Free. Think of it! come away; virtue, let sleep thy passions;
What old times held as crimes, are now but fashions.
[Exeunt.
[53] Old eds. “goose-turnd-greene.”—“Merde oye. A Goose-turd-greene.”—Cotgrave.
[54] Tacitus has the same sensible observation about prohibited books:—“Convictum Veientonem Italia depulit [Nero] et libros exuri jussit, conquisitos lectitatosque, donec cum periculo parabantur: mox licentia habendi oblivionem attulit.”—Ann., xiv. 50. But in these days of “anthropological” research a public censor of morals might to the advantage of the community be allowed to exercise authority. Discretion, of course, would have to be used; otherwise this edition of Marston might be called in; absit omen!
[55] See Dyce’s Shakesp. Glossary.
[56] For information about the city-giants see Fairholt’s excellent History of Lord Mayors’ Pageants, p. 76 (Percy Society).
[57] Proposal, scheme.
[58] Nineveh was one of the most famous of the motions (i.e., puppet-shows); Julius Cæsar was also a favourite (see Middleton, viii. 95-6). Ben Jonson alludes to the motion of “Jonas and the Whale” in Every Man out of his Humour. In Jonson’s Bartholomew Fair, v. 1, there is a mention of the motion of Jerusalem:—“O the motions that I, Lanthorn Leatherhead, have given light to, in my time, since my master Pod died! Jerusalem was a stately thing, and so was Nineveh,” &c.
[59] So ed. 2.—Ed. 1. “’tis the.”