“Poetaster.”
Introduction.—
“Light! I salute thee, but with wounded nerves,
Wishing thy golden splendour pitchy darkness.”
There is no reason to suppose Satan's address to the sun in the Paradise Lost, more than a mere coincidence with these lines; but were it otherwise, it would be a fine instance what usurious interest a great genius pays in borrowing. It would not be difficult to give a detailed psychological proof from these constant outbursts of anxious self-assertion, that Jonson was not a genius, a creative power. Subtract that one thing, and you may safely accumulate on his name all other excellences of a capacious, vigorous, agile, and richly-stored intellect.
Act i. sc. 1.—
“Ovid. While slaves be false, fathers hard, and bawds be
whorish.”
The roughness noticed by Theobald and Whalley, may be cured by a simple transposition:—