defects. It is unequal. Some of it is imitative of the classics, and much of it is heavy and gloomy. But in his lighter moods his touch is exquisite, his lyrical genius enchanting. His elegies are perhaps as fine as any in the language; and his wide and profound learning give to his dramatic productions a classical elegance often lacking in those of his contemporaries. Austin and Ralph very justly call attention to the fact that Ben Jonson is no exception to the rule that clear and strong utterance is one of the chief characteristics of genius, and that great poets have been good prose writers. "The destruction of his prose manuscripts is to be much regretted; what are left show erudite criticism and severity of judgment. Notes on books and on life written in a concise and pregnant style remind us of Bacon's Essays."

Ben Jonson's life was one of desperate struggle and of many sorrows as well as glorious success. He was of noble family, his grandfather having been a man of rank and fortune in the service of Henry VIII. His father, however, suffered persecution in the reign of Bloody Mary, and it was only at her death that he was liberated from prison. He took orders soon after the accession of Elizabeth, but death came to him just a month before the birth of his famous son.

Little is known of Ben's childhood, except that he was brave and courageous at school, a good student, a good fighter, a good hater, as well as an ardent lover. How well he loved his teacher at Westminster school where his boyhood was passed is shown by the famous dedication of his works to the great Camden.

But

The youth of the poet was full of vicissitude. Disdaining bricklaying, a trade thrust upon him probably by his stepfather, he entered Cambridge at the age of sixteen. But he soon found his means totally inadequate to his remaining at the university, and so he volunteered into the army. He performed many heroic deeds in the Low Countries; once engaging in single combat, when he slew his opponent, seized his arms, and carried them away in full view of both armies. This achievement at the age of eighteen was no ignoble one. the trade of arms as well as that of the artisan failed to satisfy the restless temperament of Ben Jonson. He returned to England and found an outlet for his intellectual energy as well as a means of support, upon the stage. He appeared first in a small playhouse called the Green Curtain. At the outset of his career, however, a misfortune overwhelmed him which coloured all his future life. A quarrel with a fellow-actor resulted in a duel, in which Ben Jonson killed his opponent. Overcome with remorse for the deed, and himself wounded painfully, he was thrown into prison and, as he says, brought near to the

gallows. The prisons of that time were sorry places; Jonson suffered acutely both in body and in spirit. It is hinted by some of his biographers that during this period of suffering no solace was offered him from the clergymen of his own church. Popish priests, however, sought him out and under their influence the forlorn youth forsook the faith for which his father had undergone such cruel persecution. Years after, Jonson returned to the church his father had loved so well. Both apostasy and reconversion were undoubtedly sincere, and whatever sins and errors stained the life-record of this headstrong, impetuous thinker, he never gave up his faith in God. Though Jonson has won his fame principally as a dramatist, he wrote many beautiful religious poems, which reveal a thoughtful, sincere, and devoted spirit.

Released at length from prison, Jonson reassumed the profession of the stage, and at the age of twenty, with no settled income, he showed his impulsive disposition by plunging into matrimony. The woman he married had domestic tastes and was brave and courageous in enduring the privations of their early life together. A hard time they had of it too. At first Jonson was very poor and quite unknown; then, as his genius found recognition and he was rewarded with court honours, he, who was always careless in the use of money, became recklessly extravagant. The poor wife could never have had either a very happy or serene life. That for five years she lived apart from her husband is not surprising. Yet Jonson's heart was tender and affectionate and he was a loving father.

Jonson was never a good actor, and at first his principal occupation was recasting old plays. But by the writing of his drama, "Every Man in his Humour," he placed himself among the great dramatists of his time. He showed that he had found his true life-work, and from the commencement of the new century he had a succession of triumphs.

Jonson's great strength was comedy, but he wrote two tragedies which were full of power and dignity. His comedies show versatility, breadth of treatment, and overflowing wit. His wide knowledge of life led him to analyse many base and contemptible passions, and yet he sought to elevate his readers, and his efforts to instruct as well as to elevate led him often to be accused of pedantry.

Jonson's high rank in the world of letters rests not only upon his dramas, but upon those masques which were so popular among the courtiers of James I. In his plays he does not show the creative strength or the imaginative insight of Shakespeare. His personages have not the living, vital force nor the finer and more subtle distinctions of character. To use his own phrase, he often delineated humours rather than persons.

This analysis of minute eccentricities and of striking whims and propensities makes Ben Jonson's personages often too abstract-types rather than individuals. The accentuation of one dominant passion is impressive and original, but it is not natural. In many plays Jonson satirised the vices and affectations of the time. He wished honestly enough to reform his age, and unlike Dryden he pandered to no prevailing taste; he spoke out his convictions fearlessly—careless whether he won worldly advancement or general scorn. His language of invective is sharp, nervous, and forcible-in all his work there is a mighty egotism as well as a mighty and manly strength. The man's individuality is all pervasive.

It is in his lovely masques that the true poetic genius of Ben Jonson is most apparent. Seldom tender or pathetic in his plays, he is both in the masques, and they have, also, a lyrical charm most entrancing.

Jonson's days were spent in laborious study, winning distinction for his great learning, and his nights were usually spent in the indulgence of his convivial habits at the Mermaid Club. This club, made up of the most famous wits and poets, was of course frequented by Shakespeare, Selden, Raleigh, Beaumont, Fletcher, and the rest. Many a good time must these friends have had together.

Keats, whose genius was in such thorough sympathy with these old Elizabethans, wrote:

Ben Jonson's ardent, tempestuous nature exposed him to many rude shocks of fate: he had many bitter quarrels with his fellow-dramatists, but he many times showed fine qualities of magnanimity and justice, and he was often forgiving.

About the time of Shakespeare's death Jonson brought out a complete edition of his own plays, and James I. honoured him by conferring upon him a pension and the office of poet to his court. Soon after this he travelled both in Scotland and on the Continent, meeting many notable people and winning everywhere both friends and enemies. At the death of the king in 1625, Jonson began to suffer a decline in court favour. His

extravagance had been so great that in spite of his pension and the many costly gifts from friends at court, he was always in want, and his drinking habits brought with them their inevitable punishment-disease and suffering.

Charles I. had been five years on the throne before he paid much attention to his father's favourite poet. But when Jonson appealed to him for help, he quickly responded with a large gift. Then, desirous of paying some tribute to literature, and to confer distinction upon his own reign, he made the Laureateship permanent-an office founded upon letters patent, with an annual salary of a hundred pounds; and in deference to Jonson's well-known tastes, he added to this salary a butt of Canary wine. The laureate was so fond of this particular wine that his boon companions often called him the canary bird. Suckling, in his famous burlesque, "The Session of the Poets," where he represents the foremost wits of the day as having a contest for the laurel, says:

"The first that broke silence was good old Ben,

Prepared with Canary wine,

And he told them plainly he deserved the bays."

This preparation with Canary wine, not to mention stronger potations, had altered Jonson's personal appearance greatly. Thin and pale in youth, he soon became stout, his face flushed and unattractive. A lady of the court described him once to someone who had likened him to the poet Horace: "That same Horace of yours has a most ungodly face, by my fan! It looks for all the world like a russet apple when 'tis bruised.” And, though we must take with a liberal dose of salt all that Drummond said of his guest, Drummond said that drink was the element in which Ben Jonson lived.

Jonson's last days were sad and lonely. His wife and all his children had long since died; palsy had attacked him; he was poor and weak, and in great suffering. And yet all his finest poetic qualities united in the production of his pastoral play, The Sad Shepherd, or The Tale of Robin Hood." We can trace echoes of this exquisite poem in many of the lyrics of our own time. But death came to Ben Jonson before he could finish this beautiful swan song.

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In the Poet's Corner of the great Abbey he was laid, and to the kind act of a stranger we owe that unique and wonderful epitaph: O rare Ben Jonson!"

SELECTIONS FROM JONSON.

TO CELIA.

(From

"The Forest.")

DRINK to me only with thine eyes,

And I will pledge with mine;

Or leave a kiss within the cup,

And I'll not look for wine.

The thirst that from the soul doth rise,
Doth ask a drink divine:

But might I of Jove's nectar sup,
I would not change for thine.
I sent thee late a rosy wreath,
Not so much honouring thee,
As giving it a hope, that there
It could not withered be.

But thou thereon did'st only breathe,
And send'st it back to me:

Since when it grows, and smells, I swear,
Not of itself, but thee.

ON TRUTH.

TRUTH is the trial of itself,
And needs no other touch,
And purer than the purest gold
Refine it ne'er so much.

It is the life and light of love,
The sun that ever shineth,
And spirit of that special grace,
That faith and love defineth.

It is the warrant of the word,

That yields a scent so sweet,
As gives a power to faith to tread
All falsehood under feet.