For the serious works of Quevedo, we must refer to his poems, as his serious compositions in prose are in general of a theological and ascetic character. The sonnets, canciones, odes and pastoral poems, which he published under the name of the Bachelor de la Torre, are even at the present day highly extolled by critics;490 and these poems have certainly more correctness than most of Quevedo’s other works. But they chiefly consist of imitations of the Spanish Petrarchist style, which was always foreign to Quevedo; and notwithstanding the great elegance of language and versification which distinguish them, they are surcharged with antiquated phrases of affected gallantry. The snows which inflame the poet, and similar tropes in which the beauty of a mistress is brilliantly set forth, occasionally call to mind the style of the Italian Marinists. Nevertheless some of these sonnets well deserve the favour which has been extended to them.491 Quevedo’s Endechas, or Laments, have a pleasing national character.492 The pastoral poems contained in this collection, approximate to the good specimens of the sixteenth century. Quevedo evidently wished to prove what he was capable of producing in this style of composition.
The serious poems of which Quevedo has avowed himself the author, are very unequal in character.493 His didactic and sententious sonnets are energetic, but deficient in delicacy.494 Some of the best assume a satirical turn.495 His odes in the Pindaric style are, however, stiff and formal. He wrote a piece of moral declamation in verse, called Sermon Estoyco, (Estoical Sermon), which is in truth precisely what the title denotes.
That Quevedo entertained very vague notions respecting poetry, is particularly evident from the whim which induced him to translate in rhymed verse, the stoical Enchiridion, or Manual of Epictetus. The translation is, however, much esteemed by the Spaniards.496
An Anacreon was still wanting to Spanish literature, though various attempts in the Anacreontic style had been made. That a poet penetrated at once with the classic spirit of Anacreon, Horace and Catullus, should now arise, and become the favourite of the Spanish public, was a thing scarcely to be expected; for all the resources of amatory poetry in the only style which had hitherto been found agreeable to Spanish taste, seemed to be exhausted. The poetry of Villegas, however, produced precisely for this reason the more powerful impression on a public which ardently longed for entertainment.
Estèvan Manuel de Villègas, was born in the year 1595, at Nagera, or Naxera, a little town in Old Castile. The history of his life is simple. His parents who were noble, though not rich, sent him to study at Madrid and Salamanca. His taste for poetry was developed at a very early period. Even in his fifteenth year he translated Anacreon, and several of the odes of Horace in verse; and likewise imitated those poets in original compositions. In his twentieth year he gave the finishing touch to his youthful effusions, and added to the collection of his translated and original poems, a second part, which has since been published conjointly with them.497 He soon after printed the whole collection at his own expence at Naxera, under the title of Amatorias; but in the interior of the book, the poems are styled Eroticas.498 Villegas ventured to dedicate these poems, together with the part added to them, to which a particular title might more properly have been assigned, to Philip III. though individual parts of the collection had previously been addressed to other patrons. That so indolent a monarch as Philip III. should have accepted the dedication of such a collection, may not be surprising, and the freedom was pardonable in a young author of three-and-twenty. But this dedication is, in another respect, remarkable in the history of Spanish literature; for the Eroticas of Villegas contain some passages, which though not wanting in delicacy of expression, are nevertheless so extremely free, that it is wonderful how they happened to escape the censure of the inquisition. The dedication was, however, productive of neither good nor evil to the poet. For several years he vainly solicited a lucrative office; and was at last obliged to content himself with the scanty emolument arising from an insignificant post in Naxera, his native town. From that time he devoted his leisure to the composition of philological works in the latin language; and though he produced nothing new for Spanish poetry, he made a prose translation of five books of Boethius. He lived till the year 1669.
The graceful luxuriance of the poetry of Villegas has no parallel in modern literature; and, generally speaking, no modern writer has so well succeeded in blending the spirit of ancient poetry with the modern. But constantly to observe that correctness of ideas, which distinguished the classical compositions of antiquity, was by Villegas, as by most Spanish poets, considered too rigid a requisition, and an unnecessary restraint on genius. He accordingly sometimes degenerates into conceits and images, the monstrous absurdity of which are characteristic of the author’s nation and age. For instance, in one of his odes in which he entreats Lyda to suffer her tresses to flow, he says, that “when agitated by Zephyr, her locks would occasion a thousand deaths, and subdue a thousand lives;”499 and then he adds, in a strain of extravagance, surpassing that of the Marinists, “that the sun himself would cease to give light, if he did not snatch beams from her radiant countenance to illumine the east.”500 But faults of this glaring kind, are by no means frequent in the poetry of Villegas; and the fascinating grace with which he emulates his models, operates with so powerful a charm, that the occasional occurrence of some little affectations, from which he could scarcely be expected entirely to abstain, is easily overlooked by the reader.
The order in which the poetic works of Villegas are arranged, is by no means the best; but as it was chosen by the author, it is proper that it should be observed in pursuing a notice of the poems themselves. The first book of the first part commences with thirty-six odes in the style of some of the odes of Horace. The Dedicatory Ode addressed to the king, announces, in language truly charming, the spirit of the whole collection.501 Then follow in a similar strain, the most delightful plays of fancy, abounding in classical allusions, without the least trace of pedantry. The style of Villegas even imparts a charm of novelty to descriptions of the oftenest described things.502 In these odes, romantic levity assumes freedoms, which if not always of the most excusable, are invariably of the most graceful description;503 and the soft and melodious expression of tender passion, which in more than one instance occurs, has never been surpassed.504
The second book of the first division of the poems of Villegas, consists of odes, which are free translations of the first book of Horace. It ought not, therefore, to have been ranked under the same title with the other poems in the collection. There is something pedantic in the generical titles by which he distinguishes the different odes; for example—Memptica, Enetica, Parænetica, &c.
With the third book of the first division commence the Anacreontic songs, or as they are styled in the collection, the Delicias of the poet. Their measure is chiefly anacreontic, sometimes in blank verse, and at other times presenting the most pleasing alternation of rhymes and assonances. Light pleasing images and soft luxuriant ideas float through these songs even more gracefully than in the odes attributed to Anacreon.505 Nothing can exceed the beauty of those in which a certain delicate moral feeling is combined with a pathetic simplicity.506 Only a few can be said to be absolutely copied from the greek or latin originals.
The fourth book of the first part, contains the complete translation of the greek odes ascribed to Anacreon. The second division is chiefly occupied with elegies and idyls, or eidillios, as Villegas, in hellenizing the term, chooses to call them. The elegies which might with greater propriety be denominated epistles, do not belong to the best of the kind in Spanish literature; in the idyls, or mythological tales, as they ought to be called, Villegas appears as one of the Cultoristos, or disciples of the school of Gongora.507
The collection concludes with several imitations of greek and latin verse, which may be regarded as the first compositions of the kind in Spanish, that were not complete failures. Doubtless the Spanish language adapts itself somewhat more readily to the ancient metres than the Italian; for final syllables sounded in pronunciation, but subject to elision in scanning, do not occur so frequently in Spanish as in Italian.—This difference is, however, in reality but of trivial importance; and Spanish verses in the ancient syllabic measures do not flow much more naturally than the Italian compositions of the same kind; because many words derived from the latin, have received in Spanish, as well as in Italian, a modern quantity,508 which is generally confounded with the ancient quantity by the imitators of the greek and latin metres. The Spanish hexameters of Villegas, it is true, approach in point of facility to the hexameters of antiquity.509 But the pentameters defied his imitative talent.510 In his sapphic verse the measure resolves into iambics: one of these sapphic odes is, however, exquisitely beautiful.511
After Quevedo and Villegas, and before entering upon the notice of a series of dramatic poets, whose works must form a subject of separate consideration, it will be necessary to mention several ingenious writers, who, though endowed with eminent talents, were nevertheless unable to retard the fast approaching close of the golden era of Spanish poesy.
If pure diction, joined to a descriptive style of the most perfect kind, might form a sufficient claim to the title of poet of the first rank, the right of Juan de Jauregui, or Xauregui, to that distinction, among the Spanish poets of the first half of the seventeenth century, could not be disputed. Jauregui, who was of Biscayan origin, but educated in the interior of Spain, first developed his talents in Italy. In that country he prosecuted his poetic studies, and at the same time thought it no degradation to practise painting as a profession, though he was a nobleman and a knight of the order of Calatrava. He is said to have excelled in painting even more than in poetry. While in Italy he made a Spanish translation of Tasso’s Amynta, in which he was so successful, that the translation is still regarded by the educated portion of his countrymen as possessing the characteristics of the happiest original composition. Jauregui was a decided opponent of the Gongorists; but his taste did not coincide with that of Quevedo. He devoted much talent and industry to a free translation of Lucan’s Pharsalia in octaves. He died in 1610; and his poetic remains, exclusive of his translations, are by no means numerous. The translation of Lucan was not published till long after the death of Jauregui; but ever since its appearance, the Spaniards have admired it as a classic composition; and it unquestionably possesses all the merit that the translation of such a work can possibly present. But from a man who could be induced to apply so much labour and time to a translation of Lucan, no very extraordinary proofs of poetic talent were to be expected; and it must be confessed that Jauregui, in none of his compositions has risen above what may be called the poetry of style. He might have carried this kind of merit still farther, had not his Lucan led him into a kind of mannered affectation. Among his original works, his Orfeo, a mythological tale, in five cantos, deserves to be distinguished.512 But his lyric poems, and particularly his sonnets, bear evident traces of the man of genius and of cultivated mind.513 Jauregui’s dramatic compositions, which were written with the view of reforming the national taste, are now lost to literature, and were at the time of their production indignantly banished from the stage. He is the author of some small works in prose, one of which is a treatise on painting.514
Prince Francisco de Borja y Esquillache, a knight of the Golden Fleece, and for some time viceroy of Peru, was the most distinguished, in point of birth, of all the Spanish poets of his age.515 With regard to cultivation, he may be placed on a level with Jauregui; but he deserves to rank higher in poetic invention. Throughout his long life, which when he died in 1658, had extended to nearly eighty years, he seems constantly to have devoted a portion of his time to the study of poetry; and though he was not entitled to the praises lavished on him by his flatterers, who styled him the Prince of Spanish Poets, he may be regarded as the last representative of the classic style of the sixteenth century. The collection of his sonnets, epistles, tales, romances, and canciones, forms a large quarto volume, the last half of which is printed in double columns.516 Prince Francisco de Borja, was likewise the author of an unsuccessful epic poem, entitled, Napoles Conquistada, and various works on sacred subjects. Though he did not contribute to the advancement of Spanish poetry, yet in all his writings, he decidedly opposed that subtlety and affectation which in the time of Gongora usurped the place of real genius. The intimate friendship he had contracted in his youth with the younger Argensola, had no doubt a favourable influence on the early developement of his talent. In the preface to his poems, which is in verse, he explains the principles of his taste with so much accuracy, modesty and elegance, that the reader cannot fail to be prepossessed in his favour, before entering on an attentive perusal of his works.517 He was particularly averse to all kinds of affectation and extravagance.518 Most of his sonnets bear traces of mature reflection.519 His long tale of Jacob and Rachel, (Cantos de Jacob y Raquel), in octaves, has indeed no other merit than that of elegant diction.520 His lyric romances, however, of which he wrote upwards of two hundred and fifty, present at once the richest and most beautiful gleanings in that species of poetic composition.521
To enter into a detailed description of the works of some other Spanish poets, with whom the old national poetry and the Italian style equally perished, would be the more unnecessary here, as these poets, though not without genius, wanted proper cultivation, and merely followed in the general stream. Besides, there is no want of literary notices which furnish abundant information respecting Luis de Ulloa, Francisco de Rioja, Gravina, Manuel de Mela, Juan de Tarsis, Count of Villamediana, and others.522 It is, however, worthy of remark, that at this period, as in the preceding ages, Spanish noblemen and men of rank were particularly distinguished among the candidates for poetic fame. The Poetic Forests, (Sylvas), as they were styled, according to Gongora’s nomenclature, but which were afterwards designated by the common Spanish word Selvas, doubtless contributed in no slight degree to hasten the decline of genuine poetry in Spain. In these Forests rhymed prose could flow on without obstruction, and every conceit was in its proper place; for no fixed metre, and no unity of ideas or events restrained the poet or versifier. The works of Count Rebolledo, which are deserving of a particular notice, will afford a sufficient idea of the direction thus given to the lyric, didactic, narrative, and bucolic poetry of Spain, in a general combination of all these styles.
Bernardino, Count of Rebolledo, was one of the heroes of the latter period of the thirty years war in Germany. After having distinguished himself in the military service both of Spain and Austria, he resided for a considerable time in the quality of Spanish ambassador at Copenhagen, where he watched over the interests of his sovereign with reference to the designs of the king of Sweden. His taste for military and political affairs did not preclude the exercise of his talent for poetry. But it was not until his mission to Copenhagen, when he had attained the age of maturity, that he found leisure to prosecute his poetic studies with assiduity. Thus, for the first time, and perhaps for the last, was Spanish poetry in the middle of the seventeenth century, transplanted to Scandanavia. Count Rebolledo was much pleased with his residence in Copenhagen; and he rendered signal service to his Danish majesty, when Charles Gustavus, King of Sweden, marched across the frozen Belt, and bombarded the Danish capital. Though a zealous catholic, he felt for the royal house of Denmark a kind of personal devotion, which he seized every opportunity of manifesting, both in verse and prose. He took particular interest in the study of the history and geography of Denmark, with the view of describing them in Spanish verse. Having returned to his native country, where he was appointed minister of war, he died in 1676, in the eightieth year of his age. His poems were, during his life, collected and published under various titles.523 One of these collections, entitled Ocios, (Leisure Hours), proves that Count Rebolledo, though he only travelled in a long beaten tract, and even in that tract did not shine above his contemporaries, possessed, nevertheless, a degree of poetic cultivation, which was probably unparalleled in Copenhagen in the age in which he lived. He was particularly successful as a writer of elegant madrigals;524 and he is the author of a play, entitled, Amor Despreciando Riesgos,525 (Love Dreads no Danger), which possesses considerable interest. But Rebolledo’s name has been rendered still more remarkable in the history of Spanish literature by his dull Forests, for which he himself claimed the title of poetic, though they exhibit only the last traces of Spanish poetry. Other writers had already done their utmost to give importance to the rhymed prose of these Forests. But Rebolledo so completely mistook the essence of poetry, that he really conceived he was executing works of high poetic merit, when he put into verse a compendium of the History and Geography of Denmark, entitled, Selvas Danicas, and a treatise on the Art of War and State Policy, entitled, Selva Militar y Politica. Whoever attempts to travel through Rebolledo’s Danish Forests, will soon find, especially if he have any recollection of genuine Spanish poetry, that he has undertaken a very disagreeable task. In the first half of the work, not a single poetic or even ingenious trait enlivens the dry enumeration of facts. What the author intended for a narrative poem, is found to be merely an account of the History of Denmark, related in the lowest style of common place prose; and the multitude of northern names, which partly retain their original spelling, and are partly hispanized, have a peculiarly grotesque effect.526 The geography of Denmark, which constitutes the second part of the work, presents a few poetic passages.527 But the Military and Political Forest, which is intended for a didactic poem, is rhymed prose from beginning to end. It is difficult to say whether the principles of tactics,528 or the instructions in the art of government,529 appear most ridiculous in the versified garb in which Rebolledo has clothed them. The worthy author might with more propriety have applied the title of poems to his Selvas Sagradas, (Sacred Forests), which are translations of the psalms in the loose forms of the Forests.
The feeling of regret with which the decay of Spanish poetry in the age of Rebolledo is beheld, yields to the agreeable surprize which arises on taking a retrospective view of the Spanish drama, the history of which must now be continued to the close of the present period. The history of the Spanish drama should properly be studied as a whole; but that combined mode of viewing the subject was not compatible with a synchronous account of all the remarkable productions of the polite literature of Spain. Having, however, in connexion with Lope de Vega, spoken of Virues, Montalvan, and others, it will, at least, be convenient not to separate the series of dramatic poets, who emulated or imitated Calderon.
Again, in the history of Spanish poetry a writer occurs, whose name deserves to be transmitted to the latest posterity, and who flourished along with others who are also worthy of honourable remembrance.
Pedro Calderon de la Barca, descended of a noble family, was born in the year 1600. He is said to have written his first dramatic work before he had completed his fourteenth year. Having finished his collegial studies at an early age, he, according to the custom of the times, attached himself to some patrons whom he found among the nobility at the court of Madrid. Not satisfied, however, with this means of introducing himself to the great world, he became a soldier, and served in several campaigns in Italy and the Netherlands. Meanwhile the fame of his talents as a dramatic poet was widely spread; and it was foretold that he would equal, if not exceed, Lope de Vega. King Philip IV. who afforded more liberal encouragement to the drama than any of his predecessors, and who was himself the author of several plays, was gratified by the idea that he had in Calderon a man capable of giving splendour to the court theatre. He called him to Madrid in the year 1636, and shortly after invested him with the order of St. Iago. From this period Calderon became permanently fixed at court, and his young sovereign, whose chief attention was devoted to amusements and festivities, kept him in constant activity. No expence was spared in bestowing pomp and brilliancy on the pieces which Calderon produced for the entertainment of the court; but on the other hand, it was expected of him to accommodate his genius to the conditions required by a courtly audience. Nevertheless his taste was consulted in the arrangement of all public festivities, and the triumphal arch through which the Queen Maria of Austria made her public entrance into Spain, was erected in conformity with his suggestions.
In his fifty-second year Calderon took holy orders, but did not on that account totally relinquish his previous occupations. From that time, however, he applied himself with more particular assiduity to the composition of his Autos Sacramentales, which soon superseded throughout the whole of Spain all the older dramas of this class. Calderon lived to an advanced age, admired by his countrymen, and amply rewarded by ecclesiastical dignities, pensions and presents, from his sovereign. In the estimation of the public, his dramas surpassed those of every preceding and contemporary writer. But in his old age, he himself attached but little importance to his temporal productions. The Duke of Veragua addressed to him a flattering letter, requesting to be furnished with a complete list of his dramas, because the booksellers were in the habit of selling the works of other writers under his name. In reply, Calderon, who was then in his eightieth year, supplied the duke only with the list of his Autos Sacramentales. He added in a letter, that with regard to his temporal dramas, he felt offended, that in addition to his own faulty works, those of other authors should be circulated in his name; and besides that, his writings were so altered that he himself could not recognize even their titles. He also expressed his determination to follow the example of the booksellers, and to pay as little regard to his plays as they did; but he observed, that on religious grounds he attached more importance to his Autos.530
Calderon died in 1687, in the eighty-seventh year of his age. Several collections of his dramas appeared during his life, and among the rest one published by his brother, Joseph Calderon, in 1640, but none were edited by the author himself. In the great edition of the collected comedies of Calderon, which his friend Juan de Vera Tassis y Villaroel began to superintend in 1685, the poet, who was then eighty-five years of age, can scarcely be expected to have indirectly participated even so far as was necessary to certify the authenticity of the component parts. It is therefore questionable whether the hundred and twenty-seven plays, published in Calderon’s name, be all genuine. This doubt may indeed be hazarded with the greater probability, as Juan de Vera Tassis, who undertook to publish the complete collection of Calderon’s dramas, estimates the number of his Autos at ninety-five; while Calderon himself, in his conscientious list furnished to the Duke of Veragua, states their number to be only sixty-eight, including those not printed. It can scarcely be believed that Calderon wrote twenty-seven Autos after he had attained the age of eighty.531
On a comparison of the dramas of Calderon and Lope de Vega, it requires no extraordinary critical penetration to discover the essential services which the former rendered to the dramatic literature of Spain. Which of these writers possessed the greater share of inventive talent, is a question which it would be difficult to determine, for Lope de Vega was not the inventor of that species of dramatic composition which was common to both, and Calderon was not behind him in the invention of new combinations of intrigue, ingenious complexities of plot, and interesting situations. In general the invention of Lope may be the bolder, but it is also the more rude of the two; and with regard to whatever may be called refinement, whether in conception or execution, but more particularly in style, Calderon formed for himself an entirely new sphere. The delicate art with which he gave the last polish to the Spanish drama, without changing its nature, carries with it an ennobling dignity in some of his historical, or, as they are styled, heroic comedies. In his comedies of intrigue this delicacy is conspicuous in the execution of the general forms of character, which had now become naturalized on the Spanish stage, and which usurped the place of individuality. Calderon’s comedies are necessarily as little pieces of character as those of Lope de Vega, for with the delineation of particular character they would have ceased to be pure dramas of intrigue. But they abound in characteristic traits, in those traits which develope, as it were, out of the souls of the dramatic personages, the natural course of the gay intrigue in all its various modifications. As an acute observer of the female mind and manners Calderon was infinitely superior to Lope de Vega. This delicacy of observation accords admirably with the almost incredible subtlety of his combinations of intrigue; and the elegance of his language and versification complete the ingenious harmony of these apparently irregular dramas, which though not sufficiently perfect to be regarded as models, are nevertheless true to the rules which the author prescribed to himself. The other merits which belong to his dramas, such as the seductive gracefulness and facility of the dialogue, Calderon shares in common with all the good dramatic writers of Spain. The faults with which he may be reproached, and which in some measure belong to the species of drama he adopted, are more numerous in some of his pieces than in others. It must also be observed, that in some of his heroic comedies, he sinks so completely beneath his own standard that it is difficult to recognize him.
In Calderon’s Comedias de Capa y Espada,532 the plots are usually of so complicated a nature, that no reader except a Spaniard, habituated to this sort of mental exercise,533 can on a first perusal seize and follow the various threads of the intrigue, by the artful entanglement of which the principal characters of the piece are repeatedly plunged from one unexpected embarrassment into another. Calderon particularly excelled in the accumulation of surprises, in connecting one difficult situation with another, and in maintaining undiminished the strongly excited interest to the close of the piece. But in order to render this task the easier, he paid still less attention than Lope de Vega to probability in the succession of the scenes; and his characters make their entries and their exits just as it happens to suit the convenience of the poet. The Spanish public was, however, disposed to pardon every improbability of this kind, which gave rise to some new situation full of dramatic truth. Calderon appears to have estimated the merits of his dramas of intrigue, in proportion to the effect produced by the situations; and in this respect he was the more an inventor in proportion as he introduced the less variety into his characters. In all Calderon’s comedies of intrigue, the dramatis personæ are the same individuals under various names. Two or three ladies of fashion, two or three lovers, an old man, a few waiting maids, a few male servants, and among these last, one who acts as the gracioso, or buffoon; such are the standing characters with which Calderon usually contented himself in his sphere of dramatic composition. The motives on which the plot turns are a licentious gallantry, in which no moral interest is permitted to mix, and a point of honour which gives rise to incessant contests. On the slightest cause of offence swords are drawn, and when passion rages, even daggers are employed. Romantic accessaries are found in wounds, and murders, though the latter, it is true, are not quite so frequent as the former. Among the other passions the fury of jealousy is conspicuous; and in order to bring this passion into play, the author avails himself of disguises, concealments, mistakes of persons, houses or letters, and occasionally some particular local circumstance, such for instance, as the secret door, which appears to be a cupboard, in the lively drama of La Dama Duende, (The Fairy Lady.) There is also no want of night scenes in Calderon’s pieces of intrigue. But however astonishing may be the variety of the situations which he has created out of this uniformity of plan, yet they cannot long satisfy a cultivated taste which requires a nobler kind of variety.
How far Calderon in his Comedias de Capa y Espada has correctly represented the fashionable world of Madrid, as it existed in the reigns of Philip III. and Philip IV. is a question which cannot now be satisfactorily determined. Modern Spanish writers have conceived they were pronouncing a judicious critical censure, when they cast on Calderon’s dramas the reproach of insulting the whole Spanish nation, by representing it as composed almost solely of romantic coxcombs and intriguing coquettes. These attacks on Calderon, are the consequence of inconsiderate zeal for the principles of the French drama, by which the dramatic literature of Spain must never be judged.534 It is scarcely necessary to observe, that a representation of one class of men, who were particularly conspicuous in Madrid, could not be intended as a representation of the whole Spanish nation. But attempts have been made to depreciate, by still more plausible sophisms, the merits of Calderon’s sketches of manners. It has been remarked, that he has totally violated nature, by putting into the mouths of valets and waiting women poetic language, which would be extraordinary even if delivered by their masters and mistresses. The Spanish servants of the present day are, doubtless, less likely than those of the seventeenth century, to converse in the poetical style in which the servants in Calderon’s plays, on particular occasions, express themselves. But the spirit of these particular occasions must not be misunderstood. The servants in Calderon’s comedies always imitate the language of their masters. In most cases they express themselves like the latter, in the natural language of real life, and often divested of that colouring of the ideas, without which a dramatic work ceases to be a poem. But whenever romantic gallantry speaks in the language of tenderness, admiration, or flattery, then, according to Spanish custom, every idea becomes a metaphor; and Calderon, who was a thorough Spaniard, seized these opportunities to give the reins to his fancy, and to suffer it to take a bold lyric flight beyond the boundaries of nature. On such occasions the most extravagant metaphoric language, in the style of the Italian Marinists, did not appear unnatural to a Spanish audience; and even Calderon himself had for that style a particular fondness, to the gratification of which he sacrificed a chaster taste. It was his ambition to become a more refined Lope de Vega, or a Spanish Marino. Thus in his play, entitled, Bien vengas Mal, si vengas Solo, (Misfortune comes Well, if it comes Alone), a waiting maid, addressing her young mistress who has risen in a gay humour, says—“Aurora would not have done wrong had she slumbered that morning in her snowy chrystal, for that the light of her mistress’s charms would suffice to draw aside the curtains from the couch of Sol.” She adds that, using a Spanish idea, “it might then indeed be said that the sun had risen in her lady’s eyes,”535 &c. Valets, on the like occasion, speak in the same style; and when lovers address compliments to their mistresses, and these reply in the same strain, the play of far-fetched metaphors is aggravated by antitheses to a degree which is intolerable to any but a Spanish formed taste.536 But it must not be forgotten that this language of gallantry was in Calderon’s time spoken by the fashionable world, and that it was a vernacular property of the ancient national poetry.
Faults of a less pardonable nature in Calderon’s dramas, are the stale jests and meaningless plays on words uttered by servants,537 and the burlesque situations to which the disgusting accidents, occasioned by certain nocturnal showers from windows give rise. But according to the testimony of travellers, such accidents are very common at night in the streets of Madrid and Lisbon; and it must be recollected that in Calderon’s time the jests of servants were considered as indispensable in a Spanish drama of intrigue, as the presence of the gracioso himself, who is, for the most part, one of the valets.538
But the violations of cultivated taste which occur in Calderon’s comedies of intrigue, are so amply redeemed, that the critic cannot long hesitate to decide whether faults or beauties are most abundant. Some of these dramas are particularly remarkable for those descriptive narratives, by the introduction of which nearly all the Spanish comedies of the same class bring to recollection their original relationship with novels.539 Though individual character is wanting, yet sometimes in the course of the intrigue, beautiful characteristic traits unexpectedly occur.540 The delicacy of the point of honour, which in all these dramas supplies the place of morality, is frequently exhibited by Calderon in its most brilliant point of view;541 and he sometimes with much formality oversteps the Spanish rule, by which moralizing was excluded from this species of drama.542 The application which may be made of the plot is frequently denoted by the title of the piece, and is still more distinctly developed at the conclusion.543 Calderon deserves praise for having but seldom introduced sonnets in his comedies of intrigue, though he has amply availed himself of other freedoms, in order to maintain the privilege of poetry in pourtraying the scenes of common life.544
Calderon’s heroic comedies are much diversified in their kind, and very unequal in their merits. Some are distinguished from the dramas of intrigue only by the rank of the characters. Of this kind is the well known piece, entitled, El Secreto a Voces, (the Published Secret), imitations of which have appeared in the Italian, French, and German languages. The Spaniards number it among their heroic comedies, merely because an Italian prince and princess are introduced in it. Other plays by Calderon, which, according to the Spanish nomenclature, are ranked in the heroic class, are in fact romantic pastoral dramas; as for example, the pleasing piece, entitled, Eco y Narciso. Others again are romantic, mythological festival pieces, accompanied by transformations and melo-dramatic splendour; of this kind is El mayor encanto Amor, (Love is the greatest Enchantment). Finally, among Calderon’s heroic comedies are included his historical dramas, several of which may properly be called tragedies. Some of these historical dramas are among the best, while others are the most trivial of Calderon’s productions. All are melo-dramatic spectacles, in which armies defile, battles are fought, and sumptuous banquets are given. The scene is, by turns, a palace, a vast landscape, a cavern, or a pleasure garden, while drums and trumpets flourish, and cannon thunder at every opportunity.
In all that regards scenic splendour in the composition of historical plays, even Lope de Vega must yield to Calderon, for the dramas of the latter were represented at the expence of the royal treasury. But in the historical style of dramatic composition Calderon only succeeded when he selected his materials from the events of his own country. Where he has adapted to the Spanish stage, subjects from the Greek and Roman history, as in his Alexander the Great,545 and in his Coriolanus,546 the absurd change of costume is almost forgotten amidst the extravagant confusion of the events, by which romantic situations are brought about one after another, but which, on the whole, produce only a mean effect. The great poet seems occasionally to have been forsaken by his good genius, particularly when he makes a display of his erudition in the very same scenes in which he completely perverts ancient history. But Calderon’s historical dramas of this class are very inferior to those of which the story was invented by himself, and the scene arbitrarily laid in ancient Greece. Among the latter is a piece, entitled, Finezas contra Finezas, (Generosity for Generosity), a beautiful poem, full of tenderness and mythological piety. But this drama, though, perhaps, single in its kind, must nevertheless yield to the christian drama, of which the history of Portugal furnishes the hero. The tragedy of Don Fernando, entitled, El Principe Constante, displays all the lustre of Calderon’s genius. The unities of time and place are lost sight of in the unity of the heroic action, into which Calderon has infused the spirit of the purest pathos, without departing from the Spanish national style of heroic comedy. This tragedy might not improperly be named the Portuguese Regulus. Don Fernando, a Portuguese prince, lands at the head of an army, accompanied by his brother Don Enrique, on the coast of Barbary in Morocco. He is victorious in his first battle, and he makes prisoner the African hero, Muley, who relates to him his history. The prince, moved by generosity, liberates his captive. No sooner has Muley expressed his surprise and gratitude, than the Moors return with a reinforcement, and the Portuguese prince is himself made prisoner. At this point commence the tragic scenes which are prepared by pathetic situations of another kind. The king of Fez and Morocco immediately offers liberty to his royal prisoner, on condition of the surrender of the garrison of Ceuta on the coast of Morocco, which is in possession of the Portuguese. The prince declares that he would rather die in the most degrading captivity, than consent to obtain his freedom by delivering a christian town into the power of the infidels. The moorish king, however, relies so confidently on the acquisition of Ceuta, that he treats the prince with every mark of respect until the return of the envoy from Portugal. The answer of the Portuguese government proves to be, as the king of Fez expected, a compliance with his proposal; but the prince firmly refuses to be ransomed on the required condition. He now receives the most rigorous treatment, which he bears with pious heroism and without complaint, until his bodily strength is exhausted and he expires. The sufferings and fortitude of Fernando;—the conflict between gratitude and religious prejudice in the mind of Muley, who exerts his utmost endeavours to deliver the captive prince;—and, on the other hand, Muley’s romantic passion for the king’s daughter, who is destined to be the bride of another;—and the still more romantic tenderness of the princess,—form altogether a picture so noble and so truly poetic, that it would be unfair in this brief sketch of the piece, to notice the numerous errors which it unquestionably presents. The action seems to terminate with the death of Fernando; but a fresh army arrives from Portugal, and the ghost of the prince, with a torch in his hand, appears at the head of the troops and leads them on to victory. The impression produced by this apparition gives the finishing touch to the romantic pathos of the foregoing scenes.547 The beautiful flights of fancy which occur at the commencement of the piece are worthy of particular attention. There Calderon has painted his favourite images in his comparison of waves with flowers.548 On another occasion of a similar kind a comparison of stars with flowers, and of flowers with stars, is introduced in two concerted sonnets.549 The heroic character of Don Fernando is decidedly evinced in his first speech to his companions in arms; and his noble spirit is still more distinctly developed when he restores Muley to freedom.550 But a more minute detail of the beauties of this tragedy would carry us beyond the limits of this work.
Calderon’s Autos Sacramentales may be noticed in a few words. In this class of dramatic composition, Calderon pursued the path which had been previously trodden by Perez de Montalvan, but he left his model far behind him. Some of his autos, of which that entitled, La Devocion de la Cruz, (the Miracles of the Cross, or literally the Devotion of the Cross), may be cited as an example, are the grandest and most ingenious productions of the kind in the Spanish language. But in these spiritual dramas, reason and moral feeling are so perverted by extravagant and fantastic notions of religious faith, that it is impossible to forbear congratulating those nations whose better fate has excluded them from amusements of this kind.
Never, perhaps, was any dramatic poet accompanied in so long a career by such a number of rivals, friends, and imitators, as Calderon. It was precisely the half century during which he indefatigably laboured for the Spanish theatre that gave birth to the greater part of those dramas, the number of which is better known than the merits. In consequence of the popularity of Lope de Vega and Calderon, the passion for dramatic composition became as epidemic in Spain as that of sonnet writing had formerly been. The encouragement which Philip IV. gave to the drama, doubtless contributed not a little to excite this poetic emulation. But the multitude of writers who entered into the competition were ambitious of rivalling Lope de Vega and Calderon in proofs of fertility of invention. The fecundity of Perez de Montalvan, who, notwithstanding his life was short, wrote nearly one hundred plays in the style of Lope de Vega, was not allowed to remain a solitary example. The impression produced by successive comedias famosas on a public whose greatest mental enjoyment was found in the theatre, was also felt by those who were desirous of producing similar works. Thus every piece which was applauded sowed the seeds of new comedies. No author thought it necessary to reform the principles on which Spanish comedy was composed, or attempted to distinguish himself by any particular originality. At the same time the spirit which governed this emulation was equally remote from an intentional imitation of the more celebrated dramatic poets. He who was ambitious of adding one more to the numberless dramas in the possession of the stage, followed in the general stream under the influence of impressions previously received. To wit and fancy free scope was allowed; but any original traits which the new production might contain, were more or less overshadowed by the general character of this class of composition. The whole of those dramatists, whose works so closely resemble each other, form therefore only one school. Were not the critic assisted by names the most extensive, knowledge of this department of Spanish literature would in most cases be insufficient to enable him to distinguish the labours of different authors. It often happened that several writers formed a co-partnership of their talents for the production of one piece. Hence arose the practice of printing on the titles of some dramas, the words, “by two wits,” or “by three wits,” (de dos ingenios, or de tres ingenios.) Of the numerous aspirants in this conflict of efforts and of talents, proportionally few succeeded in obtaining a celebrity which entitles them to be placed near Lope de Vega and Calderon. These few, however, whose number, compared with the approved dramatists of other nations, the French comic authors excepted, is still very considerable, vied in ingenuity and delicacy of composition with Calderon, and endeavoured to surpass him in regularity.
Several authors have with much labour endeavoured to discover the number of the Spanish dramas, as if the knowledge of their amount even correctly ascertained, could be worth the pains necessary to acquire it. Of the three thousand eight hundred and fifty-two dramatic works which La Huerta has enumerated,551 the greater part belongs to the age of Calderon. Those which Calderon himself wrote, appear in the list; and it also includes a considerable number of short interludes, some of which, perhaps, did not cost their authors more than a few hours labour. But this list contains only the printed dramas known to literary collectors. That the number of pieces remaining in manuscript is much greater, may from analogy be presumed; for of the dramatic compositions of the idolized Lope de Vega, which are estimated at more than two thousand, not many more than three hundred have been printed.
It would not be uninteresting to analyze, for the purpose of comparison with the works of Calderon, some of the best of the other dramas of this age; but such details do not fall within the province of this General History of Spanish Poetry and Eloquence. Some of the contemporaries of Calderon, however, vied with him in so distinguished a manner, that an express but brief notice of their merits becomes indispensable.
An honourable station, beside Calderon, belongs to Antonio de Solis, one of the most eminent authors of his age. He was ten years younger than Calderon, whom he survived a few years. His literary activity was not limited to the study of poetry; for morals, politics, and history, also occupied his attention, particularly in his maturer years. He wrote the preludes, (loas), to some of Calderon’s dramas, and appears to have been connected by the ties of friendship with that great poet. The fame of his political and historical knowledge obtained for him a place in the administration under Philip IV. and after the death of that monarch he was appointed to the lucrative post of Coronista de las Indias, or historiographer of the transactions of the Spaniards in both Indies. While he held this office, he wrote his celebrated History of the Conquest of Mexico, which will be more particularly noticed at the close of the present book. Finally, he entered into holy orders, and devoted himself almost exclusively to exercises of devotion; he died in 1686. His plays do not display so much boldness of imagination as Calderon’s; but they are ingeniously composed in the Spanish national style of intrigue, and exhibit an elegant vivacity of diction. With regard to pleasantries put into the mouths of servants, he does not exactly correspond with other Spanish dramatists. His dramatic compositions are more regular than Calderon’s, because he was less liable to be seduced by the force of his imagination. Among his comedies attributed to the heroic class, El Alcazar del Secreto, (the Castle of Mystery), is justly much valued. In his dramas of intrigue he has endeavoured to vary the characters more than his great contemporary. Thus gipseys figure in his piece, called, La Gitanilla de Madrid, which is partly founded on Cervantes’s novel of the same title.552
Augustin Moreto possessed a higher degree of comic talent than Calderon. This able and industrious writer was also favoured by Philip IV. but he became an ecclesiastic and renounced writing for the theatre. Some of his pieces are comic from beginning to end, and are also comedies of character, though the form of the Spanish drama of intrigue is still preserved. In his piece, entitled, De fuera vendra, quien de casa nos eschara,553 (He will come from without, Who will turn us out), he has introduced an old coquette, a military coxcomb, and a doctor of laws, who besides being cowardly and pedantic, is also amorous. These characters are drawn with a comic force which has seldom been surpassed, though it must be confessed that they partake too much of the caricature style. In general Moreto approximates more than Calderon to Terence, whose comedies became, in the sequel, models for the Spanish dramatists when the principles of the French drama were adopted. But his gracioso, who is always the fool of the piece in the character of a servant, repeats too often the same sort of wretched jests.
Juan de Hoz likewise approached to the comic style of the regular dramas representing character. Of this author nothing further is known, except that he wrote an excellent comedy, entitled, El castigo de la Miseria, (Avarice Punished,) which presents a considerable resemblance to one of Cervantes’s novels.554
Tirso de Molina, or Gabriel Sellez, (as his real name is said to have been) was one of the most prolific dramatic writers among the contemporaries of Calderon. He is the reputed author of upwards of seventy plays still extant. He vied with Lope de Vega and Calderon in the merit of ingenious and bold invention, which is particularly manifested in his historical and spiritual dramas.555
The dramas of intrigue by Francisco de Rojas, or Roxas, a knight of the order of Santiago, were, about the middle of the sixteenth century, as much esteemed as those of Calderon; for the art of ingenious complexity which they exhibited, rendered them particularly pleasing to the Spanish taste. A play by this author, entitled, Entre Bobos anda el Juego556, (When Fools play the Game goes well), is even at the present day a distinguished favourite on the Spanish stage. He was not so successful as a writer of heroic comedies. His Casarse para Vengarse, (Marriage of Vengeance), which is a sort of tragedy, is disgustingly surcharged with bombastic phrases.
Agustin de Salazar y Torres, was educated in Mexico, and after his return to Spain, lived at the court of Philip IV. He was an admirer of Gongora, and as many of his poems prove, also a faithful disciple; but though an inveterate Gongorist, he was one of the cleverest writers of that school of affectation. His dramatic works are distinguished for ingenuity of invention, and a style which shews that he knew how to elevate himself above the common level, without running into bombast.557 His heroic comedy, entitled, Elegir al Enemigo, (How to choose an Enemy), is full of genuine poetry.
Antonio Mira de Mescua, or Amescua, who lived as an ecclesiastic at the court of Philip IV. must not be omitted in the list of the Spanish dramatic poets of the period now under consideration. He was regarded by many of his contemporaries as a second Lope de Vega;558 and he doubtless more nearly approached the rude brilliancy of Lope than the elegant manner of Calderon. He remained, however, far behind his model; yet his historical and spiritual dramas are distinguished for conceptions, which, though extravagant, are not devoid of interest, and which were moreover perfectly in unison with the prevailing Spanish taste. In El Caballero sin Nombre, (The Knight without a Name), he has even ventured to introduce a wild bear on the stage.
To the historian who makes the dramatic literature of Spain his particular object, must be consigned the task of collecting the necessary information respecting the works of Antonio de Mendoza, Luis Velez de Guevara, Alvaro Cubillo, Luis Coello, Felipe Godinez, Juan Matos Fragoso, and other dramatists, who in the age in which they lived, were frequently placed on a level with Calderon. The writer who devotes his attention to this department of Spanish literature, must likewise take into consideration the older dramatic works which appeared during the latter years of Lope de Vega’s career, as, for example, the comedies of Juan Ruiz de Alarcon, Guillen de Castro, &c.559 Neither must he neglect to furnish bibliographic accounts of the various collections of Spanish dramas published by different editors. In the present work it is only necessary to observe, that these collections, the greater part of which appeared in the seventeenth century, were all speculations of the booksellers. Most of them present abundant traces of haste and negligence, and but few are distinguished for critical discrimination in the selection. The historian of the Spanish national taste will, however, consult those collections with the view of ascertaining what dramas were, at a certain period, the greatest favourites in Spain; for the booksellers published their collections in conformity with the humour of the public. Thus every drama which was printed, was styled a Comedia famosa, so that about the middle of the seventeenth century, the epithet famosa, had, by frequent repetition, lost all value.
The works belonging to the department of elegant prose, which appeared during the period of the ascendency of dramatic poetry in Spanish literature, may be noticed in few words. The authors who still adhered to the spirit of genuine eloquence, gave no new direction to rhetorical cultivation; they merely continued, with laudable perseverance, the task begun by their predecessors, namely, that of opposing the party who methodically endeavoured to introduce into prose composition a new tone of ingenious absurdity.
Romantic prose no longer maintained a conflict with true eloquence, but proceeded in a separate course. The reading portion of the Spanish public continued to be supplied with romances and novels, most of which, however, were the production of obscure writers. Several Spanish ladies contributed their share in this kind of authorship.
The necessary distinction between historical and romantic narrative was now made by the historiographers or chroniclers, whose numbers had been augmented since the extension of the Spanish possessions in India and America. But among all these writers, Antonio de Solis, who has already been noticed as a dramatic poet, is the only one who produced a work deserving to be ranked among the models of historical composition. His history, which he wrote in the quality of historiographer of the Indies, is the last classic relic of the kind of which Spanish literature can boast. It contains an account of the Conquest of Mexico, in a genuine historical form, notwithstanding that the subject was calculated to seduce a poetic author into the romantic narrative style.560 Those who are unacquainted with the fact of Antonio de Solis being a celebrated poet, will never conjecture it from the general tone of this work. No writer could possibly mark with more solidity of taste the distinction between poetry and prose. Antonio de Solis had, however, attained the age of maturity when he laid down the principles by which he was guided in the discharge of his functions as a historian. He states in his preface that in history all ornaments of eloquence are merely accessaries; and that the accuracy of the relation is true historical elegance. He says, that truth must be of all things the most important to the historian, and that in historical composition what is truly stated, is well stated.561 According to these principles the very worst style possible would be tolerable in a faithful historical narrative. But it would appear that Antonio de Solis, through a distrust of his own poetic imagination, exaggerated to himself the necessity of self-denial as an homage due to historical fidelity; and this exaggeration, which in reality was only theoretical, proved of essential service to him in the execution of his work. His talent for description, and his cultivated taste, naturally elevated him above the dryness and dulness of the common chronicle style. Though he seems scarcely to have reflected on the more essential requisites of the historical art, yet his work has not suffered by their neglect; for as a dramatic poet he had been accustomed to an arrangement of events which concentrated them in a single point of view; and profound political knowledge was not required for the just exposition of transactions occurring in the expedition of a small party of Spanish adventurers, led on by the daring Hernando Cortes, to the conquest of the kingdom of Mexico. Nothing more was necessary than a simple and unaffected narration, to cause the interest naturally belonging to the subject to be strongly felt.
The elegant simplicity of the historical style adopted by Antonio de Solis, forms, with the Gongorism which about this time crept into Spanish prose composition from the poetic school of Gongora, a rhetorical contrast, which is the last remarkable phenomenon in the history of Spanish eloquence. The pedantic commentators of the unintelligible Gongora had long been accustomed to write a strange fantastic prose style; but this prosaic Gongorism had not infected any man of distinguished talent, until Lorenzo, or Balthasar Gracian, became a popular author. Writers on literature mention but few particulars respecting the life of this distinguished man, who is supposed to have died in the year 1652. It is probable that he himself concealed his literary existence; for it is conjectured that the works which on their title-pages bear the name of Lorenzo Gracian, were really written by Balthasar Gracian, who was a Jesuit, and the brother of Lorenzo. Respecting Lorenzo nothing further is known than that he is understood to have lent his name to the productions of his brother; but, be this as it may, the writings which have conferred celebrity on that name, are, in some measure, sufficiently jesuitical.562 They relate, in general, to the morality of the great world, to theological morality, and to poetry and rhetoric. The most voluminous of these works bears the affected title of El Criticon. It is an allegorical picture of the whole course of human life divided into Crisis, that is to say, sections according to fixed points of view, and clothed in the formal garb of a pompous romance. It is scarcely possible to open any page of this book without recognizing in the author a man, who is in many respects far from common, but who from the ambition of being entirely uncommon in thinking and writing studiously and ingeniously, avoids nature and good sense. A profusion of the most ambiguous subtleties, expressed in ostentatious language, are scattered throughout the work;563 and those affected conceits are the more offensive, in consequence of their union with the really grand view of the essential relationship of man to nature and his Creator, which forms the subject of the treatise. Gracian would have been an excellent writer had he not so anxiously wished to be an extraordinary one. His shorter productions, in which he developes his theory of the intellectual faculties, and the conduct of life, are still more disfigured by affected ornament than the tedious Criticon;564 they, however, occasionally contain striking observations intelligibly expressed.565 His Oraculo Manual has been more read than any other of his works. It is intended to be a collection of maxims of general utility, but it exhibits good and bad precepts, sound judgments, and refined sophisms, all confounded together. In this work Gracian has not forgotten to inculcate the practical principle of jesuitism “to be all things to all men,” (hacerse a todos), nor to recommend his own favourite maxim, “to be common in nothing,” (en nada vulgar), which in order to be valid would require a totally different interpretation from that which he has given it.
Gracian’s uncommon prose was formed according to certain principles. His book on the Art of Ingeniously Thinking and Writing,566 is no inconsiderable contribution to criticism in Spanish literature. He refines to an incredible degree on subtle distinctions and antitheses, with the view of systematically bringing the style of his countrymen to the level of his own. His illustrative examples are selected from Italian and Spanish poets, particularly from Marino, Gongora and Quevedo. Throughout the whole work, ingenious thoughts (conceptos,) are constantly the subject of consideration. A man of genius, he says, may receive these ideas from nature; but art enables him to create them at pleasure. “As he who comprehends such ideas is an eagle, so he who is capable of producing them must be ranked among angels; for it is an employment of cherubims and an elevation of man which raises him to sublime hierarchy.”567 He then proceeds to describe those conceptos, which he pronounces to be undefinable, because “they are to the understanding what beauty is to the eye, and harmony to the ear.”568 Next follows an enumeration and explanation of the numerous combinations by which the various classes of these ideas, for example, the proverbial, the pathetic, the heroic, &c. may be produced. Poetic figures are examined in rotation; and the style of true eloquence is defined according to the same principles. Thus throughout the whole book good sense and good taste are most ingeniously abused.