The Poetaster | Page 9

year of the death of Shakespeare, Jonson collected his
plays, his poetry, and his masques for publication in a collective edition.
This was an unusual thing at the time and had been attempted by no
dramatist before Jonson. This volume published, in a carefully revised
text, all the plays thus far mentioned, excepting "The Case is Altered,"
which Jonson did not acknowledge, "Bartholomew Fair," and "The
Devil is an Ass," which was written too late. It included likewise a
book of some hundred and thirty odd 'Epigrams', in which form of brief
and pungent writing Jonson was an acknowledged master; "The
Forest," a smaller collection of lyric and occasional verse and some ten
'Masques' and 'Entertainments'. In this same year Jonson was made poet
laureate with a pension of one hundred marks a year. This, with his fees
and returns from several noblemen, and the small earnings of his plays
must have formed the bulk of his income. The poet appears to have
done certain literary hack-work for others, as, for example, parts of the
Punic Wars contributed to Raleigh's 'History of the World'. We know
from a story, little to the credit of either, that Jonson accompanied
Raleigh's son abroad in the capacity of a tutor. In 1618 Jonson was
granted the reversion of the office of Master of the Revels, a post for
which he was peculiarly fitted; but he did not live to enjoy its
perquisites. Jonson was honoured with degrees by both universities,
though when and under what circumstances is not known. It has been
said that he narrowly escaped the honour of knighthood, which the
satirists of the day averred King James was wont to lavish with an
indiscriminate hand. Worse men were made knights in his day than
worthy Ben Jonson.
From 1616 to the close of the reign of King James, Jonson produced
nothing for the stage. But he "prosecuted" what he calls "his wonted
studies" with such assiduity that he became in reality, as by report, one
of the most learned men of his time. Jonson's theory of authorship
involved a wide acquaintance with books and "an ability," as he put it,
"to convert the substance or riches of another poet to his own use."
Accordingly Jonson read not only the Greek and Latin classics down to
the lesser writers, but he acquainted himself especially with the Latin
writings of his learned contemporaries, their prose as well as their

poetry, their antiquities and curious lore as well as their more solid
learning. Though a poor man, Jonson was an indefatigable collector of
books. He told Drummond that "the Earl of Pembroke sent him £20
every first day of the new year to buy new books." Unhappily, in 1623,
his library was destroyed by fire, an accident serio-comically described
in his witty poem, "An Execration upon Vulcan." Yet even now a book
turns up from time to time in which is inscribed, in fair large Italian
lettering, the name, Ben Jonson. With respect to Jonson's use of his
material, Dryden said memorably of him: "[He] was not only a
professed imitator of Horace, but a learned plagiary of all the others;
you track him everywhere in their snow. . . . But he has done his
robberies so openly that one sees he fears not to be taxed by any law.
He invades authors like a monarch, and what would be theft in other
poets is only victory in him." And yet it is but fair to say that Jonson
prided himself, and justly, on his originality. In "Catiline," he not only
uses Sallust's account of the conspiracy, but he models some of the
speeches of Cicero on the Roman orator's actual words. In "Poetaster,"
he lifts a whole satire out of Horace and dramatises it effectively for his
purposes. The sophist Libanius suggests the situation of "The Silent
Woman"; a Latin comedy of Giordano Bruno, "Il Candelaio," the
relation of the dupes and the sharpers in "The Alchemist," the
"Mostellaria" of Plautus, its admirable opening scene. But Jonson
commonly bettered his sources, and putting the stamp of his
sovereignty on whatever bullion he borrowed made it thenceforward to
all time current and his own.
The lyric and especially the occasional poetry of Jonson has a peculiar
merit. His theory demanded design and the perfection of literary finish.
He was furthest from the rhapsodist and the careless singer of an idle
day; and he believed that Apollo could only be worthily served in
singing robes and laurel crowned. And yet many of Jonson's lyrics will
live as long as the language. Who does not know "Queen and huntress,
chaste and fair." "Drink to me only with thine eyes," or "Still to be neat,
still to be dressed"? Beautiful in form, deft and graceful in