the only dramatic poets of that age who are entitled to be considered after Shakspeare, and to exhibit them in the same volume with the more impressive scenes of old Marlowe, Heywood, Tourneur, Webster, Ford, and others. To shew what we have slighted, while beyond all proportion we have cried up one or two favourite names. The specimens are not accompanied with any thing in the shape of biographical notices.* I had nothing of consequence to add to the slight sketches in Dodsley and the Biographia Dramatica, and I was unwilling to swell the volume with mere transcription. The reader will not fail to observe from the frequent instances of two or. more persons joining in the composition of the same play (the noble practice of those times), that of most of the writers contained in these selections it may be strictly said, that they were contemporaries. The whole period, from the middle of Elizabeth's reign to the close of the reign of Charles I., comprizes a space of little more than half a century, within which time nearly all that we have of excellence in serious dramatic composition was produced, if we except the Samson Agonistes of Milton. * The few notes which are interspersed will be found to be chiefly critical, TABLE OF REFERENCE TO THE EXTRACTS. THOMAS SACKVILLE AND THOMAS Norton. Gorboduc ............ Thomas Kyp. GEORGE PEELE. CHRISTOPHER MARLOWE. ROBERT Tailor. ANTHONY BREWER. AUTHORS UNCERTAIN. . . . . . . . . . . . . Merry Devil of Edmonton ........ JOSEPH COOKE. Green's Tu Quoque .......... 55 THOMAS THOMAS DECKER. Page Old Fortunatus . . . . . . . . . . 56 First part of the Honest Whore . . . . . . . 63 Second part of the Honest Whore . . . . . 64 Satiro-mastix . ..... . . . 66 Thomas DeckER AND JOHN WEBSTER. JOHN MARSTON. George CHAPMAN. . . THOMAS HEYWOOD. Thomas HEYWOOD AND RICHARD BROOME. Late Lancashire Witches . . . . . . . . 120 Thomas MIDDLETON AND WILLIAM ROWLEY. Fair Quarrel ............. 124 William Rowley. All's Lost by Lust . . . . . . . . . . . 137 Woman never Vext. . . . . . . . . . . 143 THOMAS Thomas MIDDLETON. Page Women beware Women . . . . . . . 152 More Dissemblers besides Women ..... 158 No Wit Help like a Woman's . . . . . . . 161 Witch . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 164 William Rowley, Thomas Decker, John FORD, &c. Witch of Edmonton . . . . . . . . . . 175 · CYRIL TOURNEUR. Atheist's Tragedy . . . . . . . . . . . 179 Revenger's Tragedy . . . . . . . . . 183 John WEBSTER. Devil's Law Case . . . . . . . . . . . 197 Appius and Virginia ......... 201 Duchess of Malfy . . . . . . . . . . . 205 White Devil . . . . . . . . . . . . 219 John FORD. Lover's Melancholy . . . . . . . . . . . 235 Ladies' Trial . . . . . . . . . . . . . 237 Love's Sacrifice . . . ... 238 Perkin Warbeck . . . . . . . . . . . 241 Tis pity She's a Whore . . . . . . . . . 245 Broken Heart . . . . . . . . . . . . 253 SAMUEL DANIEL Hymen's Triumph .......... 266 Fulke GREVILLE. Alaham . . . . . . . . . . . . . 272 Mustapha . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 284 BENJAMIN Jonson. Case is Altered . . . . . . . . . . . . 297 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 301 Sad Shepherd . . . . . . . . . . . . 312 312 Sejanus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 315 Catiline , ... . . . . . . . . . . . 317 New Inn . . . . . . . . . . . . . 321 Alchemist : . . . . . . . . . . . . 327 Volpone . i . . . . . . . . . . . . 334 FRANCIS |