The works of Ben Jonson. With a biographical memoir, by William Gifford. A new edition

Front matter

THE WORKS OF BEN JONSON. The Muses' fairest light in no dark time ; The wonder of a learned age ; the line Which none can pass ; the most proportion'd wit, To nature, the best judge of what was fit ; The deepest, plainest, highest, clearest pen ; The voice most echo'd by consenting men ; The soul which answer'd best to all well said By others, and which most requital made. Cleveland. THE WORKS OF Hen Donjon WITH NOTES CRITICAL AND EXPLANATORY AND A BIOGRAPHICAL MEMOIR BY W. GIFFORD ESQ. WITH

Introduction

AND APPENDICES BY LIEUT. -COL. F. CUNNINGHAM IN NINE VOLUMES VOL. \ LONDON BICKERS AND SON HENRY SOTHERAN AND CO. CHISWICK PRESS : — rRINTED I)Y WHITTINGHAM AND WILK1NS, TOOKS COURT, CHANCERY LANE. CONTENTS OF VOLUME V. PAGE The Devil is an Ass i The Staple of News 149 The New Inn; or, The Light Heart . . . 295 Ode (to Himself) 415 An Answer to the Ode. (By Owen Feltham) . . 418 An Answer to Ben Jonson's Ode. (By T. Randolph). 420 To Ben Jonson. (By T. Carew) 423 Ode to Ben Jonson. (By J. Cleveland) . . . 425 Additional Notes B This Comedy was acted in 1616, by the King's Servants, at Blackfriars, but not put to the press till many years afterwards, when it appeared in the folio of 163 1. The Editor of the Biographia Dramatica, who had but to open this volume to ascertain the true date, chooses rather to copy Lang baine, who is of no authority in this respect, and assign it to a later period.

There is, indeed, another edition in folio, 1641, but it is of no authority, or even value, being full of errors. In noticing the date oi Bartholomew Fair, I had occasion to ob serve that Jonson appeared to concern himself little, if at all, with the printing of the plays in the present collection ; and the Devil is an Ass, as well as the Staple ofl News, furnishes no slight proof of it. In the folio, 16 16, which the author certainly revised, he is altogether sparing of his marginal directions, while the dramas just mentioned abound in them. They are, however, of the most trite and trifling nature ; they tell nothing that is not told in action, and generally in the same words, and are, upon the whole, such a worth less incumbrance on the page, that the reader will thank me for discarding them altogether.

They bear no trace of the poet's hand. This comedy was revived immediately after the Restoration, and, as Downes informs us, " much to the satisfaction of the town." It originally appeared with this motto, from Horace : Ficta voluptatis causd, sins proxima veris. THE