"Little of this great world can I speak, 66 More than pertains to feats and broils of battle; He is more accustomed to camps than to courts: By nature he is quick and passionate: "Now, by Heaven, My blood begins my safer guides to rule; Or do but lift this arm, the best of you Collied, blacked, discoloured. At the same time he is generous and ready to forgive. When Othello is furious with Iago, and Desdemona intercedes on the man's behalf, he immediately changes. Having previously declared that he did not care that Cassio should come to dine, on Desdemona's appeal he gives way at once, and says to her: 66 Prithee, no more; let him come when he will; وو Upon such a temperament, the skill of Iago finds good opportunity to play. Othello has his mind worked up by Iago into a condition favourable for receiving the seeds of jealousy, though, as at first presented, he is not a jealous man. This fact cannot be too strongly insisted upon, if we wish to understand the methods which Shakspere followed. There is in him a capacity for being jealous; and this, which is an attribute quite different from jealousy itself, is clearly shown and carefully expanded. Othello's temperament then, being what it is, Iago prepares the soil as cunningly as may be, and when the suggestion of jealousy is at last hinted, Othello accepts it greedily, being all the while almost unconscious of it. He accepts it with a rapidity of belief entirely in keeping with his foreign blood, his actions, and his temper. The result is the growth of a jealousy which becomes not so much a passion as an overmastering fiend. Here, then, we have a complete example of Shakspere's workmanship, which gives us a true study in the growth and development of character. In Ben Jonson's method we are confronted with studies of a totally different nature. We are shown a character who is ticketed at the outset as being avaricious, cruel, or immoral. We can find an excellent specimen in the "Character of the Persons," which is prefixed to Every Man out of his Humour. Puntarvolo is there described as A vainglorious knight, over-englishing his travels, and wholly consecrated to singularity; the very Jacob's staff of compliment; a sir that hath lived to see the revolution of time in most of his apparel, of presence good enough, but so palpably affected to his own praise that (for want of flatterers) he commends himself to the floutage of his own family. He deals upon returns and strange performances, resolving (in despight of public derision) to stick to his own particular fashion, phrase, and gesture." If we have descriptions like this provided for us, we can only say, "This character is such a one; and he must needs follow such and such a line of action." We find ourselves, therefore, in the position of watching the dramatist rather than the individual. Jonson consequently begins where Shakspere leaves. off. He does not delineate the growth of passion, or the fluctuations of character when affected by varying passion. His monsters spring into sight, fully armed and equipped, like Minerva from the head of Jupiter. Shakspere takes the raw clay; and makes a human being grow before our eyes. Another character of Shakspere's affords us a study of a wavering and a variable man. Yet in every one of Macbeth's actions, faltering though they may be, we can see a steady purpose in the background, which impels him to a terrible crime. This result is one which Macbeth himself could not realise. Shakspere knew that consistency lay in this human inconsistency; had Jonson dealt with such a character, he would have labelled him as a murderer to begin with, and would then have given him a victim in every other act. As a matter quite apart from the question of these two ways of treatment, Jonson's characters may be contrasted with Shakspere's on another ground, that the latter are universally true to nature, while the former only offer pictures of society at some one particular time. We do not go to Shakspere merely to know what people were like, or how they thought, in the days of Elizabeth and James. There is a certain amount of Tudor spirit about Shakspere's creations, because he himself had lived in Tudor times. But he went far beneath the surface, under the trappings of dress and of sixteenth century speech. He looked into the minds and hearts of men, and saw them, not only as they are influenced by the particular age they live in, but in their universal characteristics. We do not go to Twelfth Night for a study of the manners of Illyria, or As You Like It for a description of a court; though, having read the plays, we can recognise a Malvolio or a Frederick at the present day. Dialogue for the dramatist has to fulfil the duties of almost every method of writing. A narrative poem can break off the course of its story to explain, by description, the surroundings of any incident; while the dramatic poet is forced to put such words into the mouth of one of his characters, and at the same time to contrive that they shall appear as a natural part of the actor's speech. The moonlight scene in the Merchant of Venice (Act v., Sc. i.) is not only perfect as description; its value is increased by the place and by the way in which it is introduced. The idea of a storm, again, is better conveyed by the scenes of King Lear than by Falconer's Shipwreck. If, again, we consider dialogue as being a vehicle for reflection, it has always been remarked of Shakspere that there was hardly a branch of human experience on which he has not thrown some light. Ben Jonson was surfeited with knowledge. When compared with Shakspere, he is a scholar beside an uneducated man. Yet there cannot be found in his work one tithe of the wisdom, the philosophy, or the reflection which can be gathered from every page of Shakspere. In the dialogue of Jonson we can virtually read treatises on alchemy and venery. In The Alchemist is a speech on the making of gold, filled with technical terms, and forty lines long. His Roman plays contain literal translations of the speeches of Cicero; yet we have no such picture as Shakspere, in four lines, has put into the mouth of Brutus : "Cicero Looks with such ferret and such fiery eyes, As we have seen him in the Capitol, Bei cross'd in conference with some senators." وو Jonson's dialogue is eminently matter-of-fact. The glamour of poetry is altogether wanting. In Shakspere, passages are to be found of an unearthly glow and colour, sensuous as the odes of Keats, yet always throwing light upon the characters or incidents to which they belong. Take, for example, the speech of Oberon : 66 My gentle Puck, come hither. Thou rememb'rest And heard a mermaid, on a dolphin's back, Uttering such dulcet and harmonious breath That the rude sea grew civil at her song And certain stars shot madly from their spheres This passage, for glamour of phrase, is only comparable to the description of the song : "That oft-times hath Charmed magic casements, opening on the foam If it be contended, and allowed, that the highest function of the dramatist is adherence to measure and proportion, Jonson must bear off the palm. If it be thought that the dramatist's office is to hold a mirror up to nature, the preeminence belongs to Shakspere. Jonson promises that he will paint men, not monsters; but he fails in his undertaking. His Macilente, his Corvino, his Puntarvolo, with all their obedience to rule and unity, are nearer to monstrosity than the irregular humanities of Richard the Second, Prospero, or Othello. Jonson took a wrong ideal for both men and monsters. He thought nothing could be like man unless it were formal; he held that everything diverging from set rule must necessarily be monstrous. Critical opinion as to the nature of Jonson's work is unanimous; with regard to its merits, there is much difference of opinion. He was "a man of letters to the very core"; and his productions appeal chiefly to those of the same kind; but they will ever suffer from the worst blemish of art, in that they seldom please. An exception has of course to be made in the case of his Masques, and his occasional songs and lyrics. Here the most brilliant imagination, absolutely denied to his set dramas, finds full play. The little lyric of The Noble Nature and the Hymn to Diana are perfect in their form, and charming. "Lay thy bow of pearl apart And thy crystal-shining quiver; Space to breathe, how short soever: 44. The Moralities of Shakspere and Ben Jonson. The poet is the great teacher of the world. It is he who stands between nature and mankind and makes plain to his fellows those things which otherwise it would not be given them to see. It may be that the world refuses to hear his message. It may pass him by, it may even thrust him on one side, yet the utterance of the message is his work, and his duty is fulfilled when the utterance is given. Often, too, the world listens more readily to a false note than to a true song; so that he is doubly happy who finds the truth of his message recognised during his own life. To a certain extent, this was the lot of Shakspere. The hard struggles of his early years were rewarded with a great success while he was still young; and though the remainder of his life was not altogether free from troubles and vexations, the sordid worries of existence had been removed by his thirtieth year. He was so great and calm that he seems something more than mortal; but he does not sit, cold and stately, above the world, for he is essentially human-the highest development of humanity, rather than anything that differs from humanity itself. Hence all his mode of thought is intensely natural, both in his love for nature-for he himself is one with nature-and also in his love and sympathy with men. The world, as he reveals it to us, is not the sublime and awe-inspiring vision of Milton; it is the world that lies round us, which we, too, might have understood, if only we had possessed Shakspere's gift of seeing. The keynote of his philosophy is love for humanity, not the false liking which is based on self-interest. In Shakspere's sympathy, every one is the same, if only he is human. The king knows pain and grief as well as the peasant, the humblest suffer remorse as well as the highest. The infinite characters of mankind are ranged before Shakspere, and his clear eye reads the secrets of all. He lays his finger upon the touch of nature which unites mankind; he perceives unerringly the various qualities which make the differences between mankind. In his omniscience, Shakspere stands unapproachable and alone. Morality, as has been well said, makes up three-fourths of nd unquestionably it is that upon which the existence t should depend. For however great may be beauty of |