To the second class of biographical materials belong Greene's own prose works, the _Mourning Garment, Never too Late_, with the second part, _Francesco's Fortunes_, the _Groatsworth of Wit_, all partly autobiographical; and _The Repentance of Robert Greene_, confessedly autobiographical, but, until lately, of questioned authenticity. The biographical material in these works is ample, but its value is discounted by certain considerations involved in the motives of Greene's pamphlet composition. When Greene began to write, art was not yet strong enough to command a popular hearing without the assistance of a didactive motive. Adapting himself to the conditions with a tact that made him the most broadly read writer of his time, Greene made edification the end of his writing from the first. His second work to be entered on the Stationers' Register, March 1581, had a distinct moral purpose: "Youth, seeing all his ways so troublesome, abandoning virtue and leaning to vice, recalleth his former follies with an inward repentance." In choosing topics for popular pamphlets Greene tells such a story as that derived from Ælian in _Planetomachia_ (1585), or he tells over the story of the prodigal son as in the _Mourning Garment_. And throughout his life moral purpose remained a factor in his prose and drama. He turned from romances to the composition of the conny-catching pamphlets, in the trust "that those discourses will do great good, and be very beneficial to the commonwealth of England." _A Looking-Glass for London and England_ is a pure moral interlude. Often he moralises when it is unnecessary to do so, or when he has to change his original to introduce a didactic motive. Even the Palmer who tells the tale of _Never too Late_ is himself penitent for his past sins. In _Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay_ the jolly friar of Brazen-nose is made at the end to surrender his calling through motives of remorse as far as possible from the spirit of his life, and _James IV._ ends with a penitent sovereign begging forgiveness for his sins. These facts show, if they show anything, that the motive of repentance was a conventional thing with Greene, and that however faithful it may have been to his own experience not the least advantage in its use lay in its popularity. That it was a popular motive is shown by the vogue of such books as Tarlton's _News out of Purgatory_ (1590), and by the fact that T. Newman, in a dedication to _Greene's Vision_ (1592), asserts that "many have published repentances in his name." That much of Greene's autobiographical material is veracious we have corroborative evidence to prove; we should, however, not be justified in accepting it all without question. There is a bland shamelessness in the confession of sins that is itself one of the best signs of health. When Greene says, "I saw and practised such villainy as is abominable to declare," he is expressing in phrase strikingly similar to Hamlet's words to