"O for a muse of fire, that would ascend
The brightest heaven of invention!
A kingdom for a stage, princes to act,
And _monarchs_ to _behold_ the swelling scene!
Then should the warlike _Cromwell_ like himself
Assume the port of Mars; and at his heels,
Leash'd in like hounds, should famine, sword, and fire
Crouch for employment."

No sooner had this great man passed away, and an earnest age with him,
and Charles mounted the throne, than from the darkest recesses of the
stews and the taverns, from the depths within depths of Alsatia or Paris,
the whole tribe of dancers, fiddlers, drabs, mimes, stage-players, and
playwrights, knowing that their enemy was dead, and their hour of harvest
had come, emerged in swarming multitudes--multitudes swelled by the vast
tribe of play-goers, who had been counting the hours since a Falstaff
had made them laugh, an Ophelia made them weep, and a Lear made them
tremble. And had this only issued in the revival of the drama of
Shakspeare and Johnson, few could have had much to say in objection; for
that, in general, was as pure as it was powerful. But, alas, besides
them there had been a Beaumont, a Fletcher, and a Massinger, with their
unutterable abominations. Nay, the king and courtiers had imported from
France a taste which required for its gratification a licentiousness
still more abandoned, and to be cast, besides, into forms and shapes, as
stiff, stately, and elaborate as the material was vile, and were not
contented with pollution unless served up in a new, piquant, and
unnatural manner. Our poet understood this movement of his time right
well, and determined to conform to it. He knew that he could, better
than any man living, pander to the popular appetite for the