Page images
PDF
EPUB

"A shadow like an angel, with bright hair

Dabbled in blood."

But amidst all his spasmodic and braggart lines in the vein of King Cambyses, his mind continually gives evidence of possessing pathos, sweetness, and true power. Imaginations of the greatest beauty and majesty will sometimes rush up, like rockets, from the level extravagance of his most ranting plays, "streaking the darkness radiantly " as in that celebrated passage in Tamburlaine, which Shakspeare condescended to ridicule through the lips of Ancient Pistol :

";

"Enter Tamburlaine, drawn in his chariot by Trebizon and Soria, with bits in their mouths, reins in his left hand, in his right hand a whip, with which he scourgeth them.

"Tamb. Holla, ye pamper'd jades of Asia :
What, can ye draw but twenty miles a day,
And have so proud a chariot at your heels,
And such a coachman as great Tamburlaine ?
But from Asphaltis, where I conquered you,
To Byron here, where thus I honor you?
The horse that guide the golden eye of heaven,
And blow the morning from their nostrils,
Making their fiery gate above the glades,
Are not so honor'd in their governor
As you, ye slaves, in mighty Tamburlaine."
Lamb, Vol. 1., p. 18.

From the same play, which has passed into a synonyme of bombast and "midsummer madness," but which contains lines that Beaumont and Milton have not hesitated to appropriate, Leigh Hunt extracts the following exquisite passage. "If all the pens that ever poet held

Had fed the feeling of their master's thoughts,
And ev'ry sweetness that inspired their hearts,
And minds, and muses on admired themes;
If all the heavenly quintessence they still
From their immortal flowers of poesy,
Wherein, as in a mirror, we perceive
The highest reaches of a human wit;
If these had made one poem's period,
And all combin'd in beauty's worthiness;
Yet should there hover in their restless heads,
One thought, one grace, one wonder, at the best,
Which into words no virtue can digest."

The description of Tamburlaine's person has a rude Titanic grandeur, which still tells on the ear and brain as in the lines,

“Of stature tall, and straightly fashioned;

Like his desire, lift upwards and divine,

So large of limbs, his joints so strongly knit,
Such breadth of shoulders, as might mainly bear
Old Atlas' burthen.”

In the whole description, his predominating desire to accumulate round his characters the images of strength and majesty, and dwarf all other men in comparison, is finely exemplified. Tamburlaine is

"Pale of complexion, wrought in him with passion"; his eyes are "piercing instruments of sight,"

"Whose fiery circles bear encompassed

A heaven of heavenly bodies in their spheres."

The breath of heaven "delights" to play with his curls of "amber hair"; his bent brows "figure death," their smoothness "amity and life"; his "kindled wrath can only be quenched in blood "; and he is "in every part proportioned like a man," who has the right divine to subdue the world. We are astonished that Carlyle has not yet puffed Tamburlaine as made after Marlowe's image. The Scythian shepherd deserves a proud place among his heroes.

Most of Marlowe's powerful scenes are well known. His best plays are The Rich Jew of Malta; Edward the Second, the reluctant pangs of whose abdicating royalty," says Lamb, "furnished hints which Shakspeare scarce improved in Richard the Second "; and The Tragical History of the Life and Death of Dr. Faustus, which is his greatest and most characteristic performance, sadly disfigured, however, by bathos and buffoonery, and inspired in part by the very imp of mischief. Barabbas, the Jew, has been mentioned as sug gesting Shylock. The character, however, has little resemblance to Shakspeare's Jew. It is Marlowe all over. In the celebrated scene where Barabbas gloats over his vast wealth, his imagination glows like his own fiery opals." The deathscene in Edward the Second, according to Lamb, "moves pity and terror beyond any scene, ancient or modern," with

[ocr errors]

which he is acquainted. We think this praise altogether too extravagant, but we place it before our readers for judgment. "Berkley Castle. The King is left alone with Lightborn, a murderer.

"Edw. Who's there? what light is that? wherefore com❜st thou? Light. To comfort you, and bring you joyful news.

66

"Edw. Small comfort finds poor Edward in thy looks.

Villain, I know thou com'st to murder me.

"Light. To murder you, my most gracious lord?

Far is it from my heart to do you harm.

The queen sent me to see how you were used,
For she relents at this your misery;

And what eyes can refrain from shedding tears,
To see a king in this most piteous state?

"Edw. Weep'st thou already? list awhile to me,
And then thy heart, were it as Gurney's* is,
Or as Matrevis',* hewn from the Caucasus,
Yet will it melt, ere I have done my tale.
This dungeon where they keep me is a sink
Wherein the filth of all the castle falls.
"Light. O villains !

"Edw. And there, in mire and puddle, have I stood
This ten days' space; and lest that I should sleep,
One plays continually upon a drum.

They give me bread and water, being a king;
So that, for want of sleep and sustenance,
My mind 's distemper'd, and my body's numb'd,
And whether I have limbs or no, I know not.
O would my blood drop out from every vein,
As doth this water from my tattered robes!
Tell Isabel the queen, I look'd not thus,
When for her sake I ran at tilt in France,

And there unhors'd the duke of Cleremont.

66

Light. O speak no more, my lord! this breaks my heart. Lie on this bed, and rest yourself awhile.

"Edw. These looks of thine can harbour naught but death! I see my tragedy written in thy brows.

Yet stay awhile, forbear thy bloody hand,
And let me see the stroke before it comes,
That even then, when I shall lose my life,

My mind may be more steadfast on my God.

66

Light. What means your highness to mistrust me thus ?

* His keepers.

"Edw. What mean'st thou to dissemble with me thus ?

66

Light. These hands were never stained with innocent blood, Nor shall they be tainted with a king's.

"Edw. Forgive my thought, for having such a thought. One jewel have I left, receive thou this.

Still fear I, and I know not what's the cause,

But every joint shakes as I give it thee.

O, if thou harbour'st murder in thy heart,

Let the gift change thy mind, and save thy soul !
Know that I am a king; O, at that name

I feel a hell of grief! Where is my crown?

Gone, gone! and do I still remain alive?

"Light. You're overwatch'd, my lord; lie down and rest. "Edw. But that grief keeps me waking, I should sleep; For not these ten days have these eyelids closed.

Now as I speak they fall, and yet with fear

Open again. O wherefore sitt'st thou here?

66

Light. If you mistrust me, I'll be gone, my lord. "Edw. No, no, for if thou mean'st to murder me, Thou wilt return again; and therefore stay.

"Light. He sleeps.

"Edw. O let me not die! yet stay, O stay awhile! Light. How now, my lord?

66

"Edw. Something still buzzeth in mine ears,

And tells me if I sleep I never wake;

This fear is that which makes me tremble thus.
And therefore tell me, wherefore art thou come?
"Light. To rid thee of thy life; Matrevis, come.
"Edw. I am too weak and feeble to resist :
Assist me, sweet God, and receive my soul."

Lamb, Vol. I., pp. 25-27.

We take leave of Marlowe with an extract from the last scene in Faustus. The verse has the sinewy vigor and sonorous chime which generally distinguish his style. It is, however, intensified by the agony one might feel on viewing his own name traced in flaming characters on the black rolls of the damned.

"FAUSTUS alone. The clock strikes eleven.

"Faust. O Faustus,

Now hast thou but one bare hour to live,
And then thou must be damn'd perpetually.
Stand still, you ever-moving spheres of heaven,
That time may cease, and midnight never come.

Fair Nature's eye, rise, rise again, and make
Perpetual day or let this hour be but.
A year, a month, a week, a natural day,
That Faustus may repent and save his soul.
O lente, lente currite, noctis equi!

The stars move still, time runs, the clock will strike,
The devil will come, and Faustus must be damn'd.
O, I will leap to heaven! Who pulls me down?
See where Christ's blood streams in the firmament:
One drop of blood will save me; O, my Christ,
Rend not my heart for naming of my Christ!
Yet will I call on him. O spare me, Lucifer!
Where is it now? 't is gone!

And see, a threat'ning arm, and angry brow!
Mountains and hills, come, come, and fall on me,
And hide me from the heavy wrath of heaven.
No? then I will headlong run into the earth:
Gape, earth. O no, it will not harbour me.
You stars that reigned at my nativity,
Whose influence have allotted death and hell,
Now draw up Faustus like a foggy mist
Into the entrails of yon laboring cloud;
That when you vomit forth into the air,
My limbs may issue from your smoky mouths,
But let my soul mount, and ascend to heaven.
The watch strikes.

O half the hour is past! 't will all be past anon.
O if my soul must suffer for my sin,

Impose some end to my incessant pain!
Let Faustus live in hell a thousand years,
A hundred thousand, and at the last be saved:
No end is limited to damned souls.

Why wert thou not a creature wanting soul?
Or why is this immortal that thou hast ?

O Pythagoras, Metempsychosis, were that true,
This soul should fly from me, and I be chang'd
Into some brutish beast.

All beasts are happy, for when they die,
Their souls are soon dissolv'd in elements;
But mine must live still to be plagued in hell.
Curst be the parents that engender'd me:
No, Faustus, curse thyself, curse Lucifer,
That hath depriv'd thee of the joys of heaven.
The clock strikes twelve.

It strikes, it strikes; now, body, turn to air,

« PreviousContinue »