The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland | Page 9

day of October 1661, and was three days after buried at the foot of Bishop King's monument, under the south wall of the [a]isle joining on the south side to the choir of Christ Church Cathedral, near the remains of William Cartwright, and Jo. Gregory.
Footnotes: 1. Athen. Oxon. 259. Ed. 1721. 2. Wood ubi supra. 3. Athen. Oxon. p. 260.
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THOMAS NABBES.
A writer, in the reign of Charles I, whom we may reckon, says Langbaine, among poets of the third rate, but who in strict justice cannot rise above a fifth. He was patronized by Sir John Suckling. He has seven plays and masks extant, besides other poems, which Mr. Langbaine says, are entirely his own, and that he has had recourse to no preceding author for assistance, and in this respect deserves pardon if not applause from the critic. This he avers in his prologue to Covent-Garden.
He justifies that 'tis no borrowed strain, From the invention of another's brain. Nor did he steal the fancy. 'Tis the fame He first intended by the proper name. 'Twas not a toil of years: few weeks brought forth, This rugged issue, might have been more worth, If he had lick'd it more. Nor doth he raise From the ambition of authentic plays, Matter or words to height, nor bundle up Conceits at taverns, where the wits do sup; His muse is solitary, and alone Doth practise her low speculation.
The reader from the above specimen may see what a poet he was; but as he was in some degree of esteem in his time, we thought it improper to omit him.
The following are his plays;
1. The Bride, a Comedy; acted in the Year 1638 at a private House in Drury-Lane by their Majesty's Servants, printed 4to. 1640.
2. Covent Garden, a Comedy; acted in the Year 1632.
3. Hannibal and Scipio, an Historical Tragedy, acted in the year 1635.
4. Microcosmus, a Moral Masque, represented at a private house in Salisbury Court, printed 1637.
5. Spring's Glory, Vindicating Love by Temperance, against the Tenet, Sine Cerere & Baccho friget Venus; moralized in a Masque. With other Poems, Epigrams, Elegies, and Epithalamiums of the author's, printed in 4to, London, 1638. At the end of these poems is a piece called A Presentation, intended for the Prince's Birth day, May 29, 1638, annually celebrated.
6. Tottenham-Court, a Comedy, acted in the year 1633, at a private house in Salisbury Court, printed in 4to. 1638.
7. Unfortunate Lovers, a Tragedy, never acted, printed in 4to. London, 1640.
Mr. Philips and Mr. Winstanley, according to their old custom, have ascribed two other anonymous plays to our author: The Woman Hater Arraigned, a Comedy, and Charles the First, a Tragedy, which Langbaine has shewn not to be his.
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JAMES SHIRLEY,
A very voluminous dramatic author, was born in the city of London, and: was descended from the Shirleys in Suffex or Warwickshire; he was educated in grammar learning in Merchant Taylors school, and transplanted thence to St. John's College, but in what station he lived there, we don't find.
Dr. William Laud, afterwards archbishop of Canterbury, presiding over that house, conceived a great affection for our author, and was willing to cherish and improve those promising abilities early discoverable in him. Mr. Shirley had always an inclination to enter into holy orders, but, for a very particular reason, was discouraged from attempting it by Dr. Laud; this reason to some may appear whimsical and ridiculous, but has certainly much weight and force in it.
Shirley had unfortunately a large mole upon his left cheek, which much disfigured him, and gave him a very forbidding appearance. Laud observed very justly, that an audience can scarce help conceiving a prejudice against a man whose appearance shocks them, and were he to preach with the tongue of an angel, that prejudice could never be surmounted; besides the danger of women with child fixing their eyes on him in the pulpit, and as the imagination of pregnant women has strange influence on the unborn infants, it is somewhat cruel to expose them to that danger, and by these means do them great injury, as ones fortune in some measure depends upon exterior comeliness[1]. But Shirley, who was resolute to be in orders, left that university soon after, went to Cambridge, there took the degrees in arts, and became a minister near St. Alban's in Hertfordshire; but never having examined the authority, and purity of the Protestant Church, and being deluded by the sophistry of some Romish priests, he changed his religion for theirs[2], quitted his living, and taught a grammar school in the town of St. Alban's; which employment he finding an intolerable drudgery, and being of a fickle unsteady temper, he relinquished it, came up to London, and took lodgings in Gray's Inn, where he