LTHOUGH The Jew of Malta was written

between 1588 and 1592, there is no earlier edition of the play than the quarto of 1633. This was furnished with a brace of Prologues and Epilogues by Thomas Heywood, the dramatist, who tells the

"by the best of poets in that age"

the play was

"writ many years agone,

And in that age hought second unto none.'

وو

The source of the story is unknown; Mr. Symonds, arguing chiefly from its unrelieved cruelty, thinks it may be taken from some Spanish novel.

Enter MACHIAVEL.

Machiavel. Albeit the world thinks Machiavel is dead, Yet was his soul but flown beyond the Alps,

And now the Guise1 is dead, is come from France,

To view this land, and frolic with his friends.

To some perhaps my name is odious,

But such as love me guard me from their tongues;
And let them know that I am Machiavel,

And weigh not men, and therefore not men's words.
Admired I am of those that hate me most.
Though some speak openly against my books,
Yet they will read me, and thereby attain
To Peter's chair: and when they cast me off,
Are poisoned by my climbing followers.

I count religion but a childish toy,
And hold there is no sin but ignorance.

Birds of the air will tell of murders past!
I am ashamed to hear such fooleries.

Many will talk of title to a crown :

What right had Cæsar to the empery?

Might first made kings, and laws were then most sure
When like the Draco's they were writ in blood.

Hence comes it that a strong-built citadel
Commands much more than letters can import;
Which maxim had but Phalaris observed,

He had never bellowed, in a brazen bull,
Of great ones' envy. Of the poor petty wights

Let me be envied and not pitièd !

But whither am I bound? I come not, I,

To read a lecture here in Britain,

But to present the tragedy of a Jew,

Who smiles to see how full his bags are crammed,

Which money was not got without my means.

I crave but this—grace him as he deserves,

And let him not be entertained the worse

Because he favours me.

[Exit.

1 The Duc de Guise, who had organised the Massacre of St. Bartholomew in 1572, and was assassinated in 1588.

DRAMATIS PERSONE.

FERNEZE, Governor of Malta.

LODOWICK, his Son.

SELIM CALYMATH, Son of the Grand Seignior.
MARTIN DEL Bosco, Vice-Admiral of Spain.
MATHIAS, a Gentleman.

BARABAS, a wealthy Jew.

ITHAMORE, BARABAS' slave.

Knights, Bassoes, Officers, Guard, Messengers, Slaves,

and Carpenters.

KATHARINE, mother of MATHIAS.

ABIGAIL, Daughter of BARABAS.

BELLAMIRA, a Courtesan.

Abbess.

Two Nuns.

MACHIAVEL, Speaker of the Prologue.

SCENE.-MALTA.

1 This distinguished Florentine, degraded into a personification of unscrupulous policy, was frequently appealed to on the Elizabethan stage.

BARABAS discovered in his counting-house, with heaps of gold before him.

B

AR. So that of thus much that return was

made:

And of the third part of the Persian ships, There was the venture summed and satisfied.

As for those Sabans,' and the men of Uz, That bought my Spanish oils and wines of Greece, Here have I purst their paltry silverlings. Fie; what a trouble 'tis to count this trash, Well fare the Arabians, who so richly pay The things they traffic for with wedge of gold, Whereof a man may easily in a day

66

1 Old ed. "Samintes ;" modern editors print Samnites," between whom and the "men of Uz" there can be no possible connection. We have Saba for Sabæa in Faustus [see p. 195].-Bullen.