Shakespear is there himself, not in Cibber’s manager’s coat. Spenser is hardly yet returned from a ramble through the woods, or is concealed behind a group of nymphs, fawns, and satyrs. Milton lies on the table, as on an altar, never taken up or laid down without reverence. Lyly’s Endymion sleeps with the moon, that shines in at the window; and a breath of wind stirring at a distance seems a sigh from the tree under which he grew old. Faustus disputes in one corner of the room with fiendish faces, and reasons of divine astrology. Bellafront soothes Matheo, Vittoria triumphs over her judges, and old Chapman repeats one of the hymns of Homer, in his own fine translation! I should have no objection to pass my life in this manner out of the world, not thinking of it, nor it of me; neither abused by my enemies, nor defended by my friends; careless of the future, but sometimes dreaming of the past, which might as well be forgotten! Mr. Wordsworth has expressed this sentiment well (perhaps I have borrowed it from him)— ‘Books, dreams, are both a world; and books, we know, Are a substantial world, both pure and good, Round which, with tendrils strong as flesh and blood, Our pastime and our happiness may grow. · · · · · Two let me mention dearer than the rest, The gentle lady wedded to the Moor, And heavenly Una with her milk-white lamb. Blessings be with them and eternal praise, The poets, who on earth have made us heirs Of truth and pure delight in deathless lays. Oh, might my name be number’d among theirs, Then gladly would I end my mortal days!’ I have no sort of pretension to join in the concluding wish of the last stanza; but I trust the writer feels that this aspiration of his early and highest ambition is already not unfulfilled! LECTURE IV ON BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER, BEN JONSON, FORD, AND MASSINGER.