Beyond this there is a supposition, supported by greater or less probability, that he had a share in _Lust’s Dominion_ and in _Titus Andronicus_ and _Henry VI._ To the plays are to be added the fragment of _Hero and Leander_, _The Passionate Shepherd_, and the translations from Ovid written in his earlier days.[76] [SN: _Character of these writers._] If the question is asked what this body of poets had done to advance the development of the English drama, the answer must be that they had done something to improve its language. More can hardly be claimed for them. They certainly give no example of how to construct a dramatic story, nor did they create a consistent interesting character, unless Greene’s Fair Margaret be allowed as an exception. That you did very well as long as you took care that something happened, whether it was what the personage would have done, or what would follow from what went before, or not, was apparently an accepted rule with all of them. It was somewhat strange that it should have been so, for all were educated men, and were deeply conscious of their learning. Even if they did not take the classic model, which, as they were all far better qualified to write a chorus than to construct a plot, it would have been to their advantage to do, they might have learnt, without going beyond Horace, to avoid their grosser faults. It must not be forgotten that none of their surviving plays were published in favourable circumstances. All may have been, and some certainly were, subject to manipulation while in the hands of the actors. But even when allowance is made for this, it is undeniable that the writers of the school of Marlowe, to use a not very accurate but convenient expression, were totally wanting in any sense of proportion. To judge by much that they were content to write, they cannot have known the difference between good and bad. The incoherent movement of their plays was perhaps partly due to the want of scenery. When the audience would take a curtain for Syracuse, they would also take it for Ephesus or for twenty different places, indoors and out, in one act. There was, therefore, no check on the playwright, who could move with all the licence of the story-teller. But then they did not give their plays even the coherence of a story. As they were all dependent on companies of actors, they may often have put in what their employers told them was needed to please a part of the audience. It is to this necessity that we may attribute the comic scenes of _Dr Faustus_ if we wish to find an excuse for Marlowe--and if, indeed, they were his, and not written in by others at the orders of Henslowe the manager. But this does not account for all. When it is allowed for, enough remains to show that all these predecessors of Shakespeare were unable to see the difference between horseplay and humour, and were almost equally blind to the immense distinction between the “grand manner” and mere fustian.