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For this degradation of Shakspeare, Mr. Chalmers received the merited chastisement of the "British Critic;"* but in the "Supplemental Apology" he returns to the charge, and thinks he proves the fact of Shakspeare's common-place collections in the following quotation:

"I will repeat what I have already said, and prove what is plainly demonstrable; viz. that Shakspeare was a diligent reader, and copious collector. The contemporary of Shakspeare, Webster, who knew him perfectly, says, in the preface to the "White Devil," what the commentators, and critics, would do well to profit by: Detraction is the sworn friend to ignorance.‡ For mine own part, I have ever truly cherished my good opinion of other men's worthy labours, especially of that free and heightened style of Master Chapman: the laboured and understanding works of Master Jonson: the no less worthy composures of the both worthily excellent Master Beaumont, and Master Fletcher: and, lastly,

* Vol. ix. page 512. 1797.

To the reader of his "Vittoria Corombona," 4to. 1612Webster obtained his freedom of the Merchant Taylors' Company, by servitude to Henry Clinkard, the 17th Nov. 1617, as I am informed by G. V. Neunburg, Esq. the present master of that company. O. G.

We may say to Mr. Chalmers-Medice, cura teipsum!

(without wrong last to be named,) the right happie and copious industrie of M. Shakspeare, M. Dekker, and M. Heywood; wishing what I write may be read by their light."

Such is Webster's declaration; and if Mr. Chalmers infers Shakspeare's use of a commonplace-book from this passage, he deceives nobody but himself: the meaning of Webster's copious industrie is sufficiently explained by the company in which he has placed Shakspeare; namely, with Dekker and Heywood. The former had before 1612, according to the apologist's own arrangement, produced thirty-one dramas; Dekker, a still greater number, jointly and separately, including those entered in Henslowe's MSS.; Heywood, or as Mr. Chalmers emphatically calls him, much-writing Heywood," perhaps, even more:* can Mr. Chalmers produce an example of contemporaneous industry equally copious?—It is pleasant to hear Mr. Chalmers talk of "such scribblers as Dekker and Heywood!" Assuming the fact of Shakspeare's being a "copious collector of common

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* Thomas Heywood was a writer for the stage as early as 1596; and, in an address to the reader, prefixed to "The English Traveller," 4to. 1633, he says he had written, either in part or the whole, no less than two hundred and twenty dramatic pieces.

age,

place scraps," the apologist confidently demands, "Now, what dramatic poet, in that grew to a little wealth and credit in the scene, except Shakspeare?" Not construing wealth and credit in the scene to mean literally money, I think it hardly necessary to point out to Mr. Chalmers, amidst the great constellation of wits that adorned the age in which Shakspeare flourished, and among which he shone the brightest, an instance of a poet gaining credit in the scene. If Mr. Chalmers's memory will not serve him on this occasion, why, "God comfort his capacity, I say," with goodman Dull. The open and avowed quarrel of Jonson with Dekker might have suggested the probability of its being levelled at him, and have incited inquiry into the resemblance from internal evidence; but the truth is, Mr. Chalmers had not read "The Poetaster" of Ben, or he would have found in the prologue to that satire, that Dekker was the poet-ape of Jonson; and a perusal of the drama would have confirmed the fact past question. The epigram in question seems to have irritated Crispinus

* Are there no players here? no poet-apes,

That come with basilisk's eyes, whose forked tongues
Are steeped in venom, as their hearts in gall?

Prologue to Jonson's Poetaster.

not a little numberless allusions to epigrams, made by Jonson on Dekker, occur in the Satiromastix of the latter, and he appears to have smarted severely under the lash. To put that on "poet-ape" completely out of doubt, as far as concerns Shakspeare, it is only necessary, once for all, to observe, that so severely was Dekker stung by this very epigram, that he could not conceal the pain which it inflicted; and the last speech of Crispinus in Satiromastix thus manifests the poet's throes from these unfortunate lines:

That fearful wreath, this honour is your due,
All poets shall be poet-apes but you.

As in all his other charges against Ben, Mr. Chalmers is merely an echo of preceding commentators, and as he evidently made a strenuous effort at originality on the present occasion, it is not without emotions of pity that I rescue the old bard from the well-intended blow of "the leaden mace."

When Dekker published his "Satiromastix," Jonson was new to the stage, and had few claims to the applause of the theatre: when he had produced his 66 Volpone," "The Silent Woman," and, above all, "The Alchemist," perhaps Dekker would not have thought him an object for scorn to point his finger at. These, with his

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beautiful masques, some of his smaller poems, and even the scintillations sparkling" through Cynthia's Revels," Every Man in his Humour," and "Every Man out of his Humour," might have demanded a smile of favour, or at least have conciliated the repulsive disposition of the apologist :-but Mr. Chalmers has no sympathy with "humorous poets"-τα ὑπερ ἡμας, εδεν

προς ήμας.

My task draws to a close; and the cause is before a competent tribunal.-Jonson has been accused of heavy crimes upon fictitious and imaginary foundations. How hard it is to prove a negative need not be shown: but the testimony in his favour does not rest here we have incontrovertible evidences of their friendly attachment; to which should be added the uncommon zeal, with which Jonson cherished the literary reliques of his friend. We have seen that he composed an elegy on his death; that he inscribed his resemblance with his praise; and Mr. Malone thinks that he wrote the preface to the first collection of his works. Nor did time diminish Jonson's regard, or efface the remembrance of his companion from his mind. Many years after Shakspeare's death, Ben with warmth exclaimed, "I loved the man, and do honour his memory on this side idolatry as much as

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