was no outrage upon nature, and that there need be no abruptness in the passage from tears to laughter. And so was realised for the first and last time in the world's history the dream of Socrates; the theory he propounded to Agathon, who was too drunk and drowsy for argument or contradiction, as the dawn broke over that memorable symposium. But Marlowe could not don alternately the buskin and the sock. His fiery spirit walked always on the heights; no ripple of laughter reached him as he scaled the "high pyramides" of tragic art. But while the poet was pursuing his airy path the actors at the Curtain had to look after their own interests. They knew that though they should speak with the tongues of angels yet the audience would turn a deaf ear unless some comic business were provided. Accordingly they employed some hack-writer, or perhaps a member of their own company, to furnish what was required. How execrably he performed his task is only too plain. But it is strange that Marlowe's editors should have held so distinguished a dramatist as Dekker responsible for these wretched interpolations. They were misled by the entry in Henslowe's Diary concerning Dekker's "addycions" to Faustus, an entry which has been shown (vid. p. xv.) to be a gross forgery. There is not the slightest tittle of evidence to convict Dekker of having perpetrated the comic scenes found in the quarto of 1604. Let us now consider the relationship between the quartos of 1604 and 1616. From an undoubtedly genuine entry in Henslowe's Diary (ed. J. P. Collier, p. 228), we learn that on November 22, 1602, William Birde and Samuel Rowley were paid the sum of four pounds for "adicyones" to Faustus. As the sum was comparatively large the additions must have been considerable. Dyce at first thought that the quarto of 1616 represented the play in the shape it had assumed at the hands of Birde and Samuel Rowley. This view he afterwards modified on finding that the anonymous Taming of a Shrew, 1594, contained an obvious imitation of a line 1 first printed in ed. 1616. But the editors are agreed that the additions found in ed. 1616 are in no instance to be ascribed to Marlowe. My own opinion is, that the new comic scenes and the bulk of the additional matter are certainly not his; but I hold at the same time that ed. 1616 gives us occasionally the author's revised text, or restores passages that had been omitted in the first edition. As this theory has not been put forward before, I may be excused for dwelling on it at some length. the reader will turn to the speech of the chorus preceding scene vii., and compare the texts of eds. 1604 and 1616, he will readily perceive that the additional lines preserved in the later edition render the passage much 1 The line in Faustus is If "Or hewed this flesh and bones as small as sand," scene x. I. 308, and the imitation is "And hewed thee smaller than the Lybian sands." There is an allusion to an incident of the interpolated scene x. in a passage of Merry Wives, iv. 5 :-"So soon as I came beyond Eton they threw me off from behind one of them in a slough of mire, and set spurs and away, like three German devils, three Doctor Faustuses." Here the reference may be to the prose tract, but it is equally likely that Shakespeare was glancing at the play; for there is nothing to show that the additional scene was not interpolated at an early date. more picturesque. As the speech stands in the earlier edition it is very meagre; the additional lines, which were certainly beyond the reach of Birde or Samuel Rowley, give precisely what was wanted. Either Marlowe added them when revising the play, or lines omitted in the earlier edition were restored in the later. The variations in scene xiv. are interesting. At the point where Helen passes over the stage ed. 1604 has "2nd Schol. Too simple is my wit to tell her praise, Whom all the world admires for majesty. Let us depart; and for this glorious deed "2nd Schol. Was this fair Helen whose admired worth 3rd Schol. Too simple is my wit to tell her worth 1st Schol. Now we have seen the pride of Nature's work In both editions the text is assuredly Marlowe's; but in this instance the first quarto seems to preserve the revised text. Later in the same scene the exhortation of the Old Man reads better in the later than in the earlier edition. The alterations are such as we might expect the author to have made on revision. As to the additions in the terrific scene xvi. it is not easy to speak with confidence. In my judgment the text of the earlier edition is preferable. By delaying the catastrophe the additions seem to weaken its impressiveness. At the departure of the scholars, after they have paid their last sad farewell, our feelings have been raised to the highest pitch; and the intrusion at that moment of the Good and Evil Angels is an artistic mistake. Nor does the entrance of Lucifer and Mephistophilis at the beginning of the scene contribute in the slightest degree to the terror of the catastrophe. The scene as it stands in the earlier edition-the pathetic leave-taking between Faustus and the scholars, followed swiftly by the awful soliloquy -needs no addition of horror. But the new matter found in the later edition is undoubtedly powerful; it was penned by no hack-writer, but has the ring of Marlowe. My impression is, that the text in the later edition gives us the scene in its first state; and that Marlowe on revising his work heightened the dramatic effect of the profoundly impressive catastrophe by cancelling the passages which found their way into ed. 1616. But what shall be said of the final colloquy between the scholars when they find the mangled body of Faustus on the morrow of that fearful night of storm? Is it by Marlowe, or is it, as the late Professor Wagner thought, the work of a "mere versifier"? To my ear the lines are solemn and pathetic, thoroughly worthy of Marlowe ; but it does not on this account follow that they have a dramatic fitness. It is not improbable that the play in its unrevised state concluded with the scene between the scholars, and that the poet afterwards substituted for this scene the chorus' speech of compassion and warning. If we retain the colloquy between the scholars, then the final moralising of the chorus would seem to be otiose; if, on the other hand, the chorus closes the play, then even the short delay caused by the appearance of the scholars is felt to be a dramatic impropriety. To the chorus, in my judgment, must be given the last word; and we must part, however reluctantly, with the tender and pitiful colloquy.1 My view, then, is that Marlowe revised his work; that the quartos of 1604 and 1616 were both printed from imperfect and interpolated play-house copies, and that neither gives the correct text; that in some cases the readings of the earlier editions are preferable, in other cases the readings of the later. But, it may be objected, what evidence have we to show that the Elizabethan dramatists ever revised their works with such care and elaboration? Omitting all references to doubtful cases—such as the relationship between the 1597 and 1599 quartos of Romeo and Juliet, or the 1603 and 1604 quartos of Hamlet-and omitting, too, the example of Ben Jonson, who was twitted by his 1 The lengthy additions in scene vii. are the work of a practised playwright, but diction and versification plainly show that they are not from Marlowe's hand. So too with the additional scenes on pp. 299311 (Vol. I.), although we are occasionally reminded of Marlowe's early manner in reading such lines as "To cast his magic charms that shall pierce through The ebon gates of ever-burning hell, And hale the stubborn Furies from their caves." |