Ο Ν THREE PLAYS O F BENJAMIN JONSON. VIZ. VOLPONE, or The Fox: EPICOE NE, or The Silent Satint as direm "Then to the well-trod stage anon, "If JOHNSON's learned fock be on, Lebonore pi MILT. L'Allegro. れ LONDON: Printed for G. HAWKINS, at Milton's Head, be- T HESE curfory remarks on three of the most celebrated Poems (as he himself is pleased to name them) of our ancient and learned Comedian, which are here offered to the reader's confideration, (to his entertainment, or instruction, I dare not fay) were at firft written by me, for the most part, on the margin of an edition printed in the year 1640. 'Twas no ungrateful amusement (and this induces me to think 'twill be not lefs grateful to the reader) to compare JONSON with the original authors, which he imitated; and to find, that whenever he confidered with himself, how HORACE, JUVENAL, PLAUTUS, or any other of the ancient writers, would have written on fuch a fubject, or expreffed fuch a fentiment, that then he always excelled himself. And this, perhaps, may account for that inequality we find in his compofitions: his good genius feems to have forfaken him, when ever he forfook the guides of antiquity, and trufted to his own natural strength. There is indeed the one thing neceffary in all writings, much wanting in the writings of JONSON, and that is, the power to touch the heart: no scholarship (as the word is vulgarly ufed) can absolutely teach a writer this art; for this he muft go to his domeftic and inward monitor, and there fearch for the secret fprings and motives of action; what is man, whereto ferveth he, what is his good, and what is his evil? In a word, he must have the proper feeling, before he can attain to the proper expreffion. Methinks in this fcience his contemporary SHAKESPEARE has greatly the preeminence; nor is he at all inferior to JoNSON in exhibiting, in ridiculous and various lights, the various follies of mankind. But it ought not to be paffed over, without fome feverer cenfure, how vainly full, and conceitedly fatisfied with himself, we perpetually find our poet; even in fuch a * Ecclefiafticus xviii, 9. manner 1 manner as to mistake his proper talent. The Comic Mufe (* as he himself expresses it) proving ominous to him, he is refolved to try if the Tragic had a more kind afpect "Where if I prove the pleasure but of ‹‹ onė, "So he judicious be; hee shall b' alone "A theater unto me: once, I'le 'fay "To ftrike the 'eare of time, in those "fresh ftrains, "As fhall, befide the cunning of their ground, "Give caufe to fome of wonder, some defpight, "And unto more defpaire to imitate "their found. Now the aspect of the Tragic Mufe was fo little favourable to our poet when in bufkins, that even in the choice of his fubject he failed: SEJANUS and CATILINE are historical characters fo well known, In his apologetical dialogue at the end of the Poetafter. |