had not a rightful claim to the epithet for which they are indebted to Mr. Gifford; but it was not bestowed upon them by Jonson. His words are Lecta fœminæ non repudiantor,' and, without calling into question their probity, it would seem, by the mention of tempting beauties," in the verses quoted by Mr. Gifford, from Shakerly Marmion, "an enthusiastick admirer of Jonson," descriptive of these symposia, that some part of the company were at least drawn thither by " metal more attractive." Let it not be supposed for a moment, that I accuse Mr. Gifford of a wilful misquotation, or a wish to deceive. I know him to be as incapable of such meanness as even Mr. Malone, and I cannot express myself more strongly; but I have only pointed out this trivial error, with a view of showing that a verbal inaccuracy is a very distinct offence from an audacious falsehood. An hypothesis, indeed, has been started by Mr. Gifford, from the specifick meaning of the word drollery, by which he thinks the possibility of an allusion to Shakspeare is entirely removed; and had this interpretation of the passage been suggested, before it was quoted by Mr. Malone, there might, perhaps, have been some ground for suspecting that he had changed the term for the purpose of eluding the argument; but this was not the case; and impressed, as he was, with the notion that the Tempest was the object of satire, it was of very little consequence whether this beautiful drama was called a foolery or classed with a puppet-show. After all, I am compelled to say, that, without adopting the notion of a permanent hostility between those two illustrious contemporaries, I have seen nothing to convince me that Jonson, in a moment of spleen, to which we are all more or less subject, had not Shakspeare in view. The words servant monster seem so directly to point at Calaban, who is repeatedly called by that name, and so many gratuitous suppositions are required to support the other hypothesis, that I am afraid there is nearly as little reason to doubt that the Tempest was here alluded to, as that a passage in Julius Cæsar (which Mr. Gifford admits) was twice exposed to his censure, in the Induction to the Staple of News, and his Discoveries. Jonson was not unfrequently in the habit of asserting his pre-eminence, as first having taught rules to the stage; and it surely would have been but a tame mode of expressing his own superior taste and correctness, if he had merely said that his scenes were more according to truth and nature than those which a puppet-show would furnish. One charge more I must advert to, and I have done. Mr. Malone, after producing the well known passage from the Return to Parnassus, which has generally been supposed to allude to some literary contest between Jonson and Shakspeare; but which I shall not stop to examine; proceeds to add the authority of Fuller in his Worthies, which is thus noticed by Mr. Gifford "I will give Fuller's words. Many were the witcombates between Shakspeare and Ben Jonson. I behold them like a Spanish great galleon, and an English man of war. Master Jonson, like the former, was built far higher in learning, solid but slow in his performances, Shakspeare, like the latter, lesser in bulk, but lighter in sailing, could turn with all tides, tack about, and take advantage of all winds by the quickness of his wit and invention.' Fuller, vol. ii. p. 415. "These wit-combates' then (on which Mr. Malone founds a charge of hostility,) turn out after all to be those sprightly repartees which so delighted their common friends.-The solid attacks of Jonson repelled by the quick and lively sallies of Shakspeare (great masters, as both were, of conversation,) must, indeed, have been a mental treat of the highest kind, and could have given to no one, but the commentator, an idea of malice or illwill on either side. There is nothing visible to ordinary eyes, but the fulness of friendship, enlivened by a social meeting, and tending to hilarity and festive delight. Yet this is produced to prove Jonson's enmity! What idea of friendship Mr. Malone had formed, I know not; but it seems as if he thought that the conversation of all but deadly foes must, like trade-winds, tend all one way. Our author had other notions of friendship, and, I believe, correcter ones: he says, It is an act of tyranny, not love, In practised friendship, wholly to approve.' • Little know they that profess amity, And seek to scant her comely liberty, How much they lame her in her property.' The words of Fuller are susceptible of two meanings. They may mean either literary contests, or sallies of wit in conversation; and I am satisfied that Mr. Gifford has explained them truly; but is Mr. Malone, who adopted one interpretation, to be censured as if he had understood these words in the other sense? Mr. Gifford knows not Mr. Malone's notions of friendship. I regret that he did not know him better; for he was truly 66 a man to be loved." I regret still more deeply that the grave has closed over a long catalogue of illustrious men, whose esteem and regard accompanied him through life, and that my feeble voice must offer that testimony to his notions of friendship, which would have been borne with affectionate warmth, by a Reynolds, a Burke, and a Windham. He was, indeed, a cordial and a steady friend, combining the utmost mildness with the simplest sincerity, and the most manly independence. Tenacious, perhaps, of his own opinions, which he had seldom hastily formed, he was always ready to listen with candour and good humour to those of others; that suppleness of character which would yield without conviction, and that roughness of temper, which cannot tolerate dissent, were equally foreign from his nature: Requiescat in pace. I may perhaps be permitted, lest my own sentiments should be misunderstood, to state, in a few words, my opinion of Jonson. I regard him with veneration, not only for his great powers, but for that intellectual dignity which, amidst a life of poverty and hardship, in spite of the scanty prospects of his early life, and the difficulties which afterwards beset him, did not suffer them to check him in the ardent pursuit of knowledge, or prevent him from being the first scholar of his age. To no one could the charge of malignity be worse applied. He appears to have been an open, warm-hearted man; but with a hot and haughty temper. The numerous quarrels in which he was engaged, in all of which it would be too great a stretch of candour to suppose him to have been invariably in the right, but which seldom appear to have lasted long, show him to have "carried anger as a flint bears fire." His energy of expression, whether in praise or censure, frequently exposed him to resentment in the latter case, while the warmth with which, in his happier moments, he speaks of contemporary genius, evinces the liberality and generosity of his mind. His remarks upon contemporary authors, as we find them recorded by Drummond, whose veracity has never been called in question, whatever his motives may have been, are certainly couched in terms of contemptuous asperity; and if such was his usual mode of passing judgment upon others, we cannot be surprised if it should have created offence; and this explains what is said by Davies of Hereford : Some say thy soul "Envy doth ulcer: yet corrupted hearts "Such censurers may have.” This certainly does not prove that Davies thought him envious; but the very reverse: yet such an opinion must have been pretty generally prevalent before any allusion could be made to such a topick in a copy of commenda tory verses. I am willing to say a few words in exculpation of my accomplished countryman Drummond, who has been exposed to very severe censure, on account of what he has left us concerning Jonson. His memoranda were evidently never intended for the press, from the careless manner in which they are written, in point of style, while his compositions intended for the publick eye are marked by the highest degree of polish and limæ labor. His letters, which have been quoted by Mr. Gifford, exhibit his deliberate opinions respecting Jonson, while the strictures upon his character, in these loose notes, were probably penned in a moment of irritation, to which he appears to have been subject. If, indeed, the received notion of Jonson's heat of temper had any foundation, we may suppose him and his northern landlord to have been occasionally as "rheumatick as two dry toasts," from the description given of the latter by Nicholas Whiting: "Drayton on's brains a new moon calfe was getting, And testie Drummond could not speak for fretting." His remark, that Jonson was for any religion, as being versed in both, has, I think, been misunderstood. It does not, I apprehend, `mean that he was of no religion, but that having been led to consider the controversy deeply, he was acquainted with the arguments on both sides, and might sometimes, like his great namesake, be inclined to talk for victory, by which he might puzzle Drummond, who was probably not a very skilful polemick. We are told, by Jonson himself, in his Discoveries, that when he lamented that Shakspeare had not more discreetly blotted his writings, this remark was ascribed to malevolence, by the players, from whom Dryden, who was connected with the stage during great part of his life, may probably have derived his notion of Jonson's hostility to our great poet. It is not at all incredible that they may occasionally, from their very different views of poetical excellence, have been thrown into collision with each other; but I am convinced |