Зображення сторінки
PDF
ePub

was born at Caskieben, near Aberdeen, in 1587; and having first pursued collegiate studies in the university of Aberdeen, he afterward went to Rome, and thence to Padua, where he studied medicine, and took his doctor's degree in 1610. Being at this time only in the twenty-fourth year of his age, he resolved to acquire, before he entered upon his profession, those accomplishments which he well knew nothing but foreign travel could impart. With this view he made the tour of Italy, Germany, Denmark, Holland, and England, and finally settled in Paris, where he continued to practice his profession with uninterrupted success for nearly twenty years.

In 1632, Doctor Johnston returned to Scotland, and being introduced to Archbishop Laud, who was at that time in the north with Charles the First, he became, through the influence of that prelate, physician to the king. In this important relation to his majesty, he remained until 1641, when, being on a visit to a married daughter residing at Oxford, he was there seized with a serious illness of which he soon after died, in the fifty-fifth year of his sage. Doctor Johnston was an extensive writer of Latin verse, and produced in that language a number of elegies, epigrams, a paraphrase of the Song of Solomon, a collection of short poems entitled Musa Aulica, and a complete Version of the Psalms of David, the last of which is his great performance. He also edited and contributed largely to the Delicia Poetarum Scotorum -a collection of congratulatory poems by various authors, which reflected great honor on the taste and scholarship of Scotland at that time. The celebrity of Dr. Johnston's name throughout the learned world, requires this brief notice of his life; but we shall neither make any extracts, nor attempt any translations from his poems.

The following beautiful verses will afford an appropriate close to our present remarks. They are supposed to have been written by SIR ROGER L'ESTRANGE, while he was confined in prison on account of his adherence to his unfortunate monarch, Charles the First.

LOYALTY CONFINED.

Beat on, proud billows; Boreas, blow;
Swell, curl'd waves, high as Jove's roof;

Your incivility doth show

That innocence is tempest-proof;

Though surely Nereus frown, my thoughts are calm;
Then strike affliction, for thy wounds are balm.

That which the world miscalls a jail,

A private closet is to me:

While a good conscience is my bail,
And innocence my liberty:

Locks, bars, and solitude, together met,
Make me no prisoner, but an anchoret.

I, while I wish'd to be retired,

Into this private room was turn'd;

As if their wisdoms had conspir'd

The salamander should be burn'd;

Or like those sophists, that would drown a fish, I am constrain'd to suffer what I wish.

The cynic loves his poverty,

The pelican her wilderness,
And 'tis the Indian's pride to be
Naked on frozen Caucasus :
Contentment can not smart, stoics we see
Make torments easy to their apathy.

These manacles upon my arm,

I, as my mistress' favours, wear;
And for to keep my ankles warm,

I have some iron shackles there:
These walls are but my garrison; this cell,
Which men call jail, doth prove my citadel.
I'm in the cabinet lock'd up,

Like some high-prized margarite;
Or like the great Mogul or Pope,

Am cloister'd up from public sight.
Retiredness is a piece of majesty,

And thus, proud sultan, I'm as great as thee.
Here sin for want of food must starve,
Where tempting objects are not seen;
And these strong walls do only serve
To keep vice out, and keep me in:
Malice of late 's grown charitable sure;
I'm not committed, but am kept secure.

So he that struck at Jason's life,
Thinking t' have made his purpose sure,
By a malicious friendly knife

Did only wound him to a cure:

Malice, I see, wants wit; for what is meant
Mischief, ofttimes proves favour by th' event.

When once my prince affliction hath,
Prosperity doth treason seem;

And to make smooth so rough a path,
I can learn patience from him:

Now not to suffer shows no loyal heart

When kings want ease, subjects must bear a part.

What though I can not see my king,

Neither in person, or in coin;

Yet contemplation is a thing

That renders what I have not, mine:
My king from me what adamant can part,
Whom I do wear engraven on my heart.

Have you not seen the nightingale
A prisoner-like, coop'd in a cage,
How doth she chant her wonted tale,
In that her narrow hermitage!

Even then her charming melody doth prove That all her bars are trees, her cage a grove. I am that bird whom they combine

Thus to deprive of liberty;

But though they do my corpse confine,

Yet, maugre hate, my soul is free:

And, though immur'd, yet can I chirp and sing Disgrace to rebels, glory to my king.

My soul is free as ambient air,

Although my baser part 's immur'd;
Whilst loyal thoughts do still repair
T'accompany my solitude;

Although rebellion do my body bind,
My king alone can captivate my mind.

Lecture the Twelfth.

DRAMATIC LITERATURE.

THE ORIGIN OF THE ENGLISH DRAMA-JOHN HEYWOOD-RICHARD ODELL-THOMAS RYCHARDES-JOHN STILL-THOMAS SACKVILLE-THOMAS NORTON-RICHARD EDWARDS-JOHN LYLY-GEORGE PEELE-THOMAS KID-THOMAS NASH-ROB

ERT GREENE-THOMAS LODGE-ANTHONY MUNDAY-HENRY CHATTLE-CHRISTOPHER MARLOW.

O the dramatic literature of the period of Elizabeth our attention must

composition and its representation, coinciding with the love of magnificence, chivalrous feeling, and romantic adventures, which animated the court, suddenly arose to the highest degree of splendor, and attracted nearly all the poetic genius of the country. But to present this department of English literature clearly before the mind, it will be necessary to notice briefly, the origin and nature of those rude dramatic representations which both remotely and more immediately preceded it, and in which it had its commence

ment.

At the dawn of modern civilization most countries in Christian Europe possessed a rude kind of theatrical entertainment, consisting, not in those exhibitions of nature, character, and incident which constituted the plays of ancient Greece and Rome, but in representations of the principal supernatural events of the Old and New Testaments, and of the history of the saints, whence they were called Miracles, or Miracle Plays. Originally, they appear to have been acted by the clergy, or under their immediate management, and they are supposed to have considered them favorable to the diffusion of religious feeling; though from the traces of those Miracles which still remain they seem to have been profane and indecorous in the highest degree. A miracle play upon the story of St. Katherine, and in the French language, was acted at Dunstable in 1119, and how long such entertainments may have previously existed in England, is not known. From 1268, a period of more than three hundred years, they were performed almost every year in Chester; and there were few large cities in England which were not then regaled in a similar manner: even in Scotland they were not unknown.

The most sacred personages, not excluding the Deity himself, were introduced into them.

During the reign of Henry the Sixth, persons representing sentiments and abstract ideas, such as Mercy, Justice, Truth, began to be introduced into the 'Miracle plays,' and led to the composition of an improved kind of drama entirely or chiefly composed of such characters, and termed Moral Plays, These plays were, certainly, a great advance upon the 'Miracles,' inasmuch as they endeavored to convey sound moral lessons, and at the same time gave occasion to some poetical and dramatic ingenuity, in imaging forth the characters, and assigning appropriate speeches to each. The only Scriptural character retained in them was the devil, who being represented in grotesque habiliments, and perpetually beaten by an attendant character, called the Vice, served to enliven what must have been, at the best, a sober, though well-meant entertainment. The Cradle of Security, Hit the Nail on the Head, Impatient Poverty, and the Marriage of Wisdom and Wit, are the names of moral plays which enjoyed popularity in the reign of Henry the Eighth. It was about that time that acting first became a distinct profession, both miracles and moral plays having previously been represented by clergymen, school-boys, or the members of trading incorporations; and were only brought forward occasionally, as part of some public or private festivity.

As the introduction of allegorical characters had been an improvement upon those plays which consisted of Scriptural persons only, so was the introduction of historical and actual characters an improvement upon those which employed only a set of impersonated ideas. It was now found that a real human being, with a human name, was better calculated to awaken the sympathies, and keep alive the attention of an audience, and not less so to impress them with moral truths, than a being who only represented a notion of the mind. The substitution of these for the symbolical characters, gradually took place during the earlier part of the sixteenth century; and thus, with some aid from Greek dramatic literature, which now began to be studied, and from the improved theatres of Italy and Spain, the genuine English drama took its rise.

We should, perhaps, here notice the Interludes of JOHN HEYWOOD, as occupying a place between the moral plays and the modern drama. Heywood was a native of London, and was partially educated at Oxford; but the severity of academical studies did not suit his gay and sprightly disposition; and he therefore returned to his native city, and soon became familiar with the men of wit about the court, especially with Sir Thomas More, with whom he was on terms of close intimacy. He was particularly noticed and patronized by Henry the Eighth, and was afterward equally a favorite with Queen Mary, whom he is represented to have entertained and amused even on her death-bed. As Heywood was a devoted papist, he left England on the accession of Queen Elizabeth, and retired to Mecklin in Brabant, where he died in 1565.

« НазадПродовжити »