nocking his villains on the head--a practice in which he,
like his contemporaries, indulges with only too much complacency. The
idea which underlies most of his plays is a struggle of virtue assailed
by external or inward temptations. He is interested by the ethical
problems introduced in the play of conflicting passions, and never more
eloquent than in uttering the emotions of militant or triumphant virtue.
His view of life, indeed, is not only grave, but has a distinct
religious colouring. From various indications, it is probable that he
was a Roman Catholic. Some of these are grotesque enough. The
'Renegado,' for example, not only shows that Massinger was, for dramatic
purposes at least, an ardent believer in baptismal regeneration, but
includes--what one would scarcely have sought in such a place--a
discussion as to the validity of lay-baptism. The first of his surviving
plays, the 'Virgin Martyr' (in which he was assisted by Dekker), is
simply a dramatic version of an ecclesiastical legend. Though it seems
to have been popular at the time, the modern reader will probably think
that, in this case at least, the religious element is a little out of
place. An angel and a devil take an active part in the performance;
miracles are worked on the stage; the unbelievers are so shockingly
wicked, and the Christians so obtrusively good, that we--the
worldly-minded--are sensible of a little recalcitration, unless we are
disarmed by the simplicity of the whole performance. Religious tracts of
all ages and in all forms are apt to produce this ambiguous effect.
Unless we are quite in harmony with their assumptions, we feel that they
deal too much in conventional rose-colour. The angelic and diabolic
elements are not so clearly discriminated in this world, and should show
themselves less unequivocally on the stage, which ought to be its
mirror. Such art was not congenial to the English atmosphere; it might
be suitable in Madrid; but when forcibly transplanted to the London
stage, we feel that the performance has not the simple earnestness by
which alone it can be justified. The sentiment has a certain unreality,
and the _naivete_ suggests affectation. The implied belief is got up for
the moment and has a hollow ring. And therefore, the whole work, in
spite of some eloquence, is nothing better than a curiosity, as an
attempt at the assimilation of a heterogeneous form of art.

A similar vein of sentiment, though not showing itself i