When they unexpectedly met him during their search for
another person, they exclaimed, that "the Lord had delivered him
into their hands.
another person, they exclaimed, that "the Lord had delivered him
into their hands.
Dryden - Complete
_ Our business was to please the throng,
And court their wild applause;
_Aseb. _ For this we bribed the lawyer's tongue.
And then destroyed the laws.
_Cho. _ For this, &c.
_Tyr. _ To make him safe, we made his friends our prey;
_Dem. _ To make him great, we scorned his royal sway,--
_Tyr. _ And to confirm his crown, we took his heir away.
_Dem. _ To encrease his store,
We kept him poor;
_Tyr. _ And when to wants we had betrayed him,
To keep him low,
Pronounced a foe,
Whoe'er presumed to aid him.
_Aseb. _ But you forget the noblest part,
And master piece of all your art,--
You told him he was sick at heart.
_Zel. _ And when you could not work belief
In Albion of the imagined grief;
Your perjured vouchers, in a breath,
Made oath, that he was sick to death;
And then five hundred quacks of skill
Resolved, 'twas fit he should be ill.
_Aseb. _ Now hey for a common-wealth,
We merrily drink and sing!
'Tis to the nation's health,
For every man's a king.
_Zel. _ Then let the mask begin,
The Saints advance,
To fill the dance,
And the Property Boys come in.
_The Boys in white begin a Fantastic Dance[4]. _
_Cho. _ Let the saints ascend the throne.
_Dem. _ Saints have wives, and wives have preachers,
Gifted men, and able teachers;
These to get, and those to own.
_Cho. _ Let the saints ascend the throne.
_Aseb. _ Freedom is a bait alluring;
Them betraying, us securing,
While to sovereign power we soar.
_Zel. _ Old delusions, new repeated,
Shews them born but to be cheated,
As their fathers were before.
_Six Sectaries begin a formal affected Dance; the two gravest
whisper the other four, and draw them into the Plot; they pull out
and deliver Libels to them, which they receive. _
_Dem. _ See friendless Albion there alone,
Without defence
But innocence;
Albanius now is gone.
_Tyr. _ Say then, what must be done?
_Dem. _ The gods have put him in our hand[5].
_Zel. _ He must be slain.
_Tyr. _ But who shall then command?
_Dem. _ The people; for the right returns to those.
Who did the trust impose.
_Tyr. _ 'Tis fit another sun should rise,
To cheer the world, and light the skies.
_Dem. _ But when the sun
His race has run,
And neither cheers the world, nor lights the skies,
'Tis fit a common-wealth of stars should rise.
_Aseb. _ Each noble vice
Shall bear a price,
And virtue shall a drug become;
An empty name
Was all her fame,
But now she shall be dumb.
_Zel. _ If open vice be what you drive at,
A name so broad we'll ne'er connive at.
Saints love vice, but, more refinedly,
Keep her close, and use her kindly.
_Tyr. _ Fall on.
_Dem. _ Fall on; e'er Albion's death, we'll try,
If one or many shall his room supply.
_The White Boys dance about the Saints; the Saints draw out the
Association, and offer it to them; they refuse it, and quarrel about
it; then the White Boys and Saints fall into a confused dance,
imitating fighting. The White Boys, at the end of the dance, being
driven out by the Sectaries, with Protestant Flails. [6]_
_Alb. _ See the gods my cause defending,
When all human help was past!
_Acac. _ Factions mutually contending,
By each other fall at last.
_Alb. _ But is not yonder Proteus' cave,
Below that steep,
Which rising billows brave?
_Acac. _ It is; and in it lies the god asleep;
And snorting by,
We may descry
The monsters of the deep.
_Alb. _ He knows the past,
And can resolve the future too.
_Acac. _ 'Tis true!
But hold him fast,
For he can change his hue. [7]
_The Cave of_ PROTEUS _rises out of the Sea; it consists of several
arches of Rock-work adorned with mother-of-pearl, coral, and
abundance of shells of various kinds. Through the arches is seen the
Sea, and parts of Dover-pier; in the middle of the Cave is_ PROTEUS
_asleep on a rock adorned with shells, &c. like the Cave. _ ALBION
_and_ ACACIA _seize on him; and while a symphony is playing, he
sinks as they are bringing him forward, and changes himself into a
Lion, a Crocodile, a Dragon, and then to his own shape again; he
comes forward to the front of the stage, and sings. _
SYMPHONY.
_Pro. _ Albion, loved of gods and men,
Prince of peace, too mildly reigning,
Cease thy sorrow and complaining;
Thou shall be restored again:
Albion, loved of gods and men.
II.
Still thou art the care of heaven,
In thy youth to exile driven;
Heaven thy ruin then prevented,
'Till the guilty land repented.
In thy age, when none could aid thee,
Foes conspired, and friends betrayed thee;
To the brink of danger driven,
Still thou art the care of heaven.
_Alb. _ To whom shall I my preservation owe?
_Pro. _ Ask me no more; for 'tis by Neptune's foe. [8]
PROTEUS _descends. _
DEMOCRACY _and_ ZELOTA _return with their faction. _
_Dem. _ Our seeming friends, who joined alone,
To pull down one, and build another throne,
Are all dispersed and gone;
We brave republic souls remain.
_Zel. _ And 'tis by us that Albion must be slain;
Say, whom shall we employ
The tyrant to destroy?
_Dem. _ That Archer is by fate designed,
With one eye clear, and t'other blind.
_Zel. _ He comes inspired to do't.
_Omnes. _ Shoot, holy Cyclop, shoot.
_The one-eyed Archer advances, the rest follow. A fire arises
betwixt them and_ ALBION. [9]
[_Ritornel. _
_Dem. _ Lo! heaven and earth combine
To blast our bold design.
What miracles are shewn!
Nature's alarmed,
And fires are armed,
To guard the sacred throne.
_Zel. _ What help, when jarring elements conspire,
To punish our audacious crimes?
Retreat betimes,
To shun the avenging fire.
_Chor. _ To shun the avenging fire. [_Ritor. _
_As they are going back, a fire arises from behind; they all sink
together. _[10]
_Alb. _ Let our tuneful accents upwards move,
Till they reach the vaulted arch of those above;
Let us adore them;
Let us fall before them.
_Acac. _ Kings they made, and kings they love.
When they protect a rightful monarch's reign,
The gods in heaven, the gods on earth maintain.
_Both. _ When they protect, &c.
_Alb. _ But see, what glories gild the main!
_Acac. _ Bright Venus brings Albanius back again,
With all the Loves and Graces in her train.
_A machine rises out of the sea; it opens, and discovers_ VENUS
_and_ ALBANIUS _sitting in a great scallop-shell, richly adorned. _
VENUS _is attended by the Loves and Graces,_ ALBANIUS _by Heroes;
the shell is drawn by dolphins; it moves forward, while a symphony
of flutes-doux, &c. is playing, till it lands them on the stage, and
then it closes and sinks. _
VENUS _sings. _
Albion, hail! the gods present thee
All the richest of their treasures,
Peace and pleasures,
To content thee,
Dancing their eternal measures. [_Graces and Loves dance an entry. _
_Venus. _ But, above all human blessing,
Take a warlike loyal brother,
Never prince had such another;
Conduct, courage, truth expressing,
All heroic worth possessing. [_Here the Heroes' dance is performed. _
_Chor. of all. _ But above all, &c. [_Ritor. _
_Whilst a Symphony is playing, a very large, and a very glorious
Machine descends; the figure of it oval, all the clouds shining with
gold, abundance of Angels and Cherubins flying about them, and
playing in them; in the midst of it sits_ APOLLO _on a throne of
gold; he comes from the machine to_ ALBION.
_Phoeb. _ From Jove's imperial court,
Where all the gods resort,
In awful counsel met,
Surprising news I bear;
Albion the great
Must change his seat,
For he is adopted there.
_Venus. _ What stars above shall we displace?
Where shall he fill a room divine?
_Nept. _ Descended from the sea-gods' race,
Let him by my Orion shine.
_Phoeb. _ No, not by that tempestuous sign;
Betwixt the Balance and the Maid,
The just,
August,
And peaceful shade,
Shall shine in heaven with beams displayed,
While great Albanius is on earth obeyed.
_Venus. _ Albanius, lord of land and main,
Shall with fraternal virtues reign;
And add his own,
To fill the throne;
Adored and feared, and loved no less;
In war victorious, mild in peace,
The joy of man, and Jove's increase.
_Acac. _ O thou! who mountest the æthereal throne,
Be kind and happy to thy own;
Now Albion is come,
The people of the sky
Run gazing, and cry,--Make room,
Make room, make room,
Make room for our new deity!
_Here_ ALBION _mounts the machine, which moves upward slowly. _
_A full chorus of all that_ ACACIA _sung. _
_Ven. _ Behold what triumphs are prepared to grace
Thy glorious race,
Where love and honour claim an equal place;
Already they are fixed by fate,
And only ripening ages wait.
_The Scene changes to a Walk of very high trees; at the end of the
Walk is a view of that part of Windsor, which faces Eton; in the
midst of it is a row of small trees, which lead to the Castle-Hill.
In the first scene, part of the Town and part of the Hill. In the
next, the Terrace Walk, the King's lodgings, and the upper part of
St George's chapel, then the keep; and, lastly, that part of the
Castle beyond the keep. _
_In the air is a vision of the Honours of the Garter; the Knights in
procession, and the King under a canopy; beyond this, the upper end
of St George's hall. _
FAME _rises out of the middle of the Stage, standing on a Globe, on
which is the Arms of England: the Globe rests on a Pedestal; on the
front of the Pedestal in drawn a Man with a long, lean, pale face,
with fiends' wings, and snakes twisted round his body; he is
encompassed by several fanatical rebellious heads, who suck poison
from him, which runs out of a tap in his side. _[11]
_Fame. _ Renown, assume thy trumpet!
From pole to pole resounding
Great Albion's name;
Great Albion's name shall be
The theme of Fame, shall be great Albion's name,
Great Albion's name, great Albion's name.
Record the garter's glory;
A badge for heroes, and for kings to bear;
For kings to bear!
And swell the immortal story,
With songs of Gods, and fit for Gods to hear;
And swell the immortal story,
With songs of Gods, and fit for Gods to hear;
For Gods to hear.
_A full Chorus of all the Voices and Instruments; trumpets and
hautboys make Ritornello's of all_ FAME _sings; and twenty-four
Dancers, all the time in a chorus, and dance to the end of the
Opera. _
Footnotes:
1. The reader must recollect the orders of the Rump parliament to
general Monk, to destroy the gates and portcullises of the city of
London; which commission, by the bye, he actually executed, with
all the forms of contempt, although, in a day or two after, he took
up his quarters in the city, apologized for what had passed, and
declared against the parliament.
2. Dr. Titus Oates, the principal witness to the Popish Plot, was
accused of unnatural and infamous crimes. He was certainly a most
ineffably impudent, perjured villain.
3. The Chacon is supposed by Sir John Hawkins to be of Moorish or
Saracenic origin. "The characteristic of the Chacone is a bass, or
ground, consisting of four measures, wherein three crotchets make
the bar, and the repetition thereof with variations in the several
parts, from the beginning to the end of the air, which in respect
of its length, has no limit but the discretion of the composer. The
whole of the twelfth sonata of the second opera of Corelli is a
Chacone. " _Hist. of Music_, vol. iv. p. 388. There is also, I am
informed, a very celebrated Chacon composed by Jomelli.
4. By the _White Boys_ or _Property Boys_, are meant the adherents of
the Duke of Monmouth, who affected great zeal for liberty and
property, and assumed white badges, as marks of the innocence of
their intentions. When the Duke came to the famous Parliament held
at Oxford, "he was met by about 100 Batchellors all in white,
except black velvet caps, with white wands in their hands, who
divided themselves, and marched as a guard to his person. " _Account
of the Life of the Duke of Monmouth_, p. 107. In the Duke's tour
through the west of England, he was met at Exeter, by "a brave
company of brisk stout young men, all cloathed in linen waistcoats
and drawers, _white and harmless,_ having not so much as a stick in
their hands; they were in number about 900 or 1000. " _ibid. _ p.
103. See the notes on Absalom and Achitophel. The saints, on the
other hand, mean the ancient republican zealots and fanatics, who,
though they would willingly have joined in the destruction of
Charles, did not wish that Monmouth should succeed him, but aimed
at the restoration of the commonwealth. Hence the following dispute
betwixt Tyranny and Democracy.
5. The atrocious and blasphemous sentiment in the text was actually
used by the fanatics who murdered Sharpe, the archbishop of St
Andrews.
When they unexpectedly met him during their search for
another person, they exclaimed, that "the Lord had delivered him
into their hands. "
6. It is easy to believe, that, whatever was the, nature of the
schemes nourished by Monmouth, Russel, and Essex, they could have
no concern with the low and sanguinary cabal of Ramsay, Walcot, and
Rumbold, who were all of them old republican officers and
commonwealth's men. The flight of Shaftesbury, whose bustling and
politic brain had rendered him the sole channel of communication
betwixt these parties, as well as the means of uniting them in one
common design, threw loose all connection between them; so that
each, after his retreat, seems to have acted independantly of, and
often in contradiction to the other.
7. The reader may judge, whether some distant and obscure allusion to
the trimming politics of Halifax, to whom the Duke of York, our
author's patron, was hostile, may not be here insinuated. During
the stormy session of his two last parliaments, Charles was much
guided by his temporising and camelion-like policy.
8. That is by fire. See next note.
9. The allegory of the one-eyed Archer, and the fire arising betwixt
him and Albion, will be made evident by the following extracts from
Sprat's history of the Conspiracy. In enumerating the persons
engaged in the Rye-house plot, he mentions "Richard Rumbold,
maltster, an old army officer, a desperate and bloody Ravaillac. "
After agitating several schemes for assassinating Charles, the
Rye-house was fixed upon as a spot which the king must necessarily
pass in his journey trom Newmarket, and which, being a solitary
moated house, in the actual occupation of Rumbold, afforded the
conspirators facility of previous concealment and subsequent
defence. "All other propositions, as subject to far more casualties
and hazards, soon gave place to that of the Rye, in Herefordshire,
a house then inhabited by the foresaid Richard Rumbold, who
proposed that to be the seat of the action, offering himself to
command the party, that was to do the work. Him, therefore, as the
most daring captain, and by reason of a blemish in one of his eyes,
they were afterwards wont, in common discourse, to call Hannibal;
often drinking healths to _Hannibal and his boys_, meaning Rumbold
and his _hellish crew_.
"Immediately upon the coaches coming within the gates and hedges
about the house, the conspirators were to divide into several
parties; some before, in the habit of labourers, were to overthrow
a cart in the narrowest passage, so as to prevent all possibility
of escape: others were to fight the guards, Walcot chusing that
part upon a punctilio of honour; others were to shoot at the
coachman, postillion, and horses; others to aim only at his
Majesty's coach, which party was to be under the particular
direction of Rumbold himself; the villain declaring beforehand,
that, upon that occasion, he would make use of a very good
blunderbuss, which was in West's possession, and blasphemously
adding, that Ferguson should first consecrate it. " . . . "But whilst
they were thus wholly intent on this barbarous work, and proceeded
securely in its contrivance without any the least doubt of a
prosperous success, behold! on a sudden, God miraculously
disappointed all their hopes and designs, by the terrible
conflagration unexpectedly breaking out at Newmarket. In which
extraordinary event there was one remarkable passage, that is not
so generally taken notice of, as, for the glory of God, and the
confusion of his Majesty's enemies, it ought to be.
"For, after that the approaching fury of the flames had driven the
king out of his own palace, his Majesty, at first, removed into
another quarter of the town, remote from the fire, and, as yet,
free from any annoyance of smoke and ashes. There his Majesty,
finding he might be tolerably well accommodated, had resolved to
stay, and continue his recreations as before, till the day first
named for his journey back to London. But his Majesty had no sooner
made that resolution, when the wind, as conducted by an invisible
power from above, presently changed about, and blew the smoke and
cinders directly on his new lodging, making them in a moment as
untenable as the other. Upon this, his Majesty being put to a new
shift, and not finding the like conveniency elsewhere, immediately
declared, he would speedily return to Whitehall, as he did; which
happening to be several days before the assassins expected him, or
their preparations for the Rye were in readiness, it may justly
give occasion to all the world to acknowledge, what one of the very
conspirators could not but do, _that it was a providential
fire. _"--Pages 51_ et seq. _
The proprietor of the Rye-house (for Rumbold was but a tenant)
shocked at the intended purpose, for which it was to have been
used, is said to have fired it with his own hand. This is the
subject of a poem, called the Loyal Incendiary, or the generous
_Boute-feu_.
10. The total ruin of those, who were directly involved in the
Rye-house, was little to be regretted, had it not involved the fate
of those who were pursuing reform, by means more manly and
constitutional,--the fate of Russel, Essex, and Sidney.
Rumbold, "the one-eyed archer," fled to Holland, and came to
Scotland with Argyle, on his ill-concerted expedition. He was
singled out and pursued, after the dispersion of his companions in
a skirmish. He defended himself with desperate resolution against
two armed peasants, till a third, coming behind him with a
pitch-fork, turned off his head-piece, when he was cut down and
made prisoner, exclaiming, "Cruel countryman, to use me thus, while
my face was to mine enemy. " He suffered the doom of a traitor at
Edinburgh, and maintained on the scaffold, with inflexible
firmness, the principles in which he had lived. He could never
believe, he said, that the many of human kind came into the world
bridled and saddled, and the few with whips and spurs to ride them.
"His rooted ingrained opinion, says Fountainhall, was for a
republic against monarchy, to pull down which he thought a duty,
and no sin. " At his death, he declared, that were every hair of his
head a man, he would venture them all in the good old cause.
11. "I must not," says Langbaine, "take the pains to acquaint my
reader, that by the man on the pedestal, &c. is meant the late Lord
Shaftesbury. I shall not pretend to pass my censure, whether he
deserved this usage from our author or no, but leave it to the
judgments of statesmen and politicians. " Shaftesbury having been
overturned in a carriage, received some internal injury which
required a constant discharge by an issue in his side. Hence he was
ridiculed under the name of _Tapski_. In a mock account of an
apparition, stated to have appeared to Lady Gray, it says, "Bid
Lord Shaftesbury have a care to his spigot--if he is tapt, all the
plot will run out. " _Ralph's History_, vol. i. p. 562. from a
pamphlet in Lord Somers' collection. There are various allusions to
this circumstance in the lampoons of the time. A satire called "The
Hypocrite," written by Carryl, concludes thus:
His body thus and soul together vie.
In vice's empire for the sovereignty;
In ulcers shut this does abound in sin,
Lazar without and Lucifer within.
The silver pipe is no sufficient drain
For the corruption of this little man;
Who, though he ulcers have in every part,
Is no where so corrupt as in his heart.
At length, in prosecution of this coarse and unhandsome jest, a
sort of vessel with a turn-cock was constructed for holding wine,
which was called a Shaftesbury, and used in the taverns of the
royal party.
EPILOGUE
After our Æsop's fable shown to-day,
I come to give the moral of the play.
Feigned Zeal, you saw, set out the speedier pace;
But the last heat, Plain Dealing won the race:
Plain Dealing for a jewel has been known;
But ne'er till now the jewel of a crown.
When heaven made man, to show the work divine,
Truth was his image, stamped upon the coin:
And when a king is to a God refined,
On all he says and does he stamps his mind:
This proves a soul without alloy, and pure;
Kings, like their gold, should every touch endure.
To dare in fields is valour; but how few
Dare be so throughly valiant,--to be true!
The name of great, let other kings affect:
He's great indeed, the prince that is direct.
His subjects know him now, and trust him more
Than all their kings, and all their laws before.
What safety could their public acts afford?
Those he can break; but cannot break his word.
So great a trust to him alone was due;
Well have they trusted whom so well they knew.
The saint, who walked on waves, securely trod,
While he believed the beck'ning of his God;
But when his faith no longer bore him out,
Began to sink, as he began to doubt.
Let us our native character maintain;
'Tis of our growth, to be sincerely plain.
To excel in truth we loyally may strive,
Set privilege against prerogative:
He plights his faith, and we believe him just;
His honour is to promise, ours to trust.
Thus Britain's basis on a word is laid,
As by a word the world itself was made[1].
Footnote:
1. From this Epilogue we learn, what is confirmed by many proofs
elsewhere, that the attribute for which James desired to be
distinguished and praised, was that of openness of purpose, and
stern undeviating inflexibility of conduct. He scorned to disguise
his designs, either upon the religion or the constitution of his
country. He forgot that it was only the temporising concessions of
his brother which secured his way to the throne, when his
exclusion, or a civil war, seemed the only alternatives. His
brother was the reed, which bent before the whirlwind, and
recovered its erect posture when it had passed away; and James, the
inflexible oak, which the first tempest rooted up for ever.
* * * * *
DON SEBASTIAN.
A
TRAGEDY.
_--Nec tarda senectus
Debilitat vires animi, mutatque vigorem. _
VIRG.
DON SEBASTIAN.
The following tragedy is founded upon the adventures supposed to have
befallen Sebastian, king of Portugal, after the fatal battle of
Alcazar. The reader may be briefly reminded of the memorable
expedition of that gallant monarch to Africa, to signalize, against
the Moors, his chivalry as a warrior, and his faith as a Christian.
The ostensible pretext of invasion was the cause of Muly Mahomet, son
of Abdalla, emperor of Morocco; upon whose death, his brother, Muly
Moluch, had seized the crown, and driven his nephew into exile. The
armies joined battle near Alcazar. The Portuguese, far inferior in
number to the Moors, displayed the most desperate valour, and had
nearly won the day, when Muly Moluch, who, though almost dying, was
present on the field in a litter, fired with shame and indignation,
threw himself on horseback, rallied his troops, renewed the combat,
and, being carried back to his litter, immediately expired, with his
finger placed on his lips, to impress on the chiefs, who surrounded
him, the necessity of concealing his death. The Moors, rallied by
their sovereign's dying exertion, surrounded, and totally routed, the
army of Sebastian. Mahomet, the competitor for the throne of Morocco,
was drowned in passing a river in his flight, and Sebastian, as his
body was never found, probably perished in the same manner. But where
the region of historical certainty ends, that of romantic tradition
commences. The Portuguese, to whom the memory of their warlike
sovereign was deservedly dear, grasped at the feeble hope which the
uncertainty of his fate afforded, and long, with vain fondness,
expected the return of Sebastian, to free them from the yoke of Spain.
This mysterious termination of a hero's career, as it gave rise to
various political intrigues, (for several persons assumed the name and
character of Sebastian,) early afforded a subject for exercising the
fancy of the dramatist and romance writer. "The Battle of Alcazar[1]"
is known to the collectors of old plays; a ballad on the same subject
is reprinted in Evans's collection; and our author mentions a French
novel on the adventures of Don Sebastian, to which Langbaine also
refers.
The situation of Dryden, after the Revolution, was so delicate as to
require great caution and attention, both in his choice of a subject,
and his mode of treating it. His distressed circumstances and lessened
income compelled him to come before the public as an author; while the
odium attached to the proselyte of a hated religion, and the partizan
of a depressed faction, was likely, upon the slightest pretext, to
transfer itself from the person of the poet to the labours on which
his support depended. He was, therefore, not only obliged to chuse a
theme, which had no offence in it, and to treat it in a manner which
could not admit of misconstruction, but also so to exert the full
force of his talents, as, by the conspicuous pre-eminence of his
genius, to bribe prejudice and silence calumny. An observing reader
will accordingly discover, throughout the following tragedy, symptoms
of minute finishing, and marks of accurate attention, which, in our
author's better days, he deigned not to bestow upon productions, to
which his name alone was then sufficient to give weight and privilege.
His choice of a subject was singularly happy: the name of Sebastian
awaked historical recollections and associations, favourable to the
character of his hero; while the dark uncertainty of his fate removed
all possibility of shocking the audience by glaring offence against
the majesty of historical truth. The subject has, therefore, all the
advantages of a historical play, without the detects, which either a
rigid coincidence with history, or a violent contradiction of known
truth, seldom fail to bring along with them. Dryden appears from his
preface to have been fully sensible of this; and he has not lost the
advantage of a happy subject by treating it with the carelessness he
sometimes allowed himself to indulge.
The characters in "Don Sebastian" are contrasted with singular ability
and judgment. Sebastian, high-spirited and fiery; the soul of royal
and military honour; the soldier and the king; almost embodies the
idea which the reader forms at the first mention of his name. Dorax,
to whom he is so admirable a contrast, is one of those characters whom
the strong hand of adversity has wrested from their natural bias; and
perhaps no equally vivid picture can be found, of a subject so awfully
interesting. Born with a strong tendency to all that was honourable
and virtuous, the very excess of his virtues became vice, when his own
ill fate, and Sebastian's injustice, had driven him into exile. By
comparing, as Dryden has requested, the character of Dorax, in the
fifth act, with that he maintains in the former part of the play, the
difference may be traced betwixt his natural virtues, and the vices
engrafted on them by headlong passion and embittering calamity. There
is no inconsistence in the change which takes place after his scene
with Sebastian; as was objected by those, whom the poet justly terms,
"the more ignorant sort of creatures. " It is the same picture in a new
light; the same ocean in tempest and in calm; the same traveller, whom
sunshine has induced to abandon his cloak, which the storm only forced
him to wrap more closely around him. The principal failing of Dorax is
the excess of pride, which renders each supposed wound to his honour
more venomously acute; yet he is not devoid of gentler affections,
though even in indulging these the hardness of his character is
conspicuous. He loves Violante, but that is a far subordinate feeling
to his affection for Sebastian. Indeed, his love appears so inferior
to his loyal devotion to his king, that, unless to gratify the taste
of the age, I see little reason for its being introduced at all. It is
obvious he was much more jealous of the regard of his sovereign, than
of his mistress; he never mentions Violante till the scene of
explanation with Sebastian; and he appears hardly to have retained a
more painful recollection of his disappointment in that particular,
than of the general neglect and disgrace he had sustained at the court
of Lisbon. The last stage of a virtuous heart, corroded into evil by
wounded pride, has been never more forcibly displayed than in the
character of Dorax. When once induced to take the fatal step which
degraded him in his own eyes, all his good affections seem to be
converted into poison. The religion, which displays itself in the
fifth act in his arguments against suicide, had, in his efforts to
justify his apostacy, or at least to render it a matter of no moment,
been exchanged for sentiments approaching, perhaps to atheism,
certainly to total scepticism. His passion for Violante is changed
into contempt and hatred for her sex, which he expresses in the
coarsest terms. His feelings of generosity, and even of humanity, are
drowned in the gloomy and stern misanthropy, which has its source in
the self-discontent that endeavours to wreak itself upon others. This
may be illustrated by his unfeeling behaviour, while Alvarez and
Antonio, well known to him in former days, approach, and draw the
deadly lot, which ratifies their fate. No yielding of compassion, no
recollection of former friendship, has power to alter the cold and
sardonic sarcasm with which he sketches their characters, and marks
their deportment in that awful moment. Finally, the zealous attachment
of Alonzo for his king, which, in its original expression, partakes of
absolute devotion, is changed, by the circumstances of Dorax, into an
irritated and frantic jealousy, which he mistakes for hatred; and
which, in pursuing the destruction of its object, is almost more
inveterate than hatred itself. Nothing has survived of the original
Alonzo at the opening of the piece, except the gigantic passion which
has caused his ruin. This character is drawn on a large scale, and in
a heroic proportion; but it is so true to nature, that many readers
must have lamented, even within the circle of domestic acquaintance,
instances of feelings hardened, and virtues perverted, where a high
spirit has sustained severe and unjust neglect and disgrace. The whole
demeanour of this exquisite character suits the original sketch. From
"the long stride and sullen port," by which Benducar distinguishes him
at a distance, to the sullen stubbornness with which he obeys, or the
haughty contempt with which he resists, the commands of the peremptory
tyrant under whom he had taken service, all announce the untamed pride
which had robbed Dorax of virtue, and which yet, when Benducar would
seduce him into a conspiracy, and in his conduct towards Sebastian,
assumes the port and dignity of virtue herself. In all his conduct and
bearing, there is that mixed feeling and impulse, which constitutes
the real spring of human action. The true motive of Alonzo in saving
Sebastian, is not purely that of honourable hatred, which he proposes
to himself; for to himself every man endeavours to appear consistent,
and readily find arguments to prove to himself that he is so. Neither
is his conduct to be ascribed altogether to the gentler feelings of
loyal and friendly affection, relenting at the sight of his
sovereign's ruin, and impending death. It is the result of a mixture
of these opposite sensations, clashing against each other like two
rivers at their conflux, yet urging their united course down the same
channel. Actuated by a mixture of these feelings, Dorax meets
Sebastian; and the art of the poet is displayed in that admirable
scene, by suggesting a natural motive to justify to the injured
subject himself the change of the course of his feelings. As his
jealousy of Sebastian's favour, and resentment of his unjust neglect,
was chiefly founded on the avowed preference which the king had given
to Henriquez, the opportune mention of his rival's death, by removing
the cause of that jealousy, gives the renegade an apology to his own
pride, for throwing himself at the feet of that very sovereign, whom a
moment before he was determined to force to combat. They are little
acquainted with human passions, at least have only witnessed their
operations among men of common minds, who doubt, that at the height of
their very spring-tide, they are often most susceptible of sudden
changes; revolutions, which seem to those who have not remarked how
nearly the most opposite feelings are allied and united, the most
extravagant and unaccountable. Muly Moluch is an admirable specimen of
that very frequent theatrical character,--a stage tyrant. He is fierce
and boisterous enough to be sufficiently terrible and odious, and that
without much rant, considering he is an infidel Soldan, who, from the
ancient deportment of Mahomed and Termagaunt, as they appeared in the
old Mysteries, might claim a prescriptive right to tear a passion to
tatters. Besides, the Moorish emperor has fine glances of savage
generosity, and that free, unconstrained, and almost noble openness,
the only good quality, perhaps, which a consciousness of unbounded
power may encourage in a mind so firm as not to be totally depraved by
it. The character of Muly Moluch, like that of Morat, in
"Aureng-Zebe," to which it bears a strong resemblance, was admirably
represented by Kynaston; who had, says Cibber, "a fierce lion-like
majesty in his port and utterance, that gave the spectator a kind of
trembling admiration. " It is enough to say of Benducar, that the cool,
fawning, intriguing, and unprincipled statesman, is fully developed in
his whole conduct; and of Alvarez, that the little he has to say and
do, is so said and done, as not to disgrace his common-place character
of the possessor of the secret on which the plot depends; for it may
be casually observed, that the depositary of such a clew to the
catastrophe, though of the last importance to the plot, is seldom
himself of any interest whatever. The haughty and high-spirited
Almeyda is designed by the author as the counterpart of Sebastian. She
breaks out with the same violence, I had almost said fury, and
frequently discovers a sort of kindred sentiment, intended to prepare
the reader for the unfortunate discovery, that she is the sister of
the Portuguese monarch.
Of the diction, Dr Johnson has said, with meagre commendation, that it
has "some sentiments which leave a strong impression," and "others of
excellence, universally acknowledged. " This, even when the admiration
of the scene betwixt Dorax and Sebastian has been sanctioned by that
great critic, seems scanty applause for the _chef d'oeuvre_ of
Dryden's dramatic works. The reader will be disposed to look for more
unqualified praise, when such a poet was induced, by every pressing
consideration, to combine, in one effort, the powers of his mighty
genius, and the fruits of his long theatrical experience: Accordingly,
Shakespeare laid aside, it will be perhaps difficult to point out a
play containing more animatory incident, impassioned language, and
beautiful description, than "Don Sebastian. " Of the former, the scene
betwixt Dorax and the king, had it been the only one ever Dryden
wrote, would have been sufficient to insure his immortality. There is
not,--no, perhaps, not even in Shakespeare,--an instance where the
chord, which the poet designed should vibrate, is more happily struck;
strains there are of a higher mood, but not more correctly true; in
evidence of which, we have known those, whom distresses of a gentler
nature were unable to move, feel their stubborn feelings roused and
melted by the injured pride and deep repentance of Dorax. The burst of
anguish with which he answers the stern taunt of Sebastian, is one of
those rare, but natural instances, in which high-toned passion assumes
a figurative language, because all that is familiar seems inadequate
to express its feelings:
_Dor. _ Thou hast dared
To tell me, what I durst not tell myself:
I durst not think that I was spurned, and live;
And live to hear it boasted to my face.
All my long avarice of honour lost,
Heaped up in youth, and hoarded up for age!
Has honour's fountain then sucked back the stream?
He has; and hooting boys may dry-shod pass,
And gather pebbles from the naked ford.
Give me my love, my honour; give them back--
Give me revenge, while I have breath to ask it!
But I will not dwell on the beauties of this scene. If any one is
incapable of relishing it, he may safely conclude, that nature has not
merely denied him that rare gift, poetical taste, but common powers of
comprehending the ordinary feelings of humanity. The love scene,
betwixt Sebastian and Almeyda, is more purely conceived, and expressed
with more reference to sentiment, than is common with our author. The
description which Dorax gives of Sebastian, before his appearance,
coming from a mortal enemy, at least from one whose altered love was
as envenomed as hatred, is a grand preparation for the appearance of
the hero. In many of the slighter descriptive passages, we recognize
the poet by those minute touches, which a mind susceptible of poetic
feeling is alone capable of bringing out. The approach of the emperor,
while the conspirators are caballing, is announced by Orchan, with
these picturesque circumstances:
I see the blaze of torches from afar,
And hear the trampling of thick-beating feet--
This way they move. --
The following account, given by the slave sent to observe what passed
in the castle of Dorax, believed to be dead, or dying, is equally
striking:
_Haly. _ Two hours I warily have watched his palace:
All doors are shut, no servant peeps abroad;
Some officers, with striding haste, past in;
While others outward went on quick dispatch.
Sometimes hushed silence seemed to reign within;
Then cries confused, and a joint clamour followed;
Then lights went gliding by, from room to room,
And shot like thwarting meteors cross the house.
Not daring further to inquire, I came
With speed to bring you this imperfect news.
The description of the midnight insurrection of the rabble is not less
impressive:
_Ham. _ What you wish:
The streets are thicker in this noon of night,
Than at the mid-day sun: A drouzy horror
Sits on their eyes, like fear, not well awake:
All crowd in heaps, as, at a night alarm,
The bees drive out upon each others backs,
T'imboss their hives in clusters; all ask news:
Their busy captain runs the weary round
To whisper orders; and, commanding silence,
Makes not noise cease, but deafens it to murmurs.
These illustrations are designedly selected from the parts of the
lower characters, because they at once evince the diligence and
success with which Dryden has laboured even the subordinate points of
this tragedy.
"Don Sebastian" has been weighed, with reference to its tragic merits,
against "Love for Love;" and one or other is universally allowed to be
the first of Dryden's dramatic performances. To the youth of both
sexes the latter presents the most pleasing subject of emotion; but to
those whom age has rendered incredulous upon the romantic effects of
love, and who do not fear to look into the recesses of the human
heart, when agitated by darker and more stubborn passions, "Don
Sebastian" offers a far superior source of gratification.
To point out the blemishes of so beautiful a tragedy, is a painful,
though a necessary, task. The style, here and there, exhibits marks of
a reviving taste for those frantic bursts of passion, which our author
has himself termed the "Dalilahs of the theatre. " The first speech of
Sebastian has been often noticed as an extravagant rant, more worthy
of Maximin, or Almanzor, than of a character drawn by our author in
his advanced years, and chastened taste:
I beg no pity for this mouldering clay;
For if you give it burial, there it takes
Possession of your earth:
If burnt and scatter'd in the air, the winds,
That strew my dust, diffuse my royalty,
And spread me o'er your clime; for where one atom
Of mine shall light, know, there Sebastian reigns.
The reader's discernment will discover some similar extravagancies in
the language of Almeyda and the Emperor.
It is a separate objection, that the manners of the age and country
are not adhered to. Sebastian, by disposition a crusading
knight-errant, devoted to religion and chivalry, becomes, in the hands
of Dryden, merely a gallant soldier and high-spirited prince, such as
existed in the poet's own days. But, what is worse, the manners of
Mahometans are shockingly violated. Who ever heard of human
sacrifices, or of any sacrifices, being offered up to Mahomet[2]; and
when were his followers able to use the classical and learned
allusions which occur throughout the dialogue! On this last topic
Addison makes the following observations, in the "Guardian," No. 110.
"I have now Mr Dryden's "Don Sebastian" before me, in which I find
frequent allusions to ancient poetry, and the old mythology of the
heathens. It is not very natural to suppose a king of Portugal would
be borrowing thoughts out of Ovid's "Metamorphoses," when he talked
even to those of his own court; but to allude to these Roman fables,
when he talks to an emperor of Barbary, seems very extraordinary.
But observe how he defies him out of the classics in the following
lines:
Why didst not thou engage me man to man,
And try the virtue of that Gorgon face,
To stare me into statue?
"Almeyda, at the same time, is more book-learned than Don Sebastian.
She plays an Hydra upon the Emperor, that is full as good as the
Gorgon:
O that I had the fruitful heads of Hydra,
That one might bourgeon where another fell!
Still would I give thee work, still, still, thou tyrant,
And hiss thee with the last.
"She afterwards, in allusion to Hercules, bids him 'lay down the
lion's skin, and take the distaff;' and, in the following speech,
utters her passion still more learnedly:
No; were we joined, even though it were in death,
Our bodies burning in one funeral pile,
The prodigy of Thebes would be renewed,
And my divided flame should break from thine.
"The emperor of Barbary shews himself acquainted with the Roman
poets as well as either of his prisoners, and answers the foregoing
speech in the same classic strain:
Serpent, I will engender poison with thee:
Our offspring, like the seed of dragon's teeth,
Shall issue armed, and fight themselves to death.
"Ovid seems to have been Muley-Moloch's favourite author; witness
the lines that follow:
She, still inexorable, still imperious,
And loud, as if, like Bacchus, born in thunder.
"I shall conclude my remarks on his part with that poetical
complaint of his being in love; and leave my reader to consider, how
prettily it would sound in the mouth of an emperor of Morocco:
The god of love once more has shot his fires
Into my soul, and my whole heart receives him.
"Muley Zeydan is as ingenious a man as his brother Muley Moloch; as
where he hints at the story of Castor and Pollux:
May we ne'er meet;
For, like the twins of Leda, when I mount,
He gallops down the skies.
"As for the Mufti, we will suppose that he was bred up a scholar,
and not only versed in the law of Mahomet, but acquainted with all
kinds of polite learning. For this reason he is not at all surprised
when Dorax calls him a Phæton in one place, and in another tells him
he is like Archimedes.
"The Mufti afterwards mentions Ximenes, Albornoz, and cardinal
Wolsey, by name. The poet seems to think, he may make every person,
in his play, know as much as himself, and talk as well as he could
have done on the same occasion. At least, I believe, every reader
will agree with me, that the above-mentioned sentiments, to which I
might have added several others, would have been better suited to
the court of Augustus than that of Muley Moloch. I grant they are
beautiful in themselves, and much more so in that noble language,
which was peculiar to this great poet. I only observe, that they are
improper for the persons who make use of them. "
The catastrophe of the tragedy may be also censured, not only on the
grounds objected to that of "OEdipus," but because it does not
naturally flow from the preceding events, and opens, in the fifth act,
a new set of persons, and a train of circumstances, unconnected with
the preceding action. In the concluding scene, it was remarked, by the
critics, that there is a want of pure taste in the lovers dwelling
more upon the pleasures than the horrors of their incestuous
connection.
Of the lighter scenes, which were intended for comic, Dr Johnson has
said, "they are such as that age did not probably commend, and as the
present would not endure. " Dryden has remarked, with self-complacency,
the art with which they are made to depend upon the serious business.
This has not, however, the merit of novelty; being not unlike the
connection between the tragic and comic scenes of the "Spanish Friar. "
The persons introduced have also some resemblance; though the gaiety
of Antonio is far more gross than that of Lorenzo, and Morayma is a
very poor copy of Elvira. It is rather surprising, that when a gay
libertine was to be introduced, Dryden did not avail himself of a real
character, the English Stukely; a wild gallant, who, after spending a
noble fortune, became the leader of a band of Italian Condottieri,
engaged in the service of Sebastian, and actually fell in the battle
of Alcazar. Collier complains, and with very good reason, that, in the
character of the Mufti, Dryden has seized an opportunity to deride and
calumniate the priesthood of every religion; an opportunity which, I
am sorry to say, he seldom fails to use with unjustifiable inveteracy.
The rabble scenes were probably given, as our author himself says of
that in Cleomenes, "to gratify the more barbarous part of the
audience. " Indeed, to judge from the practice of the drama at this
time, the representation of a riot upon the stage seems to have had
the same charms for the popular part of the English audience, which
its reality always possesses in the streets.
Notwithstanding the excellence of this tragedy, it appears to have
been endured, rather than applauded, at its first representation;
although, being judiciously curtailed, it soon became a great
favourite with the public[3]; and, omitting the comic scenes, may be
again brought forward with advantage, when the public shall be tired
of children and of show. The tragedy of "Don Sebastian" was acted and
printed in 1690.
Footnotes:
1.
And court their wild applause;
_Aseb. _ For this we bribed the lawyer's tongue.
And then destroyed the laws.
_Cho. _ For this, &c.
_Tyr. _ To make him safe, we made his friends our prey;
_Dem. _ To make him great, we scorned his royal sway,--
_Tyr. _ And to confirm his crown, we took his heir away.
_Dem. _ To encrease his store,
We kept him poor;
_Tyr. _ And when to wants we had betrayed him,
To keep him low,
Pronounced a foe,
Whoe'er presumed to aid him.
_Aseb. _ But you forget the noblest part,
And master piece of all your art,--
You told him he was sick at heart.
_Zel. _ And when you could not work belief
In Albion of the imagined grief;
Your perjured vouchers, in a breath,
Made oath, that he was sick to death;
And then five hundred quacks of skill
Resolved, 'twas fit he should be ill.
_Aseb. _ Now hey for a common-wealth,
We merrily drink and sing!
'Tis to the nation's health,
For every man's a king.
_Zel. _ Then let the mask begin,
The Saints advance,
To fill the dance,
And the Property Boys come in.
_The Boys in white begin a Fantastic Dance[4]. _
_Cho. _ Let the saints ascend the throne.
_Dem. _ Saints have wives, and wives have preachers,
Gifted men, and able teachers;
These to get, and those to own.
_Cho. _ Let the saints ascend the throne.
_Aseb. _ Freedom is a bait alluring;
Them betraying, us securing,
While to sovereign power we soar.
_Zel. _ Old delusions, new repeated,
Shews them born but to be cheated,
As their fathers were before.
_Six Sectaries begin a formal affected Dance; the two gravest
whisper the other four, and draw them into the Plot; they pull out
and deliver Libels to them, which they receive. _
_Dem. _ See friendless Albion there alone,
Without defence
But innocence;
Albanius now is gone.
_Tyr. _ Say then, what must be done?
_Dem. _ The gods have put him in our hand[5].
_Zel. _ He must be slain.
_Tyr. _ But who shall then command?
_Dem. _ The people; for the right returns to those.
Who did the trust impose.
_Tyr. _ 'Tis fit another sun should rise,
To cheer the world, and light the skies.
_Dem. _ But when the sun
His race has run,
And neither cheers the world, nor lights the skies,
'Tis fit a common-wealth of stars should rise.
_Aseb. _ Each noble vice
Shall bear a price,
And virtue shall a drug become;
An empty name
Was all her fame,
But now she shall be dumb.
_Zel. _ If open vice be what you drive at,
A name so broad we'll ne'er connive at.
Saints love vice, but, more refinedly,
Keep her close, and use her kindly.
_Tyr. _ Fall on.
_Dem. _ Fall on; e'er Albion's death, we'll try,
If one or many shall his room supply.
_The White Boys dance about the Saints; the Saints draw out the
Association, and offer it to them; they refuse it, and quarrel about
it; then the White Boys and Saints fall into a confused dance,
imitating fighting. The White Boys, at the end of the dance, being
driven out by the Sectaries, with Protestant Flails. [6]_
_Alb. _ See the gods my cause defending,
When all human help was past!
_Acac. _ Factions mutually contending,
By each other fall at last.
_Alb. _ But is not yonder Proteus' cave,
Below that steep,
Which rising billows brave?
_Acac. _ It is; and in it lies the god asleep;
And snorting by,
We may descry
The monsters of the deep.
_Alb. _ He knows the past,
And can resolve the future too.
_Acac. _ 'Tis true!
But hold him fast,
For he can change his hue. [7]
_The Cave of_ PROTEUS _rises out of the Sea; it consists of several
arches of Rock-work adorned with mother-of-pearl, coral, and
abundance of shells of various kinds. Through the arches is seen the
Sea, and parts of Dover-pier; in the middle of the Cave is_ PROTEUS
_asleep on a rock adorned with shells, &c. like the Cave. _ ALBION
_and_ ACACIA _seize on him; and while a symphony is playing, he
sinks as they are bringing him forward, and changes himself into a
Lion, a Crocodile, a Dragon, and then to his own shape again; he
comes forward to the front of the stage, and sings. _
SYMPHONY.
_Pro. _ Albion, loved of gods and men,
Prince of peace, too mildly reigning,
Cease thy sorrow and complaining;
Thou shall be restored again:
Albion, loved of gods and men.
II.
Still thou art the care of heaven,
In thy youth to exile driven;
Heaven thy ruin then prevented,
'Till the guilty land repented.
In thy age, when none could aid thee,
Foes conspired, and friends betrayed thee;
To the brink of danger driven,
Still thou art the care of heaven.
_Alb. _ To whom shall I my preservation owe?
_Pro. _ Ask me no more; for 'tis by Neptune's foe. [8]
PROTEUS _descends. _
DEMOCRACY _and_ ZELOTA _return with their faction. _
_Dem. _ Our seeming friends, who joined alone,
To pull down one, and build another throne,
Are all dispersed and gone;
We brave republic souls remain.
_Zel. _ And 'tis by us that Albion must be slain;
Say, whom shall we employ
The tyrant to destroy?
_Dem. _ That Archer is by fate designed,
With one eye clear, and t'other blind.
_Zel. _ He comes inspired to do't.
_Omnes. _ Shoot, holy Cyclop, shoot.
_The one-eyed Archer advances, the rest follow. A fire arises
betwixt them and_ ALBION. [9]
[_Ritornel. _
_Dem. _ Lo! heaven and earth combine
To blast our bold design.
What miracles are shewn!
Nature's alarmed,
And fires are armed,
To guard the sacred throne.
_Zel. _ What help, when jarring elements conspire,
To punish our audacious crimes?
Retreat betimes,
To shun the avenging fire.
_Chor. _ To shun the avenging fire. [_Ritor. _
_As they are going back, a fire arises from behind; they all sink
together. _[10]
_Alb. _ Let our tuneful accents upwards move,
Till they reach the vaulted arch of those above;
Let us adore them;
Let us fall before them.
_Acac. _ Kings they made, and kings they love.
When they protect a rightful monarch's reign,
The gods in heaven, the gods on earth maintain.
_Both. _ When they protect, &c.
_Alb. _ But see, what glories gild the main!
_Acac. _ Bright Venus brings Albanius back again,
With all the Loves and Graces in her train.
_A machine rises out of the sea; it opens, and discovers_ VENUS
_and_ ALBANIUS _sitting in a great scallop-shell, richly adorned. _
VENUS _is attended by the Loves and Graces,_ ALBANIUS _by Heroes;
the shell is drawn by dolphins; it moves forward, while a symphony
of flutes-doux, &c. is playing, till it lands them on the stage, and
then it closes and sinks. _
VENUS _sings. _
Albion, hail! the gods present thee
All the richest of their treasures,
Peace and pleasures,
To content thee,
Dancing their eternal measures. [_Graces and Loves dance an entry. _
_Venus. _ But, above all human blessing,
Take a warlike loyal brother,
Never prince had such another;
Conduct, courage, truth expressing,
All heroic worth possessing. [_Here the Heroes' dance is performed. _
_Chor. of all. _ But above all, &c. [_Ritor. _
_Whilst a Symphony is playing, a very large, and a very glorious
Machine descends; the figure of it oval, all the clouds shining with
gold, abundance of Angels and Cherubins flying about them, and
playing in them; in the midst of it sits_ APOLLO _on a throne of
gold; he comes from the machine to_ ALBION.
_Phoeb. _ From Jove's imperial court,
Where all the gods resort,
In awful counsel met,
Surprising news I bear;
Albion the great
Must change his seat,
For he is adopted there.
_Venus. _ What stars above shall we displace?
Where shall he fill a room divine?
_Nept. _ Descended from the sea-gods' race,
Let him by my Orion shine.
_Phoeb. _ No, not by that tempestuous sign;
Betwixt the Balance and the Maid,
The just,
August,
And peaceful shade,
Shall shine in heaven with beams displayed,
While great Albanius is on earth obeyed.
_Venus. _ Albanius, lord of land and main,
Shall with fraternal virtues reign;
And add his own,
To fill the throne;
Adored and feared, and loved no less;
In war victorious, mild in peace,
The joy of man, and Jove's increase.
_Acac. _ O thou! who mountest the æthereal throne,
Be kind and happy to thy own;
Now Albion is come,
The people of the sky
Run gazing, and cry,--Make room,
Make room, make room,
Make room for our new deity!
_Here_ ALBION _mounts the machine, which moves upward slowly. _
_A full chorus of all that_ ACACIA _sung. _
_Ven. _ Behold what triumphs are prepared to grace
Thy glorious race,
Where love and honour claim an equal place;
Already they are fixed by fate,
And only ripening ages wait.
_The Scene changes to a Walk of very high trees; at the end of the
Walk is a view of that part of Windsor, which faces Eton; in the
midst of it is a row of small trees, which lead to the Castle-Hill.
In the first scene, part of the Town and part of the Hill. In the
next, the Terrace Walk, the King's lodgings, and the upper part of
St George's chapel, then the keep; and, lastly, that part of the
Castle beyond the keep. _
_In the air is a vision of the Honours of the Garter; the Knights in
procession, and the King under a canopy; beyond this, the upper end
of St George's hall. _
FAME _rises out of the middle of the Stage, standing on a Globe, on
which is the Arms of England: the Globe rests on a Pedestal; on the
front of the Pedestal in drawn a Man with a long, lean, pale face,
with fiends' wings, and snakes twisted round his body; he is
encompassed by several fanatical rebellious heads, who suck poison
from him, which runs out of a tap in his side. _[11]
_Fame. _ Renown, assume thy trumpet!
From pole to pole resounding
Great Albion's name;
Great Albion's name shall be
The theme of Fame, shall be great Albion's name,
Great Albion's name, great Albion's name.
Record the garter's glory;
A badge for heroes, and for kings to bear;
For kings to bear!
And swell the immortal story,
With songs of Gods, and fit for Gods to hear;
And swell the immortal story,
With songs of Gods, and fit for Gods to hear;
For Gods to hear.
_A full Chorus of all the Voices and Instruments; trumpets and
hautboys make Ritornello's of all_ FAME _sings; and twenty-four
Dancers, all the time in a chorus, and dance to the end of the
Opera. _
Footnotes:
1. The reader must recollect the orders of the Rump parliament to
general Monk, to destroy the gates and portcullises of the city of
London; which commission, by the bye, he actually executed, with
all the forms of contempt, although, in a day or two after, he took
up his quarters in the city, apologized for what had passed, and
declared against the parliament.
2. Dr. Titus Oates, the principal witness to the Popish Plot, was
accused of unnatural and infamous crimes. He was certainly a most
ineffably impudent, perjured villain.
3. The Chacon is supposed by Sir John Hawkins to be of Moorish or
Saracenic origin. "The characteristic of the Chacone is a bass, or
ground, consisting of four measures, wherein three crotchets make
the bar, and the repetition thereof with variations in the several
parts, from the beginning to the end of the air, which in respect
of its length, has no limit but the discretion of the composer. The
whole of the twelfth sonata of the second opera of Corelli is a
Chacone. " _Hist. of Music_, vol. iv. p. 388. There is also, I am
informed, a very celebrated Chacon composed by Jomelli.
4. By the _White Boys_ or _Property Boys_, are meant the adherents of
the Duke of Monmouth, who affected great zeal for liberty and
property, and assumed white badges, as marks of the innocence of
their intentions. When the Duke came to the famous Parliament held
at Oxford, "he was met by about 100 Batchellors all in white,
except black velvet caps, with white wands in their hands, who
divided themselves, and marched as a guard to his person. " _Account
of the Life of the Duke of Monmouth_, p. 107. In the Duke's tour
through the west of England, he was met at Exeter, by "a brave
company of brisk stout young men, all cloathed in linen waistcoats
and drawers, _white and harmless,_ having not so much as a stick in
their hands; they were in number about 900 or 1000. " _ibid. _ p.
103. See the notes on Absalom and Achitophel. The saints, on the
other hand, mean the ancient republican zealots and fanatics, who,
though they would willingly have joined in the destruction of
Charles, did not wish that Monmouth should succeed him, but aimed
at the restoration of the commonwealth. Hence the following dispute
betwixt Tyranny and Democracy.
5. The atrocious and blasphemous sentiment in the text was actually
used by the fanatics who murdered Sharpe, the archbishop of St
Andrews.
When they unexpectedly met him during their search for
another person, they exclaimed, that "the Lord had delivered him
into their hands. "
6. It is easy to believe, that, whatever was the, nature of the
schemes nourished by Monmouth, Russel, and Essex, they could have
no concern with the low and sanguinary cabal of Ramsay, Walcot, and
Rumbold, who were all of them old republican officers and
commonwealth's men. The flight of Shaftesbury, whose bustling and
politic brain had rendered him the sole channel of communication
betwixt these parties, as well as the means of uniting them in one
common design, threw loose all connection between them; so that
each, after his retreat, seems to have acted independantly of, and
often in contradiction to the other.
7. The reader may judge, whether some distant and obscure allusion to
the trimming politics of Halifax, to whom the Duke of York, our
author's patron, was hostile, may not be here insinuated. During
the stormy session of his two last parliaments, Charles was much
guided by his temporising and camelion-like policy.
8. That is by fire. See next note.
9. The allegory of the one-eyed Archer, and the fire arising betwixt
him and Albion, will be made evident by the following extracts from
Sprat's history of the Conspiracy. In enumerating the persons
engaged in the Rye-house plot, he mentions "Richard Rumbold,
maltster, an old army officer, a desperate and bloody Ravaillac. "
After agitating several schemes for assassinating Charles, the
Rye-house was fixed upon as a spot which the king must necessarily
pass in his journey trom Newmarket, and which, being a solitary
moated house, in the actual occupation of Rumbold, afforded the
conspirators facility of previous concealment and subsequent
defence. "All other propositions, as subject to far more casualties
and hazards, soon gave place to that of the Rye, in Herefordshire,
a house then inhabited by the foresaid Richard Rumbold, who
proposed that to be the seat of the action, offering himself to
command the party, that was to do the work. Him, therefore, as the
most daring captain, and by reason of a blemish in one of his eyes,
they were afterwards wont, in common discourse, to call Hannibal;
often drinking healths to _Hannibal and his boys_, meaning Rumbold
and his _hellish crew_.
"Immediately upon the coaches coming within the gates and hedges
about the house, the conspirators were to divide into several
parties; some before, in the habit of labourers, were to overthrow
a cart in the narrowest passage, so as to prevent all possibility
of escape: others were to fight the guards, Walcot chusing that
part upon a punctilio of honour; others were to shoot at the
coachman, postillion, and horses; others to aim only at his
Majesty's coach, which party was to be under the particular
direction of Rumbold himself; the villain declaring beforehand,
that, upon that occasion, he would make use of a very good
blunderbuss, which was in West's possession, and blasphemously
adding, that Ferguson should first consecrate it. " . . . "But whilst
they were thus wholly intent on this barbarous work, and proceeded
securely in its contrivance without any the least doubt of a
prosperous success, behold! on a sudden, God miraculously
disappointed all their hopes and designs, by the terrible
conflagration unexpectedly breaking out at Newmarket. In which
extraordinary event there was one remarkable passage, that is not
so generally taken notice of, as, for the glory of God, and the
confusion of his Majesty's enemies, it ought to be.
"For, after that the approaching fury of the flames had driven the
king out of his own palace, his Majesty, at first, removed into
another quarter of the town, remote from the fire, and, as yet,
free from any annoyance of smoke and ashes. There his Majesty,
finding he might be tolerably well accommodated, had resolved to
stay, and continue his recreations as before, till the day first
named for his journey back to London. But his Majesty had no sooner
made that resolution, when the wind, as conducted by an invisible
power from above, presently changed about, and blew the smoke and
cinders directly on his new lodging, making them in a moment as
untenable as the other. Upon this, his Majesty being put to a new
shift, and not finding the like conveniency elsewhere, immediately
declared, he would speedily return to Whitehall, as he did; which
happening to be several days before the assassins expected him, or
their preparations for the Rye were in readiness, it may justly
give occasion to all the world to acknowledge, what one of the very
conspirators could not but do, _that it was a providential
fire. _"--Pages 51_ et seq. _
The proprietor of the Rye-house (for Rumbold was but a tenant)
shocked at the intended purpose, for which it was to have been
used, is said to have fired it with his own hand. This is the
subject of a poem, called the Loyal Incendiary, or the generous
_Boute-feu_.
10. The total ruin of those, who were directly involved in the
Rye-house, was little to be regretted, had it not involved the fate
of those who were pursuing reform, by means more manly and
constitutional,--the fate of Russel, Essex, and Sidney.
Rumbold, "the one-eyed archer," fled to Holland, and came to
Scotland with Argyle, on his ill-concerted expedition. He was
singled out and pursued, after the dispersion of his companions in
a skirmish. He defended himself with desperate resolution against
two armed peasants, till a third, coming behind him with a
pitch-fork, turned off his head-piece, when he was cut down and
made prisoner, exclaiming, "Cruel countryman, to use me thus, while
my face was to mine enemy. " He suffered the doom of a traitor at
Edinburgh, and maintained on the scaffold, with inflexible
firmness, the principles in which he had lived. He could never
believe, he said, that the many of human kind came into the world
bridled and saddled, and the few with whips and spurs to ride them.
"His rooted ingrained opinion, says Fountainhall, was for a
republic against monarchy, to pull down which he thought a duty,
and no sin. " At his death, he declared, that were every hair of his
head a man, he would venture them all in the good old cause.
11. "I must not," says Langbaine, "take the pains to acquaint my
reader, that by the man on the pedestal, &c. is meant the late Lord
Shaftesbury. I shall not pretend to pass my censure, whether he
deserved this usage from our author or no, but leave it to the
judgments of statesmen and politicians. " Shaftesbury having been
overturned in a carriage, received some internal injury which
required a constant discharge by an issue in his side. Hence he was
ridiculed under the name of _Tapski_. In a mock account of an
apparition, stated to have appeared to Lady Gray, it says, "Bid
Lord Shaftesbury have a care to his spigot--if he is tapt, all the
plot will run out. " _Ralph's History_, vol. i. p. 562. from a
pamphlet in Lord Somers' collection. There are various allusions to
this circumstance in the lampoons of the time. A satire called "The
Hypocrite," written by Carryl, concludes thus:
His body thus and soul together vie.
In vice's empire for the sovereignty;
In ulcers shut this does abound in sin,
Lazar without and Lucifer within.
The silver pipe is no sufficient drain
For the corruption of this little man;
Who, though he ulcers have in every part,
Is no where so corrupt as in his heart.
At length, in prosecution of this coarse and unhandsome jest, a
sort of vessel with a turn-cock was constructed for holding wine,
which was called a Shaftesbury, and used in the taverns of the
royal party.
EPILOGUE
After our Æsop's fable shown to-day,
I come to give the moral of the play.
Feigned Zeal, you saw, set out the speedier pace;
But the last heat, Plain Dealing won the race:
Plain Dealing for a jewel has been known;
But ne'er till now the jewel of a crown.
When heaven made man, to show the work divine,
Truth was his image, stamped upon the coin:
And when a king is to a God refined,
On all he says and does he stamps his mind:
This proves a soul without alloy, and pure;
Kings, like their gold, should every touch endure.
To dare in fields is valour; but how few
Dare be so throughly valiant,--to be true!
The name of great, let other kings affect:
He's great indeed, the prince that is direct.
His subjects know him now, and trust him more
Than all their kings, and all their laws before.
What safety could their public acts afford?
Those he can break; but cannot break his word.
So great a trust to him alone was due;
Well have they trusted whom so well they knew.
The saint, who walked on waves, securely trod,
While he believed the beck'ning of his God;
But when his faith no longer bore him out,
Began to sink, as he began to doubt.
Let us our native character maintain;
'Tis of our growth, to be sincerely plain.
To excel in truth we loyally may strive,
Set privilege against prerogative:
He plights his faith, and we believe him just;
His honour is to promise, ours to trust.
Thus Britain's basis on a word is laid,
As by a word the world itself was made[1].
Footnote:
1. From this Epilogue we learn, what is confirmed by many proofs
elsewhere, that the attribute for which James desired to be
distinguished and praised, was that of openness of purpose, and
stern undeviating inflexibility of conduct. He scorned to disguise
his designs, either upon the religion or the constitution of his
country. He forgot that it was only the temporising concessions of
his brother which secured his way to the throne, when his
exclusion, or a civil war, seemed the only alternatives. His
brother was the reed, which bent before the whirlwind, and
recovered its erect posture when it had passed away; and James, the
inflexible oak, which the first tempest rooted up for ever.
* * * * *
DON SEBASTIAN.
A
TRAGEDY.
_--Nec tarda senectus
Debilitat vires animi, mutatque vigorem. _
VIRG.
DON SEBASTIAN.
The following tragedy is founded upon the adventures supposed to have
befallen Sebastian, king of Portugal, after the fatal battle of
Alcazar. The reader may be briefly reminded of the memorable
expedition of that gallant monarch to Africa, to signalize, against
the Moors, his chivalry as a warrior, and his faith as a Christian.
The ostensible pretext of invasion was the cause of Muly Mahomet, son
of Abdalla, emperor of Morocco; upon whose death, his brother, Muly
Moluch, had seized the crown, and driven his nephew into exile. The
armies joined battle near Alcazar. The Portuguese, far inferior in
number to the Moors, displayed the most desperate valour, and had
nearly won the day, when Muly Moluch, who, though almost dying, was
present on the field in a litter, fired with shame and indignation,
threw himself on horseback, rallied his troops, renewed the combat,
and, being carried back to his litter, immediately expired, with his
finger placed on his lips, to impress on the chiefs, who surrounded
him, the necessity of concealing his death. The Moors, rallied by
their sovereign's dying exertion, surrounded, and totally routed, the
army of Sebastian. Mahomet, the competitor for the throne of Morocco,
was drowned in passing a river in his flight, and Sebastian, as his
body was never found, probably perished in the same manner. But where
the region of historical certainty ends, that of romantic tradition
commences. The Portuguese, to whom the memory of their warlike
sovereign was deservedly dear, grasped at the feeble hope which the
uncertainty of his fate afforded, and long, with vain fondness,
expected the return of Sebastian, to free them from the yoke of Spain.
This mysterious termination of a hero's career, as it gave rise to
various political intrigues, (for several persons assumed the name and
character of Sebastian,) early afforded a subject for exercising the
fancy of the dramatist and romance writer. "The Battle of Alcazar[1]"
is known to the collectors of old plays; a ballad on the same subject
is reprinted in Evans's collection; and our author mentions a French
novel on the adventures of Don Sebastian, to which Langbaine also
refers.
The situation of Dryden, after the Revolution, was so delicate as to
require great caution and attention, both in his choice of a subject,
and his mode of treating it. His distressed circumstances and lessened
income compelled him to come before the public as an author; while the
odium attached to the proselyte of a hated religion, and the partizan
of a depressed faction, was likely, upon the slightest pretext, to
transfer itself from the person of the poet to the labours on which
his support depended. He was, therefore, not only obliged to chuse a
theme, which had no offence in it, and to treat it in a manner which
could not admit of misconstruction, but also so to exert the full
force of his talents, as, by the conspicuous pre-eminence of his
genius, to bribe prejudice and silence calumny. An observing reader
will accordingly discover, throughout the following tragedy, symptoms
of minute finishing, and marks of accurate attention, which, in our
author's better days, he deigned not to bestow upon productions, to
which his name alone was then sufficient to give weight and privilege.
His choice of a subject was singularly happy: the name of Sebastian
awaked historical recollections and associations, favourable to the
character of his hero; while the dark uncertainty of his fate removed
all possibility of shocking the audience by glaring offence against
the majesty of historical truth. The subject has, therefore, all the
advantages of a historical play, without the detects, which either a
rigid coincidence with history, or a violent contradiction of known
truth, seldom fail to bring along with them. Dryden appears from his
preface to have been fully sensible of this; and he has not lost the
advantage of a happy subject by treating it with the carelessness he
sometimes allowed himself to indulge.
The characters in "Don Sebastian" are contrasted with singular ability
and judgment. Sebastian, high-spirited and fiery; the soul of royal
and military honour; the soldier and the king; almost embodies the
idea which the reader forms at the first mention of his name. Dorax,
to whom he is so admirable a contrast, is one of those characters whom
the strong hand of adversity has wrested from their natural bias; and
perhaps no equally vivid picture can be found, of a subject so awfully
interesting. Born with a strong tendency to all that was honourable
and virtuous, the very excess of his virtues became vice, when his own
ill fate, and Sebastian's injustice, had driven him into exile. By
comparing, as Dryden has requested, the character of Dorax, in the
fifth act, with that he maintains in the former part of the play, the
difference may be traced betwixt his natural virtues, and the vices
engrafted on them by headlong passion and embittering calamity. There
is no inconsistence in the change which takes place after his scene
with Sebastian; as was objected by those, whom the poet justly terms,
"the more ignorant sort of creatures. " It is the same picture in a new
light; the same ocean in tempest and in calm; the same traveller, whom
sunshine has induced to abandon his cloak, which the storm only forced
him to wrap more closely around him. The principal failing of Dorax is
the excess of pride, which renders each supposed wound to his honour
more venomously acute; yet he is not devoid of gentler affections,
though even in indulging these the hardness of his character is
conspicuous. He loves Violante, but that is a far subordinate feeling
to his affection for Sebastian. Indeed, his love appears so inferior
to his loyal devotion to his king, that, unless to gratify the taste
of the age, I see little reason for its being introduced at all. It is
obvious he was much more jealous of the regard of his sovereign, than
of his mistress; he never mentions Violante till the scene of
explanation with Sebastian; and he appears hardly to have retained a
more painful recollection of his disappointment in that particular,
than of the general neglect and disgrace he had sustained at the court
of Lisbon. The last stage of a virtuous heart, corroded into evil by
wounded pride, has been never more forcibly displayed than in the
character of Dorax. When once induced to take the fatal step which
degraded him in his own eyes, all his good affections seem to be
converted into poison. The religion, which displays itself in the
fifth act in his arguments against suicide, had, in his efforts to
justify his apostacy, or at least to render it a matter of no moment,
been exchanged for sentiments approaching, perhaps to atheism,
certainly to total scepticism. His passion for Violante is changed
into contempt and hatred for her sex, which he expresses in the
coarsest terms. His feelings of generosity, and even of humanity, are
drowned in the gloomy and stern misanthropy, which has its source in
the self-discontent that endeavours to wreak itself upon others. This
may be illustrated by his unfeeling behaviour, while Alvarez and
Antonio, well known to him in former days, approach, and draw the
deadly lot, which ratifies their fate. No yielding of compassion, no
recollection of former friendship, has power to alter the cold and
sardonic sarcasm with which he sketches their characters, and marks
their deportment in that awful moment. Finally, the zealous attachment
of Alonzo for his king, which, in its original expression, partakes of
absolute devotion, is changed, by the circumstances of Dorax, into an
irritated and frantic jealousy, which he mistakes for hatred; and
which, in pursuing the destruction of its object, is almost more
inveterate than hatred itself. Nothing has survived of the original
Alonzo at the opening of the piece, except the gigantic passion which
has caused his ruin. This character is drawn on a large scale, and in
a heroic proportion; but it is so true to nature, that many readers
must have lamented, even within the circle of domestic acquaintance,
instances of feelings hardened, and virtues perverted, where a high
spirit has sustained severe and unjust neglect and disgrace. The whole
demeanour of this exquisite character suits the original sketch. From
"the long stride and sullen port," by which Benducar distinguishes him
at a distance, to the sullen stubbornness with which he obeys, or the
haughty contempt with which he resists, the commands of the peremptory
tyrant under whom he had taken service, all announce the untamed pride
which had robbed Dorax of virtue, and which yet, when Benducar would
seduce him into a conspiracy, and in his conduct towards Sebastian,
assumes the port and dignity of virtue herself. In all his conduct and
bearing, there is that mixed feeling and impulse, which constitutes
the real spring of human action. The true motive of Alonzo in saving
Sebastian, is not purely that of honourable hatred, which he proposes
to himself; for to himself every man endeavours to appear consistent,
and readily find arguments to prove to himself that he is so. Neither
is his conduct to be ascribed altogether to the gentler feelings of
loyal and friendly affection, relenting at the sight of his
sovereign's ruin, and impending death. It is the result of a mixture
of these opposite sensations, clashing against each other like two
rivers at their conflux, yet urging their united course down the same
channel. Actuated by a mixture of these feelings, Dorax meets
Sebastian; and the art of the poet is displayed in that admirable
scene, by suggesting a natural motive to justify to the injured
subject himself the change of the course of his feelings. As his
jealousy of Sebastian's favour, and resentment of his unjust neglect,
was chiefly founded on the avowed preference which the king had given
to Henriquez, the opportune mention of his rival's death, by removing
the cause of that jealousy, gives the renegade an apology to his own
pride, for throwing himself at the feet of that very sovereign, whom a
moment before he was determined to force to combat. They are little
acquainted with human passions, at least have only witnessed their
operations among men of common minds, who doubt, that at the height of
their very spring-tide, they are often most susceptible of sudden
changes; revolutions, which seem to those who have not remarked how
nearly the most opposite feelings are allied and united, the most
extravagant and unaccountable. Muly Moluch is an admirable specimen of
that very frequent theatrical character,--a stage tyrant. He is fierce
and boisterous enough to be sufficiently terrible and odious, and that
without much rant, considering he is an infidel Soldan, who, from the
ancient deportment of Mahomed and Termagaunt, as they appeared in the
old Mysteries, might claim a prescriptive right to tear a passion to
tatters. Besides, the Moorish emperor has fine glances of savage
generosity, and that free, unconstrained, and almost noble openness,
the only good quality, perhaps, which a consciousness of unbounded
power may encourage in a mind so firm as not to be totally depraved by
it. The character of Muly Moluch, like that of Morat, in
"Aureng-Zebe," to which it bears a strong resemblance, was admirably
represented by Kynaston; who had, says Cibber, "a fierce lion-like
majesty in his port and utterance, that gave the spectator a kind of
trembling admiration. " It is enough to say of Benducar, that the cool,
fawning, intriguing, and unprincipled statesman, is fully developed in
his whole conduct; and of Alvarez, that the little he has to say and
do, is so said and done, as not to disgrace his common-place character
of the possessor of the secret on which the plot depends; for it may
be casually observed, that the depositary of such a clew to the
catastrophe, though of the last importance to the plot, is seldom
himself of any interest whatever. The haughty and high-spirited
Almeyda is designed by the author as the counterpart of Sebastian. She
breaks out with the same violence, I had almost said fury, and
frequently discovers a sort of kindred sentiment, intended to prepare
the reader for the unfortunate discovery, that she is the sister of
the Portuguese monarch.
Of the diction, Dr Johnson has said, with meagre commendation, that it
has "some sentiments which leave a strong impression," and "others of
excellence, universally acknowledged. " This, even when the admiration
of the scene betwixt Dorax and Sebastian has been sanctioned by that
great critic, seems scanty applause for the _chef d'oeuvre_ of
Dryden's dramatic works. The reader will be disposed to look for more
unqualified praise, when such a poet was induced, by every pressing
consideration, to combine, in one effort, the powers of his mighty
genius, and the fruits of his long theatrical experience: Accordingly,
Shakespeare laid aside, it will be perhaps difficult to point out a
play containing more animatory incident, impassioned language, and
beautiful description, than "Don Sebastian. " Of the former, the scene
betwixt Dorax and the king, had it been the only one ever Dryden
wrote, would have been sufficient to insure his immortality. There is
not,--no, perhaps, not even in Shakespeare,--an instance where the
chord, which the poet designed should vibrate, is more happily struck;
strains there are of a higher mood, but not more correctly true; in
evidence of which, we have known those, whom distresses of a gentler
nature were unable to move, feel their stubborn feelings roused and
melted by the injured pride and deep repentance of Dorax. The burst of
anguish with which he answers the stern taunt of Sebastian, is one of
those rare, but natural instances, in which high-toned passion assumes
a figurative language, because all that is familiar seems inadequate
to express its feelings:
_Dor. _ Thou hast dared
To tell me, what I durst not tell myself:
I durst not think that I was spurned, and live;
And live to hear it boasted to my face.
All my long avarice of honour lost,
Heaped up in youth, and hoarded up for age!
Has honour's fountain then sucked back the stream?
He has; and hooting boys may dry-shod pass,
And gather pebbles from the naked ford.
Give me my love, my honour; give them back--
Give me revenge, while I have breath to ask it!
But I will not dwell on the beauties of this scene. If any one is
incapable of relishing it, he may safely conclude, that nature has not
merely denied him that rare gift, poetical taste, but common powers of
comprehending the ordinary feelings of humanity. The love scene,
betwixt Sebastian and Almeyda, is more purely conceived, and expressed
with more reference to sentiment, than is common with our author. The
description which Dorax gives of Sebastian, before his appearance,
coming from a mortal enemy, at least from one whose altered love was
as envenomed as hatred, is a grand preparation for the appearance of
the hero. In many of the slighter descriptive passages, we recognize
the poet by those minute touches, which a mind susceptible of poetic
feeling is alone capable of bringing out. The approach of the emperor,
while the conspirators are caballing, is announced by Orchan, with
these picturesque circumstances:
I see the blaze of torches from afar,
And hear the trampling of thick-beating feet--
This way they move. --
The following account, given by the slave sent to observe what passed
in the castle of Dorax, believed to be dead, or dying, is equally
striking:
_Haly. _ Two hours I warily have watched his palace:
All doors are shut, no servant peeps abroad;
Some officers, with striding haste, past in;
While others outward went on quick dispatch.
Sometimes hushed silence seemed to reign within;
Then cries confused, and a joint clamour followed;
Then lights went gliding by, from room to room,
And shot like thwarting meteors cross the house.
Not daring further to inquire, I came
With speed to bring you this imperfect news.
The description of the midnight insurrection of the rabble is not less
impressive:
_Ham. _ What you wish:
The streets are thicker in this noon of night,
Than at the mid-day sun: A drouzy horror
Sits on their eyes, like fear, not well awake:
All crowd in heaps, as, at a night alarm,
The bees drive out upon each others backs,
T'imboss their hives in clusters; all ask news:
Their busy captain runs the weary round
To whisper orders; and, commanding silence,
Makes not noise cease, but deafens it to murmurs.
These illustrations are designedly selected from the parts of the
lower characters, because they at once evince the diligence and
success with which Dryden has laboured even the subordinate points of
this tragedy.
"Don Sebastian" has been weighed, with reference to its tragic merits,
against "Love for Love;" and one or other is universally allowed to be
the first of Dryden's dramatic performances. To the youth of both
sexes the latter presents the most pleasing subject of emotion; but to
those whom age has rendered incredulous upon the romantic effects of
love, and who do not fear to look into the recesses of the human
heart, when agitated by darker and more stubborn passions, "Don
Sebastian" offers a far superior source of gratification.
To point out the blemishes of so beautiful a tragedy, is a painful,
though a necessary, task. The style, here and there, exhibits marks of
a reviving taste for those frantic bursts of passion, which our author
has himself termed the "Dalilahs of the theatre. " The first speech of
Sebastian has been often noticed as an extravagant rant, more worthy
of Maximin, or Almanzor, than of a character drawn by our author in
his advanced years, and chastened taste:
I beg no pity for this mouldering clay;
For if you give it burial, there it takes
Possession of your earth:
If burnt and scatter'd in the air, the winds,
That strew my dust, diffuse my royalty,
And spread me o'er your clime; for where one atom
Of mine shall light, know, there Sebastian reigns.
The reader's discernment will discover some similar extravagancies in
the language of Almeyda and the Emperor.
It is a separate objection, that the manners of the age and country
are not adhered to. Sebastian, by disposition a crusading
knight-errant, devoted to religion and chivalry, becomes, in the hands
of Dryden, merely a gallant soldier and high-spirited prince, such as
existed in the poet's own days. But, what is worse, the manners of
Mahometans are shockingly violated. Who ever heard of human
sacrifices, or of any sacrifices, being offered up to Mahomet[2]; and
when were his followers able to use the classical and learned
allusions which occur throughout the dialogue! On this last topic
Addison makes the following observations, in the "Guardian," No. 110.
"I have now Mr Dryden's "Don Sebastian" before me, in which I find
frequent allusions to ancient poetry, and the old mythology of the
heathens. It is not very natural to suppose a king of Portugal would
be borrowing thoughts out of Ovid's "Metamorphoses," when he talked
even to those of his own court; but to allude to these Roman fables,
when he talks to an emperor of Barbary, seems very extraordinary.
But observe how he defies him out of the classics in the following
lines:
Why didst not thou engage me man to man,
And try the virtue of that Gorgon face,
To stare me into statue?
"Almeyda, at the same time, is more book-learned than Don Sebastian.
She plays an Hydra upon the Emperor, that is full as good as the
Gorgon:
O that I had the fruitful heads of Hydra,
That one might bourgeon where another fell!
Still would I give thee work, still, still, thou tyrant,
And hiss thee with the last.
"She afterwards, in allusion to Hercules, bids him 'lay down the
lion's skin, and take the distaff;' and, in the following speech,
utters her passion still more learnedly:
No; were we joined, even though it were in death,
Our bodies burning in one funeral pile,
The prodigy of Thebes would be renewed,
And my divided flame should break from thine.
"The emperor of Barbary shews himself acquainted with the Roman
poets as well as either of his prisoners, and answers the foregoing
speech in the same classic strain:
Serpent, I will engender poison with thee:
Our offspring, like the seed of dragon's teeth,
Shall issue armed, and fight themselves to death.
"Ovid seems to have been Muley-Moloch's favourite author; witness
the lines that follow:
She, still inexorable, still imperious,
And loud, as if, like Bacchus, born in thunder.
"I shall conclude my remarks on his part with that poetical
complaint of his being in love; and leave my reader to consider, how
prettily it would sound in the mouth of an emperor of Morocco:
The god of love once more has shot his fires
Into my soul, and my whole heart receives him.
"Muley Zeydan is as ingenious a man as his brother Muley Moloch; as
where he hints at the story of Castor and Pollux:
May we ne'er meet;
For, like the twins of Leda, when I mount,
He gallops down the skies.
"As for the Mufti, we will suppose that he was bred up a scholar,
and not only versed in the law of Mahomet, but acquainted with all
kinds of polite learning. For this reason he is not at all surprised
when Dorax calls him a Phæton in one place, and in another tells him
he is like Archimedes.
"The Mufti afterwards mentions Ximenes, Albornoz, and cardinal
Wolsey, by name. The poet seems to think, he may make every person,
in his play, know as much as himself, and talk as well as he could
have done on the same occasion. At least, I believe, every reader
will agree with me, that the above-mentioned sentiments, to which I
might have added several others, would have been better suited to
the court of Augustus than that of Muley Moloch. I grant they are
beautiful in themselves, and much more so in that noble language,
which was peculiar to this great poet. I only observe, that they are
improper for the persons who make use of them. "
The catastrophe of the tragedy may be also censured, not only on the
grounds objected to that of "OEdipus," but because it does not
naturally flow from the preceding events, and opens, in the fifth act,
a new set of persons, and a train of circumstances, unconnected with
the preceding action. In the concluding scene, it was remarked, by the
critics, that there is a want of pure taste in the lovers dwelling
more upon the pleasures than the horrors of their incestuous
connection.
Of the lighter scenes, which were intended for comic, Dr Johnson has
said, "they are such as that age did not probably commend, and as the
present would not endure. " Dryden has remarked, with self-complacency,
the art with which they are made to depend upon the serious business.
This has not, however, the merit of novelty; being not unlike the
connection between the tragic and comic scenes of the "Spanish Friar. "
The persons introduced have also some resemblance; though the gaiety
of Antonio is far more gross than that of Lorenzo, and Morayma is a
very poor copy of Elvira. It is rather surprising, that when a gay
libertine was to be introduced, Dryden did not avail himself of a real
character, the English Stukely; a wild gallant, who, after spending a
noble fortune, became the leader of a band of Italian Condottieri,
engaged in the service of Sebastian, and actually fell in the battle
of Alcazar. Collier complains, and with very good reason, that, in the
character of the Mufti, Dryden has seized an opportunity to deride and
calumniate the priesthood of every religion; an opportunity which, I
am sorry to say, he seldom fails to use with unjustifiable inveteracy.
The rabble scenes were probably given, as our author himself says of
that in Cleomenes, "to gratify the more barbarous part of the
audience. " Indeed, to judge from the practice of the drama at this
time, the representation of a riot upon the stage seems to have had
the same charms for the popular part of the English audience, which
its reality always possesses in the streets.
Notwithstanding the excellence of this tragedy, it appears to have
been endured, rather than applauded, at its first representation;
although, being judiciously curtailed, it soon became a great
favourite with the public[3]; and, omitting the comic scenes, may be
again brought forward with advantage, when the public shall be tired
of children and of show. The tragedy of "Don Sebastian" was acted and
printed in 1690.
Footnotes:
1.
