Upon a harp made of dead Spanish bones,
The proudest instrument the world affords:
To thee that never blushest, though thy cheeks
Are full of blood, O Saint Revenge, to thee
I consecrate my murders, all my stabs,’ &c.
It may be worth while to observe, for the sake of the curious, that many of Marlowe’s most sounding lines consist of monosyllables, or nearly so. The repetition of Eleazar’s taunt to the Cardinal, retorting his own words upon him, ‘Spaniard or Moor, the saucy slave shall die’—may perhaps have suggested Falconbridge’s spirited reiteration of the phrase—‘And hang a calve’s skin on his recreant limbs.’
I do not think the rich Jew of Malta so characteristic a specimen of this writer’s powers. It has not the same fierce glow of passion or expression. It is extreme in act, and outrageous in plot and catastrophe; but it has not the same vigorous filling up. The author seems to have relied on the horror inspired by the subject, and the national disgust excited against the principal character, to rouse the feelings of the audience: for the rest, it is a tissue of gratuitous, unprovoked, and incredible atrocities, which are committed, one upon the back of the other, by the parties concerned, without motive, passion, or object. There are, notwithstanding, some striking passages in it, as Barabbas’s description of the bravo, Philia Borzo[[18]]; the relation of his own unaccountable villainies to Ithamore; his rejoicing over his recovered jewels ‘as the morning lark sings over her young;’ and the backwardness he declares in himself to forgive the Christian injuries that are offered him,[[19]] which may have given the idea of one of Shylock’s speeches, where he ironically disclaims any enmity to the merchants on the same account. It is perhaps hardly fair to compare the Jew of Malta with the Merchant of Venice; for it is evident, that Shakespear’s genius shews to as much advantage in knowledge of character, in variety and stage-effect, as it does in point of general humanity.
Edward II. is, according to the modern standard of composition, Marlowe’s best play. It is written with few offences against the common rules, and in a succession of smooth and flowing lines. The poet however succeeds less in the voluptuous and effeminate descriptions which he here attempts, than in the more dreadful and violent bursts of passion. Edward II. is drawn with historic truth, but without much dramatic effect. The management of the plot is feeble and desultory; little interest is excited in the various turns of fate; the characters are too worthless, have too little energy, and their punishment is, in general, too well deserved, to excite our commiseration; so that this play will bear, on the whole, but a distant comparison with Shakespear’s Richard II. in conduct, power, or effect. But the death of Edward II. in Marlow’s tragedy, is certainly superior to that of Shakespear’s King; and in heart-breaking distress, and the sense of human weakness, claiming pity from utter helplessness and conscious misery, is not surpassed by any writer whatever.
‘Edward. Weep’st thou already? List awhile to me,
And then thy heart, were it as Gurney’s is,