No More Learning

Tyrwhitt disputes the existence of this personage,
and supposes Chaucer's original to have been the _Philostrato dell'
amorose fatiche de Troilo,_ a work of Boccacio. But Chaucer was never
reluctant in acknowledging obligations to his contemporaries, when
such really existed; and Mr Tyrwhitt's opinion seems to be
successfully combated by Mr Godwin, in his "Life of Chaucer. " The
subject, whencesoever derived, was deemed by Shakespeare worthy of the
stage; and his tragedy, of Troilus and Cressida, contains so many
scenes of distinguished excellence, that it could have been wished our
author had mentioned it with more veneration. In truth, even the
partiality of an editor must admit, that on this occasion, the modern
improvements of Dryden shew to very little advantage beside the
venerable structure to which they have been attached. The arrangement
of the plot is, indeed, more artificially modelled; but the preceding
age, during which the infidelity of Cressida was proverbially current,
could as little have endured a catastrophe turning upon the discovery
of her innocence, as one which should have exhibited Helen chaste, or
Hector a coward. In Dryden's time, the prejudice against this
unfortunate female was probably forgotten, as her history had become
less popular. There appears, however, something too nice and
fastidious in the critical rule, which exacts that the hero and
heroine of the drama shall be models of virtuous perfection. In the
most interesting of the ancient plays we find this limitation
neglected, with great success; and it would have been more natural to
have brought about the catastrophe on the plan of Shakespeare and
Chaucer, than by the forced mistake in which Dryden's lovers are
involved, and the stale expedient of Cressida's killing herself, to
evince her innocence. For the superior order, and regard to the unity
of place, with which Dryden has new-modelled the scenes and entries,
he must be allowed the full praise which he claims in the preface.

In the dialogue, considered as distinct from the plot, Dryden appears
not to have availed himself fully of the treasures of his predecessor.
He has pitilessly retrenched the whole scene, in the 3d act, between
Ulysses and Achilles, full of the purest and most admirable moral
precept, expressed in the most poetical and dignified language[1].
Probably this omission arose from Dryden's desire to simplify the
plot, by leaving out the intrigues of the Grecian chiefs, and limiting
the interest to the amours of Troilus and Cressida. But he could not
be insensible to the merit of this scene, though he has supplied it by
one far inferior, in which Ulysses is introduced, using gross flattery
to the buffoon Thersites. In the latter part of the play, Dryden has
successfully exerted his own inventive powers. The quarrelling scene
between Hector and Troilus is very impressive, and no bad imitation of
that betwixt Brutus and Cassius, with which Dryden seems to have been
so much charmed, and which he has repeatedly striven to emulate. The
parting of Hector and Andromache contains some affecting passages,
some of which may be traced back to Homer; although the pathos, upon
the whole, is far inferior to that of the noted scene in the Iliad,
and destitute of the noble simplicity of the Grecian bard.

Mr Godwin has justly remarked, that the delicacy of Chaucer's ancient
tale has suffered even in the hands of Shakespeare; but in those of
Dryden it has undergone a far deeper deterioration. Whatever is coarse
and naked in Shakespeare, has been dilated into ribaldry by the poet
laureat of Charles the second; and the character of Pandarus, in
particular, is so grossly heightened, as to disgrace even the obliging
class to whom that unfortunate procurer has bequeathed his name. So
far as this play is to be considered as an alteration of Shakespeare,
I fear it must be allowed, that our author has suppressed some of his
finest poetry, and exaggerated some of his worst faults.

Troilus and Cressida was published in 1679.


Footnote:
1. I need only recall to the reader's remembrance the following
beautiful passage, inculcating the unabating energy necessary to
maintain, in the race of life, the ground which has been already
gained.

_Ulys. _ Time hath, my lord, a wallet at his back,
Wherein he puts alms for oblivion,
A great-siz'd monster of ingratitudes:
These scraps are good deeds past; which are devour'd
As fast as they are made, forgot as soon
As done: Perséverance, dear my lord,
Keeps honour bright: To have done, is to hang
Quite out of fashion, like a rusty mail
In monumental mockery. Take the instant way;
For honour travels in a strait so narrow,
Where one but goes abreast: keep then the path;
For emulation hath a thousand sons,
That one by one pursue: If you give way,
Or hedge aside from the direct forthright,
Like to an enter'd tide, they all rush by,
And leave you hindmost. --
Or, like a gallant horse fallen in first rank,
Lie there for pavement to the abject rear,
O'er run and trampled on: Then what they do in present,
Though less than yours in past, must o'ertop yours:
For time is like a fashionable host,
That slightly shakes his parting guest by the hand;
And with his arms out stretch'd, as he would fly,
Grasps-in the comer: Welcome ever smiles,
And Farewel goes out sighing. O, let not virtue seek
Remuneration for the thing it was;
For beauty, wit,
High birth, vigour of bone, desert in service,
Love, friendship, charity, are subjects all
To envious and calumniating time.
One touch of nature makes the whole world kin,--
That all, with one consent, praise new-born gawds,
Though they are made and moulded of things past;
And give to dust, that is a little gilt,
More laud than gilt o'er-dusted.
The present eye praises the present object:
Then marvel not, thou great and complete man,
That all the Greeks begin to worship Ajax;
Since things in motion sooner catch the eye,
Than what not stirs. The cry went once on thee,
And still it might, and yet it may again,
If thou would'st not entomb thyself alive,
And case thy reputation in thy tent;
Whose glorious deeds, but in these fields of late,
Made emulous missions 'mongst the gods themselves,
And drave great Mars to faction.




TO

THE RIGHT HONOURABLE

ROBERT,

EARL OF SUNDERLAND[1],

PRINCIPAL SECRETARY OF STATE, ONE OF HIS MAJESTY'S
MOST HONOURABLE PRIVY-COUNCIL, &C.


MY LORD,

Since I cannot promise you much of poetry in my play, it is but
reasonable that I should secure you from any part of it in my
dedication. And indeed I cannot better distinguish the exactness of
your taste from that of other men, than by the plainness and sincerity
of my address. I must keep my hyperboles in reserve for men of other
understandings. An hungry appetite after praise, and a strong
digestion of it, will bear the grossness of that diet; but one of so
critical a judgment as your lordship, who can set the bounds of just
and proper in every subject, would give me small encouragement for so
bold an undertaking. I more than suspect, my lord, that you would not
do common justice to yourself; and, therefore, were I to give that
character of you, which I think you truly merit, I would make my
appeal from your lordship to the reader, and would justify myself from
flattery by the public voice, whatever protestation you might enter to
the contrary. But I find I am to take other measures with your
lordship; I am to stand upon my guard with you, and to approach you as
warily as Horace did Augustus:

_Cui malè si palpere, recalcitrat undique tutus. _

An ill-timed, or an extravagant commendation, would not pass upon you;
but you would keep off such a dedicator at arms-end, and send him back
with his encomiums to this lord, or that lady, who stood in need of
such trifling merchandise. You see, my lord, what an awe you have upon
me, when I dare not offer you that incense which would be acceptable
to other patrons; but am forced to curb myself from ascribing to you
those honours, which even an enemy could not deny you. Yet I must
confess, I never practised that virtue of moderation (which is
properly your character) with so much reluctancy as now: for it
hinders me from being true to my own knowledge, in not witnessing your
worth, and deprives me of the only means which I had left, to shew the
world that true honour and uninterested respect which I have always
paid you. I would say somewhat, if it were possible which might
distinguish that veneration I have for you, from the flatteries of
those who adore your fortune. But the eminence of your condition, in
this particular, is my unhappiness; for it renders whatever I would
say suspected. Professions of service, submissions, and attendance,
are the practice of all men to the great; and commonly they, who have
the least sincerity, perform them best; as they, who are least engaged
in love, have their tongues the freest to counterfeit a passion. For
my own part, I never could shake off the rustic bashfulness which
hangs upon my nature; but, valuing myself at as little as I am worth,
have been afraid to render even the common duties of respect to those
who are in power. The ceremonious visits, which are generally paid on
such occasions, are not my talent. They may be real even in courtiers,
but they appear with such a face of interest, that a modest man would
think himself in danger of having his sincerity mistaken for his
design. My congratulations keep their distance, and pass no farther
than my heart. There it is that I have all the joy imaginable, when I
see true worth rewarded, and virtue uppermost in the world.

If, therefore, there were one to whom I had the honour to be known;
and to know him so perfectly, that I could say, without flattery, he
had all the depth of understanding that was requisite in an able
statesman, and all that honesty which commonly is wanting; that he was
brave without vanity, and knowing without positiveness; that he was
loyal to his prince, and a lover of his country; that his principles
were full of moderation, and all his counsels such as tended to heal,
and not to widen, the breaches of the nation: that in all his
conversation there appeared a native candour, and a desire of doing
good in all his actions: if such an one, whom I have described, were
at the helm; if he had risen by his merits, and were chosen out in the
necessity and pressures of affairs, to remedy our confusions by the
seasonableness of his advice, and to put a stop to our ruin, when we
were just rolling downward to the precipice; I should then
congratulate the age in which I live, for the common safety; I should
not despair of the republic, though Hannibal were at the gates; I
should send up my vows for the success of such an action, as Virgil
did, on the like occasion, for his patron, when he was raising up his
country from the desolations of a civil war:

_Hunc saltem everso juvenem succurrere seclo
Ne, superi, prohibete. _

I know not whither I am running, in this extacy which is now upon me:
I am almost ready to re-assume the ancient rights of poetry; to point
out, and prophecy the man, who was born for no less an undertaking,
and whom posterity shall bless for its accomplishment. Methinks, I am
already taking fire from such a character, and making room for him,
under a borrowed name, amongst the heroes of an epic poem. Neither
could mine, or some more happy genius, want encouragement under such a
patron:

_Pollio amat nostram, quamvis sit rustica, musam. _

But these are considerations afar off, my lord: the former part of the
prophecy must be first accomplished; the quiet of the nation must be
secured; and a mutual trust, betwixt prince and people, be renewed;
and then this great and good man will have leisure for the ornaments
of peace; and make our language as much indebted to his care, as the
French is to the memory of their famous Richelieu[2]. You know, my
lord, how low he laid the foundations of so great a work; that he
began it with a grammar and a dictionary; without which all those
remarks and observations, which have since been made, had been
performed to as little purpose, as it would be to consider the
furniture of the rooms, before the contrivance of the house. Propriety
must first be stated, ere any measures of elegance can be taken.
Neither is one Vaugelas sufficient for such a work[3]. It was the
employment of the whole academy for many years; for the perfect
knowledge of a tongue was never attained by any single person. The
court, the college, and the town, must be joined in it. And as our
English is a composition of the dead and living tongues, there is
required a perfect knowledge, not only of the Greek and Latin, but of
the old German, the French, and the Italian; and, to help all these, a
conversation with those authors of our own, who have written with the
fewest faults in prose and verse. But how barbarously we yet write and
speak, your lordship knows, and I am sufficiently sensible in my own
English. For I am often put to a stand, in considering whether what I
write be the idiom of the tongue, or false grammar, and nonsense
couched beneath that specious name of Anglicism; and have no other way
to clear my doubts, but by translating my English into Latin, and
thereby trying what sense the words will bear in a more stable
language. I am desirous, if it were possible, that we might all write
with the same certainty of words, and purity of phrase, to which the
Italians first arrived, and after them the French; at least that we
might advance so far, as our tongue is capable of such a standard. It
would mortify an Englishman to consider, that from the time of Boccace
and of Petrarch, the Italian has varied very little; and that the
English of Chaucer, their contemporary, is not to be understood
without the help of an old dictionary. But their Goth and Vandal had
the fortune to be grafted on a Roman stock; ours has the disadvantage
to be founded on the Dutch[4]. We are full of monosyllables, and those
clogged with consonants, and our pronunciation is effeminate; all
which are enemies to a sounding language. It is true, that to supply
our poverty, we have trafficked with our neighbour nations; by which
means we abound as much in words, as Amsterdam does in religions; but
to order them, and make them useful after their admission, is the
difficulty. A greater progress has been made in this, since his
majesty's return, than, perhaps, since the conquest to his time. But
the better part of the work remains unfinished; and that which has
been done already, since it has only been in the practice of some few
writers, must be digested into rules and method, before it can be
profitable to the general. Will your lordship give me leave to speak
out at last? and to acquaint the world, that from your encouragement
and patronage, we may one day expect to speak and write a language,
worthy of the English wit, and which foreigners may not disdain to
learn? Your birth, your education, your natural endowments, the former
employments which you have had abroad, and that which, to the joy of
good men you now exercise at home, seem all to conspire to this
design: the genius of the nation seems to call you out as it were by
name, to polish and adorn your native language, and to take from it
the reproach of its barbarity. It is upon this encouragement that I
have adventured on the following critique, which I humbly present you,
together with the play; in which, though I have not had the leisure,
nor indeed the encouragement, to proceed to the principal subject of
it, which is the words and thoughts that are suitable to tragedy; yet
the whole discourse has a tendency that way, and is preliminary to it.
In what I have already done, I doubt not but I have contradicted some
of my former opinions, in my loose essays of the like nature; but of
this, I dare affirm, that it is the fruit of my riper age and
experience, and that self-love, or envy have no part in it. The
application to English authors is my own, and therein, perhaps, I may
have erred unknowingly; but the foundation of the rules is reason, and
the authority of those living critics who have had the honour to be
known to you abroad, as well as of the ancients, who are not less of
your acquaintance. Whatsoever it be, I submit it to your lordship's
judgment, from which I never will appeal, unless it be to your good
nature, and your candour. If you can allow an hour of leisure to the
perusal of it, I shall be fortunate that I could so long entertain
you; if not, I shall at least have the satisfaction to know, that your
time was more usefully employed upon the public. I am,

MY LORD,

Your Lordship's most Obedient,
Humble Servant,
JOHN DRYDEN.


Footnotes:
1. This was the famous Earl of Sunderland, who, being a Tory under the
reign of Charles, a Papist in that of his successor, and a Whig in
that of William, was a favourite minister of all these monarchs. He
was a man of eminent abilities; and our author shews a high opinion
of his taste, by abstaining from the gross flattery, which was then
the fashionable stile of dedication.

2. Alluding to the institution of an academy for fixing the language,
often proposed about this period.

3. Author of a treatise on the French language.

4. Dutch is here used generally for the High Dutch or German.




THE

PREFACE.


The poet Æschylus was held in the same veneration by the Athenians of
after-ages, as Shakespeare is by us; and Longinus has judged, in
favour of him, that he had a noble boldness of expression, and that
his imaginations were lofty and heroic; but, on the other side,
Quintilian affirms, that he was daring to extravagance. It is certain,
that he affected pompous words, and that his sense was obscured by
figures; notwithstanding these imperfections, the value of his
writings after his decease was such, that his countrymen ordained an
equal reward to those poets, who could alter his plays to be acted on
the theatre, with those whose productions were wholly new, and of
their own. The case is not the same in England; though the
difficulties of altering are greater, and our reverence for
Shakespeare much more just, than that of the Grecians for Æschylus. In
the age of that poet, the Greek tongue was arrived to its full
perfection; they had then amongst them an exact standard of writing
and of speaking: the English language is not capable of such a
certainty; and we are at present so far from it, that we are wanting
in the very foundation of it, a perfect grammar. Yet it must be
allowed to the present age, that the tongue in general is so much
refined since Shakespeare's time, that many of his words, and more of
his phrases, are scarce intelligible. And of those which we
understand, some are ungrammatical, others coarse; and his whole style
is so pestered with figurative expressions, that it is as affected as
it is obscure. It is true, that in his latter plays he had worn off
somewhat of the rust; but the tragedy, which I have undertaken to
correct, was in all probability one of his first endeavours on the
stage.

The original story was written by one Lollius a Lombard, in Latin
verse, and translated by Chaucer into English; intended, I suppose, a
satire on the inconstancy of women: I find nothing of it among the
ancients; not so much as the name Cressida once mentioned.
Shakespeare, (as I hinted) in the apprenticeship of his writing,
modelled it into that play, which is now called by the name of
"Troilus and Cressida," but so lamely is it left to us, that it is not
divided into acts; which fault I ascribe to the actors who printed it
after Shakespeare's death; and that too so carelessly, that a more
uncorrected copy I never saw. For the play itself, the author seems to
have begun it with some fire; the characters of Pandarus and
Thersites, are promising enough; but as if he grew weary of his task,
after an entrance or two, he lets them fall: and the latter part of
the tragedy is nothing but a confusion of drums and trumpets,
excursions and alarms. The chief persons, who give name to the
tragedy, are left alive; Cressida is false, and is not punished. Yet,
after all, because the play was Shakespeare's, and that there appeared
in some places of it the admirable genius of the author, I undertook
to remove that heap of rubbish under which many excellent thoughts lay
wholly buried. Accordingly, I new modelled the plot, threw out many
unnecessary persons, improved those characters which were begun and
left unfinished, as Hector, Troilus, Pandarus, and Thersites, and
added that of Andromache. After this, I made, with no small trouble,
an order and connection of all the scenes; removing them from the
places where they were inartificially set; and, though it was
impossible to keep them all unbroken, because the scene must be
sometimes in the city and sometimes in the camp, yet I have so ordered
them, that there is a coherence of them with one another, and a
dependence on the main design; no leaping from Troy to the Grecian
tents, and thence back again, in the same act, but a due proportion of
time allowed for every motion. I need not say that I have refined his
language, which before was obsolete; but I am willing to acknowledge,
that as I have often drawn his English nearer to our times, so I have
sometimes conformed my own to his; and consequently, the language is
not altogether so pure as it is significant. The scenes of Pandarus
and Cressida, of Troilus and Pandarus, of Andromache with Hector and
the Trojans, in the second act, are wholly new; together with that of
Nestor and Ulysses with Thersites, and that of Thersites with Ajax and
Achilles. I will not weary my reader with the scenes which are added
of Pandarus and the lovers, in the third, and those of Thersites,
which are wholly altered; but I cannot omit the last scene in it,
which is almost half the act, betwixt Troilus and Hector. The occasion
of raising it was hinted to me by Mr Betterton; the contrivance and
working of it was my own. They who think to do me an injury, by
saying, that it is an imitation of the scene betwixt Brutus and
Cassius, do me an honour, by supposing I could imitate the
incomparable Shakespeare; but let me add, that if Shakespeare's scene,
or that faulty copy of it in "Amintor and Melantius," had never been,
yet Euripides had furnished me with an excellent example in his
"Iphigenia," between Agamemnon and Menelaus; and from thence, indeed,
the last turn of it is borrowed. The occasion which Shakespeare,
Euripides, and Fletcher, have all taken, is the same,--grounded upon
friendship; and the quarrel of two virtuous men, raised by natural
degrees to the extremity of passion, is conducted in all three, to the
declination of the same passion, and concludes with a warm renewing of
their friendship. But the particular ground-work which Shakespeare has
taken, is incomparably the best; because he has not only chosen two of
the greatest heroes of their age, but has likewise interested the
liberty of Rome, and their own honours, who were the redeemers of it,
in this debate. And if he has made Brutus, who was naturally a patient
man, to fly into excess at first, let it be remembered in his defence,
that, just before, he has received the news of Portia's death; whom
the poet, on purpose neglecting a little chronology, supposes to have
died before Brutus, only to give him an occasion of being more easily
exasperated. Add to this, that the injury he had received from
Cassius, had long been brooding in his mind; and that a melancholy
man, upon consideration of an affront, especially from a friend, would
be more eager in his passion, than he who had given it, though
naturally more choleric. Euripides, whom I have followed, has raised
the quarrel betwixt two brothers, who were friends. The foundation of
the scene was this: The Grecians were wind-bound at the port of Aulis,
and the oracle had said, that they could not sail, unless Agamemnon
delivered up his daughter to be sacrificed: he refuses; his brother
Menelaus urges the public safety; the father defends himself by
arguments of natural affection, and hereupon they quarrel. Agamemnon
is at last convinced, and promises to deliver up Iphigenia, but so
passionately laments his loss, that Menelaus is grieved to have been
the occasion of it, and, by a return of kindness, offers to intercede
for him with the Grecians, that his daughter might not be sacrificed.
But my friend Mr Rymer has so largely, and with so much judgment,
described this scene, in comparing it with that of Melantius and
Amintor, that it is superfluous to say more of it; I only named the
heads of it, that any reasonable man might judge it was from thence I
modelled my scene betwixt Troilus and Hector. I will conclude my
reflections on it, with a passage of Longinus, concerning Plato's
imitation of Homer: "We ought not to regard a good imitation as a
theft, but as a beautiful idea of him who undertakes to imitate, by
forming himself on the invention and the work of another man; for he
enters into the lists like a new wrestler, to dispute the prize with
the former champion. This sort of emulation, says Hesiod, is
honourable, [Greek: Agathê d' eris esti Brotoisin]--when we combat for
victory with a hero, and are not without glory even in our overthrow.
Those great men, whom we propose to ourselves as patterns of our
imitation, serve us as a torch, which is lifted up before us, to
enlighten our passage, and often elevate our thoughts as high as the
conception we have of our author's genius. "

I have been so tedious in three acts, that I shall contract myself in
the two last. The beginning scenes of the fourth act are either added
or changed wholly by me; the middle of it is Shakespeare altered, and
mingled with my own; three or four of the last scenes are altogether
new. And the whole fifth act, both the plot and the writing, are my
own additions.

But having written so much for imitation of what is excellent, in that
part of the preface which related only to myself, methinks it would
neither be unprofitable nor unpleasant to inquire how far we ought to
imitate our own poets, Shakespeare and Fletcher, in their tragedies;
and this will occasion another inquiry, how those two writers differ
between themselves: but since neither of these questions can be
solved, unless some measures be first taken, by which we may be
enabled to judge truly of their writings, I shall endeavour, as
briefly as I can, to discover the grounds and reason of all criticism,
applying them in this place only to Tragedy. Aristotle with his
interpreters, and Horace, and Longinus, are the authors to whom I owe
my lights; and what part soever of my own plays, or of this, which no
mending could make regular, shall fall under the condemnation of such
judges, it would be impudence in me to defend. I think it no shame to
retract my errors, and am well pleased to suffer in the cause, if the
art may be improved at my expence: I therefore proceed to

THE GROUNDS OF CRITICISM IN TRAGEDY.

Tragedy is thus defined by Aristotle (omitting what I thought
unnecessary in his definition). It is an imitation of one entire,
great, and probable action; not told, but represented; which, by
moving in us fear and pity, is conducive to the purging of those two
passions in our minds. More largely thus: Tragedy describes or paints
an action, which action must have all the properties above named.
First, it must be one or single; that is, it must not be a history of
one man's life, suppose of Alexander the Great, or Julius Cæsar, but
one single action of theirs. This condemns all Shakespeare's
historical plays, which are rather chronicles represented, than
tragedies; and all double action of plays. As, to avoid a satire upon
others, I will make bold with my own "Marriage A-la-mode," where there
are manifestly two actions, not depending on one another; but in
"OEdipus" there cannot properly be said to be two actions, because the
love of Adrastus and Eurydice has a necessary dependence on the
principal design into which it is woven. The natural reason of this
rule is plain; for two different independent actions distract the
attention and concernment of the audience, and consequently destroy
the intention of the poet; if his business be to move terror and pity,
and one of his actions he comical, the other tragical, the former will
divert the people, and utterly make void his greater purpose.
Therefore, as in perspective, so in tragedy, there must be a point of
sight in which all the lines terminate; otherwise the eye wanders, and
the work is false. This was the practice of the Grecian stage. But
Terence made an innovation in the Roman: all his plays have double
actions; for it was his custom to translate two Greek comedies, and to
weave them into one of his, yet so, that both their actions were
comical, and one was principal, the other but secondary or
subservient. And this has obtained on the English stage, to give us
the pleasure of variety.

As the action ought to be one, it ought, as such, to have order in it;
that is, to have a natural beginning, a middle, and an end. A natural
beginning, says Aristotle, is that which could not necessarily have
been placed after another thing; and so of the rest. This
consideration will arraign all plays after the new model of Spanish
plots, where accident is heaped upon accident, and that which is first
might as reasonably be last; an inconvenience not to be remedied, but
by making one accident naturally produce another, otherwise it is a
farce and not a play. Of this nature is the "Slighted Maid;" where
there is no scene in the first act, which might not by as good reason
be in the fifth. And if the action ought to be one, the tragedy ought
likewise to conclude with the action of it. Thus in "Mustapha," the
play should naturally have ended with the death of Zanger, and not
have given us the grace-cup after dinner, of Solyman's divorce from
Roxolana.

The following properties of the action are so easy, that they need not
my explaining. It ought to be great, and to consist of great persons,
to distinguish it from comedy, where the action is trivial, and the
persons of inferior rank. The last quality of the action is, that it
ought to be probable, as well as admirable and great. It is not
necessary that there should be historical truth in it; but always
necessary that there should be a likeness of truth, something that is
more than barely possible; _probable_ being that which succeeds, or
happens, oftener than it misses. To invent therefore a probability and
to make it wonderful, is the most difficult undertaking in the art of
poetry; for that, which is not wonderful, is not great; and that,
which is not probable, will not delight a reasonable audience. This
action, thus described, must be represented and not told, to
distinguish dramatic poetry from epic: but I hasten to the end or
scope of tragedy, which is, to rectify or purge our passions, fear and
pity.

To instruct delightfully is the general end of all poetry. Philosophy
instructs, but it performs its work by precept; which is not
delightful, or not so delightful as example. To purge the passions by
example, is therefore the particular instruction which belongs to
tragedy. Rapin, a judicious critic, has observed from Aristotle, that
pride and want of commiseration are the most predominant vices in
mankind; therefore, to cure us of these two, the inventors of tragedy
have chosen to work upon two other passions, which are, fear and pity.
We are wrought to fear, by their setting before our eyes some terrible
example of misfortune, which happened to persons of the highest
quality; for such an action demonstrates to us, that no condition is
privileged from the turns of fortune; this must of necessity cause
terror in us, and consequently abate our pride. But when we see that
the most virtuous, as well as the greatest, are not exempt from such
misfortunes, that consideration moves pity in us, and insensibly works
us to be helpful to, and tender over, the distressed; which is the
noblest and most godlike of moral virtues, Here it is observable, that
it is absolutely necessary to make a man virtuous, if we desire he
should be pitied: we lament not, but detest, a wicked man; we are glad
when we behold his crimes are punished, and that poetical justice is
done upon him. Euripides was censured by the critics of his time, for
making his chief characters too wicked; for example, Phædra, though
she loved her son-in-law with reluctancy, and that it was a curse upon
her family for offending Venus, yet was thought too ill a pattern for
the stage. Shall we therefore banish all characters of villainy? I
confess I am not of that opinion; but it is necessary that the hero of
the play be not a villain; that is, the characters, which should move
our pity, ought to have virtuous inclinations, and degrees of moral
goodness in them. As for a perfect character of virtue, it never was
in nature, and therefore there can be no imitation of it; but there
are allays of frailty to be allowed for the chief persons, yet so that
the good which is in them shall outweigh the bad, and consequently
leave room for punishment on the one side, and pity on the other.

After all, if any one will ask me, whether a tragedy cannot be made
upon any other grounds than those of exciting pity and terror in
us;--Bossu, the best of modern critics, answers thus in general: That
all excellent arts, and particularly that of poetry, have been
invented and brought to perfection by men of a transcendent genius;
and that, therefore, they, who practise afterwards the same arts, are
obliged to tread in their footsteps, and to search in their writings
the foundation of them; for it is not just that new rules should
destroy the authority of the old. But Rapin writes more particularly
thus, that no passions in a story are so proper to move our
concernment, as fear and pity; and that it is from our concernment we
receive our pleasure, is undoubted. When the soul becomes agitated
with fear for one character, or hope for another; then it is that we
are pleased in tragedy, by the interest which we take in their
adventures.

Here, therefore, the general answer may be given to the first
question, how far we ought to imitate Shakespeare and Fletcher in
their plots; namely, that we ought to follow them so far only, as they
have copied the excellencies of those who invented and brought to
perfection dramatic poetry; those things only excepted, which
religion, custom of countries, idioms of languages, &c. have altered
in the superstructures, but not in the foundation of the design.

How defective Shakespeare and Fletcher have been in all their plots,
Mr Rymer has discovered in his criticisms. Neither can we, who follow
them, be excused from the same, or greater errors; which are the more
unpardonable in us, because we want their beauties to countervail our
faults. The best of their designs, the most approaching to antiquity,
and the most conducing to move pity, is the "King and no King;" which,
if the farce of Bessus were thrown away, is of that inferior sort of
tragedies, which end with a prosperous event. It is probably derived
from the story of OEdipus, with the character of Alexander the Great,
in his extravagances, given to Arbaces. The taking of this play,
amongst many others, I cannot wholly ascribe to the excellency of the
action; for I find it moving when it is read. It is true, the faults
of the plot are so evidently proved, that they can no longer be
denied. The beauties of it must therefore lie either in the lively
touches of the passion; or we must conclude, as I think we may, that
even in imperfect plots there are less degrees of nature, by which
some faint emotions of pity and terror are raised in us; as a less
engine will raise a less proportion of weight, though not so much as
one of Archimedes's making; for nothing can move our nature, but by
some natural reason, which works upon passions. And, since we
acknowledge the effect, there must be something in the cause.

The difference between Shakespeare and Fletcher, in their plottings,
seems to be this; that Shakespeare generally moves more terror, and
Fletcher more compassion: for the first had a more masculine, a
bolder, and more fiery genius; the second, a more soft and womanish.
In the mechanic beauties of the plot, which are the observation of the
three unities, time, place, and action, they are both deficient; but
Shakespeare most. Ben Jonson reformed those errors in his comedies,
yet one of Shakespeare's was regular before him; which is, "The Merry
Wives of Windsor. " For what remains concerning the design, you are to
be referred to our English critic. That method which he has prescribed
to raise it, from mistake, or ignorance of the crime, is certainly the
best, though it is not the only; for amongst all the tragedies of
Sophocles, there is but one, OEdipus, which is wholly built after that
model.

After the plot, which is the foundation of the play, the next thing to
which we ought to apply our judgment, is the manners; for now the poet
comes to work above ground. The ground-work, indeed, is that which is
most necessary, as that upon which depends the firmness of the whole
fabric; yet it strikes not the eye so much, as the beauties or
imperfections of the manners, the thoughts, and the expressions.

The first rule which Bossu prescribes to the writer of an heroic poem,
and which holds too by the same reason in all dramatic poetry, is to
make the moral of the work; that is, to lay down to yourself what that
precept of morality shall be, which you would insinuate into the
people; as, namely, Homer's (which I have copied in my "Conquest of
Granada,") was, that union preserves a commonwealth and discord
destroys it. Sophocles, in his OEdipus, that no man is to be accounted
happy before his death. It is the moral that directs the whole action
of the play to one centre; and that action or fable is the example
built upon the moral, which confirms the truth of it to our
experience. When the fable is designed, then, and not before, the
persons are to be introduced, with their manners, characters, and
passions.

The manners, in a poem, are understood to be those inclinations,
whether natural or acquired, which move and carry us to actions, good,
bad, or indifferent, in a play; or which incline the persons to such
or such actions. I have anticipated part of this discourse already, in
declaring that a poet ought not to make the manners perfectly good in
his best persons; but neither are they to be more wicked in any of his
characters, than necessity requires. To produce a villain, without
other reason than a natural inclination to villainy, is, in poetry, to
produce an effect without a cause; and to make him more a villain than
he has just reason to be, is to make an effect which is stronger than
the cause.

The manners arise from many causes; and are either distinguished by
complexion, as choleric and phlegmatic, or by the differences of age
or sex, of climates, or quality of the persons, or their present
condition. They are likewise to be gathered from the several virtues,
vices, or passions, and many other common-places, which a poet must be
supposed to have learned from natural philosophy, ethics, and history;
of all which, whosoever is ignorant, does not deserve the name of
poet.

But as the manners are useful in this art, they may be all comprised
under these general heads: First, they must be apparent; that is, in
every character of the play, some inclinations of the person must
appear; and these are shown in the actions and discourse. Secondly,
the manners must be suitable, or agreeing to the persons; that is, to
the age, sex, dignity, and the other general heads of manners: thus,
when a poet has given the dignity of a king to one of his persons, in
all his actions and speeches, that person must discover majesty,
magnanimity, and jealousy of power, because these are suitable to the
general manners of a king[1]. The third property of manners is
resemblance; and this is founded upon the particular characters of
men, as we have them delivered to us by relation or history; that is,
when a poet has the known character of this or that man before him, he
is bound to represent him such, at least not contrary to that which
fame has reported him to have been. Thus, it is not a poet's choice to
make Ulysses choleric, or Achilles patient, because Homer has
described them quite otherwise. Yet this is a rock, on which ignorant
writers daily split; and the absurdity is as monstrous, as if a
painter should draw a coward running from a battle, and tell us it was
the picture of Alexander the Great.

The last property of manners is, that they be constant and equal, that
is, maintained the same through the whole design: thus, when Virgil
had once given the name of _pious_ to Æneas, he was bound to show him
such, in all his words and actions through the whole poem. All these
properties Horace has hinted to a judicious observer. --1. _Notandi
sunt tibi mores;_ 2. _Aut famam sequere,_ 3. _aut sibi concenientia
finge;_ 4. _Sercetur ad imum, qualis ab incepto processerit, et sibi
constet. _

From the manners, the characters of persons are derived; for, indeed,
the characters are no other than the inclinations, as they appear in
the several persons of the poem; a character being thus defined,--that
which distinguishes one man from another. Not to repeat the same
things over again, which have been said of the manners, I will only
add what is necessary here. A character, or that which distinguishes
one man from all others, cannot be supposed to consist of one
particular virtue, or vice, or passion only; but it is a composition
of qualities which are not contrary to one another in the same person.
Thus, the same man may be liberal and valiant, but not liberal and
covetous; so in a comical character, or humour, (which is an
inclination to this or that particular folly) Falstaff is a liar, and
a coward, a glutton, and a buffoon, because all these qualities may
agree in the same man; yet it is still to be observed, that one
virtue, vice, and passion, ought to be shown in every man, as
predominant over all the rest; as covetousness in Crassus, love of his
country in Brutus; and the same in characters which are feigned.

The chief character or hero in a tragedy, as I have already shown,
ought in prudence to be such a man, who has so much more of virtue in
him than of vice, that he may be left amiable to the audience, which
otherwise cannot have any concernment for his sufferings; and it is on
this one character, that the pity and terror must be principally, if
not wholly, founded: a rule which is extremely necessary, and which
none of the critics, that I know, have fully enough discovered to us.
For terror and compassion work but weakly when they are divided into
many persons. If Creon had been the chief character in "OEdipus,"
there had neither been terror nor compassion moved; but only
detestation of the man, and joy for his punishment; if Adrastus and
Eurydice had been made more appearing characters, then the pity had
been divided, and lessened on the part of OEdipus. But making OEdipus
the best and bravest person, and even Jocasta but an underpart to him,
his virtues, and the punishment of his fatal crime, drew both the
pity, and the terror to himself.

By what has been said of the manners, it will be easy for a reasonable
man to judge, whether the characters be truly or falsely drawn in a
tragedy; for if there be no manners appearing in the characters, no
concernment for the persons can be raised; no pity or horror can be
moved, but by vice or virtue; therefore, without them, no person can
have any business in the play. If the inclinations be obscure, it is a
sign the poet is in the dark, and knows not what manner of man he
presents to you; and consequently you can have no idea, or very
imperfect, of that man; nor can judge what resolutions he ought to
take; or what words or actions are proper for him. Most comedies, made
up of accidents or adventures, are liable to fall into this error; and
tragedies with many turns are subject to it; for the manners can never
be evident, where the surprises of fortune take up all the business of
the stage; and where the poet is more in pain, to tell you what
happened to such a man, than what he was. It is one of the
excellencies of Shakespeare, that the manners of his persons are
generally apparent; and you see their bent and inclinations. Fletcher
comes far short of him in this, as indeed he does almost in every
thing. There are but glimmerings of manners in most of his comedies,
which run upon adventures; and in his tragedies, Rollo, Otto, the King
and no King, Melantius, and many others of his best, are but pictures
shown you in the twilight; you know not whether they resemble vice or
virtue, and they are either good, bad, or indifferent, as the present
scene requires it. But of all poets, this commendation is to be given
to Ben Jonson, that the manners even of the most inconsiderable
persons in his plays, are every where apparent.

By considering the second quality of manners, which is, that they be
suitable to the age, quality, country, dignity, &c. of the character,
we may likewise judge whether a poet has followed nature. In this
kind, Sophocles and Euripides have more excelled among the Greeks than
Æschylus; and Terence more than Plautus, among the Romans. Thus,
Sophocles gives to OEdipus the true qualities of a king, in both those
plays which bear his name; but in the latter, which is the "OEdipus
Coloneus," he lets fall on purpose his tragic style; his hero speaks
not in the arbitrary tone; but remembers, in the softness of his
complaints, that he is an unfortunate blind old man; that he is
banished from his country, and persecuted by his next relations. The
present French poets are generally accused, that wheresoever they lay
the scene, or in whatsoever age, the manners of their heroes are
wholly French. Racine's Bajazet is bred at Constantinople; but his
civilities are conveyed to him, by some secret passage, from
Versailles into the seraglio. But our Shakespeare, having ascribed to
Henry the Fourth the character of a king and of a father, gives him
the perfect manners of each relation, when either he transacts with
his son or with his subjects. Fletcher, on the other side, gives
neither to Arbaces, nor to his king, in "The Maid's Tragedy," the
qualities which are suitable to a monarch; though he may be excused a
little in the latter, for the king there is not uppermost in the
character; it is the lover of Evadne, who is king only in a second
consideration; and though he be unjust, and has other faults which
shall be nameless, yet he is not the hero of the play. It is true, we
find him a lawful prince, (though I never heard of any king that was
in Rhodes) and therefore Mr Rymer's criticism stands good,--that he
should not be shown in so vicious a character. Sophocles has been more
judicious in his "Antigona;" for, though he represents in Creon a
bloody prince, yet he makes him not a lawful king, but an usurper, and
Antigona herself is the heroine of the tragedy: but when Philaster
wounds Arethusa and the boy; and Perigot his mistress, in the
"Faithful Shepherdess," both these are contrary to the character of
manhood. Nor is Valentinian managed much better; for, though Fletcher
has taken his picture truly, and shown him as he was, an effeminate,
voluptuous man, yet he has forgotten that he was an emperor, and has
given him none of those royal marks, which ought to appear in a lawful
successor of the throne. If it be enquired, what Fletcher should have
done on this occasion; ought he not to have represented Valentinian as
he was;--Bossu shall answer this question for me, by an instance of
the like nature: Mauritius, the Greek emperor, was a prince far
surpassing Valentinian, for he was endued with many kingly virtues; he
was religious, merciful, and valiant, but withal he was noted of
extreme covetousness, a vice which is contrary to the character of a
hero, or a prince: therefore, says the critic, that emperor was no fit
person to be represented in a tragedy, unless his good qualities were
only to be shown, and his covetousness (which sullied them all) were
slurred over by the artifice of the poet. To return once more to
Shakespeare; no man ever drew so many characters, or generally
distinguished them better from one another, excepting only Jonson. I
will instance but in one, to show the copiousness of his invention; it
is that of Caliban, or the monster, in "The Tempest. " He seems there
to have created a person which was not in nature, a boldness which, at
first sight, would appear intolerable; for he makes him a species of
himself, begotten by an incubus on a witch; but this, as I have
elsewhere proved, is not wholly beyond the bounds of credibility, at
least the vulgar still believe it. We have the separated notions of a
spirit, and of a witch; (and spirits, according to Plato, are vested
with a subtle body; according to some of his followers, have different
sexes;) therefore, as from the distinct apprehensions of a horse, and
of a man, imagination has formed a centaur; so, from those of an
incubus and a sorceress, Shakespeare has produced his monster. Whether
or no his generation can be defended, I leave to philosophy; but of
this I am certain, that the poet has most judiciously furnished him
with a person, a language, and a character, which will suit him, both
by father's and mother's side: he has all the discontents, and malice
of a witch, and of a devil, besides a convenient proportion of the
deadly sins; gluttony, sloth, and lust, are manifest; the dejectedness
of a slave is likewise given him, and the ignorance of one bred up in
a desert island. His person is monstrous, and he is the product of
unnatural lust; and his language is as hobgoblin as his person; in all
things he is distinguished from other mortals. The characters of
Fletcher are poor and narrow, in comparison of Shakspeare's; I
remember not one which is not borrowed from him; unless you will
except that strange mixture of a man in the "King and no King;" so
that in this part Shakespeare is generally worth our imitation; and to
imitate Fletcher is but to copy after him who was a copyer.

Under this general head of manners, the passions are naturally
included, as belonging to the characters. I speak not of pity and of
terror, which are to be moved in the audience by the plot; but of
anger, hatred, love, ambition, jealousy, revenge, &c. as they are
shown in this or that person of the play. To describe these naturally,
and to move them artfully, is one of the greatest commendations which
can be given to a poet: to write pathetically, says Longinus, cannot
proceed but from a lofty genius. A poet must be born with this
quality: yet, unless he help himself by an acquired knowledge of the
passions, what they are in their own nature, and by what springs they
are to be moved, he will be subject either to raise them where they
ought not to be raised, or not to raise them by the just degrees of
nature, or to amplify them beyond the natural bounds, or not to
observe the crisis and turns of them, in their cooling and decay; all
which errors proceed from want of judgment in the poet, and from being
unskilled in the principles of moral philosophy. Nothing is more
frequent in a fanciful writer, than to foil himself by not managing
his strength; therefore, as, in a wrestler, there is first required
some measure of force, a well-knit body and active limbs, without
which all instruction would be vain; yet, these being granted, if he
want the skill which is necessary to a wrestler, he shall make but
small advantage of his natural robustuousness: so, in a poet, his
inborn vehemence and force of spirit will only run him out of breath
the sooner, if it be not supported by the help of art. The roar of
passion, indeed, may please an audience, three parts of which are
ignorant enough to think all is moving which is noisy, and it may
stretch the lungs of an ambitious actor, who will die upon the spot
for a thundering clap; but it will move no other passion than
indignation and contempt from judicious men. Longinus, whom I have
hitherto followed, continues thus:--If the passions be artfully
employed, the discourse becomes vehement and lofty: if otherwise,
there is nothing more ridiculous than a great passion out of season:
and to this purpose he animadverts severely upon Æschylus, who writ
nothing in cold blood, but was always in a rapture, and in fury with
his audience: the inspiration was still upon him, he was ever tearing
it upon the tripos; or (to run off as madly as he does, from one
similitude to another) he was always at high-flood of passion, even in
the dead ebb, and lowest water-mark of the scene. He who would raise
the passion of a judicious audience, says a learned critic, must be
sure to take his hearers along with him; if they be in a calm, 'tis in
vain for him to be in a huff: he must move them by degrees, and kindle
with them; otherwise he will be in danger of setting his own heap of
stubble on fire, and of burning out by himself, without warming the
company that stand about him. They who would justify the madness of
poetry from the authority of Aristotle, have mistaken the text, and
consequently the interpretation: I imagine it to be false read, where
he says of poetry, that it is [Greek: Euphuous ê manikou], that it had
always somewhat in it either of a genius, or of a madman. 'Tis more
probable that the original ran thus, that poetry was [Greek: Euphuous
ou manikou], That it belongs to a witty man, but not to a madman. Thus
then the passions, as they are considered simply and in themselves,
suffer violence when they are perpetually maintained at the same
height; for what melody can be made on that instrument, all whose
strings are screwed up at first to their utmost stretch, and to the
same sound? But this is not the worst: for the characters likewise
bear a part in the general calamity, if you consider the passions as
embodied in them; for it follows of necessity, that no man can be
distinguished from another by his discourse, when every man is
ranting, swaggering, and exclaiming with the same excess: as if it
were the only business of all the characters to contend with each
other for the prize at Billingsgate; or that the scene of the tragedy
lay in Bethlem. Suppose the poet should intend this man to be
choleric, and that man to be patient; yet when they are confounded in
the writing, you cannot distinguish them from one another: for the man
who was called patient and tame, is only so before he speaks; but let
his clack be set a-going, and he shall tongue it as impetuously and as
loudly, as the arrantest hero in the play. By this means, the
characters are only distinct in name; but, in reality, all the men and
women in the play are the same person. No man should pretend to write,
who cannot temper his fancy with his judgment: nothing is more
dangerous to a raw horseman, than a hot-mouthed jade without a curb.

It is necessary therefore for a poet, who would concern an audience by
describing of a passion, first to prepare it, and not to rush upon it
all at once. Ovid has judiciously shown the difference of these two
ways, in the speeches of Ajax and Ulysses: Ajax, from the very
beginning, breaks out into his exclamations, and is swearing by his
Maker,--_Agimus, proh Jupiter, inquit. _ Ulysses, on the contrary,
prepares his audience with all the submissiveness he can practise, and
all the calmness of a reasonable man; he found his judges in a
tranquillity of spirit, and therefore set out leisurely and softly
with them, till he had warmed them by degrees; and then he began to
mend his pace, and to draw them along with his own impetuousness: yet
so managing his breath, that it might not fail him at his need, and
reserving his utmost proofs of ability even to the last. The success,
you see, was answerable; for the crowd only applauded the speech of
Ajax;--

_Vulgique secutum ultima murmur erat:--_

But the judges awarded the prize, for which they contended, to
Ulysses;

_Mota manus procerum est; et quid facundia posset
Tum patuit, fortisque viri tulit arma disertus. _

The next necessary rule is, to put nothing into the discourse, which
may hinder your moving of the passions. Too many accidents, as I have
said, incumber the poet, as much as the arms of Saul did David; for
the variety of passions, which they produce, are ever crossing and
justling each other out of the way. He, who treats of joy and grief
together, is in a fair way of causing neither of those effects. There
is yet another obstacle to be removed, which is,--pointed wit, and
sentences affected out of season; these are nothing of kin to the
violence of passion: no man is at leisure to make sentences and
similes, when his soul is in an agony. I the rather name this fault,
that it may serve to mind me of my former errors; neither will I spare
myself, but give an example of this kind from my "Indian Emperor. "
Montezuma, pursued by his enemies, and seeking sanctuary, stands
parleying without the fort, and describing his danger to Cydaria, in a
simile of six lines;

As on the sands the frighted traveller
Sees the high seas come rolling from afar, &c.

My Indian potentate was well skilled in the sea for an inland prince,
and well improved since the first act, when he sent his son to
discover it. The image had not been amiss from another man, at another
time: _Sed nunc non erat his locus:_ he destroyed the concernment
which the audience might otherwise have had for him; for they could
not think the danger near, when he had the leisure to invent a simile.

If Shakespeare be allowed, as I think he must, to have made his
characters distinct, it will easily be inferred, that he understood
the nature of the passions: because it has been proved already, that
confused passions make distinguishable characters: yet I cannot deny
that he has his failings; but they are not so much in the passions
themselves, as in his manner of expression: he often obscures his
meaning by his words, and sometimes makes it unintelligible. I will
not say of so great a poet, that he distinguished not the blown puffy
stile, from true sublimity; but I may venture to maintain, that the
fury of his fancy often transported him beyond the bounds of judgment,
either in coining of new words and phrases, or racking words which
were in use, into the violence of a catachresis. It is not that I
would explode the use of metaphors from passion, for Longinus thinks
them necessary to raise it: but to use them at every word, to say
nothing without a metaphor, a simile, an image, or description; is, I
doubt, to smell a little too strongly of the buskin. I must be forced
to give an example of expressing passion figuratively; but that I may
do it with respect to Shakespeare, it shall not be taken from any
thing of his: it is an exclamation against Fortune, quoted in his
Hamlet, but written by some other poet:

Out, out, thou strumpet Fortune! all you gods,
In general synod, take away her power;
Break all the spokes and felleys from her wheel,
And bowl the round nave down the hill of heav'n,
As low as to the fiends.

And immediately after, speaking of Hecuba, when Priam was killed
before her eyes:

But who, ah woe! had seen the mobled queen
Run barefoot up and down, threatening the flame
With bisson rheum; a clout about that head,
Where late the diadem stood; and, for a rob
About her lank and all o'er-teemed loins,
A blanket in th' alarm of fear caught up.
Who this had seen, with tongue in venom steep'd
'Gainst fortune's state would treason have pronounc'd;
But if the gods themselves did see her then,
When she saw Pyrrhus make malicious sport
In mincing with his sword her husband's limbs,
The instant burst of clamour that she made
(Unless things mortal move them not at all)
Would have made milch the burning eyes of heaven,
And passion in the gods.

What a pudder is here kept in raising the expression of trifling
thoughts! would not a man have thought that the poet had been bound
prentice to a wheel-wright, for his first rant? and had followed a
rag-man, for the clout and blanket, in the second? Fortune is painted
on a wheel, and therefore the writer, in a rage, will have poetical
justice done upon every member of that engine: after this execution,
he bowls the nave down-hill, from heaven, to the fiends: (an
unreasonable long mark, a man would think;) 'tis well there are no
solid orbs to stop it in the way, or no element of fire to consume it:
but when it came to the earth, it must be monstrous heavy, to break
ground as low as the center. His making milch the burning eyes of
heaven, was a pretty tolerable flight too: and I think no man ever
drew milk out of eyes before him: yet, to make the wonder greater,
these eyes were burning. Such a sight indeed were enough to have
raised passion in the gods; but to excuse the effects of it, he tells
you, perhaps they did not see it. Wise men would be glad to find a
little sense couched under all these pompous words; for bombast is
commonly the delight of that audience, which loves poetry, but
understands it not: and as commonly has been the practice of those
writers, who, not being able to infuse a natural passion into the
mind, have made it their business to ply the ears, and to stun their
judges by the noise. But Shakespeare does not often thus; for the
passions in his scene between Brutus and Cassius are extremely
natural, the thoughts are such as arise from the matter, the
expression of them not viciously figurative. I cannot leave this
subject, before I do justice to that divine poet, by giving you one of
his passionate descriptions: 'tis of Richard the Second when he was
deposed, and led in triumph through the streets of London by Henry of
Bolingbroke: the painting of it is so lively, and the words so moving
that I have scarce read any thing comparable to it, in any other
language. Suppose you have seen already the fortunate usurper passing
through the crowd, and followed by the shouts and acclamations of the
people; and now behold King Richard entering upon the scene: consider
the wretchedness of his condition, and his carriage in it; and refrain
from pity, if you can:

As in a theatre, the eyes of men,
After a well-grac'd actor leaves the stage,
Are idly bent on him that enters next,
Thinking his prattle to be tedious:
Even so, or with much more contempt, men's eyes
Did scowl on Richard: no man cry'd, God save him:
No joyful tongue gave him his welcome home,
But dust was thrown upon his sacred head,
Which with such gentle sorrow he shook off,
His face still combating with tears and smiles,
(The badges of his grief and patience)
That had not God (for some strong purpose) steel'd
The hearts of men, they must perforce have melted,
And barbarism itself have pitied him.

To speak justly of this whole matter: it is neither height of thought
that is discommended, nor pathetic vehemence, nor any nobleness of
expression in its proper place; but it is a false measure of all
these, something which is like them, and is not them: it is the
Bristol-stone, which appears like a diamond; it is an extravagant
thought, instead of a sublime one; it is roaring madness, instead of
vehemence; and a sound of words, instead of sense. If Shakespeare were
stripped of all the bombasts in his passions, and dressed in the most
vulgar words, we should find the beauties of his thoughts remaining;
if his embroideries were burnt down, there would still be silver at
the bottom of the melting-pot: but I fear (at least let me fear it for
myself) that we, who ape his sounding words, have nothing of his
thought, but are all outside; there is not so much as a dwarf within
our giant's clothes. Therefore, let not Shakespeare suffer for our
sakes; it is our fault, who succeed him in an age which is more
refined, if we imitate him so ill, that we copy his failings only, and
make a virtue of that in our writings, which in his was an
imperfection.

For what remains, the excellency of that poet was, as I have said, in
the more manly passions; Fletcher's in the softer: Shakespeare writ
better betwixt man and man; Fletcher, betwixt man and woman:
consequently, the one described friendship better; the other love: yet
Shakespeare taught Fletcher to write love: and Juliet and Desdemona
are originals. It is true, the scholar had the softer soul; but the
master had the kinder. Friendship is both a virtue and a passion
essentially; love is a passion only in its nature, and is not a virtue
but by accident: good nature makes friendship; but effeminacy love.
Shakespeare had an universal mind, which comprehended all characters
and passions; Fletcher a more confined and limited: for though he
treated love in perfection, yet honour, ambition, revenge, and
generally all the stronger, passions, he either touched not, or not
masterly. To conclude all, he was a limb of Shakespeare.

I had intended to have proceeded to the last property of manners,
which is, that they must be constant, and the characters maintained
the same from the beginning to the end; and from thence to have
proceeded to the thoughts and expressions suitable to a tragedy: but I
will first see how this will relish with the age. It is, I confess,
but cursorily written; yet the judgment, which is given here, is
generally founded upon experience: but because many men are shocked at
the name of rules, as if they were a kind of magisterial prescription
upon poets, I will conclude with the words of Rapin, in his
Reflections on Aristotle's Work of Poetry: "If the rules be well
considered, we shall find them to be made only to reduce nature into
method, to trace her step by step, and not to suffer the least mark of
her to escape us: it is only by these, that probability in fiction is
maintained, which is the soul of poetry. They are founded upon good
sense, and sound reason, rather than on authority; for though
Aristotle and Horace are produced, yet no man must argue, that what
they write is true, because they writ it; but 'tis evident, by the
ridiculous mistakes and gross absurdities, which have been made by
those poets who have taken their fancy only for their guide, that if
this fancy be not regulated, it is a mere caprice, and utterly
incapable to produce a reasonable and judicious poem. "


Footnote:
1. The _dictum_ of Rymer, concerning the royal prerogative in poetry,
is thus expressed: "We are to presume the highest virtues, where we
find the highest of rewards; and though it is not necessary that
all heroes should be kings, yet, undoubtedly, all crowned heads, by
poetical right, are heroes. This character is a flower; a
prerogative so certain, so inseparably annexed to the crown, as by
no parliament of poets ever to be invaded. " _The Tragedies of the
last Age considered,_ p. 61. Dryden has elsewhere given his assent
to this maxim, that a king, in poetry, as in our constitution, can
do no wrong. The only apology for introducing a tyrant upon the
stage, was to make him at the same time an usurper.




PROLOGUE

SPOKEN BY MR BETTERTON,
REPRESENTING THE GHOST OF SHAKESPEARE.


See, my loved Britons, see your Shakespeare rise,
An awful ghost confessed to human eyes!
Unnamed, methinks, distinguished I had been
From other shades, by this eternal green,
About whose wreaths the vulgar poets strive,
And with a touch, their withered bays revive.
Untaught, unpractised, in a barbarous age,
I found not, but created first the stage.
And, if I drained no Greek or Latin store,
'Twas, that my own abundance gave me more.
On foreign trade I needed not rely,
Like fruitful Britain, rich without supply.
In this my rough-drawn play, you shall behold
Some master-strokes, so manly and so bold,
That he who meant to alter, found 'em such,
He shook, and thought it sacrilege to touch.
Now, where are the successors to my name?
What bring they to fill out a poet's fame?
Weak, short-lived issues of a feeble age;
Scarce living to be christened on the stage!
For humour farce, for love they rhyme dispense,
That tolls the knell for their departed sense.
Dulness might thrive in any trade but this:
'Twould recommend to some fat benefice.
Dulness, that in a playhouse meets disgrace,
Might meet with reverence, in its proper place.
The fulsome clench, that nauseates the town,
Would from a judge or alderman go down,
Such virtue is there in a robe and gown!
And that insipid stuff which here you hate,
Might somewhere else be called a grave debate;
Dulness is decent in the church and state.
But I forget that still 'tis understood,
Bad plays are best decried by showing good.
Sit silent then, that my pleased soul may see
A judging audience once, and worthy me;
My faithful scene from true records shall tell,
How Trojan valour did the Greek excell;
Your great forefathers shall their fame regain,
And Homer's angry ghost repine in vain[1].


Footnote:
1. The conceit, which our ancestors had adopted, of their descent from
Brutus, a fugitive Trojan, induced their poets to load the Grecian
chiefs with every accusation of cowardice and treachery, and to
extol the character of the Trojans in the same proportion. Hector
is always represented as having been treacherously slain.




DRAMATIS PERSONÆ.


HECTOR, } _Sons of_ PRIAM.
TROILUS, }
PRIAM, _King of Troy. _
ÆNEAS, _a Trojan Warrior. _
PANDARUS, _Uncle to_ CRESSIDA.
CALCHAS, _a Trojan Priest, and Father to_ CRESSIDA, _a fugitive to
the Grecian camp. _
AGAMEMNON, }
ULYSSES, }
ACHILLES, }
AJAX, } _Grecian Warriors, engaged in the_
NESTOR, } _siege of Troy. _
DIOMEDES, }
PATROCLUS, }
MENELAUS, }
THERSITES, _a slanderous Buffoon. _

CRESSIDA, _Daughter to_ CALCHAS.
ANDROMACHE, _Wife to_ HECTOR.




TROILUS AND CRESSIDA


ACT I.

SCENE I. --_A Camp. _

_Enter_ AGAMEMNON, ULYSSES, DIOMEDES, _and_ NESTOR.

_Agam. _ Princes, it seems not strange to us, nor new,
That, after nine years siege, Troy makes defence,
Since every action of recorded fame
Has with long difficulties been involved,
Not answering that idea of the thought,
Which gave it birth; why then, you Grecian chiefs,
With sickly eyes do you behold our labours,
And think them our dishonour, which indeed
Are the protractive trials of the gods,
To prove heroic constancy in men?

_Nest. _ With due observance of thy sovereign seat,
Great Agamemnon, Nestor shall apply
Thy well-weighed words. In struggling with misfortunes
Lies the true proof of virtue: On smooth seas,
How many bauble-boats dare set their sails,
And make an equal way with firmer vessels!
But let the tempest once enrage that sea,
And then behold the strong-ribbed argosie,
Bounding between the ocean and the air,
Like Perseus mounted on his Pegasus.
Then where are those weak rivals of the main?
Or, to avoid the tempest, fled to port,
Or made a prey to Neptune. Even thus
Do empty show, and true-prized worth, divide
In storms of fortune.

_Ulys. _ Mighty Agamemnon!
Heart of our body, soul of our designs,
In whom the tempers, and the minds of all
Should be inclosed,--hear what Ulysses speaks.

_Agam. _ You have free leave.

_Ulys. _ Troy had been down ere this, and Hector's sword
Wanted a master, but for our disorders:
The observance due to rule has been neglected,
Observe how many Grecian tents stand void
Upon this plain, so many hollow factions:
For, when the general is not like the hive,
To whom the foragers should all repair,
What honey can our empty combs expect?
Or when supremacy of kings is shaken,
What can succeed? How could communities,
Or peaceful traffic from divided shores,
Prerogative of age, crowns, sceptres, laurels,
But by degree, stand on their solid base?
Then every thing resolves to brutal force,
And headlong force is led by hoodwinked will.
For wild ambition, like a ravenous wolf,
Spurred on by will, and seconded by power,
Must make an universal prey of all,
And last devour itself.

_Nest. _ Most prudently Ulysses has discovered
The malady, whereof our state is sick.

_Diom. _ 'Tis truth he speaks; the general's disdained
By him one step beneath, he by the next;
That next by him below: So each degree
Spurns upward at superior eminence.
Thus our distempers are their sole support;
Troy in our weakness lives, not in her strength.

_Agam. _ The nature of this sickness found, inform us
From whence it draws its birth?

_Ulys. _ The great Achilles, whom opinion crowns
The chief of all our host,
Having his ears buzzed with his noisy fame,
Disdains thy sovereign charge, and in his tent
Lies, mocking our designs; with him Patroclus,
Upon a lazy bed, breaks scurril jests,
And with ridiculous and aukward action,
Which, slanderer, he imitation calls,
Mimics the Grecian chiefs.

_Agam. _ As how, Ulysses?

_Ulys. _ Even thee, the king of men, he does not spare,
(The monkey author) but thy greatness pageants,
And makes of it rehearsals: like a player,
Bellowing his passion till he break the spring,
And his racked voice jar to his audience;
So represents he thee, though more unlike
Than Vulcan is to Venus.
And at this fulsome stuff,--the wit of apes,--
The large Achilles, on his prest bed lolling,
From his deep chest roars out a loud applause,
Tickling his spleen, and laughing till he wheeze.

_Nest. _ Nor are you spared, Ulysses; but, as you speak in council,
He hems ere he begins, then strokes his beard,
Casts down his looks, and winks with half an eye;
Has every action, cadence, motion, tone,
All of you but the sense.

_Agam. _ Fortune was merry
When he was born, and played a trick on nature,
To make a mimic prince; he ne'er acts ill,
But when he would seem wise:
For all he says or does, from serious thought,
Appears so wretched, that he mocks his title,
And is his own buffoon.

_Ulys. _ In imitation of this scurril fool,
Ajax is grown self-willed as broad Achilles.
He keeps a table too, makes factious feasts,
Rails on our state of war, and sets Thersites
(A slanderous slave of an o'erflowing gall)
To level us with low comparisons.
They tax our policy with cowardice,
Count wisdom of no moment in the war,
In brief, esteem no act, but that of hand;
The still and thoughtful parts, which move those hands,
With them are but the tasks cut out by fear,
To be performed by valour.

_Agam. _ Let this be granted, and Achilles' horse
Is more of use than he; but you, grave pair,
Like Time and Wisdom marching hand in hand,
Must put a stop to these encroaching ills:
To you we leave the care;
You, who could show whence the distemper springs,
Must vindicate the dignity of kings. [_Exeunt. _


SCENE II. --_Troy. _

_Enter_ PANDARUS _and_ TROILUS.

_Troil. _ Why should I fight without the Trojan walls,
Who, without fighting, am o'erthrown within?
The Trojan who is master of a soul,
Let him to battle; Troilus has none.

_Pand. _ Will this never be at an end with you?

_Troil. _ The Greeks are strong, and skilful to their strength,
Fierce to their skill, and to their fierceness wary;
But I am weaker than a woman's tears,
Tamer than sleep, fonder than ignorance,
And artless as unpractised infancy.

_Pand_ Well, I have told you enough of this; for my part I'll not
meddle nor make any further in your love; he, that will eat of the
roastmeat, must stay for the kindling of the fire.

_Troil. _ Have I not staid?

_Pand. _ Ay, the kindling; but you must stay the spitting of the meat.

_Troil. _ Have I not staid?

_Pand. _ Ay, the spitting; but there's two words to a bargain; you must
stay the roasting too.

_Troil. _ Still have I staid; and still the farther off.

_Pand. _ That's but the roasting, but there's more in this word stay;
there's the taking off the spit, the making of the sauce, the dishing,
the setting on the table, and saying grace; nay, you must stay the
cooling too, or you may chance to burn your chaps.

_Troil. _ At Priam's table pensive do I sit,
And when fair Cressid comes into my thoughts--
(Can she be said to come, who ne'er was absent! )

_Pand. _ Well, she's a most ravishing creature; and she looked
yesterday most killingly; she had such a stroke with her eyes, she cut
to the quick with every glance of them.