Preface (continued 3)

For sheer vitality and strength three of the plays stand out conspicuously: The Bondman, The Renegado, and The Guardian. Though they are disfigured by one or two coarse scenes, one is carried along in reading them as if one were in a sailing-boat, dancing along a fresh sea. Of The Bondman Monck Mason says: “I don't recollect any play whatsoever that begins or ends in a manner so pleasing, uncommon, and striking.” It contains four well-drawn characters—Timoleon, Marullo, Leosthenes, and Cleora. The plot is lively, though some critics, I think unjustly, have accused the author of cutting the knot in the fifth act. The disguised brother and sister who meet in Act III., I should perhaps indicate their relationship. Timandra does not explicitly mention her brother till V., 1, 64. A reference earlier in the play to the wrong which Leosthenes had done her would certainly make for clearness. There is much fine eloquence in the play. The one or two offensive comic scenes are not essential to the plot.

The Renegado has an Oriental setting, which alone would make it attractive on the stage. The character of Donusa is on the grand scale, one of Massinger's successes; the Merchant, the Jesuit, and Grimaldi are all well drawn. There is some fine oratory and a good plot, which works up to an exciting end. There is not much in the comic line of value here.

The plot of The Guardian is more complicated than is usual with Massinger. It contains some charming banditti scenes, while Alphonso's fictitious narrative in the last act is one of the strongest pieces of writing in our author. The guardian, Durazzo, the kind-hearted but cynical and quick-tempered old man of the world, is one of Massinger's most successful creations. On the other hand, it will be allowed that there is too much concession in The Guardian to a corrupt taste, due perhaps to poverty [pg 135] and the depression of failure. The character of Iolante is unattractive; her intrigue with a man who turns out to be her brother is odious; her repentance is cheap and unconvincing. The earlier part of the play in its movement and morals alike reminds us of Fletcher.

The Picture is full of power, and enriched with some good strokes of satire; the alternations of mood in the chief characters are represented with skill, while the magic portrait on which the plot hinges seems to take a natural place in the story. There is, however, a crudeness and hardness of texture about the play, though Mathias and Sophia are well drawn, especially the latter. Everything comes right at the last, and true love is vindicated after the display of some proper pride; but one feels that the three venture their honour too far. “He comes too near who comes to be denied.” The King's faults are overdrawn; the Queen very nearly spoils the play; the young courtiers, though realistic, are unpleasant; the comic element is poor and farcical.482 In dealing with a psychological theme, Massinger was trying to adjust to the hard-and-fast concrete outlines of the drama a story which would have been easier to manage and more attractive to read if it had been cast in the form of a novel. There would then have been possible gradations of light and shade, which would have made the treatment less bald. It would have supplied Richardson with a problem worthy of his heart-breaking and long-drawn analysis.

The Duke of Milan is a gloomy play, with a somewhat intricate plot, presenting to us that strange “Italianate”483 world of treachery and poison with which Webster, Ford, and Tourneur make us familiar. We must remember, on the other hand, that Italy gives an atmosphere which [pg 136] domestic plays like The Yorkshire Tragedy and Arden of Feversham lack. As in The Bondman and The Unnatural Combat, the plot is developed late, though hints are given before. Thus, the ill-treated sister is early referred to,484 while the last words of the same act prepare us for Francisco's villainy. The finest scene in the play is Act III., 1, which is bathed in the romantic atmosphere so congenial to our author. Sforza submits to his enemy, the Emperor Charles, without forfeiting our esteem, while the Emperor shows a noble magnanimity. There is a subdued comic element in the person of Graccho, the musician.

The Duke of Milan is carefully written485 and skilfully constructed; the author has taken great pains to draw the characters of Sforza and Marcelia, though Francisco is perhaps more successful than either.486 The Duke's last words are the clue to his character:

I come: Death, I obey thee!

Yet I will not die raging; for alas!

My whole life was a frenzy: good Eugenia,

In death forgive me.487

The chief “frenzy” of his life was his devotion to his wife Marcelia. This peerless beauty combines pride488 with a kindly simplicity which is no match for Francisco; while she dearly loves her husband and forgives him in her last words, she is not altogether attractive. On the other hand, her anger with Sforza for leaving orders that she should be killed if he did not return safe from his [pg 137] hazardous enterprise is natural, and the scene in which she receives him coldly and provokes his violent anger would be effective when acted.489 We are inevitably reminded of Othello, and the comparison is most instructive as revealing the great gap which separates the pupil from the master. Marcelia is not so gracious as Desdemona, nor Sforza so strong as Othello, nor Francisco so devilish as Iago. As is usually the case with Massinger, the fifth act carries along our interest to the end. We do not weep, but we are certainly moved by the horror of the Duke's death. The princesses of the Ducal House are responsible for an improbable scene490 when they flout Marcelia in the absence of her lord. Their behaviour reminds us of the ladies in The Roman Actor. In style The Duke of Milan is marked by several passages of fine poetry and a comparative absence of the parenthetic construction.

The Fatal Dowry is a famous and much-admired play, adapted by Nicholas Rowe in the eighteenth century to form the basis of his Fair Penitent.491 There are some fine scenes here, notably the funeral, which is as effective as anything our poet has written. On the other hand, the scene in which Rochfort is robed and blindfolded, and [pg 138] assents to his daughter's death, recalls Fletcher in its improbability; nor is it likely that Beaumelle would marry Charalois at such short notice. All we can say about this is that hurried weddings are one of the presuppositions of the Jacobean drama.492 There are an heroic atmosphere, a fine friendship, and much rhetoric of a high order in The Fatal Dowry. Moreover, as the moral lines at the end point out, there is the clash of law and natural vengeance in this play, which is a legitimate source of dramatic power. Charalois, Romont, Malotin, and Pontalier are all well drawn: the “sweet and gentle nature” of Charalois is particularly attractive, though he is not incapable of passionate anger,493 which makes the punishment he inflicts on his guilty wife in IV., 4 more credible. On the other hand, a story is at a disadvantage in which the father, though generous and dignified, is impulsive and quixotic, the heroine is worthless, and her lover contemptible.494 The style in places is less lucid than usual, which may be due to the co-operation of Field; moreover, the metre is more halting than Massinger's is wont to be, and I think it probable that the play has been carelessly printed. There is much spirited sarcasm in Act III., and some fun in Act IV.495

The Unnatural Combat is full of splendid rhetoric; indeed, there are perhaps too many soliloquies. This early work is grim as an iron-bound coast; yet the affairs of the honest, brave, and poverty-stricken captain, Belgarde, provide a lighter element, and the moralizing of the pert page in III., 2 is both sensible and light-handed in execution. The reason for the son's antipathy to his father is hinted at from time to time in the first act; its disclosure is postponed too late. We should [pg 139] also have been prepared for the wrongs and treachery of Montreville, which burst upon us too suddenly in the last act. The evil passion of Malefort is powerfully depicted; here, again, we have a careful study of conflicting emotions. Though he struggles against his evil desires, we feel that a bad man must come to a bad end.496 The play would have been better rounded off if in the initial part some indication had been given that he seemed to everyone a man whose mind, for some mysterious reason, was unbalanced and unhinged.497 Once allow that such a theme can be tolerable as that which we have here, and the hints which Montreville drops from time to time are adequate to stir the suspicion of the spectator.

The style is more like rhythmical prose than that of any other of Massinger's plays. Here alone in our author do children occur, and that in an unpleasing context.498 The ghosts of Malefort's victims, which appear in the last scene, seem to me a legitimate and powerful episode. It was natural to compare this violent play with Chapman's tragedies; Malefort reminding us of Bussy d'Ambois and Byron; but there is little in common between the two authors. In the first place, Massinger knows how to construct a play; in the second place, there is hardly a line in The Unnatural Combat which is obscure, whereas in the last act of Bussy d'Ambois, Chapman's masterpiece, there is hardly a line which is intelligible.

The Parliament of Love contains much fine poetry499 and one great forensic scene, such as our author loves.500 It is, however, in too fragmentary a state for us to judge [pg 140] it fairly.501 The atmosphere is unreal, the interest flags, the boisterous comedy is unattractive. There are more women than is usual in Massinger, and duelling and friendship inspire two noble scenes (III., 2; IV., 2). Though vice is humbled, we ask here, as in The Picture, does virtue gain by the way in which its opposite is portrayed? And are not the characters, male and female alike, undiscriminated? The interest, in other words, is concentrated in the triple story, and doubtless we feel some satisfaction in the punishment of Clarindore, the betrayer of secrets.502 There are a good many half-lines in the manner of Fletcher.

Though Believe as You List503 is full of dignity and poetry, it has a plot without much nexus, of the sort which Aristotle would blame as ἐπεισοδιώδης.504 We are wafted from Carthage to Bithynia, from Bithynia to Lusitania, from Lusitania to Sicily. Though Antiochus is truly a king even in his misfortunes, and excites our respect and compassion, the play can hardly have been a success. The melancholy tinge is too uniform; the improbabilities of the recognitions are too glaring. The Courtesan and Berecinthius cannot be said to have added to the gaiety of nations; of the other characters Flaminius alone has individuality. The peculiar circumstances under which the play was written may help to explain the fiasco.

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The Old Law does not owe much to Massinger. As it was a favourite play, it may have owed its association with his name to revision on his part.505 There is a charming tenderness in places and a rollicking improbability about the whole scheme, both alien to the staid Massinger. The humour is not his, but better; his phraseology is markedly absent;506 the prose scenes show another conception [pg 142] of art; the careless metre suggests Rowley. It is clear that whoever wrote the comic parts of The Old Law was responsible for Chough, Trimtram, and the Roarers in A Fair Quarrel. The scene is laid in “Epire,” a region which seems to have been regarded by our ancestors as a place for strange things to happen, and a vague background like the city of Callipolis;507 it seems to have the same character in the present day. A King of “Epire” figures among Diocletian's court in The Virgin Martyr, and in The Dumb Knight508 we find a Duke of Epire. The classical allusions and Latin phrases suggest that the author of The Old Law was a man of some culture.

My task is now ended. I shall consider myself happy if I persuade some of my readers to make the acquaintance of Massinger's plays.509 We have lately been celebrating the tercentenary of Shakspere's death. The best way of honouring a great author is to read his writings; but to appreciate aright the greatness of Shakspere we should be wise to combine with our study a just estimate of his contemporaries and satellites; and, of the many dramatists of that century, none seem to me more worthy of affectionate consideration than Philip Massinger. It is especially instructive to return to his writings from the perusal of the masterpieces of his contemporaries; though from time to time they display rich gifts of pathos, poetry, and humour, they are too often marred by waywardness, unnaturalness, want of proportion, and grossness; it is a relief to resume the study of an author whose work is sober, well balanced, dignified, and lucid. While he shares with them the modern atmosphere of romance and adventure, he is the most Greek of his generation; and this is the real secret of his abiding charm. The [pg 143] passionate, the abnormal, the lurid, the farcical elements, in which his contemporaries revel, are not, indeed, entirely absent, but they are less conspicuous; the luxuriance of the thicket does not hinder the wayfarer from following the path; we pluck the roses without tearing our flesh on the thorns; and as we contemplate the marble splendour of his verse we almost forget that sculpture has its limitations.

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