(for there is a state of manners
conceivable so pure, that the language of Hamlet at Ophelia's feet might
be a harmless rallying, or playful teazing, of a shame that would exist in
Paradise)--at the worst, how diverse in kind is it from Beaumont and
Fletcher's! In Shakespeare it is the mere generalities of sex, mere words
for the most part, seldom or never distinct images, all head-work, and
fancy drolleries; there is no sensation supposed in the speaker. I need
not proceed to contrast this with B. and F.

"Rollo."

This, perhaps, the most energetic of Fletcher's tragedies. He evidently
aimed at a new Richard III. in Rollo;--but, as in all his other imitations
of Shakespeare, he was not philosopher enough to bottom his original.
Thus, in Rollo, he has produced a mere personification of outrageous
wickedness, with no fundamental characteristic impulses to make either the
tyrant's words or actions philosophically intelligible. Hence the most
pathetic situations border on the horrible, and what he meant for the
terrible, is either hateful, {~GREEK SMALL LETTER TAU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON WITH VARIA~} {~GREEK SMALL LETTER MU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER IOTA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER SIGMA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ETA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER TAU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON WITH VARIA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER NU~}, or ludicrous. The scene of
Baldwin's sentence in the third act is probably the grandest working of
passion in all B. and F.'s dramas;--but the very magnificence of filial
affection given to Edith, in this noble scene, renders the after scene (in
imitation of one of the least Shakespearian of all Shakespeare's works, if
it be his, the scene between Richard and Lady Anne) in which Edith is
yielding to a few words and tears, not only unnatural, but disgusting. In
Shakespeare, Lady Anne is described as a weak, vain, very woman
throughout.

Act i. sc. 1.--

"_Gis._ He is indeed the perfect character
Of a good man, and so his actions speak him."

This character of Aubrey, and the whole spirit of this and several other
plays of the same authors, are interesting as traits of the morals which
it was fashionable to teach in the reigns of James I. and his successor,
who died a martyr to them. Stage, pulpit, law, fashion,--all conspired to
enslave the realm. Massinger's plays breathe the opposite spirit;
Shakespeare's the spirit of wisdom which is for all ages. By the by, the
Spanish dramatists--Calderon, in particular,--had