unsocial government from which they had so fortunately escaped, that
the people appear to have anxiously avoided all retrospect, and, with
Prynne and Vicars, to have lost sight of Shakspeare and "his
fellows." Instead, therefore, of taking up dramatic poetry where it
abruptly ceased in the labours of Massinger, they elicited, as it
were, a manner of their own, or fetched it from the heavy monotony of
their continental neighbours.'


So is history written, and, what is more, believed. The amount of
misrepresentation in this passage (which would probably pass current
with most readers in the present day) is quite ludicrous. In the
first place, it will hardly be believed that these words occur in an
essay which, after extolling Massinger as one of the greatest poets
of his age, second, indeed, only to Shakspeare, also informs us (and,
it seems, quite truly) that, so far from having been really
appreciated or patronised, he maintained a constant struggle with
adversity,--'that even the bounty of his particular friends, on which
he chiefly relied, left him in a state of absolute dependence,'--that
while 'other writers for the stage had their periods of good fortune,
Massinger seems to have enjoyed no gleam of sunshine; his life was
all one misty day, and "shadows, clouds, and darkness rested on it."'

So much for Charles's patronage of a really great poet. What sort of
men he did patronise, practically and in earnest, we shall see
hereafter, when we come to speak of Mr. Shirley.

But Mr. Gifford must needs give an instance to prove that Charles was
'not inattentive to the success of Massinger,' and a curious one it
is; of the same class, unfortunately, as that with the man in the old