against lust, greed, and motiveless cruelty. When we
rise from the play it is not with a sense that we have moved amongst
base creatures. Lorenzo repels us; but it is Hieronimo who dominates the
stage, filling us with pity for his wrongs and weakness. The
supernatural remains outside nature, crude, as all stage
representations of it must be, but unobtrusive (and, in the prologue,
at least, thoroughly dignified), serving a useful purpose in keeping
before us the imminence of Nemesis biding its appointed hour. It is not
easy to suggest how better an insistence upon this lofty _motif_ could
have been maintained.

If we now revert to our former statement of the essential elements of a
successful tragedy we find that each has been included and lifted to a
high level in Kyd's masterpiece. The catastrophe is not only
overwhelming but greatly just. The figure of Hieronimo has set a new
standard in characterization. Scene after scene stamps itself on our
memory. And the procrastinating evolution of the plot keeps us in fear,
in hope, in uncertainty to the last. If this estimate of the greatness
of the play seems exaggerated, we may fairly ask what other tragedy,
before its date, combines all four qualities in the same degree of
excellence. _Doctor Faustus_ and _The Jew of Malta_ contain far more
wonderful verse, and the former holds within it grander material for
tragedy, but as an example of tragic craftmanship _The Spanish Tragedy_
is inferior to neither. It can be shown that both suffer very seriously
from the neglect of one or more of the four essentials which we have
named.

It is only fair to the reader to add that entirely opposite views to
those set forth above have been expressed by other writers. Perhaps the
most slashing criticism of the play is that by Mr. Courthope.[64]

It remains to illustrate Kyd's verse. In _The Spanish Tragedy_ it still
clings to the occasional use of rhyme, as in _Jeronimo_. Moreover it is
becoming, if anything, more restrained, less spontaneously natural. The
weight of tragedy seems to oppress the poetic inspiration, so that it
rarely ventures outside the limits of melancholy dignity or regulated
passion. Kyd's formalism is, unfortunately for him, magnified by its
contrast with the superb freedom of the interpolated passages. If we
resolutely shut our eyes to these patches of fierce irregularity, we
shall be better able to criticize the author's own work by the standard
of his contemporar