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 BEN JONSON AND 
 
 THE CLASSICAL SCHOOL 
 
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 i FELIX E. SCHELLING 
 
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BEN JONSON AND THE CLASSICAL SCHOOL. 
 
 " The words, classical and romantic, although, like many 
 other critical expressions, sometimes abused by those who 
 have understood them vaguely or too absolutely, yet define 
 two real tendencies in the history of art and literature. * * * 
 The ' classic ' comes to us out of the cool and quiet of other 
 times, as the measure of what a long experience has shown 
 will at least never displease us. And in the classical literature 
 of Greece and Rome, as in the classics of the last century, the 
 essentially classical element is that quality of order in beauty, 
 which they possess, indeed, to a pre-eminent degree. * * * 
 It is the addition of strangeness to beauty, that constitutes 
 the romantic character in art ; and the desire of beauty 
 being a fixed element in every artistic organisation, it is the 
 addition of curiosity to this desire of beauty that constitutes 
 the romantic temper." ^ 
 
 These are the words of that rare interpreter of the " House 
 Beautiful," the late Mr. Walter Pater, and may serve us as a 
 fitting position whence to depart in a search for the origin of 
 some of those elements which combined to produce the many 
 and noteworthy changes that came over English literature 
 during the seventeenth century. 
 
 Without entering here into definitions and distinctions 
 which have been much aired and not a little abused, it is 
 well to notice that these terms are not necessarily hostile 
 to each other or even mutually exclusive. Classicism and 
 Romanticism are tendencies rather than opposed methods in 
 art. Literature has always partaken of both, although one 
 may dominate in one age, the other in another. It may be 
 surmised that in the ebb and flow of these elements consists 
 the life of literature, and that in the absolute triumph of either 
 lies its destruction : for death may come to art no less from 
 
 ^ Walter Pater, Appreciations, "Postscript," p. 253 f. 
 
2 FELIX E. SCHELLING. 
 
 freedom run to licence than from the riveted fetters of abso- 
 lute convention. In a sense every 'classic' has once contained 
 within it the ' romantic/ has once moved by its novelty and 
 appealed to curiosity. If the romantic temper is more con- 
 cerned with the choice of subject, as has sometimes been 
 affirmed, there may be even a finer art in novelty of treat- 
 ment ; nor may novelty be denied although it consist but in 
 the change from romantic excesses grown common and hence 
 distasteful. Be this as it may, the classic temper studies the 
 past, the romantic temper neglects it. The romantic temper 
 is empirical; in its successful experiments it leads us forward, 
 as did Wordsworth, Shelley and Browning, and creates new 
 precedents on which to found the classics of the future. It 
 is revulsion from the failures of romantic art that brings us 
 trooping back to the classics with Matthew Arnold who felt 
 that he could "find the only sure guidance, the only solid 
 footing among the ancients." ^ 
 
 The history of English literature since the Renaissance 
 exhibits three periods of unusual interest in the models of 
 the past, three notable returns to the classics as they were 
 understood in each age, with a possible fourth period of 
 interest yet to come and widely presaged in our many retrans- 
 lations of Greek and Roman authors and in the poetry of 
 Matthew Arnold and the late Mr. William Morris. With 
 this last we have nothing to do; an important name is identi- 
 fied with each of the other three : Sir Philip Sidney, whose 
 classicism was concerned with externals, and soon over- 
 whelmed with the flood of romanticism on which he was 
 himself "the first fair freight;" Ben Jonson, whose classicism 
 came alike by nature and by study ; Pope, who long after 
 stands for the culmination of a movement which, losing its 
 aims and substituting too often mere form for living principle, 
 is none the less worthy of a greater respect and consideration 
 than has been usually accorded it at the hands of the critics 
 of our century. 
 
 ^ Preface to Arnold's Poems, ed. 1854. 
 
BEN JONSON AND THE CLASSICAL SCHOOL. 3 
 
 That minor contemporaries of Sidney like Ascham, Webbe, 
 and Gabriel Harvey should look to classic example for the 
 salvation of English letters is little to be wondered. Their 
 education demanded it, and contemporary literature oifered 
 nothing. Save Chaucer, there was not an English poet that 
 a scholar dared to name with the mighty dead of " insolent 
 Greece or haughty Rome ; " and Chaucer was antiquated to 
 the Elizabethan, who might love to archaize in the pastoral 
 lingo of Hobbinol and Cuddy, but who was likely to leave 
 unread what he could not readily conform to his own time 
 and place. The classicism of Sidney is that of his age, and 
 shows itself mainly in two characteristics : the reaffirmation 
 of ancient aesthetic theory, in which the Def&nse of Poesy far 
 outweighs all similar contemporary work, and in metrical 
 experiments in English verse modelled on classical prosody. 
 In the former Sidney was the companion of Gascoigne, James 
 VI, William Webbe, and George Puttenham ; in the latter, of 
 Harvey, Stanihurst, Abraham Fraunce, and Spenser himself. 
 If Sidney's sapphics and asclepiads stand as a warning to the 
 temerity of venturesome youth, it must be remembered that 
 our own contemporaries have not ceased from theorizing upon 
 such metres nor indeed from imitating them. Such turning 
 to the classics as Sidney's and Spenser's is purely empirical 
 and due less to any deep seated conviction on the subject than 
 to a contemplation of the dead level of contemporary literary 
 achievement. Sidney's Defense was directly called forth by 
 Gossou's attack upon poetry in his School of Abuse, and 
 Sidney's own practice of classical metres went hand in hand 
 with experiments in the Italian sonnet, the canzone and the 
 sestine, many specimens of which are to be found in Astrophel 
 and Stella, and in the Arcadia. Lastly, it would be difficult 
 to find a work farther removed from classical ideals than the 
 famous Arcadia itself, the story of which vies with the Faerie 
 Queene in rambling involution and elaborated episode, the 
 style of which is ornate and florid, though often very beauti- 
 
4 FELIX E. SCHELLING. 
 
 ful, the essence of which, in a word, is novelty, the touchstone 
 of romantic art. 
 
 Vastly in contrast with this superficial imitation of classi- 
 cal verse is the classicism of Ben Jonson, from his character 
 as a man and a scholar, and in its relation to his environment. 
 Between Sidney, dead in the year 1586, and Jonson begin- 
 ning his career but a year or two short of the next century, a 
 great literature had sprung up, which up to the end of the 
 reign of Elizabeth and, without the domain of the drama, 
 was dominated by the overwhelming influence of Spenser. 
 It would be difficult to find a contrast more marked than 
 that which exists between Spenser and Jonson. As the quali- 
 ties of these two poets in their contrasts are at the very root 
 of our subject, they must be considered in some detail. 
 
 What may be called the manner of Spenser — i. e., Spenser's 
 way of imitating and interpreting nature artistically by means 
 of poetic expression — may be summarized as consisting of a 
 sensuous love of beauty, involving a power of elaborated 
 pictorial representation, a use of classical imagery for decora- 
 tive effect, a fondness for melody of sound, a flowing sweet- 
 ness, naturalness and continuousness of diction, amounting to 
 diffuseness at times, the diffuseness of a fragrant, beautiful, 
 flowering vine. We may say of the poets that employ this 
 manner that they are worshipers of beauty rather than 
 students of beauty's laws ; ornate in their expression of the 
 type, dwelling on detail in thought and image lovingly elabo- 
 rated and sweetly prolonged. To such artists it is no matter 
 if a play have five acts or twenty-five, if an epic ever come 
 to an end, or if consistency of parts exist. Rapt in the 
 joy of gentle onward motion, in the elevation of pure, poetic 
 thought, even the subject seems to be of small import, if it 
 but furnish the channel in which the bright limpid liquid 
 continues musically to flow. Drayton, who, besides pastorals 
 after the manner of his master, Spenserized the enormous 
 Polyolhion; the allegorical Fletchers, Giles and Phineas; 
 George Wither and William Browne in their beautiful later 
 
BEN J0N80N AND THE CLASSICAL SCHOOL. 5 
 
 pastorals ; Milton himself in his earliest poetry, though some- 
 what restrained by a chaster taste than was Spenser's and by 
 a spirit in closer touch with the classics : these are some of 
 the multitude of followers and imitators of Spenser. 
 
 If now we will turn to the poetry of Ben Jonson, more 
 especially his lyrical verse, the first thing we note is a sense 
 of form, not merely in detail and transition, like the " links 
 .... bright and even " of The Faerie Queene, but a sense of 
 the entire poem in its relation to its parts. This sense involves 
 brevity and condensity of expression, a feeling on the part of 
 the poet that the effect may be spoiled by a word too much — 
 a feeling which no true Spenserian ever knew. It is thus 
 that Jonson writes in courtly compliment to his patroness 
 Lucy, Countess of Bedford : 
 
 This morning timely rapt with holy fire, 
 I thought to form unto my zealous Muse, 
 What kind of creature I should most desire, 
 To honor, serve, and love, as poets use. 
 I meant to make her fair, and free, and wise. 
 Of greatest blood, and yet more good than great; 
 I meant the day-star should not brighter rise. 
 Nor lend like influence from his lucent seat. 
 I meant she should be courteous, facile, sweet, 
 Hating that solemn vice of greatness, pride ; 
 I meant each softest virtue there should meet. 
 Fit in that softer bosom to reside. 
 Only a learnM and a manly soul 
 I purposed her ; that should, with even powers, 
 The rock, the spindle, and the shears control 
 Of Destiny, and spin her own free hours. 
 Such when I meant to feign and wished to see. 
 My Muse bade Bedford write, and that was she.' 
 
 About such poetry as this there is a sense of finish rather 
 than of elaboration. It is less continuous than complete ; 
 more concentrated, less diffuse; chaste rather than florid; 
 controlled, and yet not always less spontaneous ; reserved, 
 and yet not always less natural. There are other things 
 
 ^Epigrams, No. Lxxvi, Fol. 1640, i, 22. 
 
6 FELIX E. SCHELLING. 
 
 in the Jonsonian manner. It retained classical allusion 
 less for the sake of embellishment than as an atmosphere — 
 to borrow a term from the nomenclature of art. Its drafts 
 upon ancient mythology become allusive, and the effects pro- 
 duced by Horace, Catullus or Anacreon are essayed in 
 reproduction under English conditions. Not less eager in 
 the pursuit of beauty than the Spenserian, the manner of 
 Jonson seeks to realize her perfections by means of con- 
 structive excellence, not by entranced passion. It concerns 
 itself with choiceness of diction, selectiveness in style, with 
 the repression of wandering ideas and loosely conceived figures, 
 in a word the manner of Jonson involves classicality. Sidney's 
 return to the ancients has been called empirical ; the classicism 
 of Jonson may be termed assimilative. 
 
 It is a commonplace of the history of literature that Jonson 
 literally dominated the age in which he lived. But it is not 
 so generally understood just why this was true in the face of 
 the unexampled popularity of Shakespeare's plays and the 
 frequent failure of Jonson's own, and with the existence of 
 strong poetical counter-influences which seemed more typical 
 of the spirit of the time than Jonson's own. It is notable 
 that it is the egotists, like Byron and Rousseau, that often 
 most strongly impress themselves upon their own times ; they 
 are, in Ben Jonson's well known words, " of an age ; " those 
 who have mastered themselves and risen, as did Shakespeare, 
 above his own environment while still sharing it, move in 
 larger circles, and influence the world " for all time." Shake- 
 speare was not literary, Jonson was abundantly so. Despite 
 Shakespeare's popular success, Jonson had with him the 
 weight of the court and the learned. Thus it came about 
 that Shakes}>eare enjoyed the greatest pecuniary return 
 derived from literature, directly or indirectly, until the 
 days of Sir Walter Scott; whilst Jonson, dependent on 
 patronage, often almost in want, achieved a reputation and 
 an influence in literature altogether unsurpassed up to his 
 time. There was only one poet who shared even in part 
 
BEN JONSON AND THE CliASSICAL SCHOOL. 7 
 
 this literary supremacy of Jonson, and that poet was John 
 Donne. To Donne, especially to the Marinist in him, must 
 be granted the credit — if credit it be — of delaying for more 
 than a generation the natural revulsion of English literature 
 back to classicism and restraint. This is not the place in 
 which to discuss the interesting relations of Jonson and 
 Donne. Except for a certain rhetorical and dialectical 
 address, which might be referred to a study of the ancients, 
 the poetry of Donne is marked by its disregard of conven- 
 tions, by its extraordinary originality of thought and expres- 
 sion, by that rare quality of poetic insight that justifies 
 Jonson's enthusiastic claim that "John Donne [was] the first 
 poet in the world in some things."' Not less significant on 
 the other hand are Jonson's contrasted remarks to Drummond 
 on the same topic : " That Donne's Anniversary [in which 
 true womanhood is idealized if not deified] was profane and 
 full of blasphemies," and "that Donne, for not keeping of 
 accent, deserved hanging." ^ The classicist has always regarded 
 the romanticist thus, nor have the retorts been more courteous, 
 as witness the well known lines of Keats' Sleep and Poetry 
 in which the age of classicism is described as "a schism 
 nurtured by foppery and. barbarism."^ 
 
 Thus we find Spenser and Jonson standing as exponents 
 respectively of the expansive or romantic movement and the 
 repressive or classical spirit. In a different line of distinction 
 Donne is equally in contrast with Spenser, as the intensive, 
 or subjective artist. Both of these latter are romanticists in 
 that each seeks to produce the effect demanded of art by 
 means of an appeal to the sense of novelty; but Spenser's 
 romanticism is that of selection, which chooses from the outer 
 world the fitting and the pleasing, and constructs it into a 
 permanent artistic joy. Donne's is the romanticism of insight, 
 which, looking inward, descries the subtle relations of things 
 and transmutes them into poetry with a sudden and unex- 
 
 ^Jonson'a Conversationa with Drummond, Shakespeare Society, 1842, p. 8. 
 'Ibid., p. 3. 'Poems by John KecUs, ed. Bates, 1896, p. 59. 
 
8 FELIX E. 8CHELLING. 
 
 pected flood of light. Between Jonson and Donne there is the 
 kinship of intellectuality; between Spenser and Donne the 
 kinship of romanticism ; between Spenser and Jonson the kin- 
 ship of the poet's joy in beauty. Spenser is the most objective 
 and therefore allegorical and mystical ; Donne is the most 
 subjective and the most spiritual ; Jonson, the most artistic 
 and therefore the most logical. 
 
 But not only did Jonson dominate his age and stand for the 
 classical ideal in the midst of current Spenserianism, Marin- 
 ism, and other popular modes, it was this position of Jonson, 
 defended as it was in theory as well as exemplified in his 
 work, that directed the course which English literature was 
 to take for a century and a half after his death. There are 
 few subjects in the history of English literature attended with 
 greater difficulty than the attempt to explain how the lapse 
 of a century in time should have transformed the literature of 
 England from the traits which characterized it in the reign 
 of Queen Elizabeth to those which came to prevail under the 
 rule of Queen Anne. The salient characteristics of the two 
 ages are much too well known to call for a word here. Few 
 readers, moreover, are unfamiliar with the more usual theories 
 on this subject : how one critic believes that Edmund Waller 
 invented the new poetry by a spontaneous exercise of his own 
 cleverness ; ^ how another demands that this responsibility be 
 fixed upon Greorge Sandys.* How some think that " classic- 
 ism " was an importation from France, which came into 
 England in the luggage of the fascinating Frenchwoman, 
 who afterwards became the Duchess of Portsmouth ; and how 
 still others suppose that the whole thing was really in the 
 
 ' Grosse, Eighteenth Century Literature, p. 2. 
 
 ■Henry Wood, "Beginnings of the 'Classical' Heroic Couplet in Eng- 
 land : " "At all events it was Sandys, and not Waller, who at the beginning 
 of the third decade of the century, first of all Englishmen, made a uniform 
 practice of writing in heroic couplets which are, on the whole, in accord 
 with the French rule, and which, for exactness of construction, and for har- 
 monious .versification, go far towards satisfying the demands of the later 
 ' classical ' school in England." — American Journal of Philology, xi, p. 73. 
 
BEN JONSON AND THE CLASSICAL SCHOOL. 9 
 
 air, to be caught by infection by anyone who did not draw 
 apart and live out of the literary miasma as did Milton.^ It 
 may not be unnecessary to add that some of these theorists 
 place the beginning and end of " classicism " in the definite 
 and peculiar construction of a certain species of English deca- 
 syllabic verse ; and that even when they escape this, the 
 "heroic" or "Popean couplet" has always usurped an undue 
 share of consideration. 
 
 The conservative reaction which triumphed with the Res- 
 toration has been so "hardly entreated" and so bitterly 
 scorned that there is much temptation to attempt a justifi- 
 cation. Imaginative literature did lose in the change, and 
 enormously ; but if the imagination, and with it the power 
 that produces poetry, became for a time all but extinct, 
 the understanding, or power which arranges, correlates, 
 expounds and explains, went through a course of develop- 
 ment which has brought with it in the end nothing but gain 
 to the literature considered as a whole. 
 
 If the reader will consider the three great names, Ben 
 Jonson, finishing his work about 1635, John Dryden, at the 
 height of his fame fifty years later, and Alexander Pope, with 
 nearly ten years of literary activity before him a century 
 after Jonson's death, he will notice certain marked difierences 
 in a general resemblance in the range, subject-matter and 
 diction of the works of these three. The plays of Jonson, 
 despite the restrictive character of his genius, exemplify nearly 
 the whole spacious field of Elizabethan drama, with an added 
 success in the development of the masque, which is Jonson's 
 own. Jonson is the first poet that gave to occasional verse 
 that variety of subject, that power and finish, which made it, 
 for nearly two centuries, the most important form of poetical 
 expression. The works of Jonson are pervaded with satire, 
 criticism and translation, though all appear less in set form 
 than as applied to original work. Finally Jonson's lyrics 
 
 ^ Goese, From Shakespeare to Pope, p. 19. 
 
10 FELIX E. SCHELLING. 
 
 maintain the diversity, beauty and originality which distin- 
 guishes this species of poetry in his favored age. 
 
 If we will turn now to Dryden, we still find a wide range 
 in subject, although limitations are discoverable in the charac- 
 ter of his dramas and of his lyrics. If we except his operas 
 and those pseudo-dramatic aberrations in which he adapted 
 the work of Shakespeare and Milton, Dryden writes only two 
 kinds of plays, the Heroic Drama and the Comedy of Manners ; 
 whilst his lyrics, excepting the two odes for Saint Cecilia's 
 Day and some perfunctory religious poems, are wholly amatory 
 in the narrow and vitiated sense in which that term was 
 employed in the time of Charles II. The strongest element 
 of Dryden's work is occasional verse ; and he makes a new de- 
 parture, showing the tendency of the time, in the development 
 of wriat may be called occasional prose : the preface and dedi- 
 catory epistle. Satire takes form in the translation of Juvenal 
 and in the author's own brilliant original satires, translation 
 becomes Dryden's most lucrative literary employment, and 
 criticism is the very element in which he lives. Lastly, we 
 turn to Pope. Here are no plays and very few lyrics, .'scarcely 
 one which is not an applied poem. Occasional verse, satire, 
 criticism, and translation have usurped the whole field. There 
 was no need that Pope should write his criticism in prose, as 
 did Dryden ; for verse had become in his hands essentially a 
 medium for the expression of that species of thought which 
 we in this century associate with the prose form. The verse 
 of Pope was a medium more happily fitted for the expression 
 of the thought of Pope, where rhetorical brilliancy and telling 
 antithesis rather than precision of thought was demanded, than 
 any prose that could possibly have been devised. 
 
 It has often been affirmed that England has the greater 
 poetry, whilst France possesses the superior prose ; and in 
 the confusion or distinction of the two species of literature 
 this difference has been explained.' Poetry must be governed 
 
 ' See in general Matthew Arnold's essay on " The Literary Influence of 
 Academies." 
 
BEN JONSON AND THE CLASSICAL SCHOOL. 11 
 
 by the imagination, it must not only see and imitate nature, 
 it must transform what it sees, converting the actual into the 
 terras of the ideal : if it does much beside, it is less poetry. 
 On the other hand, prose is a matter of the understanding, to 
 call in as helps whatever other faculty you will, but to be 
 ruled and governed by the intelligence alone, to the end that 
 the object may be realized as it actually is. With this dis- 
 tinction before us, when passion, real or simulated, when 
 imagination, genuine or forced, takes the reins from the 
 understanding, the product may become poetry, or enthusi- 
 asm, or rhapsody ; it certainly ceases to be prose, good, bad 
 or indifferent. So, likewise, when the understanding sup- 
 plants imagination, we have also a product, which, whatever 
 its form or the wealth of rhetoric bestowed upon it, is alien 
 to poetry. This is to be interpreted into no criticism of the 
 many English literary products, which have the power to 
 run and to fly ; we could not spare one of the great pages of 
 Carlyle, or of Mr. Ruskin ; and yet it may well be doubted 
 if, on the whole, the French have not been somewhat the 
 gainers from the care with which they have customarily, and 
 until lately, kept their prose and their poetry sundered. 
 
 Up to this point it has been our endeavor to establish 
 the simultaneous existence of the restrictive as well as the 
 romantic element in our literature as early as the reign of 
 Elizabeth, to show the relation of the one to the other in 
 the stretch of years that elapsed from her reign to that of 
 Queen Anne, and to exemplify the relation of Jonson (who 
 is claimed to be the exponent of the classical spirit) to his 
 immediate contemporaries and to his two most typical suc- 
 cessors. Let us now examine some of the reasons which may 
 be urged for placing Jonson in so prominent a position. 
 
 In Ben Jonson we have the earliest example of the inter- 
 esting series of English literary men who have had definite 
 theories about literature. Dryden, Pope, and Wordsworth 
 were such, each potent in moulding the taste of his own 
 
12 FELIX E. SCHELLING. 
 
 age, and, with it, the course which literature was to take in 
 times to come. It is notorious that the attitude of Jonson 
 towards the prevalent literary taste of his age was far from 
 conciliatory. He despised the popular judgment with an 
 arrogance unparalleled in the annals of literature, although 
 he constantly professed himself solicitous of the favorable 
 opinion of the judicious. Jonson was a great moralist in his 
 way, and "of all styles he loved most to be named Honest;"^ 
 but he was likewise an artist, and many of his current criti- 
 cisms of his contemporaries : his strictures on Shakespeare for 
 his anachronisms, on Sidney for making all the characters 
 of the Arcadia speak like gentlemen and gentlewomen, his 
 objection to the obscurity and irregular versification of Donne, 
 are referable to an outraged aesthetic sense.^ This position 
 was altogether conscious, the position of the professional 
 man who has a theory to oppose to the amateurishness and 
 eclecticism abundantly exemplified in contemporary work ; 
 and Jonson must have felt toward the glittering, multiform 
 literature of Elizabeth much what Matthew Arnold suflFered 
 " amid the bewildering confusion of our times " and might 
 well have exclaimed with him, " I seemed to myself to find 
 the only sure guidance, the only solid footing, among the 
 ancients. They, at any rate, knew what they wanted in Art, 
 and we do not. It is this uncertainty which is disheartening."* 
 The theories which Ben Jonson held about literature were 
 from the first those of the classicist. He believed in the 
 criticism of Horace and in the rhetoric of Quintilian ; * in the 
 sanction of classical usage for history, oratory, and poetry. He 
 believed that English Drama should follow the example of the 
 vettis comoedia,'^ and that an English ode should be modelled 
 
 ^JoMon's Gonversations with Drummond, as above, p. 37. 
 
 'Ibid., pp. 16, 2, and 3. 
 
 • Preface to Matthew Arnold's Poems, ed. 1864. 
 
 *See the many passages of the Discoveries mhich are no more than trans- 
 lations of the Institules, and the weight given to the theories of Horace in 
 the same book. 
 
 'Prologue to Every Man out of his Humour, PoL 1640, i, 74. 
 
BEN JONSON AND THE CLASSICAL SCHOOL. 13 
 
 faithfully on the structural niceties of Pindar. Despite all 
 this, Jonson's theories about literature were not only, in the 
 main, reasonable and consistent, they were often surprisingly 
 liberal. Thus he could laugh, as he did, in a well known 
 passage of the prologue to Every Man in His Humour, at the 
 absurdities of contemporary stage realism which, 
 
 with three rusty swords, 
 And help of some few foot-and-half-foot words, 
 Fight over York and Lancaster's long jars; 
 And in the tiring-house bring wounds to scars ; ^ 
 
 and yet declare, as to that fetish of the supine classicist, the 
 three unities, that " we [English playwrights] should enjoy 
 the same licence or free power to illustrate and heighten our 
 invention as they [the ancients] did ; and not be tied to those 
 strict and regular forms which the niceness of a few, who are 
 nothing but form, would thrust upon us."'^ He could aflBrm 
 that "Spenser's stanzas pleased him not, nor his matter;"' 
 and yet tell Drummond that " for a heroic poem there was no 
 such ground as King Arthur's fiction " (i. e. the legends con- 
 cerning King Arthur).* He censured the pastoralists for 
 their unreality, and yet he had by heart passages of the 
 Shepherds' Calendar^ and showed how to write a true pastoral 
 drama in the Sad Shepherd; he mocked the sonneteers," 
 especially Daniel,^ in his satirical plays, for their sugared 
 sweetness and frivolity, but wrote himself some of the finest 
 lyrics of his age. The catholicity of Jonson's taste in its 
 sympathy included the philosophy and eloquence of Lord 
 Bacon, the divinity of Hooker, the historical and antiquarian 
 enquiries of Camden and Selden, the classical scholarship of 
 Chapman and the poetry of such diverse men as Spenser, 
 Father Southwell, Donne, Sandys, Herrick, Carew, and 
 his lesser "sous."^ 
 
 ^Ibid., i, 5. 'Ibid.., i, 74. ^Conversations, as above, p. 2. 
 
 *Ibid., p. 10. ^Ibid., p. 9. « J6id., p. 4. 
 
 ^ See especially on this topic The War of the Theatres by J. H. Penniman, 
 Puhlications of the University of Pennsylvania, Series in Philology, Literature 
 and Archaeology, Vol. IV, No. 3, pp. 24-30, 53, 64. 
 
 * See the Conversations, as above, passim. 
 
14 FELIX E. 8CHELLING. 
 
 The characteristics of Jonson as the exponent of the con- 
 servative spirit in literature in an age conspicuous for its 
 passionate love of novelty are somewhat these : an unusual 
 acquaintance with the literature of Greece and Rome, a hold- 
 ing of " the prose writers and poets of antiquity," to employ 
 the happy phrase of the late Mr. John Addington Symonds, 
 " in solution in his spacious memory," and a marvelous ability 
 to pour them "plastically forth into the mould of thought ;"* 
 a keen appreciation of the principles which lie at the root of 
 classical literature, with an intelligent recognition and a liberal 
 interpretation of those principles in their adaptation to the 
 needs of contemporary English conditions. The rhetorician 
 in Jonson was alike his distinction and his greatest limitation. 
 It was this which gave him an ever-present sense of an inspir- 
 ing design, whether it was in the construction of a complete 
 play or in the selection and ordering of the words of a single 
 clause. These more general characteristics of the classicist 
 will be recognized at once as Jonson's ; but even the specific 
 qualities that mark the coming age of English classicism are 
 his. We have already remarked Jonson's fondness for satire 
 and criticism, and his exceeding use of that species of applied 
 poetry called occasional verse. Restriction in the ranigje of 
 subject is always attended by a corresponding restriction ir , jyle 
 and form, and we are prepared to find in Jonson's occa nonal 
 verse a strong tendency to precise and pointed antithetical 
 diction, and a somewhat conventionalized and restricted metri- 
 cal form. If we will look at Jonson's prose we shall find 
 other "notes" only less marked of the coming classical 
 supremacy, in his slightly Latinized vocabulary and in his 
 occasional preference for abstract over concrete expression. 
 
 Take the following from the Discoveries: "There is a 
 difference between mooting and pleading ; between fencing 
 and fighting. To make arguments in my study and to con- 
 fute them, is easy ; where I answer myself, not an adversary. 
 So I can see whole volumes despatched by the umbractical 
 
 ^Ben Jonson^ English Worthies, p. 52. 
 
BEN JONSON AND THE CLASSICAL SCHOOL. 15 
 
 doctors on all sides .... but indeed I would no more choose 
 a rhetorician for reigning in a school, than I would a pilot 
 for rowing in a pond." ^ And again : " When a virtuous man 
 is raised, it brings gladness to his friends, grief to his enemies 
 and glory to his posterity. Nay, his honors are a great part 
 of the honor of the times ; when by this means he is grown 
 to active men an example, to the slothful a spur, to the 
 envious a punishment." ^ 
 
 Besides Jonson's several strictures on cross rimes, the 
 stanzas of Spenser, the alexandrine of Drayton, English 
 hexameters and sonnets, the very first entry of the Con- 
 versations with Drummond tells us of a projected epic with 
 the added information " it is all in couplets for he detested 
 all other rimes." ^ A little below Jonson tells of his having 
 written against Campion's and Daniel's well-known treatises 
 on versification to prove "couplets to be the bravest sort of 
 verses, especially when they are broken like hexameters," 
 i. e., exhibit a regular caesural pause.* 
 
 The non-dramatic verse of Jonson was grouped by the 
 author under the headings Epigrams and The Forest, both 
 published in the Folio of 1616, and Underwoods, mis- 
 cellaneous poems of the collected edition of 1640. Aside 
 from his strictly lyrical verse in which Jonson shared the 
 metrical inventiveness and variety of his age, the decasyllabic 
 rimed couplet is all but his constant measure. For epistles, 
 elegies, and epigrams, some two hundred poems, he seldom 
 uses any other verse, and he employs this verse in translation 
 and sometimes even for lyric purposes. In Jonson's hands 
 the decasyllabic couplet became the habitual measure for 
 occasional verse, and, sanctioned by his usage, remained such 
 for a hundred and fifty years. But not only did Jonson's 
 theory and practise coincide in his overwhelming preference 
 
 ^Discoveries, ed. Schelling, p. 16. Cf. also, " In her indagations often times 
 new scents put her by, and she takes in errors into her by the same con- 
 duits she doth truths." — Ibid., p. 28. 
 
 *Ibid., 42. 'Ibid., pp. 2, 4, and 1. *Ibid., p. 2. 
 
 2 
 
16 
 
 FELIX E. 8CHELLING. 
 
 for this particular form of verse, but the decasyllabic couplet 
 as practised by Jonson exemplifies all the characteristics 
 which, in greater emphasis, came in time to distinguish the 
 manner and versification of Waller and Dryden. Moreover, 
 the practice of no other poet exemplifies like characteristics to 
 anything approaching the same extent until we pass beyond 
 the accession of Charles I. 
 
 In an examination of the versification of several Eliza- 
 bethan and later poets ^ for the purpose of establishing the 
 
 'As to versification, the following passages have been considered as 
 typical, one hundred lines in each case: 
 
 1591, Spenser: (a) Mother HvhberdHs Tale, lines 1-100, Riv. Ed., p. 99. 
 
 (b) " " " " 977-1077, p. 133. 
 
 1593, Marlowe, Hero and Leander, Sestiad I, lines 1-100, ed. Bohn, 
 
 p. 157. 
 1598, Drayton, Bosamond to Henry TI, England's Heroieal Epiitles, ed. 
 
 Drayton, 1619, p. 105. 
 1600, Chapman, Hero and Leander, Sestiad VI, last 100 lines, as above, 
 
 p. 226. 
 1603, Jonson : (a) ^ Panegyry on the Happy enimnee of James our Sovereign 
 
 to his first high session of Parlimenl in this Kingdom, 
 
 Ed. 1640, i, 87. 
 1612 (b) To Penshursf, pr. in Fol. of 1616, ed. Bohn, p. 347. 
 
 1616 (c) The first XVII Epigrams and four lines of XVIII, 
 
 excepting Epig. VIII, which is not in couplets, and 
 
 Epig. XII, which has a peculiar movement, due to 
 
 its subject, and is hence not a fair example, ibid., pp. 
 
 283-88. 
 1623 (d) An Execration on ViUean, p. 461. 
 
 1631 (e) Elegy on Lady WinUm, p. 552. 
 
 1636, Sandys: (a) Psalm LXXIIL Library of Old Authors, Sandys, it,. 
 
 p. 204. 
 1638 (b) Paraphrase upon the Book of Job, -Und., l, 1. 
 
 1641 (c) Deo Optimo Maximo, ibid., ii, 403. 
 
 1660, Waller: (a) To the King, ed. Drury, p. 163. 
 1678-80 (b) On the Duke of MonmotUh's Expedition, 1678, 48 lines. 
 
 On the Earl of Roscommon' s Translation of Horace, 1680, 
 
 52 lines, ed. Drury, pp. 212 and 214. 
 1660, Dryden : (a) Astraea Redux, Globe ed., p. 8. 
 1687 (b) Hind and the Panther, ib., p. 171. 
 
 1693 (c) Epistle to Sir Godfrey Kneller, ib., p. 264. 
 
 1713, Pope: (a) Windsor Forest, Chandos ed., p. 95. 
 
 1732 (b) Essay on Man, Epistie IV, lines 19-110, ibid., p. 218. 
 
BEN JONSON AND THE CLASSICAL SCHOOL. 
 
 17 
 
 truth of this proposition, several things are to be noted. 
 Spenser's use of the couplet, despite the early date of his 
 only example {Mother Hubberd's Tale) and his conscious 
 imitation in it of Chaucer, was found to stand as a very 
 fair representative of the use of this metre by those who 
 followed Spenser in other particulars of style and versifica- 
 tion. Spenser's use of the couplet has therefore been employed 
 as representative here. Thus although a certain rigidity of 
 manner, that caused hira all but to give up run-on couplets 
 and lines, distinguishes the couplets of Drayton, and although 
 Chapman shows a greater freedom and variety in the same 
 respects, both these poets, with many others, their contempo- 
 raries, may be said to use the couplet in a manner in general 
 resembling that of Spenser, and to group with him in not 
 making a strong medial caesura a characteristic of their use 
 of this verse. As we are not concerned with these poets in 
 this discussion except so far as the determination that Spenser 
 is representative of them, the figures which establish this 
 point may be relegated to the note below.^ 
 
 In the case of Jonson a consideration of the length of his 
 career and the variety of his practice demanded a wider range 
 
 ' This table may be compared with that of the text below, p. 238. The 
 count is made upon the passages mentioned in the note preceding this, and 
 the averages of Spenser and Sandys are repeated from the other table for 
 convenience of comparison. It will be noted that Sandys corresponds to 
 Drayton in his use of the continuous line, and to Marldwe in the frequency 
 of the medial caesura, whilst his freedom in the run-on line exceeds even 
 that of Chapman. 
 
 Run-on Couplets 
 
 Bun-on Lines 
 
 Continuous Lines „ 
 
 Lines showing a Medial Caesura 
 
 Oli-I 
 
 w2 
 
 5 
 
 19.5 
 59 
 35 
 
 t£ OS 
 
 2 
 11 
 51 
 40 
 
 
 1 
 
 4 
 46 
 44 
 
 ■<to 
 
 12 
 28 
 55 
 38 
 
 5 
 22.6 
 47 
 40 
 
18 
 
 FELIX E. SCHELLING. 
 
 from which to judge. The passages chosen range from 1603 
 to 1631, and include almost every species of poetry which 
 Jonson wrote in this verse. Sandys exhibited an unexpected 
 diversity of manner, although within a well defined range. 
 The poem Deo Optimo Maximo is the only original poem of 
 any length by Sandys : it has been considered with two trans- 
 lations. Lastly, the passages from Waller, Dryden, and Pope 
 will be seen to take into consideration both the earlier and 
 the later manner of each. 
 
 The points considered in this enquiry are (1) the number 
 of the run-on couplets ; (2) the number of run-on lines ; (3) 
 the character of the line as to internal caesura, especially 
 in the contrast which exists between the continuous line ii. e., 
 one in which there is no internal caesura) and that exhibiting 
 an ir.fernal caesura so placed as to produce the effect of split- 
 ting the line into two halves. This last results when the 
 rhetorical pause occurs after the second stressed syllable or 
 after either of the syllables following. This tendency to split 
 the decasyllabic line into two is a notorious feature in the 
 versification of the Popean School ; as well as of Waller Sind 
 Dryden. It is scarcely less marked in the verse of Jonson. 
 The following table gives the average of all the passages 
 examined and for each author : 
 
 Sun-on Couplets 
 
 Run-on Lines 
 
 Lines which show no Me-) 
 dial Caesura / 
 
 Lines showing a caesura \ 
 after the fourth, fifth [• 
 and sixth syllables j 
 
 Lines showing a caesura T 
 after the fourth, fifth, I 
 sixth and seventh sylla- [ 
 bles 
 
 6. 
 19.5 
 
 59. 
 35. 
 
 35.5 
 
 
 5. 
 22.6 
 
 47. 
 40. 
 
 44.6 
 
 •-9* 
 
 4.4 
 21.8 
 
 26. 
 65.2 
 
 64.4 
 
 SS 
 
 ^2 
 
 3.5 
 J 2.5 
 
 36. 
 56. 
 
 58.5 
 
 H CO 
 Kco 
 
 .6 
 7.6 
 
 36.3 
 
 53. 
 
 55. 
 
 
 0. 
 5.5 
 
 21. 
 
 67.5 
 
 71. 
 
BEN JONSON AND THE CLASSICAL SCHOOL. 19 
 
 The following features appear : — 
 
 1. As to the run-on couplets, Jonson shows, with Sandys 
 and Spenser, the earlier freedom, and shows it to about the 
 same degree. But Waller shows it too, and his proportion 
 in this respect (3.5) is far nearer to Jonson's (4.4) than to 
 Dryden's (which is only .6). Pope gave up the run-on 
 couplet. 2. As to run-on lines, Sandys exhibits a slightly 
 larger proportion than Jonson or Spenser, but their averages 
 (Spenser, 19.5, Sandys, 22.6, Jonson, 21.8) are substantially 
 the same. It may be noted that Jonson's average in run-on 
 couplets and verses falls in his Epigrams very nearly to that 
 of Dryden in The Hind and the Panther; the former showing 
 eleven run-on lines and the latter nine; both having two 
 run-on couplets. But nearly the same is true of Sandys' 
 Paraphrase of the Psalm LXXIII, in which there is but one 
 run-on couplet and eleven run-on lines. On the other hand 
 Sandys' freest verse in these respects, the Paraphrase of Joby 
 surpasses the utmost freedom of Jonson. Thus as to run-on 
 couplets and run-on lines, the test places Spenser, Sandys 
 and Jonson in one group, with Waller and Jonson showing 
 averages which dwindle to the stricter manner of Pope in 
 these respects. It may be remarked in passing that it is a 
 mistake to consider that the Elizabethans often practised the 
 couplet with the freedom, not to say licence, that characterizes 
 its nineteenth century use in the hands of such poets as Keats. 
 
 Now if these passages be considered with reference to 
 the occurrence of a medial caesura and the contrasted non- 
 occurrence of any caesura within the lines, they fall at once 
 into two groups, (1) that of Spenser and Sandys, whose 
 manner is continuous and whose use of the internal caesura is 
 correspondingly infrequent ; ^ and (2) that of Jonson, Waller, 
 Dryden and Pope, whose manner is characterized by shorter 
 clauses, inversions and interpolations, which breaks up con- 
 tinuity and prevailingly places the internal caesura within the 
 range of the fourth and seventh syllables of the verse, posi- 
 
 * See note above, p. 237. 
 
20 FELIX E. SCHELLING. 
 
 tions which tend to break the verse into two halves. The 
 proportion of lines in which no medial caesura occurs is 
 largest in Spenser, 69 being the average; Sandys' average is 
 47. Sandys' Paraphrase of Psalm LXXIII shows the highest 
 number of continuous lines, 63; Pope's Essay on Man the 
 smallest, 17. Jonson's average is but 26, showing a smaller 
 average number of continuous lines than either Waller or 
 Dry den, and approaching Poise's average, which is but 21 . 
 
 The proportion of lines, which show a rhetorical pause or 
 caesura after the second accent, after the arsis of the third 
 foot, and after the third accent, hence producing the general 
 eflfect of cutting the verse into two halves, are smallest in 
 Spenser and Sandys, their averages being respectively 35 and 
 40 to each 100 lines. In Jonson the average of these lines 
 rises to 65.2, which is greater than Dryden's 53 ; and nearly 
 that of Waller, 56. It is interesting to note that Jonson's 
 fondness for a pause after the arsis of the fourth foot (seventh 
 syllable of the verse), which is shared by Pope, brings the 
 averages of these two, by including that caesura with the count 
 already taken of the caesuras of the three preceding feet, up to 
 64.4 per cent, for Jonson and 71 per cent, for Pope. In the 
 use of this feminine caesura and the corresponding caesura of 
 the previous foot (that after the third arsis), Jonson's verse 
 is more like that of Pope than is Dryden's, whose prefer- 
 ence is for the masculine caesura, i. e., that after an accented 
 syllable. It is not in the least here assumed that the versifi- 
 cation of Jonson, Dryden, and Pope is all reducible to a 
 single definition ; but it is claimed that the characteristics of 
 the versification of Jonson's couplets are of the type which, 
 developed through Dryden and Waller, led on logically to 
 the culmination of that type in Pope ; and that no possible 
 development of the couplet of Sandys and Speuser could 
 have led to a similar result. 
 
 Examination has been made into the versification of this 
 group of poets, not because peculiar store is set upon such 
 matters, but because of the mistakes which have arisen in 
 
BEN JONSON AND THE CLASSICAL SCHOOL. 21 
 
 consequence of the obiter dicta of Dryden and of Pope. It was 
 sufficient for the subsequent " historians " of English Literature 
 to know that in the rough draft of an outline of the course of 
 English literature, communicated by Pope to Warburton, and 
 preserved by Ruffhead, the great poet made Sandys in his 
 Paraphrase of Job one of the originals of Waller in versifica- 
 tion ; the thing is copied forever after .^ More important is 
 the classical manner with its crisp diction, its set figures, its 
 parallel constructions, its contrasted clauses, its inversions. 
 Without pursuing this subject into minute detail, the follow- 
 ing passages may be well compared. 
 In 1660 Dryden wrote thus : 
 
 And welcome now, great monarch, to your own, 
 
 Behold th' approaching cliffs of Albion : 
 
 It is no longer motion cheats your view, 
 
 As you meet it, the land approacheth you. 
 
 The land returns, and in the white it wears, 
 
 The marks of patience and sorrow bears. 
 
 But you, whose goodness your descent doth show 
 
 Your heavenly parentage, and earthly too, 
 
 By that oame mildness, which your father's crown 
 
 Before did ravish, shall secure your own.' 
 
 In obvious further development of the same manner. Pope 
 writes some seventy-five years later : 
 
 To thee, the world its present homage pays. 
 The harvest early, but mature the praise ; 
 Great friend of liberty ! In kings a name 
 Above all Greek, above all Boman fame : 
 Whose word is truth, as sacred as revered 
 As heav'n's own oracles from altars heard. 
 Wonder of kings ! like whom to mortal eyes 
 None e'er has risen, and none e'er shall rise.' 
 
 ' See Ruffhead's Zri/e of Pope, 1769, p. 410 »eq.; also Pope, Amer. ed., 1854, 
 I, clvi. 
 
 'Aatraea Redux, Dryden, Globe ed., p. 14. 
 
 'First Epistle of the Second Book of Horace, To Augustus, 1737, Pope, Chandos 
 ed., p. 313. 
 
22 FELIX E. SCHELLING. 
 
 Sandys wrote as follows in 1638, the year after the death 
 of Jonson : 
 
 The Mase, who from your influence took her birth, 
 First wandered through the many-peopled earth ; 
 Next 8ung the change of things, disclosed th' unknown. 
 Then to a nobler shape transformed her own ; 
 Fetched from Engaddi spice, from Jewry balm, 
 And bound her brows with Idumaean palm ; 
 Now old, hath her last voyage made, and brought 
 To royal harbor this her sacred fraught : 
 Who to her King bequeaths the wealth of Kings, 
 And dying, her own epicedium sings.' 
 
 But Jonson had written thus, near the beginning of the 
 reign of James : 
 
 Who would not be thy subject James, t' obey 
 
 A prince that rules by example more than sway? 
 
 Whose manners draw more than thy powers constrain, 
 
 And in this short time of thy happiest reign, 
 
 Hast purged thy realms, as we have now no cause 
 
 Left us for fear, but first our crimes, then laws. 
 
 Like aids 'gainst treason who hath found before ? 
 
 And than in them how could we know God more? 
 
 First thou preserved wert, our Lord to be. 
 
 And since, the whole land was preserv'd in thee.' 
 
 These- four passages meet on the common ground of royal 
 panegyric, and may be regarded as typical of the manner 
 of each poet, and as abundantly upholding the conclusions 
 already reached with respect to their versification. 
 
 If now we consider rhetorical structure and remember how 
 true it is of the style of Pope that it is built upon antithesis 
 and parallel construction, word against word, clause against 
 clause, verse against verse, paragraph against paragraph, and 
 what is more important, thought against thought, we shall 
 find an interesting result. There is nothing antithetical in 
 the prevailing style of Sandys, either in his translation — 
 
 ' Dedication of A Paraphraae upon Job. Sandys, ed. Library of Old 
 Authors, I, Ixxix. 
 
 'Epigram XXXV, To King James, fol. 1641, i, p. 12. 
 
BEN JONSON AND THE CLASSICAL SCHOOL. 23 
 
 except 80 far as Hebrew parallelism may easily account for 
 it — or in his original verse. On the other hand Jonson knew 
 the value of antithetical construction and used it with intelli- 
 gence and frequency, though not, as did later writers, almost to 
 the exclusion of all other rhetorical devices. In the passages 
 from Dryden and Pope quoted above, this characteristic 
 appears as prevailingly in both poets; but the quotation 
 from Jonson also exemplifies antithetical construction in all 
 its subtlety. The prince and his sviject are contrasted ; the 
 prince rules, the subject obeys. The prince rules by example 
 more than by sway; his manners draw more than his powers 
 constrain. The subject fears his own crimes more than the 
 prince's laws; and in the end the prince is preserved to be 
 king, and his subjects are preserved in him ; which last anti- 
 thesis involves "conceit" as it often continued to do in Dryden 
 as witness " the approaching cliffs of Albion " in the passage 
 cited above. 
 
 The epigram of Jonson to King James, from which the 
 lines above are taken, was written in 1604. The Panegyric 
 on the same Sovereign's accession, written in the previous 
 year and the earliest extended piece of Jonson's writing in 
 couplets, shows beyond any cavil the beginnings of those 
 qualities which, developed, differentiate the couplet of Dryden 
 and Pope from others' usage of the same measure, and it 
 displays what is more important, a treatment and mode of 
 dealing with material, a diction and style which equally 
 determine its kinship.' 
 
 * I add some typical instancesi of Jonsou's use of this structure out of the 
 scores that can be culled from his pages. These will be seen to involve 
 nearly all the mannerisms afterwards carried to so artificial a degree of 
 refinement by Pope himself, and to binge, all of them, on a pointed, con- 
 densed and antithetical way of putting things. 
 
 Gall'st a book good or bad as it doth sell. Epigram 3. 
 And I a poet here, no herald am. Epig. 8. 
 He that dares damn himself, dares more than fight. Epig. 16. 
 Blaspheme God greatly, or some poor hind beat. Epig. 28. 
 Look not upon thy dangers, but our /ear«. Epig. 51. 
 
24 FELIX E. SCHELLINQ. 
 
 An examination of Jonson's use of the couplet through 
 successive years exhibits less advance towards the later regu- 
 larity than might have been supposed, and it can hardly be 
 affirmed that Jonson was any more rhetorically constructive 
 in his later writings than in those composed when his classical 
 theories were new and strong upon him. We cannot expect 
 the laws which govern organic growth to coincide with those 
 controlling constructive ingenuity ; a house is built, a tree 
 grows, and the conscious and self-controlled development of 
 such a man as Jonson is alien to the subtle and harmonious 
 unfolding of a genius like Shakespeare's. What we do find 
 in Jonson's use of the devices of the later classicists is a full 
 recognition of their actual value, and an application of each 
 to the special needs and requirements of the work which he 
 may have in hand. Thus he employed the couplet for epi- 
 gram and epistle alike, but used it with greater terseness and 
 
 At once thou maJ^st me happy and unmak^st. Epig. 55. 
 
 And hoodwinked for a man, embrace a post. Epig. 58. 
 
 Active in's brains and passive in his bones. Epig. 68. 
 
 And no less vnse than skilfvU in the laws. Epig. 74, p. 21. 
 
 The ports of Death are sins, of Life, good deeds. Epig. 80, p. 23. 
 
 In making thy friends books, and thy books friends. Epig. 86, p. 24. 
 
 That dares not write things false, nor hide things true. Epig. 95. 
 
 And study conscience more than thou wouldst /ame. Epig. 98. 
 
 TVuth might spend all her voice, fame all her art. Epig. 106. 
 
 And first to know thine own slate, then the staters. Epig. 109. 
 
 He wrote with the same spirit that hefougU. Epig. 110. 
 
 They murder him again that envy thee. Epig. 111. 
 
 Til thou canst find the best choose the least ill. Epig. 119. 
 
 And in their error's maze, thine own way know, 
 Which is to live to eonseienee not to show. Ibid. 
 
 That strives his manners should precede his wit. Epig. 121, p. 39. 
 
 Outdance the baiion, or outboast the brave. Epig. 130, p. 41. 
 
 Men love thee not for this, they laugh at thee. Ibid. 
 
 The learned have no more privilege than the lay. Epig. 132, p. 42. 
 
 For fame with breath soon kindled, soon blovm ouL Ibid. 
 
 In place of scutcheons, that should deck thy hearse, 
 
 Take better ornaments, my tears and verse. Epig. 27, p. 10. 
 
BEN JONSON AND THE CLASSICAL SCHOOL. 25 
 
 more in accord with later usage in the former, feeling that 
 fluency and a somewhat negligent manner at times were fitting 
 to epistolary style. The latter can be found in any of the 
 Epistles. No better specimen of Jonson's antithetical manner 
 could be found than the fine epigram to Edward Allen : — 
 
 If Eome so great, and in her wisest age, 
 Fear'd not to boast tlie glories of her stage, 
 As skilful Roscius, and grave -^sop, men, 
 Yet crown'd with honors, as with riches, then ; 
 Who had no less a trumpet of their name, 
 Than Cicero, wiiose every breath was fame : 
 How can so great example die in me. 
 That, Allen, I should pause to publish thee ? 
 Who both their graces in thyself hast more 
 Out-stript, than they did all that went before: 
 And present worth in all dost so contract, 
 As others speak, but only thou dost act. 
 Wear this renown. 'Tis just, that who did give 
 So many poets life, by one should live.' 
 
 The liberality of Jonson's spirit, despite his own strong 
 preferences, caused him likewise to admit into his practice 
 
 Believe it, Guilty, if you lose your shame, 
 
 I'll lose my modesty, and tell your name. Epig. 38, p. 13. 
 
 That we thy loss might know, and thou our love, 
 
 Great heav'n did well, to give ill fame free wing. I^pig. 51, p. 15. 
 
 Nay ask you how the day goes in your ear 
 
 Keep a star-chamber sentence close twelve days 
 
 And whisper what a proclamation says. Ji^ig. 92, p. 26. 
 
 It is the fair acceptance. Sir, creates 
 
 The entertainment perfect, not the cates. Epig. 101, p. 30. 
 
 And did not shame it by our actions then 
 
 No more than I dare now do with my pen, Epig. 108, p. 34. 
 
 Thou rather striv'st the matter to possess 
 
 The elements of honor than the dress. Epig. 109, p. 34. 
 
 I modestly quit that, and think to write 
 
 Next morn an ode; thou mak'st a song e'er night. Epig. 112, p. 35. 
 
 I pity thy ill luck 
 That both for wil and sense so oft doth pluck. Ibid. 
 
 But blood not minds, but minds did blood adorn, 
 
 And to live great, was better than greai bom. Epig. 116, p. 37. 
 
 Who sees a soul in such a body set 
 
 Might love the treasure for the cabinet. Epig. 125, p. 39. 
 
 ^Epigram LXXXIX, fol. 1640, l, p. 25. 
 
26 FELIX E. SCHELLING. 
 
 forms which theoretically he disapproved. He had the sanc- 
 tion of Catullus and Tibullus for his lyrics, but he even 
 stooped to write a few sonnets, to bits of pastoral in the 
 prevailing mode like a Nymph's Passion, and to concetti 
 after the manner of the Marinists, like the dainty trifle, That 
 Women are but Men's Shadows. This eclecticism of practice 
 in the great classical theorist combined with the strong 
 influence of Donne's subtle novelty of treatment and the 
 older romantic influence of Spenser, perpetuated in men like 
 Drayton, Drummond and the later Spenserians, delayed the 
 incoming tide of classicism, which setting in, none the less, 
 about the time of the accession of Charles I, became the chief 
 current until after the Restoration, and reached its full when 
 Milton, the last of the Elizabethans, died. 
 
 i:>othing could more strongly exemplify this eclecticism in 
 the practice of Jonson than the fact that two such diverse men 
 as Robert Herrick and Edmund Waller were alike his poeti- 
 cal "sons." Herrick, the man, has a naive and engaging per- 
 sonality, which is choice, though not more sterling than the 
 solid worth of Ben Jonson himself; whilst the frank Paganism 
 of Herrick, the poet, and his joy in the fleeting beauties of 
 nature are things apart from Jonson's courtly and prevail- 
 ingly ethical appraisement of the world. Notwithstanding, 
 Herrick had his priceless lyrical gift of Jonson, though he 
 surpassed his master in it. Unhappily for his fame, he 
 inherited also Jonson's occasional grossness of thought, his 
 fondness for the obscenities of Martial, and he surpassed 
 his master in this as well. Waller's debt to Jonson is also 
 two-fold : in the lyric, which he impoverished and conven- 
 tionalized, and in occasional verse, for which he possessed a 
 peculiar talent, and which he freed of the weight of Jonson's 
 learning, his moral earnestness and strenuousness of style, 
 codifying the result into a system which was to give laws to 
 generations of poets to come. Waller was a man, the essence 
 of whose character was time-serving, to whom ideals were 
 nothing, but to whom immediate worldly success, whether in 
 
BEN JONSON AND THE CLASSICAL SCHOOL. 27 
 
 social life or letters, was much ; a man whose very unorigi- 
 nality and easy adaptability made him precisely the person to 
 fill what Mr. Gosse deftly calls the post of " Coryphaeus of 
 the long procession of the commonplace." The instinct of his 
 followers was right in singling Waller out for that position 
 of historical eminence, not because, as a boy, he sat down 
 and deliberately resolved on a new species of poetry, but 
 because he chose out with unerring precision just those quali- 
 ties of thought, form and diction which appealed to the people 
 of his age, and wrote and re-wrote his poetry in conformity 
 therewith. In Carew, Waller found the quintessence of vers 
 de sociite, and "reformed" it of its excessive laces and fall- 
 ing-bands to congruity with the greater formality which 
 governed the costume of the succeeding century. Lastly, 
 in Jonson he found an increasing love of that regularity 
 of rhythm which results from a general correspondence of 
 length of phrase with length of measure, amongst much with 
 which he was in little sympathy, a minute attention to the 
 niceties of expression, a kind of spruce antithetical diction, 
 and a versification of a constructiveness suited to the epi- 
 grammatic form in which the thought was often cast. In 
 Sandys, Fairfax, Drummond and some others, he found a 
 smoothness and sweetness of diction, in which these poets 
 departed measurably from their immediate contemporaries and 
 preserved something of the mellifluousness of the Spenserians. 
 With almost feminine tact Waller applied these things to his 
 unoriginal but carefully chosen subject-matter, and in their 
 union wrought his success. 
 
 The real value of the following age of repression consisted 
 in its recognition of the place that the understanding must 
 hold — not only in the production of prose — but in the pro- 
 duction of every form of enduring art. It endeavored to 
 establish a standard by which to judge, and failed, less 
 because of the inherent weakness of the restrictive ideal, 
 than because the very excess of the imaginative age preced- 
 ing drove the classicists to a greater recoil and made them 
 
28 FELIX E. SCHELLINO. 
 
 content with the correction of abuse instead of solicitous to 
 found their reaction upon a sure foundation. The essential 
 cause of this great change in the literature of England, above 
 all question of foreign origin, precocious inventiveness of 
 individual poets, artificial and " classical heroic couplets," 
 lies in the gradual increase of the understanding as a regula- 
 tive force in the newer literature, the consequent rise of a 
 well-ordered prose, and the e- Hy consequent suppression 
 for several decades of that fr .^y of the imagination which 
 is the vitalizing atmosphere of poetry. 
 
 Making due allowance for the existence of many concurrent 
 forces, English and foreign, which made for the coming age 
 of repression, but which it is not within the province of this 
 paper to discuss, it has been the endeavor of this enquiry to 
 establish the following points: — 
 
 1. That the position of Ben Jonson was such as to give a 
 sanction and authority to his opinions and practise above any 
 man of his age. 
 
 2. That Jonson's theories were those of the classicist from 
 the first, though put forward and defended with a liberality 
 of spirit and a sense of the need of the adaptation of ancient 
 canons of art to changed English conditions, that warrant 
 the use of the term, assimilative classicism, as applied to 
 these theories. 
 
 3. That the practice of Jonson as exemplified in his 
 works exhibits all the "notes" of this assimilative classi- 
 cism ; amongst them in subject, a preference for applied poetry 
 over pure poetry, as exemplified in his liking for satire, epi- 
 gram, translation and occasional verse ; in treatment, a sense 
 of design and construction, repressiveness and selectiveness, a 
 feeling for brevity and condensity, a sense of finish, and the 
 allusiveness of the scholar; in diction, qualities distinctive 
 of the coming "classical" age, such as care in the choice of 
 words, a slightly Latinized vocabulary, the employment of a 
 spruce, antithetical style, and the use of parallel construction 
 and epigram ; in versification, a preference for the decasyllabic 
 
BEN JONSON AND THE CLASSICAL SCHOOL. 29 
 
 couplet and the writing of it in a manner, which is distin- 
 guishable from the continuous manner of Spenser, but which 
 contains all tlie distinctive characteristics which, developed, 
 led on to the later use of this measure by Waller, Dryden 
 and Pope. 
 
 4. That these theories and practices of Jonson are trace- 
 able in his work from the first, and in their range, consistency, 
 and intensity antedate similar theories and practise in the 
 works of any other English writer. 
 
 From all this is derived the conclusion that there is not 
 a trait which came to prevail in the poetry of the new classic 
 school as practised by Waller and Dryden, and later by Pope, 
 which is not directly traceable to the influence or to the example 
 of Ben Jonson. We cannot but view with renewed respect a 
 genius so overmastering that it became not only the arbiter 
 of its own age, but gave taws which afforded sanction and 
 precedent to generations of successors. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 Alexandrine, the, 15. 
 
 American Journcd of Philology, 8. 
 
 Anacreon, 6. 
 
 Anne, Age of, contrasted with the 
 Age of Elizabeth, 8; losses and 
 gains in literature after the Res- 
 toration and in the, 9. 
 
 Anniversary, The, 7. 
 
 Antithesis, 22-25, 28. 
 
 Appreciations, 1. 
 
 Arcadia, 3, 12. 
 
 Astrophel and Stella, 3. 
 
 Arnold, Matthew, 2 {Ms), 10, 
 12. 
 
 Arnold, Poema of Matthew, 2, 12. 
 
 Arthur, King, 13. 
 
 AscHAM, Roger, 3. 
 
 Astroea Redux, 16, 21. 
 
 Bacon, Francis, Lord St. Albans, 
 
 13. 
 Beauty, worship of, as an inspiration 
 
 in verse, 4; Jonson's conception 
 
 of, 6. 
 Bedford, Lucy, Countess of, 5. 
 " Beginnings of the ' Cla.ssical ' Heroic 
 
 Couplet in England," 8. 
 Browne, William, 4. 
 Browning, Robert, 2. 
 
 Caesura, the, 15, 17-20. 
 Camden, William, 13. 
 Canzone, the, 3. 
 Carew, Thomas, 27. 
 
 Carlyle, Thomas, 11. 
 
 Catl'llus, 6, 26. 
 
 Chapman, George, 13, 16 f. 
 
 Chaucer, Geoffrey, 3. 
 
 Classical prosody in English verse, 
 3; Allusions in Jonson, 6. 
 
 Classicism, Nature of, 1, 2; three 
 periods of, in English literature 
 since the Renaissance, 2 ; Sid- 
 ney's, 3, 4; tendency to, in Sid- 
 ney's time, 3; of Jonson, 6 f., 11 
 f., 14, 28; theories as to the 
 origin of, after the Restoration, 
 8 f.; Sandys and, 8, 21 ; and 
 decasylhibic verse, 9 ; losses and 
 gains due to England's period of 
 so-called, 9; romanticism and, co- 
 existent in the Age of Elizabeth, 
 11 ; exhibited in the manner of 
 Dryden, 21 ; period of, why de- 
 layed after Jonson, 26; value of 
 this period of, 27. 
 
 Come<ly of Manners, 10. 
 
 Conversations with JJrummond, 7, 12, 
 15 
 
 Cou|)let, tiie heroic, 8, 9, 28 ; Jon- 
 son on tlie, 15; Jonson's u^e of 
 the, 15 f., 24 f., 28 f.; the, as 
 used by various typical poets with 
 scheme, 16-19 ; nineteenth cen- 
 tury use of, 19. 
 
 Criticism of Jonson, Dryden, and 
 Pope, 9 f. 
 
 Cross rhymes, 15. 
 
 " Cuddy," 3. 
 
 31 
 
32 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Daniel, Samuel, 13. 
 
 Defence of Poetry, 3 (bis), 
 
 Deo Optimo Maximo, 16, 18. 
 
 Discoveries, 12, 14, 15. 
 
 DoNNK, John, influence of, 7, 26 ; 
 a romanticist, 7 ; conapared with 
 Jonson and Spenser, 8; Jonson's 
 appreciation of the verse of, 
 13. 
 
 Drama, the, 9, 10, 12 f. 
 
 Drayton, Michael, 4, 16 f., 
 26. 
 
 Dbummond, William, 7, 26, 27. 
 
 Dryden, John, compared with Jon- 
 son and Pope, 9 f., 18 f.; plays 
 of, 10; forms of verse affected by, 
 10 ; prose of, 10 ; a theorist con- 
 cerning literature, 11; influence 
 of, 11; verse structure of, 16, 
 18-20 ; classicism exhibited in 
 the manner of, 21 ; rhetorical 
 structure of, 23; historical rela- 
 tion of .Jonson to, 16, 20, 29. 
 
 Dryden, Poems of, 16, 21. 
 
 Egotists, influence of, 6. 
 
 Eifjhteenlh Century Literature, 8. 
 
 Eleyy on Lady Winton, 16. 
 
 Elizabeth, Age of, and the Age of 
 Anne, 8 ; classicism and roman- 
 ticism coexistent in the, 11. 
 
 EnglamCs Heroical Epistles, 16. 
 
 English literature, changes in, in 
 the 17th century, 1, 8; three 
 periods of classicism in, 2 ; poetry 
 vs. prose in, 10. 
 
 English Worthies, 14. 
 
 Epigrams, 5, 15, 16, 19, 22, 23 f., 
 25. 
 
 Epistle to Sir Godfrey Kneller, 16. 
 
 Essay on Man, 1 6. 
 
 Every Man in His Humour, 13. 
 
 Every Man ovA of his Humour, 12 f. 
 
 Execration upon Vulcan, An, 16. 
 
 j Faerie Queene, 3. 
 
 I Fairfax, Edward, 27. 
 
 First Epistle of the Second Book of 
 Horace, 21. 
 
 Fletcher, Giles and Phineas, 
 4. 
 
 Forest, The, 15. 
 
 Fraunce, Abraham, 3. 
 
 French prose, 10. 
 
 From Shakespeare to Pope, 9. 
 
 Gascoigne, George, 3. 
 
 Greek literature, 1, 2, 3, 6, 13, 
 
 14. 
 GossE, Edmund, 8, 9, 27. 
 GossoN, Stephen, 3. 
 
 Heroic Couplet, see Couplet. 
 
 Horace, 6, 12. 
 
 Harvey, Gabriel, 3 (bis). 
 
 Heroic Drama of Dryden, 10. 
 
 Herrick, Robert, 13, 26. 
 
 Hexameter, the, 15. 
 
 Hero and Leander, 16. 
 
 Hind and the Panthei; The, 16, 19. 
 
 " Hobbinol," 3. 
 
 Hooker, Richard, 13. 
 
 Institutes, 12. 
 
 James VI, 3. 
 
 Jonson, Benjamin, classicism of, 
 2, 4, 6 f., 11 f., 12 f., 14, 22, 
 28 ; contrast between Spenser 
 and, 4 ; characteristics of the 
 poetry of, 5 f., 9, 12, 22, 26, 
 28; feeling of, for form, 5, 12 
 f., 14, 23, 25 f.; use of classi- 
 cal and mythological allusion 
 by, 6 ; influence of, 6 f., 8, 
 28 ; and Shakespeare compared, 
 6 ; popularity of, with the court 
 and with learned men, 6 ; de- 
 pendent and often in want, 6 ; 
 and Donne, 7 ; compared with 
 Donne and Spenser, 8 ; com- 
 
INDEX. 
 
 33 
 
 pared with Dryden and Pope, 
 9 f. ; plays of, 9 ; subject-matter 
 of, 9 ; a theorist concerning litera- 
 ture, 11 ; not conciliatory toward 
 literary taste of his time, 12; 
 strictures of, on Shakespeare, Sid- 
 ney, Donne, and others, 12, 13, 
 15 ; catholicity of taste of, 13 ; 
 a rhetorician, 14 ; the prose of, 
 14 ; on metrical forms, 15 ; pro- 
 jected epic of, 16 ; on the coup- 
 let, 15 ; use of the couplet by, 
 15 f. ; versification of, 17-20, 
 28 ; couplets of, of the same 
 type as Dryden's, Waller's, and 
 Pope's, 20 ; rhetorical structure 
 of the verse of, 22 f., 25, 28; 
 eclecticism of, 25 f.; and his 
 "sons," 26; character of, 26 f . ; 
 summary of conclusions regard- 
 ing, 28 f. 
 Jonson's Conversalions with Drummond, 
 7, 12 f, 
 
 JtrVENAL, 10. 
 
 Keats, John, 7, 19. 
 Keats, Poems of John, 7. 
 
 Literary Injluence of Academies, The, 
 
 10. 
 Lyric verse of Jonson, Dryden and 
 
 Pope, 9 f. 
 
 Marinism, 7, 8, 26. 
 Marlowe, Christopher, 16 f. 
 Martial, 26. 
 Masque, the, 9. 
 Metre, experiments in, 3, 15. 
 Milton, John, 5, 9, 26. 
 Morris, William, 2. 
 Mother Hubherd's Tale, 16. 
 . Mythological allusion in Jonson, 
 6. 
 
 Nymph's Passion, 26. 
 
 Ode, the, 12. 
 
 Odes for St. Cecilia's Day, 10. 
 
 Occasional verse of Jonson, Dryden, 
 and Pope, 9 f. 
 
 On the Duke of Monmouth's Expedi- 
 tion, 16. 
 
 On the Earl of Roscommon's Transla- 
 tion of Horace, 1 6. 
 
 Panegyry on the happy Entrance of 
 Jnmes, A, Id, 23. 
 
 Parallelism, 22, 28. 
 
 Paraphrase upon the Book of Job, 16, 
 29. 
 
 Pastoral verse, 13, 26. 
 
 Pater, Walter, 1. 
 
 Penniman, J. H., 13. 
 
 Pindar, 13. 
 
 Poetry, nature of, .ns differentiated 
 from prose, 1 1 f. 
 
 Pope, Alexandei;, classicism of, 
 2, 21 ; compared with Jonson 
 and Dryden, 9 ; used verse to 
 express thought now expressed in 
 prose, 10; influence of, 11; ver- 
 sification of, 16-20 ; historical 
 relation of Jonson to, 20, 29 ; 
 affirmed Sandys to be one of the 
 originals of Waller, 21 ; rlietori- 
 cal structure of, 22 f. 
 
 Pope, Life of 21. 
 
 Pope, Poems of, 2). 
 
 Portsmouth, Duchess of, 8. 
 
 Prose, of Dryden, 10 ; nature of, as 
 differentiated from poetry, 11 f.; 
 of Jonson, 14. 
 
 Proso«ly, classical, in English verse, 
 3. 
 
 Piulm LXXIII, 16, 29. 
 
 Publications of tlie University of Penn- 
 sylvania, 13. 
 
 Puttenham, George, 3. 
 
 Quintilian, 12. 
 
34 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Religious verse of Dryden, 10. 
 
 Restoration, literary loss and gain 
 after the, 9. 
 
 Roman literature, 1, 2, 3, 6, 12, 
 14. 
 
 Romanticism, nature of, 1, 2 ; of 
 Sidney, 2; novelty the touch- 
 stone of, 4 ; of Spenser and 
 Donne, 7 f. ; and restrictive 
 tendency co-existent in the age 
 of Elizabeth, 11. 
 
 Rtjffhead, Owen, 21. 
 
 Run-on couplets and lines, 17-19. 
 
 RusKiN, John, 11. 
 
 -Sad Shepherd, 13. 
 
 Sandys, George, new school of 
 verse fathered on, 8 ; Jonson's 
 appreciation of, 13 ; versification 
 of, 16-20; affirmed by Pope to 
 be one of the originals of Waller, 
 21; classicism of, 22; rhetorical 
 structure of, 22 f. 
 
 Satire of Jonson, of Dryden and 
 Pope, 9 f. 
 
 Sestine, the, 3. 
 
 School of Abuse, 3. 
 
 Scott, Sir Walter, 6. 
 
 Selden, John, 13. 
 
 Shakespeare, William, 6, 12. 
 
 Shelley, Pebcy Bysshe, 2. 
 
 Shepherds' Calendar, 13. 
 
 Sidney, Sir Philip, classicism and 
 romanticism of, 2, 3, 6 ; ex- 
 periments of, in classical metres, 
 3 (bis) ; in Italian verse-forms, 
 3 ; strictures of Jonson on, 12. 
 
 Spenser, Edmund, metrical experi- 
 ments of, 13 ; relation of, to the 
 classics, 13 ; infiuence of, 4, 26 ; 
 contrast between Jonson and, 
 
 4, 7 f.; a worshiper of beautyi 
 4; the followers of, 4 f.; expo- 
 nent of the romantic movement, 
 7 ; Jonson's appreciation of, 13 i 
 Jonson's strictures on the stanza, 
 of, 15; versification of, 16-20; 
 imitated Chaucer, 17. 
 
 Spenserian stanza, 15. 
 
 Stanihurst, Richard, 3. 
 
 Sleep and Poetry, 7. 
 
 Sonnet, the, 3, 13, 14, 26. 
 
 " Sons," the, of Jonson, 13, 26. 
 
 Southwell, Robert, 13. 
 
 Symonds, J. A., 14. 
 
 That Women are but Men's Shadows, 
 26. 
 
 TiBULLUS, 26. 
 
 To Edward Allen, 25. 
 
 To King James, 22 f. 
 
 To the King, 16. 
 
 Translation, activity of Jonson, Dry- 
 den, and Pope in, 9 f. 
 
 Underwoods, 15. 
 
 Wallkb, Edmund, alleged to be 
 the originator of the New Verse, 
 8 ; historical relation of, to Jon- 
 son, 16, 20, 29 ; versification of, 
 16-20; a "son" of Jonson, 26; 
 debt of, to Jonson, 26 ; character 
 of, 26 f.; debt of, to Carew and 
 others, 27. 
 
 War of the Theatres, The, 13. 
 
 Warburton, William, 21. 
 
 Webbe, William, 3 (bis). 
 
 Windsor Forest, 16. 
 
 Wither, George, 4. 
 
 Wood, Henry, 8, 
 
 Wordsworth, William, 2, 11. 
 
NOV 5 1985 
 
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