: a been written originally under the name of Oldcastle; fome of that family being then remaining, the queen was pleased to command him to alter it; upon which he made use of Falstaff. The present offence was, indeed, avoided; but I don't know whether the author may not have been fomewhat to blame in his second choice, fince it is certain that fir John Falstaff, who was a knight of the garter, and a lieutenant-general, was a name of diftinguished merit in the wars in France in Henry the fifth's and Henry the fixth's times. What grace foever the queen conferred upon him, it was not to her only he owed the fortune which the reputation of his wit made. He had the honour to meet with many great and uncommon marks of favour and friendship from the earl of Southampton, famous in the hiftories of that time for his friendship to the unfortunate earl of Effex. It was to that noble lord that he dedicated his poem of Venus and Adonis. There is one instance so singular in the magnificence of this patron of Shakespear's, that if I had not been, affured that the story was handed down by fir William. D'Avenant, who was probably very well acquainted with his affairs, I should not have ventured to have inferted, that my lord. Southampton at one time gave him a thousand pounds, to enable him to go through with a purchase which he heard he had a mind to. A bounty very great, and very rare at any time, and almost equal to that profuse generofity the present age has shown to French dancers and Italian fingers. WHAT particular habitude or friendships he contracted with private men, I have not been able to learn, more than that every one, who had a true taste of merit, and could diftinguish men, had generally a just value and esteem for him. His exceeding candor and good-nature must certainly have inclined all the gentler part of the world to love him, as the power of his wit obliged the men of the most delicate knowledge and polite learning to admire him. His acquaintance with Ben. Jonfon began with a remarkable piece of humanity and good-nature: Mr. Jonson, who was at that * See the epilogue to Henry 4th. time : time altogether unknown to the world, had offered one of his plays to the players, in order to have it acted; and the persons into whose hands it was put, after having turned it carelefly and superciliously over, were just upon returning it to him with an ill-natur'd answer, that it would be of no fervice to their company; when Shakespear luckily caft his eye upon it, and found fomething so well in it as to engage him first to read it through, and afterwards to recommend Mr. Jonfon and his writings to the publick. Jonfon was certainly a very good scholar, and in that had the advantage of Shakespear; though at the fame time, I believe, it must be allowed, that what nature gave the latter, was more than a balance for what books had given the former: and the judgment of a great man upon this occafion was, I think, very just and proper. In a conversation between fir John Suckling, fir William D'Avenant, Endymion Porter, Mr. Hales of Eaton, and Ben. Jonfon; fır John Suckling, who was a professed admirer of Shakespear, had undertaken his defence against Ben. Jonson with fome warmth; Mr. Hales, who had fat still for fome time, told them, That if Mr. Shakespear had not read the ancients, he had likewise not stolen any thing from them; and that if he would produce any one topick finely treated by any of them, he would undertake to show something upon the fame subject at least as well written by Shakespear. THE latter part of his life was spent, as all men of good fenfe will wish theirs may be, in ease, retirement, and the converfation of his friends. He had the good fortune to gather an eftate equal to his occafion, and, in that, to his wifh; and is faid to have spent some years before his death at his native Stratford. His pleasurable wit, and good-nature, engaged him in the acquaintance, and entitled him to the friendship of the gentlemen of the neighbourhood. Amongst them, it is a story almost still ́ remembered in that country, that he had a particular intimacy with Mr. Combe, an old gentleman noted thereabouts for his wealth his wealth and usury: it happened, that in a pleasant conversation amongst their common friends, Mr. Combe told Shakespear in a laughing • Combe, an old gentlen manner manner, that he fancy'd he intended to write his epitaph, if he happened to outlive him; and since he could not know what might be said of him when he was dead, he defired it might be done immediately: upon which Shakespear gave him these four verses, 1 1 Ten in the hundred lies bere ingrav'd, But the sharpness of the satire is said to have stung the man so severely, that he never forgave it. HE dyed in the 53d year of his age, and was bury'd on the north fide of the chancel, in the great church at Stratford, where a monument, as engraved in the plate, is placed in the wall. On his grave-stone underneath is, Good friend, for Jesus' fake, forbear He had three daughters, of which two lived to be married; Judith, the elder, to one Mr. Thomas Quiney, by whom she had three fons, who all dyed without children; and Susannah, who was his favourite, to Dr. John Hall, a physician of good reputation in that country. She left one child only, a daughter, who was married first to Thomas Nash, efq; and afterwards to fir John Bernard of Abbington, but dyed likewife without issue. THIS is what I could learn of any note, either relating to himself or family: the character of the man is best seen in his writings. But since Ben. Jonfon has made a fort of an essay towards it in his Discoveries, I will give it in his words: "I REMEMBER i "I REMEMBER the players have often mentioned it as an honour "to Shakespear, that in writing (whatsoever he penn'd) "blotted out a line. My answer hath been, 'Would, he had "blotted a thousand! which they thought a malevolent speech. "I had not told pofterity this, but for their ignorance, who chose "that circumstance to commend their friend by, wherein he most "faulted: and to justify mine own candor, (for I loved the man, "and do honour his memory, on this fide idolatry, as much as "any.) He was, indeed, honest, and of an open and free nature, "had an excellent fancy, brave notions, and gentle expressions; "wherein he flowed with that facility, that sometimes it was "necessary he should be stopped: fufflaminandus erat, as Augustus "faid of Haterius. His wit was in his own power; 'would, the "rule of it had been so too! Many times he fell into those things "which could not escape laughter; as when he said in the perfon "of Cafar, one speaking to him, "Cæfar thou doft me wrong. "He reply'd: "Cæfar did never wrong, but with just cause. "and such like, which were ridiculous. But he redeemed his "vices with his virtues: there was ever more in him to be praised " than to be pardoned. As for the passage which he mentions out of Shakespear, there is somewhat like it in Julius Cæfar, but without the absurdity; nor did I ever meet with it in any edition that I have seen, as quoted by Mr. Jonson. Besides his plays in this edition, there are two or three ascribed to him by Mr. Langbain, which I have never seen, and know nothing of. He writ likewise Venus and Adonis, and Tarquin and Lucrece, in stanzas, which have " As to the have been printed in a late collection of poems. character given of him by Ben. Jonfon, there is a good deal true in it: but, I believe, it may be as well expressed by what Horace fays of the first Romans, who wrote tragedy upon the Greek models, (or, indeed, translated them) in his epiftle to Augustus: --Natura fublimis & acer, Nam fpirat tragicum fatis &. feliciter audet, As I have not proposed to myself to enter into a large and complete collection upon Shakespear's works, so I will only take the liberty, with all due fubmiffion to the judgments of others, to observe fome of those things I have been pleased with in looking him over. His plays are properly to be diftinguished only into comedies and tragedies. Those which are called hiftories, and even fome of his comedies, are really tragedies, with a run or mixture of comedy amongst them. That way of tragi-comedy was the common mistake of that age, and is, indeed, become fo agreeable to the English tafte, that though the feverer critics among us cannot bear it, yet the generality of our audience feem to be better pleased with it than with an exact tragedy. The Merry Wives of Windfor, the Gomedy of Errors, and the Taming of the Shrew, are all pure comedy; the rest, however they are called, have something of both kinds. 'Tis not very easy to determine which way of writing he was most excellent in. There is certainly a great deal of entertainment in his comical humours; and though they did not then strike at all ranks of people, as the fatire of the present age has taken the liberty to do, yet there is a pleafing and a well-diftinguished variety in those characters which he thought fit to meddle with. Falstaff is allowed by every body to be a masterpiece; the character is always well sustained, though drawn |