No More Learning

To form an adequate conception of the poet's satirical purpose in
this play one should compare the methods used here with the treatment
followed in Jonson's other dramas where the witch motive occurs.
In _The Masque of Queens_, 1609, and in _The Sad Shepherd_, Jonson
employed the lore of witchcraft more freely, but in a quite different
way. Here, instead of hard realism with all its hideous details, the
more picturesque beliefs and traditions are used for purely imaginative
and poetical purposes.

_The Masque of Queens_ was presented at Whitehall, and dedicated to
Prince Henry. Naturally Jonson's attitude toward witchcraft would here
be respectful. It is to be observed, however, that in the copious notes
which are appended to the masque no contemporary trials are referred
to. The poet relies upon the learned compilations of Bodin, Remigius,
Cornelius Agrippa, and Paracelsus, together with many of the classical
authors. He is clearly dealing with the mythology of witchcraft.
Nightshade and henbane, sulphur, vapors, the eggshell boat, and the
cobweb sail are the properties which he uses in this poetic drama.
The treatment does not differ essentially from that of Middleton and
Shakespeare.

In _The Sad Shepherd_ the purpose is still different. We have none of
the wild unearthliness of the masque. Maudlin is a witch of a decidedly
vulgar type, but there is no satirical intent. Jonson, for the purpose
of his play, accepts for the moment the prevailing attitude toward
witchcraft, and the satisfaction in Maudlin's discomfiture doubtless
assumed an acquiescence in the popular belief. At the same time the
poetical aspect is not wholly forgotten, and appears with especial
prominence in the beautiful passage which describes the witch's forest
haunt, beginning: 'Within a gloomy dimble she doth dwell'.
_The Sad
Shepherd_ and the masque are far more akin to each other in their
treatment of witchcraft than is either to _The Devil is an Ass_.

[84] See _Trials for Witchcraft 1596-7_, vol. 1, _Miscellany of the
Spalding Club_, Aberdeen, 1841.

[85] First appeared in 1597. _Workes_, fol. ed. , appeared 1616, the
year of this play.




IV. PERSONAL SATIRE


The detection of personal satire in Jonson's drama is difficult,
and at best unsatisfactory. Jonson himself always resented it as an
impertinence. [86] In the present case Fleay suggests that the motto,
_Ficta, voluptatis causa, sint proxima veris_, is an indication that we
are to look upon the characters as real persons. But Jonson twice took
the pains to explain that this is precisely the opposite of his own
interpretation of Horace's meaning. [87] The subject of personal satire
was a favorite one with him, and in _The Magnetic Lady_ he makes the
sufficiently explicit statement: 'A play, though it apparel and present
vices in general, flies from all particularities in persons'.

On the other hand we know that Jonson did occasionally indulge in
personal satire. Carlo Buffone,[88] Antonio Balladino,[89] and the
clerk Nathaniel[90] are instances sufficiently authenticated. Of these
Jonson advances a plea of justification: 'Where have I been particular?