invention as they [the ancients] did; and not be tied to those strict and
regular forms which the niceness of a few, who are nothing but form, would
thrust upon us." "Every Man in His Humour" is written in prose, a novel
practice which Jonson had of his predecessor in comedy, John Lyly. Even
the word "humour" seems to have been employed in the Jonsonian sense by
Chapman before Jonson's use of it. Indeed, the comedy of humours itself is
only a heightened variety of the comedy of manners which represents life,
viewed at a satirical angle, and is the oldest and most persistent species
of comedy in the language. None the less, Jonson's comedy merited its
immediate success and marked out a definite course in which comedy long
continued to run. To mention only Shakespeare's Falstaff and his rout,
Bardolph, Pistol, Dame Quickly, and the rest, whether in "Henry IV." or in
"The Merry Wives of Windsor," all are conceived in the spirit of humours.
So are the captains, Welsh, Scotch, and Irish of "Henry V.," and Malvolio
especially later; though Shakespeare never employed the method of humours
for an important personage. It was not Jonson's fault that many of his
successors did precisely the thing that he had reprobated, that is, degrade
"the humour: into an oddity of speech, an eccentricity of manner, of dress,
or cut of beard. There was an anonymous play called "Every Woman in Her
Humour." Chapman wrote "A Humourous Day's Mirth," Day, "Humour Out of
Breath," Fletcher later, "The Humourous Lieutenant," and Jonson, besides
"Every Man Out of His Humour," returned to the title in closing the cycle
of his comedies in "The Magnetic Lady or Humours Reconciled."

With the performance of "Every Man Out of His Humour" in 1599, by
Shakespeare's company once more at the Globe, we turn a new page in
Jonson's career. Despite his many real virtues, if there is one feature
more than any other that distinguishes Jonson, it is his arrogance; and to
this may be added his self-righteousness, especially under criticism or
satire. "Every Man Out of His Humour" is the first of three "comical