natural desire of the reader to know something of his domestic
circumstances. Ford had declared in the title-pages of his several
plays, that he was of the Inner Temple; and, from his entry there, Mr.
Malone, following up the inquiry, discovered that he was the second son
of Thomas Ford, Esq., and that he was baptized at Ilsington, in
Devonshire, the 17th of April, 1586. To this information Mr. Weber has
added nothing; and he hopes that the meagreness of his biographical
account will be readily excused by the reader who has examined the lives
of his (Ford's) dramatical contemporaries, in which we are continually
"led to lament that our knowledge respecting them amounts to little
better than nothing." It would surely be unjust to appear dissatisfied
at the imperfect account of an ancient author, when all the sources of
information have been industriously explored. But, in the present case,
we doubt whether Mr. Weber can safely "lay this flattering unction to
his soul"; and we shall therefore give such a sketch of the poet's life,
as an attentive examination of his writings has enabled us to
compile....

Reversing the observation of Dryden on Shakespeare, it may be said of
Ford that "he wrote laboriously, not luckily": always elegant, often
elevated, never sublime, he accomplished by patient and careful industry
what Shakespeare and Fletcher produced by the spontaneous exuberance of
native genius. He seems to have acquired early in life, and to have
retained to the last a softness of versification peculiar to himself.
Without the majestic march of verse which distinguishes the poetry of
Massinger, and with none of that playful gaiety which characterises the
dialogue of Fletcher, he is still easy and harmonious. There is,
however, a monotony in his poetry, which those who have perused his
scenes long together must have inevitably perceived. His dialogue is
declamatory and formal, and wants that quick chace of replication and
rejoinder so necessary to effect in representation. If we could put out
of our remembrance the singular merits of "The Lady's Trial," we should
consider the genius of Ford as altogether inclined to tragedy; and even
there so large a proportion of the pathetic pervades the drama, that it
requires the "humours" of Guzman and Fulgoso, in addition to a happy
catastrophe, to warrant the name of comedy. In the plots of his
tragedies Ford is far from judicious; they are for the most part too
full of the hor