JUAN RUIZ DE ALARCON.
The author of this play was Alarcon, that thoughtful writer who, on the Spanish stage, ranks with Lope, Calderon, Moreto, and Tirso. Strange as it may appear to those who doubt whether any good can come out of Mexico, he was born and bred in that mysterious country. What his countrymen do not know of their great artist, Cabrera, they are able to tell of their chief literary glory—namely, the place and date of his baptism. Documents found in the royal university of Mexico established the several facts that Juan Ruiz de Alarcon y Mendoza was baptized in that city on the 2d day of October, 1572, and received the grade of licentiate or lawyer from the university. It was for some time asserted that he was born at Tasco (for whose church Cabrera is said to have painted extraordinary works); but Chalco, not far from the capital, has also laid claim to the honor of his birth. He is represented as short, ugly, and humpbacked. To improve his fortunes, he sought the literary life of Madrid, but his first efforts were deemed of little importance. By the year 1621 he had written eight acted comedies, of which Las Paredes Oyen (The Walls Hear) is esteemed the best, as also one of the finest in any language. In spite of his physical imperfections his genius won him admirers, socially as well as otherwise. In 1628, he became clerk to the Council of the Indies, and held his office till his death in 1639; so that it seems our author was a contemporary of Shakespeare, Webster, Jonson, and other great lights of the English drama. His comedies are lauded as forming a system of practical philosophy, inasmuch as they give a delightful verification of the proverbial wisdom of his time, and preach capital sermons from common texts. "Luck and Labor," "The World's Favors," "No Evil that does not come for Good," "Before you Marry see what you are about," "The Truth made Suspicious," are the suggestive titles of some of his dramas, which appear to have lost nothing of their peculiar excellence by pointing morals. It was Alarcon who said:
To kill an enemy is argument
Of fearing him; but to despise and spare him
Is greater chastisement, for while he lives
He is a witness of his own defeat.
He that kills, victory abbreviates,
And he that pardons makes it the more great,
As meanwhile that the conquered lives
The conqueror goes on conquering.
To give to comedy a conscience and a purpose is the distinguishing design of Alarcon; but, while the public of Madrid never failed to perceive the moral of his humor, they could yet heartily laugh at the wit of his dialogues and the genuine comicality of his situations. In his plays cool reason walked hand in hand with sentiment and pleasantry, as they do in some of the most admired comedies of our own stage. The delight with which the Mexicans witnessed La Verdad Sospechosa proved that to Alarcon belonged not merely the ingenuity by which men are amused, but something of that magic by which their own wit and humor are excited. Alarcon could give logic to a whim, a fancy, or a passion. In the Prueba de las Promesas his lover expostulates:
If Beauty's faithful lover I have been,
Esteeming though despised; loving, abhorred;
What law allows to thee, what text approves
That thou shouldst hate me because I do love thee?
An apology for woman made by a servant in Todo es Ventura (Luck is Everything) may be translated thus:
What is it that we most condemn in maids?
Inconstancy of mind? We taught them so.
The love of money? It's a thing in taste—
Or let that righteous fellow throw a stone
Who is not guilty of the self-same fault.
Of being easy? Well, what must they do,
If no man perseveres and all get tired
At the fourth day of trying? Of being hard?
Why do we thus complain when we, too, all
Run to extremes? If difficult our suit
We hate it, and if easy we despise.
In Ganar Amigos (To Gain Friends) Don Fernando has killed the brother of Don Fadrique, and seeks and obtains refuge with the latter, who, however, does not know him. Don Fadrique, though at length made aware of the truth, faithfully keeps the pledge he has given the slayer of his brother. Seeing this, Don Fernando gratefully exclaims:
The earth whereon thou stand'st shall be my altar.
Fadrique. Rise, sir; give me no thanks, as do I not
This deed for you, but for my honor's self,
For I have plighted unto you my word.