ture, is in general peculiarly happy: the passage which I have just quoted is an instance of this, and that which follows is still more striking : "1. Of all the Flowers, methinks the Rose is best. 2. Why, gentle Madam? 1. It is the very emblem of a maid; For when the west wind courts her gently, How modestly she blows, and paints the Sun With her chaste blushes! When the north wind comes near her, Rude and impatient, then, lil Chastity, She locks her beauties in her bud again, Shakspeare is reported to have joined in the composition of the "Two Noble Kinsmen," from which this passage is taken; and from the extreme beauty and delicacy of the simile, I am half inclined to ascribe it to him. Again, how exqui sitely simple and natural is the following image: "Though I have lost my fortune, and lost you, For a worthy Father, yet I will not lose My former virtue; my integrity Shall not forsake me: But, as the wild ivy Of tower, or defaced temple, than it does Make my adversity my instrument To wind me up into a full content." The public are much better acquainted with the writings of Massinger than with those of most of his contemporaries: for which distinction he is mainly indebted to the admirable manner in which he has been edited by Mr. Gifford, and to the circumstance of some of his Plays having been illustrated on the Stage by the talents of a popular Actor. I cannot, however, quite agree with Mr. Gifford, when he ranks this Author immediately after Shakspeare. He certainly yields in versatility of talent to Beaumont and Fletcher, whose Comic genius was very great; and in feeling and nature, I by no means think his Tragedies equal to their's, or to Ford's, or Webster's. Massinger excelled in working up a single scene forcibly and effectively, rather than in managing his plots skilfully, or in delineating characters faithfully, and naturally. His catastrophes are sometimes brought about in a very improbable and unnatural manner; as in the "Bondman," where the Insurrection of the slaves is quelled by their masters merely shaking their whips at them; and in "A new Way to pay old Debts," where Overreach, about to murder his daughter, suddenly drops his weapon, and says, "Some undone Widow sits upon my arm, and takes away the use of 't." I am aware that the first incident is said to be an historical fact; but even if it be so, it is not a probable and effective incident in a Drama. "Le vrai n'est pas toujours le vraisemblable." His characters are certainly drawn with amazing power, especially those in which the blacker passions are depicted; but they are generally out of nature. At least he wanted the art of shading his pictures: he gives us nothing but the bold, prominent features; we miss all the delicate tints of the back ground. With all these drawbacks, the genius of Massinger is unquestionably great. The sweetness and purity of his style, was not surpassed even in his own days. His choice and management of imagery is generally very happy; excepting that he is apt to pursue a favourite idea too long. His descriptive powers were also very considerable, the clearness and distinctness with which he places objects before our eyes, might furnish models for a Painter. In single scenes too, as I before observed, his genius is great and original. The battle between the Father and Son in the "Unnatural Combat," and the dreadful parley which precedes it, are as powerfully expressed, as they are imagined. Indeed, the genius of Massinger is, perhaps, more conspicuous in this Play, with all it's faults, than in any other. The character of Old Malefort, although possessing all the defects which I have pointed out, is a masterly delineation, and ably sustained. Like Ford's Giovanni, he is the victim of a guilty passion; but instead of an enthusiastic, romantic, and accomplished scholar, we have here a veteran warrior, and the perpetrator of many crimes. The flash of lightning by which he is destroyed is another of Massinger's violent catastrophes; but such a catastrophe is finer and more effective in this Play than in some others, as it seems to harmonise with the tremendous tone of the whole picture. I have not space to enter into a detailed review of the merits of the rest of Shakspeare's contemporaries. Jonson, Beaumont and Fletcher, and Massinger, have perhaps, fewer faults than most of them; but there are others by whose excellencies they are rivalled, and even surpasssed. Ford is the Poet of domestic life; the lord and ruler of our sighs and tears. No where, not even in the pages of Shakspeare himself, is there to be found any thing more deeply pathetic, or more intensely affecting, than some scenes in the "Broken Heart," and the "Brother and Sister." But his "web is of a mingled yarn." He delighted too much in violent situations, and shocking catastrophes; and his style is too bald and unornamented. He cannot shower the sweet flowers of fancy over the grave, and hide the horrors of his scenes of blood under the bewitching mantle of Poetry. This is the grand secret with which Shakspeare was so well acquainted. We weep and tremble over the scenes of Ford; but we feel a disinclination to take up the volume again, and undergo the same harrowing and unmitigated sensations. In Shakspeare, though we tremble as we read, we still cling to his pages with thrilling interest and unabated delight, and recur to them with feelings of increased admiration. The same objections will apply to the Dramas of Webster; but his fancy had a far bolder wing than that of Ford, and he, therefore, in that particular, approaches near to the standard of Shakspeare. This Author, with whose name few persons are probably very familiar, enjoyed a great and a deserved reputation among his contemporaries, and will, doubtless, yet emerge from the temporary oblivion in which the forgetful generations who succeeded him have allowed him to sink. Ford, of whom I have just been speaking, says,— "Crown him a Poet, whom nor Greece nor Rome and Middleton, another distinguished Dramatic |