FRANCIS BEAUMONT and JOHN FLETCHER.
These two joyned together, made one of the happy Triumvirate (the other two being Johnson and Shakespear) of the chief Dramatick Poets of our Nation, in the last foregoing Age; among whom there might be said to be a symmetry of perfection, while each excelled in his peculiar way: Ben Johnson in his elaborate pains and knowledge of Authors, Shakespear in his pure vein of wit, and natural Poetick height; Fletcher in a Courtly Elegance and Gentile Familiarity of Style, and withal a Wit and Invention so overflowing, that the luxuriant Branches thereof were frequently thought convenient to be lopt off by Mr. Beaumont; which two joyned together, like Castor and Pollux, (most happy when in conjunction) raised the English to equal the Athenian and Roman Theaters; Beaumont bringing the Ballast of Judgment, Fletcher the Sail of Phantasie, both compounding a Poet to admiration.
These two admirable Wits wrote in all two and fifty Plays, whereof three and forty were Comedies; namely, Beggars Bush, Custom of the Country, Captain Coxcomb, Chances, Cupid's Revenge, Double Marriage, Elder Brother, Four Plays in one, Fair Maid of the Inn, Honest man's Fortune, Humorous Lieutenant, Island Princess, King and no King, Knight of the burning Pestle, Knight of Malta, Little French Lawyer, Loyal Subject, Laws of Candy, Lovers Progress, Loves Cure, Loves Pilgrimage, Mad Lover, Maid in the Mill, Monsieur Thomas, Nice Valour, Night-Walker, Prophetess, Pilgrim, Philaster, Queen of Corinth, Rule a Wife and have a Wife, Spanish Curate, Sea-Voyage, Scornful Lady, Womans Prize, Women pleased, Wife for a Month, Wit at several weapons, and a Winters Tale. Also six Tragedies; Bonduca, the Bloody Brother, False One, the Maids Tragedy, Thiery and Theodoret, Valentinian, and Two Noble Kinsmen, a Tragi-Comedy, Fair Shepherdess, a Pastoral; and a Masque of Grays-Inn Gentlemen.
It is reported of them, that meeting once in a Tavern, to contrive the rude Draught of a Tragedy, Fletcher undertook to kill the King therein, whose Words being over-heard by a Listner (though his Loyalty not to be blamed herein) he was accused of High Treason, till the Mistake soon appearing, that the Plot was only against a Dramatick and Scenical King, all wound off in Merriment.
Yet were not these two Poets so conjoyned, but that each of them did several Pieces by themselves, Mr. Beaumont, besides other Works, wrote a Poem, entituled, Salmacis and Hermaphroditus, a Fable taken out of Ovid's Metamorphosis; and Mr. Fletcher surviving Mr. Beamont, wrote good Comedies of himself; so that it could not be laid to his Charge what Ajax doth to Ulysses;
Nihil hic Diomede remoto,
When Diomedes was gone,
He could do nought alone.
Though some think them inferior to the former, and no wonder if a single thread was not so strong as a twisted one, Mr. Fletcher (as it is said) died in London of the Plague, in the first year of King Charles the First, 1625.