after all Jonson was ridiculing Marston, and that the point of the satire
consisted in an intentional confusion of "the grand scourge or second
untruss" with "the scurrilous and profane" Chester?

We have digressed into detail in this particular case to exemplify the
difficulties of criticism in its attempts to identify the allusions in
these forgotten quarrels. We are on sounder ground of fact in recording
other manifestations of Jonson's enmity. In "The Case is Altered" there is
clear ridicule in the character Antonio Balladino of Anthony Munday,
pageant-poet of the city, translator of romances and playwright as well.
In "Every Man in His Humour" there is certainly a caricature of Samuel
Daniel, accepted poet of the court, sonneteer, and companion of men of
fashion. These men held recognised positions to which Jonson felt his
talents better entitled him; they were hence to him his natural enemies.
It seems almost certain that he pursued both in the personages of his
satire through "Every Man Out of His Humour," and "Cynthia's Revels,"
Daniel under the characters Fastidious Brisk and Hedon, Munday as
Puntarvolo and Amorphus; but in these last we venture on quagmire once
more. Jonson's literary rivalry of Daniel is traceable again and again, in
the entertainments that welcomed King James on his way to London, in the
masques at court, and in the pastoral drama. As to Jonson's personal
ambitions with respect to these two men, it is notable that he became, not
pageant-poet, but chronologer to the City of London; and that, on the
accession of the new king, he came soon to triumph over Daniel as the
accepted entertainer of royalty.

"Cynthia's Revels," the second "comical satire," was acted in 1600, and, as
a play, is even more lengthy, elaborate, and impossible than "Every Man Out
of His Humour." Here personal satire seems to have absorbed everything,
and while much of the caricature is admirable, especially in the detail of