conceit the only Shake-scene in the country;" circumstances which have naturally induced the most sagacious critics on our bard to infer, that, thus early to have excited so much envy as this railing accusation evinces, he must without doubt have been a corrector and improver of plays anterior to 1590, and very probably in 1589.

Now, though the first edition of the Venus and Adonis was not published until 1593, yet the author's positive declaration, that it was "the first heir of his invention," necessarily implies that its composition had taken place prior to any poetical attempts for the stage; and as we have seen, that his arrival in town could not have occurred before 1586; that he was then immediately employed as an actor in a very inferior rank; and that his earliest efforts as a dramatic poet may be attributed to the year 1589 or 1590, it will follow, as a legitimate deduction, if we allow the space of a twelvemonth for his settlement at the theatre, that the composition of this poem, "the first heir of his invention," must be given to the interval elapsing between the years 1587 and 1590, a period not too extended, the nature of his other engagements being considered, for the completion of a poem very nearly amounting to twelve hundred lines.

Having thus conducted Shakspeare to his entrance on the career of authorship and fame, it will now be necessary, in conformity with our plan, to take a general and cursory survey of Literature, as it existed in the reigns of Elizabeth and James. The remainder of this chapter will therefore be devoted to a broad outline on this subject, reserving, however, the topics of Romance and Miscellaneous Poetry, for distinct and immediately subsequent consideration, as these will form an apposite prelude to an estimate of the patronage which our author enjoyed, to a critique on his poems, and to critical notices of contemporary miscellaneous poets, enquiries which, while they embrace, in one view, the merits of Shakspeare as a miscellaneous poet, are, at the same time, in their preliminary and collateral branches, in some degree preparatory to his introduction as a dramatic writer; preparatory also to a sketch of the manners, customs, and diversions of the metropolis, during his age, and to a discussion of his transcendent powers as the bard of fancy and of nature.

The literary period of which we are proceeding to give a slight sketch, may be justly considered as the most splendid in our annals; for in what equal portion of our history can we bring forward three such mighty names as Spenser, Bacon, and Shakspeare, each, in their respective departments, remaining without a rival. As the field, however, is so ample that even to do justice to an outline will require much attention to arrangement, it will be necessary to distribute what we have to offer, in this stage of our work, under the heads of Bibliography, Philology, Criticism, History, General, Local, and Personal, and Miscellaneous Literature; premising that as we confine ourselves, in the strictest sense, to elegant literature, or what has been termed the Belles Lettres, science, theology, and politics, will, of course, be excluded.

Literature, which had for some centuries been confined to ecclesiastics and scholars by profession, was, at the commencement of Elizabeth's reign, thrown open to the higher classes of general society. The example was given by the Queen herself; and the nobility, the superior orders of the gentry, and even their wives and daughters, became enthusiasts in the cause of letters. The novelty which attended these studies, the eager desire to possess what had been so long studiously and jealously concealed, and the curiosity to explore and rifle the treasures of the Greek and Roman world, which mystery and imagination had swelled into the marvellous, contributed to excite an absolute passion for study, and for books. The court, the ducal castle, and the baronial hall, were suddenly converted into academies, and could boast of splendid libraries, as well as of splendid tapestries. In the first of these, according to Ascham, might be seen the Queen reading "more Greeke every day, than some prebendarie of this church doth read Latin in a whole week[429:A]," and while she was translating Isocrates or Seneca, it may be easily conceived that her maids of honour found it convenient to praise and to adopt the disposition of her time. In the second, observes Warton, the daughter of a duchess was taught not only to distil strong waters, but to construe Greek[429:B]; and in the third, every young lady who aspired to be fashionable was compelled, in imitation of the greater world, to exhibit similar marks of erudition.

If such were the studious manners of the ladies, it will readily be credited, that an equal, if not a greater attachment to literature existed in the other sex; in short, an intimacy with Greek, Latin, and Italian, was deemed essential to the character of the nobleman and the courtier; and learning was thus rendered a passport to promotion and rank. That this is not an exaggerated statement, but founded on contemporary authority, will be evident from a passage in Harrison's Description of England, where, after delineating the court, he adds,—"This further is not to be omitted, to the singular commendation of both sorts and sexes of our courtiers here in England, that there are verie few of them, which have not the use and skill of sundrie speaches, beside an excellent veine of writing before time not regarded.—Trulie it is a rare thing with us now, to heare of a courtier which hath but his owne language. And to saie how many gentlewomen and ladies there are, that beside sound knowledge of the Greeke and Latine toongs, are thereto no lesse skilfull in the Spanish, Italian, and French, or in some one of them, it resteth not in me: sith I am persuaded, that as the noblemen and gentlemen do surmount in this behalfe, so these come verie little or nothing at all behind them for their parts, which industrie God continue, and accomplish that which otherwise is wanting!" Again, a few lines below, he remarks of the ladies of the court, that some of them employ themselves "in continuall reading either of the holie scriptures, or histories of our owne or forren nations about us, and diverse in writing volumes of their owne, or translating of other mens into our English and Latine toongs[430:A];" employments which now appear to us very extraordinary as the daily occupations of a court, but were, then, the natural result of that ardent love of letters, which had somewhat suddenly been diffused through the higher classes.

Were we, however, to conclude, that the same erudite taste pervaded the bulk of the people, or even the middle orders of society, we should be grossly mistaken. Literature, though cultivated with enthusiasm in the metropolis, was confined even there to persons of high rank, or to those who were subservient to their education and amusement. In the country, to read and write were still esteemed rare accomplishments, and among the rural gentry of not the first degree, little difference, in point of literary information, was perceptible between the master and his menial attendant. Of this several of the plays of Shakspeare and Jonson will afford evidence, especially the comedies of the Merry Wives of Windsor, and Every Man in his Humour, to which a striking proof may be added from Burton, who wrote just at the close of the Shaksperian [430:B]period; and, in treating of study, as a cause of melancholy, says, "I may not deny, but that we have a sprinkling of our Gentry, here, and there one, excellently well learned;—but they are but few in respect of the multitude, the major part (and some again excepted, that are indifferent) are wholly bent for Hawks and Hounds, and carried away many times with intemperate lust, gaming, and drinking. If they read a book at any time, 'tis an English Chronicle, Sir Huon of Bordeaux, Amadis de Gaul, &c. a play-book, or some pamphlet of News, and that at such seasons only, when they cannot stir abroad, to drive away time, their sole discourse is dogs, hawks, horses, and what News? If some one have been a traveller in Italy, or as far as the Emperour's Court, wintered in Orleance, and can court his mistris in broken French, wear his clothes neatly in the newest fashion, sing some choice out-landish tunes, discourse of lords, ladies, towns, palaces, and cities, he is compleat and to be admired: otherwise he and they are much at one; no difference betwixt the master and the man, but worshipful titles: wink and choose betwixt him that sits down (clothes excepted) and him that holds the trencher behind him."[431:A]

It is to the court, therefore, and its attendants, to the nobility, higher gentry, and their preceptors, that we are to look for that ardent love of books and learning which so remarkably distinguished the reigns of Elizabeth and James, and which was destined, in another century, to descend into, and illuminate the larger masses of our population. Nothing, indeed, can more forcibly paint Elizabeth's passion for books and learning, than a passage in Harrison's unadorned but faithful description of her court:—"Finallie," says that interesting pourtrayer of ancient manners, "to avoid idlenesse, and prevent sundrie transgressions, otherwise likelie to be committed and doone, such order is taken, that everie office hath either a bible, or the booke of the acts and monuments of the church of England, or both, beside some histories and chronicles lieing therein, for the exercise of such as come into the same: whereby the stranger that entereth into the court of England upon the sudden, shall rather imagine himselfe to come into some publike schoole of the universities, where manie give eare to one that readeth, than into a princes palace, if you conferre the same with those of other nations. Would to God all honorable personages would take example of hir graces godlie dealing in this behalfe, and shew their conformitie unto these hir so good beginnings! which if they would, then should manie grievous offenses (wherewith God is highlie displeased) be cut off and restrained, which now doo reigne exceedinglie, in most noble and gentlemen's houses, whereof they see no paterne within hir graces gates."[432:A] Well might Mr. Dibdin apostrophize this learned Queen in the following picturesque and characteristic terms:—"All hail to the sovereign, who, bred up in severe habits of reading and meditation, loved books and scholars to the very bottom of her heart! I consider Elizabeth as a royal bibliomaniac of transcendant fame!—I see her, in imagination, wearing her favorite little Volume of Prayers[432:B], the composition of Queen Catharine Parr, and Lady Tirwit, 'bound in solid gold, and hanging by a gold chain at her side,' at her morning and evening devotions—afterwards, as she became firmly seated upon her throne, taking an interest in the embellishments of the Prayer Book[432:C], which goes under her own name; and then indulging her strong bibliomaniacal appetites in fostering the institution for the erecting of a Library, and an Academy for the study of Antiquities and History."[432:D]

The example of Elizabeth, whose taste for books had been fostered under the tuition of Ascham, was speedily followed by some of the first characters in the kingdom; but by none with more ardent zeal then by Archbishop Parker, who was such an indefatigable admirer and collector of curious and precious books, and of every thing that appertained to them, that, according to Strype, he kept constantly in his house "drawers of pictures, wood-cutters, painters, limners, writers, and book-binders,—one of these was Lylye, an excellent writer, that could counterfeit any antique writing. Him the archbishop customarily used to make old books compleat."[433:A] No expense, in short, was spared, by this amiable and accomplished divine, in procuring the most rare and valuable articles; his library was daily increased through the medium of numerous agents, whom he employed, both at home and abroad, and among these was Batman the author of the Doome and the commentator uppon Bartholome, who, we are told, purchased for him not less than 6700 books "in the space of no more than four years."[433:B]

To Parker succeeded the still more celebrated names of Sir Robert Cotton and Sir Thomas Bodley, men to whom the nation is indebted for two of the most extensive and valuable of its public libraries. The enthusiasm which animated these illustrious characters in their bibliographical researches is almost incredible, and what gives an imperishable interest to their biography is, that their morals were as pure as their literary zeal was glowing.

Sir Thomas Bodley was singularly fortunate in the selection of Dr. Thomas James for the keeper of his library, whom Camden terms vir eruditus, et vere φιλόβιβλος[433:C], and of whom Fuller says, that "on serious consideration one will conclude the Library made for him, and him for it, like tallies they so fitted one another. Some men live like mothes in libraries, not being better for the books, but the books the worse for them, which they only soile with their fingers. Not so Dr. James, who made use of books for his own and the publique good. He knew the age of a manuscript, by looking upon the face thereof, and by the form of the character could conclude the time wherein it was written."[434:A]

Among the lovers and collectors of curious books, during the reign of Elizabeth, may be mentioned Dr. John Dee, notorious for his magical and astrological lore, and who, according to his own account, possessed a library of "four thousand volumes, printed and unprinted, bound and unbound, valued at 2000l.," beside numerous boxes and cases of very rare evidences Irish and Welsh[434:B]; and Captain Cox of Coventry, whose boudoir of romances and ballads we shall have occasion to notice, at some length, in the succeeding chapter.

It is remarkable that the two sovereigns included in the era of Shakspeare, should have felt an equally unbounded inclination to study and to books. So attached was James to bibliothecal delights, that when he visited the Bodleian Library in 1605, he is said by Burton to have exclaimed on his departure, "if it were so that I must be a prisoner, if I might have my wish, I would desire to have no other prison than this library, and to be chained together with so many good authors."[434:C] Burton himself was one of the most inveterate bibliomaniacs of his day; Hearne tells us that he was a collector of "ancient popular little pieces," which, together with a multitude of books of the best kind, he gave to the Bodleian Library.[434:D] In the preface to his curious folio, he speaks of his eyes aking with reading, and his fingers with turning the leaves[434:E]; and in the body of his work, under the article of study, he expatiates, in the highest strain of enthusiasm, on the luxury of possessing numerous books: "we have thousands of authors of all sorts," he observes; "many great libraries full well furnished, like so many dishes of meat, served out for several palates: and he is a very block that is affected with none of them.—I could even live and dye with—and take more delight, true content of mind in them, than thou hast in all thy wealth and sport, how rich soever thou art.——Nicholas Gerbelius, that good old man, was so much ravished with a few Greek authors restored to light, with hope and desire of enjoying the rest, that he exclaims forthwith, Arabibus atque Indis omnibus erimus ditiores, We shall be richer than all the Arabick or Indian Princes; of such esteem they were with him, in comparable worth and value."—He then adopts the emphatic language of Heinsius: "I no sooner come into the Library, but I bolt the door to me, excluding lust, ambition, avarice, and all such vices, whose nurse is idleness, their mother Ignorance, and Melancholy herself, and in the very lap of eternity, amongst so many divine souls, I take my seat, with so lofty a spirit and sweet content, that I pity all our great ones, and rich men that know not this happiness. I am not ignorant in the mean time," he adds, "notwithstanding this which I have said, how barbarously and basely for the most part our ruder Gentry esteem of libraries and books, how they neglect and contemn so great a treasure, so inestimable a benefit.—For my part I pity these men,—how much, on the other side, are all we bound that are scholars, to those munificent Ptolomies, bountiful Mæcenates, heroical patrons, divine spirits,—qui nobis hæc otia fecerunt, Namque erit ille mihi semper Deus—that have provided for us so many well furnished libraries as well in our publick Academies in most cities, as in our private Colledges? How shall I remember Sir Thomas Bodley, amongst the rest, Otho Nicholson, and the right reverend John Williams Lord Bishop of Lincolne, (with many other pious acts) who besides that at St. John's College in Cambridge, that in Westminster, is now likewise in Fieri with a Library at Lincolne (a noble president for all corporate towns and cities to imitate) O quam te memorem (vir illustrissime) quibus elogiis?"[435:A]

The passion for letters and for books, which was thus diffused among the higher classes, necessarily occasioned much attention to be paid to the preservation and decoration of libraries, the volumes of which, however, were not arranged on the shelves in the manner that we are now accustomed to see them. The leaves, and not the back, were placed in front, in order to exhibit the silk strings or golden clasps which united the sides of the cover. Thus Bishop Earl, describing the character of a young gentleman of the University, says,—"His study has commonly handsome shelves, his books neat silk strings, which he shews to his father's man, and is loth to unty or take down for fear of misplacing."[436:A]

To the most costly of these embellishments, the golden clasps, Shakspeare has referred, both in a metaphorical and literal sense. In the Twelfth Night the Duke, addressing the supposed Cesario, exclaims—

and in Romeo and Juliet, Lady Capulet observes,

It appears, indeed, that the art of ornamenting the exterior of books was carried, at this period, to a lavish extent, jewels, as well as gold, being employed to enhance their splendour. Let us listen to the directions of the judicious Peacham, on this head, a contemporary authority, who has thought it not unnecessary to subjoin the best mode of keeping books, and the best scite for a library. "Have a care," says he, "of keeping your bookes handsome, and well bound, not casting away over much in their gilding or stringing for ostentation sake, like the prayer-bookes of girles and gallants, which are carried to Church but for their out-sides. Yet for your owne use spare them not for noting or interlining (if they be printed) for it is not likely you meane to be a gainer by them, when you have done with them: neither suffer them through negligence to mold and be moath-eaten, or want their strings or covers.—Suffer them not to lye neglected, who must make you regarded; and goe in torn coates, who must apparell your mind with the ornaments of knowledge, above the roabes and riches of the most magnificent Princes.

"To avoyde the inconvenience of moathes and moldinesse, let your study be placed, and your windowes open if it may be, towards the East, for where it looketh South or West, the aire being ever subject to moisture, moathes are bred and darkishnesse encreased, whereby your maps and pictures will quickly become pale, loosing their life and colours, or rotting upon their cloath, or paper, decay past all helpe and recovery."[437:A]

The interior, also, as well as the exterior, of books, had acquired a high degree of richness and finishing during the era of which we are treating. The black-letter, Roman, and Italic, types were, in general, clear, sharp, and strong, and though the splendid art of illumination had ceased to be practised, in the sixteenth century, in consequence of the establishment of printing, the loss was compensated for, by more correct ornamental capital initials, cut with great taste and spirit on wood and copper, and by engraved borders and title-pages. Portraits were also frequently introduced in the initials, especially by the celebrated printers Jugge, and Day, the latter of whom, patronised by Archbishop Parker, became in his turn the patron of Fox the martyrologist, in the first edition of whose book, 1563, and in Day's edition of Dee's General and Rare Memorials pertayning to the perfecte Arte of Navigation, folio, 1577, may be found an admirable specimen of this style of decoration, the capital initial C including a portrait of Elizabeth sitting in state, and attended by three of her ministers.[437:B] A similar mode of costly ornamenture issued from the presses of Grafton, Whitchurch, Bill, and Barker, and perhaps in no period of our annals has this species of decorative typography been carried to a higher state of perfection. Some very grotesque ornaments, it is true, and some degree of affectation were occasionally exhibited in title-pages, and to one of the latter class, very common in this age, Shakspeare alludes in the Second Part of King Henry IV., where Northumberland, describing the approach of a messenger, says,

imagery drawn from the custom of printing elegiac poems with the title-page, and every intermediate leaf, entirely black; but, upon the whole, valuable books, and especially the Bible, had more splendid and minutely ornamental finishing bestowed upon their pages, than has since occurred, in this country, until towards the close of the eighteenth century.

It had been fortunate, if accuracy in typography had kept pace with the taste for decoration; but this, with few exceptions, may be said never to have been the case, and about the termination of Elizabeth's reign, the era of total incorrectness, as Mr. Steevens remarks, commenced, when "works of all kinds appeared with the disadvantage of more than their natural and inherent imperfections[438:B];" an assertion sufficiently borne out by the state in which the dramatic poetry of this period was published. It may be added that the Black-letter continued to be the prevailing type during the days of Elizabeth, but seems to have nearly deserted the English press before the demise of her successor.

Of what extent was the Library of Shakspeare, and of what its chief treasures consisted, can now only be the subject of conjecture. That he was a lover and collector of books more particularly within the pale of his own language, and in the range of elegant literature, is sufficiently evidenced by his own works. A Bibliotheca Shakspeariana may, in fact, be drawn, from the industry of his commentators, who have sought for, and quoted, almost every book to which he has been directly or remotely indebted. The disquisitions indeed into which we are about to enter will pretty accurately point out the species of books which principally ornamented his shelves, and may preclude any other remark here, than that the chief wealth of his collection consisted of Historic, Romantic, and Poetic Literature, in all their various branches.

Philological or grammatical literature, as applied to the English language, appears to have made little progress until after the middle of the sixteenth century. We are told by Roger Ascham in 1544, the period of the publication of his Toxophilus, that "as for the Latine or Greeke tongue, everye thinge is so excellentlye done in them, that none can do better; in the Englishe tongue, contrary, everye thinge in a maner so meanlye both for the matter and handelinge, that no man can do worse. For therein the least learned, for the most part, have bene alwayes most readye to write."[439:A] The Toxophilus of this useful and engaging writer, was written in his native tongue, with the view of presenting the public with a specimen of a purer and more correct English style than that to which they had hitherto been accustomed; and with the hope of calling the attention of the learned, from the exclusive study of the Greek and Latin, to the cultivation of their vernacular language. The result which he contemplated was attained, and, from the period of this publication, the shackles of Latinity were broken, and composition in English prose became an object of eager and successful attention.

Previous to the exertions of Ascham, very few writers can be mentioned as affording any model for English style. If we except the Translation of Froissart by Bourchier, Lord Berners, in 1523, and the History of Richard III. by Sir Thomas More, certainly compositions of great merit, we shall find it difficult to produce an author of much value for his vernacular prose. On the contrary, very soon after the appearance of the Toxophilus, we find harmony and beauty in English style emphatically praised and enjoined. Thus, in The Arte of Rhetorike for the use of all suche as are studious of Eloquence, sette forthe in Englishe by Thomas Wilson, 1553, we are informed that many now aspired to write English elegantly. "When we have learned," remarks this critic, "usuall and accustomable wordes to set forthe our meanynge, we ought to joyne them together in apte order, that the eare maie delite in hearynge the harmonie. I knowe some Englishemen, that in this poinct have suche a gift in the Englishe as fewe in Latin have the like; and therefore delite the Wise and Learned so muche with their pleasaunte composition, that many rejoyce when thei maie heare suche, and thinke muche learnyng is gotte when thei maie talke with them."[440:A] The Treatise of Wilson powerfully assisted the cause which Ascham had been advocating; it displays much sagacity and good sense, and greatly contributed to clear the language from the affectation consequent on the introduction of foreign words and idiom. The licentiousness, in this respect, was carried, indeed, at this time, to such a height, that those who affected more than ordinary refinement, either in conversation or writing, so Italianated or Latinized their English, as to be scarcely intelligible to the common people. Wilson severely satirizes this absurd practice. "Some," says he, "seke so farre for outlandishe Englishe, that they forget altogether their mother's language. And I dare sweare this, if some of their mothers were alive, thei were not able to tel what thei saie: and yet these fine Englishe clerkes wil saie thei speake in their mother tongue, if a man should charge them for counterfeityng the kinges Englishe.—He that cometh lately out of Fraunce, will talke Frenche Englishe, and never blushe at the matter. Another choppes in with Englishe Italianated, and applieth the Italian phraise to our Englishe speakyng.—The unlearned or folishe phantasticall, that smelles but of learnyng (suche fellowes as have seene learned men in their daies) will so Latine their tongues, that the simple cannot but wonder at their talke, and thinke surely thei speake by some revelacion. I know them, that thinke Rhetorike to stande wholie upon darke wordes; and he that can catche an ynkehorne terme by the taile, hym thei compt to be a fine Englishman and a good rhetorician." He then adds a specimen of this style from a letter "devised by a Lincolneshire man for a voide benefice," addressed to the Lord Chancellor:—"Ponderyng, expendyng, and revolutyng with myself, your ingent affabilitie, and ingenious capacitie, for mundane affaires, I cannot but celebrate and extoll your magnificall dexteritie above all other. For how could you have adapted suche illustrate prerogative, and dominiall superioritie, if the fecunditie of your ingenie had not been so fertile and wonderfull pregnaunt, &c."[441:A] That the same species of pedantry continued to prevail in 1589, we have the testimony of Puttenham, who, in his chapter Of Language, observes that "we finde in our English writers many wordes and speaches amendable, and ye shall see in some many inkhorne termes so ill affected brought in by men of learning as preachers and schoole-masters: and many straunge termes of other languages by Secretaries and Marchaunts and travailours, and many darke wordes and not usual nor well sounding, though they be dayly spok in Court."[441:B]

Before Puttenham, however, had published, another and a still more dangerous mode of corruption had infected English composition. In 1581, John Lilly, a dramatic poet, published a Romance in two parts, of which the first is entitled, Euphues, The Anatomy of Wit, and the second, Euphues and his England. This production is a tissue of antithesis and alliteration, and therefore justly entitled to the appellation of affected; but we cannot with Berkenhout consider it as a most contemptible piece of nonsense.[441:C] The moral is uniformly good; the vices and follies of the day are attacked with much force and keenness; there is in it much display of the manners of the times, and though, as a composition, it is very meretricious, and sometimes absurd in point of ornament, yet the construction of its sentences is frequently turned with peculiar neatness and spirit, though with much monotony of cadence. William Webbe, no mean judge, speaking of those who had attained a good grace and sweet vein in eloquence, adds,—"among whom I think there is none that will gainsay but Master John Lilly hath deserved most high commendations, as he who hath stepped one step farther therein than any since he first began the witty discourse of his Euphues, whose works surely in respect of his singular eloquence and brave composition of apt words and sentences, let the learned examine, and make a tryal thereof through all parts of rhetoric in fit phrases, in pithy sentences, in gallant tropes, in flowing speech, in plain sense; and surely in my judgment I think he will yield him that verdict, which Quintilian giveth of both the best orators, Demosthenes and Tully; that from the one nothing may be taken away, and to the other nothing may be added[442:A];" an encomium that was repeated by Nash[442:B], Lodge[442:C], and Meres[442:D], but which should be contrasted with the sounder opinion of Drayton, who, in his Epistle of Poets and Poesy, mentioning the noble Sidney,

observes that he

Yet the most correct description of the merits and defects of this once celebrated author has been given by Oldys, in his Librarian, who remarks that "Lilly was a man of great reading, good memory, ready faculty of application, and uncommon eloquence; but he ran into a vast excess of allusion; in sentence and conformity of style he seldom speaks directly to the purpose, but is continually carried away by one odd allusion or simile or other (out of natural history, that is yet fabulous and not true in nature), and that still overborne by more, thick upon the back of one another; and through an eternal affectation of sententiousness keeps to such a formal measure of his periods as soon grows tiresome; and so, by confining himself to shape his sense so frequently into one artificial cadence, however ingenious or harmonious, abridges that variety which the style should be admired for."[443:B]

So greatly was the style of Euphues admired in the court of Elizabeth, and, indeed, throughout the kingdom, that it became a proof of refined manners to adopt its phraseology. Edward Blount, who republished six of Lilly's plays, in 1632, under the title of Sixe Court Comedies, declares that "Our nation are in his debt for a new English which hee taught them. Euphues and his England," he adds, "began first that language. All our ladies were then his scollers; and that beautie in court who could not parley Euphuesme, was as little regarded as shee which now there speakes not French;" a representation certainly not exaggerated; for Ben Jonson, describing, a fashionable lady, makes her address her gallant in the following terms:—"O master Brisk, (as it is in Euphues) hard is the choice when one is compell'd, either by silence to die with grief, or by speaking, to live with shame:" upon which Mr. Whalley observes, that the court ladies in Elizabeth's time had all the phrases of Euphues by heart.[443:C]

Scarcely had corruption from this source ceased to violate the purity and propriety of our language, when the fashion of interlarding composition with a perpetual series of Latin quotations commenced; a custom which continued until the close of the reign of James, and gave to the style of this period a complexion the most heterogeneous and absurd, being, in fact, composed of two languages, half Latin and half English. Of this barbarous and pedantic habit, the works of Bishop Andrews afford the most flagrant instance; an example which, we have reason to regret, was followed too closely by Robert Burton, who, when he trusts to his native tongue, has written in a style at once simple and impressive.

These affectations, arising from the use of inkhorn terms, of antithesis, alliteration, arbitrary orthography, and the perpetual intermixture of Latin phraseology, have been deservedly and powerfully ridiculed by Sir Philip Sidney and Shakspeare; by the former under the character of Rombus, a village schoolmaster, in a masque presented to Her Majesty in Wansted Garden, and by the latter in the person of Holofernes in Love's Labour's Lost. The satire of Sir Philip is supported with humour; Her Majesty is supposed to have parted, by her presence, a violent contest between two shepherds for the affection of the Lady of the May, on which event Rombus comes forward with a learned oration.

"Now the thunder-thumping Jove transfused his dotes into your excellent formositie, which have with your resplendent beames thus segregated the enmity of these rurall animals; I am Potentissima Domina, a Schoole-master, that is to say, a Pedagogue, one not a little versed in the disciplinating of the juvenall frie, wherin (to my laud I say it) I use such geometrical proportions, as neither wanted mansuetude nor correction, for so it is described.

"Yet hath not the pulchritude of my vertues protected me from the contaminating hands of these Plebeians; for coming solummodo, to have parted their sanguinolent fray, they yeelded me no more reverence, than if I had been some Pecorius Asinus. I, even I, that am, who am I? Dixi verbus sapiento satum est. But what said that Troian Æneas, when he sojourned in the surging sulkes of the sandiferous seas, Hæc olim memonasse juvebit. Well, well, ad propositos revertebo, the puritie of the verity is that a certaine Pulchra puella profecto, elected and constituted by the integrated determination of all this topographicall region as the soveraigne Ladie of this Dame Maies month, hath beene quodammodo hunted, as you would say, pursued by two, a brace, a couple, a cast of young men, to whom the crafty coward Cupid had inquam delivered his dire-dolorous dart;" here the May-Lady interfering calls him a tedious fool, and dismisses him; upon which in anger he exclaims,—

"O Tempori, O Moribus! in profession a childe, in dignitie a woman, in yeares a Ladie, in cæteris a maide, should thus turpifie the reputation of my doctrine, with the superscription of a foole, O Tempori, O Moribus!"[445:A]

The Schoolmaster of Shakspeare appears, from the researches of Warburton and Dr. Farmer, to have been intended as a satire upon John Florio, whose First Fruits, or Dialogues in Italian and English, were published in 1578, his Second in 1591, and his "Worlde of Wordes" in 1598. He was ludicrously pedantic, dogmatic, and assuming, and gave the first affront to the dramatic poets of his day, by affirming that "the plaies that they plaie in England, are neither right comedies, nor right tragedies; but representations of histories without any decorum."[445:B] The character of Holofernes, however, while it caricatures the peculiar folly and ostentation of Florio, holds up to ridicule, at the same time, the general pedantry and literary affectations of the age; and amongst these very particularly the absurd innovations which Lilly had introduced. Sir Nathaniel, praising the specimen of alliteration which Holofernes exhibits in his "extemporal epitaph," calls it "a rare talent;" upon which the schoolmaster comments on the compliment in a manner which pretty accurately describes the fantastic genius of the author of Euphues:—"This is a gift that I have, simple, simple; a foolish extravagant spirit, full of forms, figures, shapes, objects, ideas, apprehensions, motions, revolutions: these are begot in the ventricle of memory, nourished in the womb of pia mater; and deliver'd upon the mellowing of occasion;" and subsequently in a strain of good sense not very common from the mouth of this imperious pedant, he still more definitely points out the foppery of Lilly both in style and pronunciation,—"He is too picked," he remarks, "too spruce, too affected, too odd, as it were, too peregrinate, as I may call it.—He draweth out the thread of his verbosity finer than the staple of his argument. I abhor such fanatical phantasms, such insociable and point devise companions; such rackers of orthography, as to speak, dout, fine, when he should say, doubt; det, when he should pronounce, debt; d, e, b, t; not d, e, t: he clepeth a calf, cauf; half, hauf; neighbour, vocatur nebour; neigh, abbreviated, ne: This is abhominable, (which he would call abominable,) it insinuateth me of insanie; Ne intelligis domine? to make frantick, lunatick."[446:A]

Yet, notwithstanding these various attempts, all tending to corrupt the purity of our language, and originating from the pedantic taste of the age, and from a love of novelty and over-refinement, English style more rapidly improved during the reigns of Elizabeth and James, than has been the case in any previous, or subsequent period of our annals. To establish this assertion, we have only to appeal to the great writers of this era, and among these, it will be sufficient to mention the names of Ralegh, Hooker, Bacon and Daniel, masters of a style, at once vigorous, perspicuous, and often richly modulated. If to this brief catalogue, though adequate to our purpose, we add the prose of Ascham, Sidney, Southwell, Knolles, Hakewell, and Peacham, still omitting many authors of much merit, it may justly be affirmed, that no specimens of excellence in dignified and serious composition could be wanting as exemplars. That the good sense of the age was aware of the value of these writers, in point of style, though surrounded by innovations supported by rank and fashion, may be concluded from the admonitions of Peacham, who in his chapter "Of stile, in speaking and writing," not only describes the style which ought to be adopted, but enumerates the authors who have afforded the best examples of it for the student. "Let your style," he admirably observes, "bee furnished with solid matter, and compact of the best, choice, and most familiar words; taking heed of speaking, or writing such words, as men shall rather admire than understand.—Flowing at one and the selfe same height, neither taken in and knit up too short, that, like rich hangings of Arras or Tapistry, thereby lose their grace and beautie, as Themistocles was wont to say: nor suffered to spread so farre, like soft Musicke in an open field, whose delicious sweetnesse vanisheth, and is lost in the ayre.

"To helpe yourselfe herein, make choice of those authors in prose, who speake the best and purest English. I would commend unto you (though from more antiquity) the Life of Richard the third, written by Sir Thomas Moore; the Arcadia of the noble Sir Philip Sidney, whom Du Bartas makes one of the foure columnes of our language; the Essayes, and other peeces of the excellent master of eloquence, my Lord of S. Albanes, who possesseth not onely eloquence, but all good learning, as hereditary both by father and mother. You have then M. Hooker, his Policy: Henry the fourth, well written by S. John Heyward; that first part of our English Kings, by M. Samuel Daniel. There are many others I know, but these will tast you best, as proceeding from no vulgar judgment."[447:A]

With regard to the state of colloquial language during this epoch, it may safely be asserted, that a reference to the works of Shakspeare will best acquaint us with the "diction of common life," with the tone of conversation which prevailed both in the higher and lower ranks of society; for the dialogue of his most perfect comedies is, by many degrees, more easy, lively, and perspicuous, than that of any other contemporary dramatic writer.

It is by no means, however, our wish to infer, from what has been said in praise of the prose writers of this period, that they are to be considered as perfect models in the nineteenth century; on the contrary, it must be confessed, that the best of them exhibit abundant proofs of quaintness and prolixity, of verbal pedantry and inverted phraseology; and though the language, through their influence, made unparalleled strides, and fully unfolded its copiousness, energy, and strength, it remained greatly deficient in correctness and polish, in selection of words, and harmony of arrangement.[448:A]

These defects, especially the two latter, are to be attributed, in a great measure, to philological studies being almost exclusively confined to the learned languages, a subject of complaint with a few individuals, who lamented the neglect which this classical enthusiasm entailed on their native tongue. Thus Arthur Golding, in some verses prefixed to Baret's Alviarie, after observing that