contemporary, speaking of his Tragedy the " Duch

ess of Malfy," says—

"Thy Monument is raised in thy life time,

Each Man is his own marble.

Thy Epitaph only the title be,

Write Duchess! that will fetch a tear for thee."

The Tragedy here mentioned is certainly one of the most extraordinary compositions in our language. With many faults, and many extravagances, it yet evinces so much sterling merit, such a vivid Poetic fancy, and such power in moving terror and pity, that I know very few Dramatic pieces which are entitled to rank above it. Two similies will sufficiently show the originality and beauty of Webster's imagery. The first illustrates the ingratitude displayed to a faithful servant, who continued attached to his master during his fallen. fortunes:

"Oh! th' inconstant,

And rotten ground of service! You may see,
'Tis e'en like one, that on a Winter's night

Takes a long slumber o'er a dying fire,

As loath to part from't; yet parts thence more cold,
Than when he first sat down."

The Second is contained in the following lines:

"An honest Statesman to a Prince

Is like a Cedar planted by a spring:

The spring bathes the tree's roots, the grateful tree
Rewards it with the shadow."

Chapman, Middleton, Heywood, Dekker, and Tourneur, occupy honourable stations in what may be called the School of Shakspeare; and Shirley gracefully closes the list, not as one of the greatest, but as the last, of an illustrious phalanx, who disappeared, and left their ranks to be occupied by a body, to whom they bore no more resemblance, than did the Titans who assaulted Olympus, to

"That small infantry

Warr'd on by Cranes."

We have now traced the history, and entered into a brief review, of the merits of Dramatic Literature in England, previous to the Restoration; we have seen it's faint and imperfect dawn in the authors of "Gorboduc," and "Gammer Gurton's Needle;" it's morning light of rich promise in Peele, Lily, and Marlowe; and it's full meridian of power and splendour, in Shakspeare and his contemporaries. We have now the less gratifying, but not less imperative duty, of the Historian and Critic, to perform, to narrate it's

degradation and debasement; it's decline and fall: to watch it's downward course from the proud pinnacle on which we have recently contemplated it, until we find it in the present day, in a state where the only consolation left us, is the conviction that it cannot possibly sink any lower : when we find the National Theatres, where delighted and applauding audiences listened to the music of Shakspeare, Fletcher, and Jonson, converted into booths for cattle, and puppet-boxes for Punch; when the boards where Garrick trod are disgraced by hoofs; and when the natural emotions of "Lear" and "Hamlet" are no longer attractive, unless aided by the contortions of Apes, and the mummeries of Pantomime.

The deposition and death of Charles the First, as we have already had occasion to remark, were events, which, however advantageous they may have proved to the liberties of the Nation, were death blows to Poetry, and the Arts. When Charles ascended the throne, above a Century had elapsed since the civil commotions of the nation had been quieted by the accession of the house of Tudor; and the Ecclesiastical persecutions of Henry, Mary, and Elizabeth, had subsided into something like Religious toleration, if not Reli

gious liberty. Charles the First, if the incidents of his reign had not turned out so disastrous, bid fair to have proved to England, what Francis the First had been to France, the encourager of the Arts; the munificent patron of their Professors; and an example in the highest station in the realm, of good taste and mental acquirement, which would have been very generally imitated by all who looked up to the Throne as the fountain of emolument and honour.

The triumph of the Puritans effected a sad Revolution in these matters. The days of Jack Cade seemed to have returned, when a man was hanged for being able to write his own name, instead of having a mark to himself like an honest, plain-dealing citizen; and when the nobility were proscribed as national enemies, because, as it was said, they thought it scorn to go in leathern aprons. Painting, Sculpture, Music, and Poetry, but above all Dramatic Poetry, were anathematised as infamous, and abominable; and even Milton considered it necessary to excuse himself to his sect, for writing the fine Tragedy of " Sampson Agonistes," by citing the authority of St. Paul, who thought it not unworthy of him to insert a verse of Euripides, the great Tragic writer of Greece, into

the Holy Scriptures:-1 Corinthians, 15th chapter, 83d verse," Be not deceived, evil communications corrupt good manners."

Milton, as a Dramatist, is the connecting link between the writers who flourished previous, and subsequent, to the Restoration: not that he has much in common with either, but of his two Dramas, the first," Comus," was written before, and the other, "" Sampson Agonistes," after, that period; and they are each characteristic of the writer at the different periods in which they were written. The first has all the buoyancy and vivacity of youth; is full of high aspirings; of splendid imaginings; the outpourings of a Poetical spirit, before it was soured by disappointment, or fevered by Criticism, or embittered by political, or polemical controversy. The Second is as strongly characteristic of it's Author when " fallen on evil days, and evil tongues; with darkness and with dangers compassed round." The utmost severity of thought and diction is observable in this Drama. There are no vagaries of fancy; no symptoms of an unbridled imagination. In thought, expression, sentiment, it is Greek, attic Greek; tinged, however, with that solemn and unearthly character, which it derived from the Sacred nature of it's subject. Both Dramas are worthy of