No physic strong to cure a tortured mind
But freedom from the torture it sustains.”
Now hear Shakespeare:—
“Canst thou not minister to a mind diseased,
Pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow,
Raze out the written troubles of the brain,
And, with some sweet oblivious antidote,
Cleanse the stuff’d bosom of the perilous stuff
Which weighs upon the heart?”
Ford lingers-out his heart-breaks too much. He recalls to my mind a speech of Calianax in Beaumont and Fletcher’s “Maid’s Tragedy:” “You have all fine new tricks to grieve. But I ne’er knew any but direct crying.” One is tempted to prefer the peremptory way in which the old ballad-mongers dealt with such matters:—