Ben Jonson and the men who contributed to Jonson's memorial volume, Jonsonus Virbius, all make much of a struggle or contest between 'Ignorance' and 'Learning' that was taking place in England - a social and political reformation. As this blog suggests, this struggle (a byproduct of the humanist learning that was being introduced to England) extended beyond stylistic choices in Poetry to affect all aspects of human social life; eventually leading to a revolution in the form of government.
But before Englishman 'rationalized' their government by cutting the head off their King - there was another battle in which a great nobleman 'lost his head' - so to speak - a contest between new Learning and humanist-style Virtue and an older, more ancient form of power and a different way of understanding the world. In order to promote new values - these older values were attacked as being backward, ignorantly unreformed, vulgar, and in some cases, were even designated vicious.
During his lifetime, Ben Jonson believed that he had won the battle with Ignorance - he was crowned 'Poet Laureate' and wore the laurels of the victor. His memorials include poems that record the victory of learning and understanding, and the subjection of Ignorance. He and his followers believed that a 'turning point' in history had been reached.
In his lifetime, Ben Jonson raised two important monuments to his victory. A monument to his own worth, his Folio of 1616, an elegant volume as precise and correct as possible.
The second monument to his victory took the form of a trophy, the spoils of war, and it was another Book: The 1623 First Folio of William Shakespeare.
Spolia opima (or "rich spoils/trophies") refers to the armor, arms, and other effects that an ancient Roman general had stripped from the body of an opposing commander slain in single combat. Though the Romans recognized and put on display other sorts of trophies--such as standards and the beaks of enemy ships--spolia opima were considered the most honorable to have won and brought great fame to their captor.
The First Folio is a monument. It is the 'monument Shakespeare', and it is dedicated to Jonson's victory over English Ignorance and barbarism. It stands as Jonson's trophy; spoils stripped from the 'enemy' commander, the Earl of Oxford, and raised high in a public place. It is dedicated to Jonson's patron the Earl of Pembroke and his brother.
Rise, MY Shakespeare:
Trophy \Tro"phy\, n.; pl. Trophies. [F. troph['e]e (cf. It. &
Sp. trofeo), L. tropaeum, trophaeum, Gr. ?, strictly, a
monument of the enemy's defeat, fr.? a turn, especially, a
turning about of the enemy, a putting to flight or routing
him, fr. ? to turn. See Trope.]
1. (Gr. & Rom. Antiq.) A sign or memorial of a victory raised
on the field of battle, or, in case of a naval victory, on
the nearest land. Sometimes trophies were erected in the
chief city of the conquered people.
Note: A trophy consisted originally of some of the armor,
weapons, etc., of the defeated enemy fixed to the trunk
of a tree or to a post erected on an elevated site,
with an inscription, and a dedication to a divinity.
The Romans often erected their trophies in the Capitol.
2. The representation of such a memorial, as on a medal; esp.
(Arch.), an ornament representing a group of arms and
military weapons, offensive and defensive.
3. Anything taken from an enemy and preserved as a memorial
of victory, as arms, flags, standards, etc.
Around the posts hung helmets, darts, and spears,
And captive chariots, axes, shields, and bars, And
broken beaks of ships, the trophies of their wars.
--Dryden.
4. Any evidence or memorial of victory or conquest; as, every
redeemed soul is a trophy of grace.
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John Oldham on Jonson:
...Boldly thou didst the learned world invade,
Whilst all around thy pow'rful Genius sawy'd,
Soon vanquish'd Rome, and Greece were made submit,
Both were thy humble tributaries made,
And thou return'dst in Tripumph with their captive Wit.
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TO THE MOST NOBLE
A N D
INCOMPARABLE PAIRE
OF BRETHREN
WILLIAM
Earle of Pembroke,&c. Lord Chamberlaine to the
Kings most Excellent Majesty.
A N D
PHILIP
Earle of Montgomery,&c. Gentleman of his Majesties
Bed-Chamber. Both Knights of the most Noble Order
of the Garter, and our singular good
L O R D S
Right Honourable,
Whilst we studie to be thankful in our particular, for the many favors we have received from your L.L. we are falne upon the ill fortune, to mingle two the most diverse things that can bee, feare, and rashnesse; rashnesse in the enterprize, and feare of the successe. For, when we valew the places your H.H. sustaine, we cannot but know their dignity greater, then to descend to the reading of these trifles: and, while we name them trifles, we have depriv'd our selves of the defence of our Dedication. But since your L.L. have beene pleas'd to thinke these trifles some-thing, heeretofore; and have prosequuted both them, and their Authour living, with so much favour: we hope, that (they out-living him, and he not having the fate, common with some, to be exequutor to his owne writings) you will use the like indulgence toward them, you have done unto their parent. There is a great difference, whether any Booke choose his Patrones, or finde them: This hath done both. For, so much were your L.L. likings of the severall parts, when they were acted, as before they were published, the Volume ask'd to be yours. We have but collected them, and done an office to the dead, to procure his Orphanes, Guardians; without ambition either of selfe-profit, or fame: onely to keepe the memory of so worthy a Friend, & Fellow alive, as was our
S H A K E S P E A R E , by humble offer of his playes, to your most noble patronage. Wherein, as we have justly observed, no man to come neere your L.L. but with a kind of religious addresse; it hath bin the height of our care, who are the Presenters, to make the present worthy of your H.H. by the perfection. But, there we must also crave our abilities to be considerd, my Lords. We cannot go beyond our owne powers. Country hands reach foorth milke, creame, fruites, or what they have : and many Nations (we have heard) that had not gummes & incense, obtained their requests with a leavened Cake. It was no fault to approach their Gods, by what meanes they could: And the most, though meanest, of things are made more precious, when they are dedicated to Temples. In that name therefore, we most humbly consecrate to your H.H. these remaines of your servant Shakespeare; that what delight is in them, may be ever your L.L. the reputation his, & the faults ours, if any be committed, by a payre so carefull to shew their gratitude both to the living, and the dead, as is
Your Lordshippes most bounden,
JOHN HEMINGE.
HENRY CONDELL.
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Trophies and Monuments-
Written to Philip Herbert after the death of his brother William:
Chaffinge, Thomas, ca. 1581-1646.
Title: The iust mans memoriall Date: 1630
My Lord, let me take the boldnesse to tell you, that the eyes of the world are fastned on you; you cannot bee hid, your actions are not done in a corner, notice will be taken of all your counsels, and your counsellors, men are big with the expectation of you, and blame them not that they should be so, especially of you, who (besides others of your Illustrious Stocke and Linage well known) have had so pious and religious an Aeneas to your brother, and so famous and valiant a Hector to your Unckle.
Et Frater Aeneas, & Avunculus excitet:
Let the piety and goodnes of the one, and the valour and Chevalry of the other, serve as so many silver Watch-bels in your eares, to awaken you to all Honourable and Noble atchievements. Miltiades Trophees would not let Themistocles sleepe. Neither let the matchless Trophees and Monuments of their glory, suffer your eyes to sleepe, or your eye-lids to slumber: but bee rather as spurres to set you forward in the couragious prosecution of all good causes for Gods Glory andthe Church. O bee not idle in the Imitation of them, whose image you not onely beare, but whose part also you are; so shall not After-ages in the storying of their glorious Annals, shut up yours, with a Degeneremq: Neoptolemum.
To live in the face of a glorious Court, where your eyes are daily fill'd, as with Magnificence, so with Vanity; yet you shall doe well, otherwise, to cast them aside from such Gorgeous Spectacles, and sticke them in the shrowds and winding-sheetes of the dead. Nothing shall more humble you then this, and so nothing life you neerer Heaven then this!
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William Cartwright, a Son of Ben, records his faction's judgement of Shakespeare's 'trifles'- discriminating between worth and worthless:
Trifle \Tri"fle\, n. [OE. trifle, trufle, OF. trufle mockery,
raillery, trifle, probably the same word as F. truffe
truffle, the word being applied to any small or worthless
object. See Truffle.]
1. A thing of very little value or importance; a paltry, or
trivial, affair.
With such poor trifles playing. --Drayton.
Trifles light as air Are to the jealous confirmation
strong As proofs of holy writ. --Shak.
Small sands the mountain, moments make year, And
frifles life. --Young.
Trifle \Tri"fle\, v. i. [imp. & p. p. Trifled; p. pr. & vb. n.
Trifling.] [OE. trifelen, truflen. See Trifle, n.]
To act or talk without seriousness, gravity, weight, or
dignity; to act or talk with levity; to indulge in light or
trivial amusements.
They trifle, and they beat the air about nothing which
toucheth us. --Hooker.
To trifle with, to play the fool with; to treat without
respect or seriousness; to mock; as, to trifle with one's
feelings, or with sacred things.
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-- CARTWRIGHT, WILLIAM, 1647,
Upon the Dramatick Poems of Mr. John Fletcher.
...Shakespeare to thee was DULL, whose best jest lyes
I'th Ladies questions, and the Fooles replyes; [70]
Old fashion'd wit, which walkt from town to town
In turn'd Hose, which our fathers call'd the CLOWN;
Whose wit our nice times would obsceannesse call,
And which made Bawdry passe for Comicall:
Nature was all his Art, thy veine was free
As his, but without his SCURILITY...
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These worthless trifles were considered to be far beneath the dignity of an Earl. Oxford's 'shame' and ignoble behaviours are discreetly obscured by the 'Monument Shakespeare' - the Immortal Buffoon.
_Mirth Making_, Chris Holcomb
In his Ethics, Aristotle suggests that *changes in stylistic and substantive predilections indicate advances in civilization*. While enumerating the differences between the jesting of a BUFFOON and a witty gentleman, Aristotle compares each character type to Old and New Comedy, respectively: "The difference (between a buffoon and a gentleman) may be seen by comparing the old and modern comedies; the earlier dramatists found their fun in obscenity, the modern prefer innuendo, which marks a great advance in decorum; (4.8.6). This comparison suggest that smutty humor is less civilized than the more refined humor delivered through innuendo. (footnote pp. 199-200)
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Mirth Making. The Rhetorical Discourse on Jesting in Early Modern England In the First Folio Jonson discreetly mocks his fallen opposition under the cover of a disproportionate and anticlassical [Droeshout] Figure. The First Folio's figurative language and apparent praise mock the common ways of vulgar praise (But these [common]ways/ Were not the paths I meant unto thy praise ), concealing from undiscerning readers Jonson's 'correct' criticism of Shakespeare's vulgarity and ignorant appeal to the unlearned and unrefined. Jonson's encomium to Shakespeare is a 'rhetorical Janus'.
Chris Holcomb
...Associations between social status and certain forms of jesting appear as early as the Nicomachean Ethics, where Aristotle classifies different modes of jesting according to three social types: the boor, the buffoon, and the witty man of tact. Aristotle has little to say about boorish men except that they never say "anything funny themselves and take offense at those who do" (4.8.3) Instead, Aristotle dwells on differences between the buffoon and man of wit, and in differentiating these two social types, he associates indecorous jests with those of the lower-class buffoon and decorous ones with those of a gentleman. 'Those who go to excess in ridicule are thought to be buffoons or vulgar fellows, who itch to have their joke at all costs, and are more concerned to raise a laugh than to keep within the bounds of decorum' (4.8.3). The buffoon often jests in a 'servile' and often obscene fashion (4.8.5-6), he 'cannot resist a joke,' he will 'not keep his tongue off himself or anyone else, if he can raise a laugh,' and he 'will say things which a man of refinement would never say' (4.8.10). Those 'who jest with good taste,' by contrast, will say 'only the sort of things that are suitable to a virtuous man and a gentleman; (4.8.5). They prefer to jest by way of 'innuendo, which marks a great advance in decorum,' and they will never stoop so low in their jesting as to say anything 'unbecoming to a gentleman' (4.8.6-7). The line Aristotle draws here is not simply one between the indecorous and decorous; it is also one between the lower and upper classes. And while Aristotle couches his distinctions in more or less descriptive (although elitist) terms, they do have prescriptive force. If a speaker is to show himself as a 'man of refinement,' he must limit his jesting behaviours and avoid the excesses of the buffoon.
Cicero and Quintilian adopt Aristotle's method of classifying decorous and indecorous jests along class lines, and they both use the buffoon and well-bred man of tact to define forms of jesting befitting an orator (the boor, as often happens in everyday life, is left out of their discussions of jesting). But they add to the ranks of the buffoon (or SCURRA, in Latin) a cast of characters familiar from the Roman stage, street performances, and entertainments provided at a gentleman's dinner party - characters including the mime (mimus), pantomime (ethologus), and clown (sannio). Cicero says that 'an orator must avoid each of two dangers: he must not let his jesting become buffoonery or mere mimicking (scurrilis...aut mimicus)' (2.58.239). Like Aristotle's buffoon, the Latin scurra violates proprieties of time. Cicero says he jests "from morning to night, and without any reason at all" (2.60.245). He also shows no restraint in his selection of objects of ridicule, and his jests, like a scattergun, will often strike 'unintended victims' (2.60.245). He will even turn himself into an object of ridicule if he thinks he can raise a laugh (Quintilian, 6.3.82). Most important, the scurra is a member of the lower classes, a parasite who would often perform at a gentleman's dinner party for table scraps, and his antics almost always bespoke his lowly position. For all of these reasons, especially the last, Cicero and Quintilian repeatedly insist that orators avoid all likeness to buffoons, and toward this end, they offer a set of strictures limiting the jesting practices of orators so that those practices accord with the orator's gentlemanly status. With respect to proprieties of time, Cicero says, "Regard then to occasions, control and restraint of our actual raillery, and economy in bon-mots, will distinguish an orator from a buffoon (oratorem a scurra)" (2.60.247).
As we have seen, orators should also be careful in their selection of comic butts and avoid targeting the excessively wretched or wicked and the well-beloved. Moreover, they must never turn themselves into objects of laughter for, as Quintilian says, "To make jokes against oneself is scarcely fit for any save professed buffoons and is strongly to be disapproved in an orator" (6.3.82). Presumable, orators should keep the audience's laughter off themselves and direct it only at their opponents. Above all, the orator should only jest in ways that befit a gentleman or liberalis. He should avoid obscenities in his jesting, which are 'not only degrading to a pubic speaker, but also hardly sufferable at a gentleman's dinner party (convivio liberorum)' (De oratore, 2.61.252), and 'scurrilous or brutal jests, although they may raise a laugh, are quite unworthy of a gentleman (liberali)' (Quintilian, 6.3.83). In an allusion to his famous formulation or the orator as a good man, or vir bonus, skilled in speaking, Quintilian sums up his attitudes toward buffoonery, a summation that will serve for Cicero's views on the subject as well: 'A good man (vir bonus) will see that everything he says is consistent with his dignity and the respectability of his character (dignitate ac verecundia); for we pay too dear for the laugh we raise if it is at the cost of our own integrity (probitatis)' (6.3.35). (Holcomb,pp.39-40)
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The idea of ancient literary criticism
By Yun Lee
...In his treatise On Style, Demetrius declares that figured language must be employed if somebody wishes to address and to criticize eithera tyrant or a powerful individual, and he advocates this as a middle course between flattery, which is base, and direct criticism, which is dangerous. Ahl notes, in an essay entitled 'The Art of Safe Criticism', that Quintilian, Vespasian's imperial rhetorician, subsequently elaborates Demetrius' account of the political use of figured language at Institutio oratoria 9.2.66. Quintilian sets out three different occasions on which figured language, which he defines as language that is changed from its most obvious and uncomplicated usage by poetic or oratorical usage (9.1.13), may be employed. The first of these concerns when it is dangerous to speak openly; the second concerns propriety - where the Latin 'it is not fitting/suitable ('non decet' ) perhaps renders the Greek 'improper' (aprepes); while the third advocates the use of figured language where the novelty of such structures may produce delight and pleasure. Of these three occasions, the first is the most obviously political, and what Quintilian proposes is a need for the author inquestion to tread warily around authority, particularly as author and political leader may be at odds. The following section of the works suggests that the rhetorician has in mind the empire, figured as tyranny: he cites the use of rhetorical figures in school exercises which require pupils to produce speeches to instigate rebellion against despots without speaking too plainly to tyrants. (9.2.67).
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disease of the Age/mountebanke
Sweet Swan of Avon ! what a sight it were
To see thee in our waters yet appear,
And make those flights upon the banks of Thames,
That so did take Eliza, and our James !
(Great English poets sing in the Thames - not the muddy backwater Avon)
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Macbeth:
Then yield thee, coward,
And live to be the SHOW and gaze o' the time.
We'll have thee, as our RARER MONSTERS are,
Painted upon a pole, and underwrit,
"Here may you see the tyrant."
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TRIUMPH, my Britain
Thou hast one to SHOW
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Oxford's tyrannical 'self-love', and his refusal to reform himself and his Art.
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O! lest the world should task you to recite
What merit lived in me, that you should love
After my death,--dear love, forget me quite,
For you in me can NOTHING WORTHy prove.
Unless you would devise some virtuous lie,
To do more for me than mine own desert,
And hang more praise upon deceased I
Than niggard truth would willingly impart:
O! lest your true love may seem false in this
That you for love speak well of me untrue,
My name be buried where my body is,
And live no more to shame nor me nor you.
For I am shamed by that which I bring forth,
And so should you, to love things NOTHING WORTH.
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Of the period after the Restoration - David Norbrook writes (In _Writing the English Republic_):
"Forgetting was officially sanctioned: The Act of Indemnity and Oblivion banned 'any name or names, or other words of reproach tending to revive the memory of the late differences thereof'. This book is one attempt to counter that process of erasure, which has had long-term effects on English literary history and, arguably, on wider aspects of political identity.. In the short term, the Act of Indemnity and Oblivion can be seen as an enlightened piece of legislation. *Twenty years of bitter contention between and within families and social and religious groups needed oblivion to heal them*. In the longer term, however, such forgetting has had it costs. Suppressing the republican element in English Cultural history entails simplifying a complex but intellectually and artistically challenging past into a sanitized and impoverished Royal heritage....The republic's political institutions 'continue to languish in a historiographical blind spot'; much the same applies to artistic culture (Norbrook pp1-2.)
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Greville - Life of Sidney
Neither am I (for my part) so much in love with this life, nor believe so little in a better to come, as to complain of God for taking him [Sidney], and such like exorbitant WORTHYness from us: fit (as it were by an Ostracisme) to be divided, and not incorporated with our corruptions: yet for the sincere affection I bear to my Prince, and Country, my prayer to God is, that this WORTH, and Way may not fatally be buried with him; in respect, that both before his time, and since,experience hath published the usuall discipline of greatnes to have been tender of it self onely; making honour a triumph, or rather TROPHY of desire, set up in the eyes of Mankind, either to be worshiped as IDOLS, or else as Rebels to perish under her glorious oppressions. Notwithstanding, when the PRIDE of FLESH, and power of favour shall cease in these by death, or disgrace; what then hath time to register, or FAME to publish in these great mens names, that will not be offensive, or infectious to others? What Pen without BLOTTING can write the story of their deeds? Or what Herald blaze their Arms without a blemish? And as for their counsels and projects, when they come once to light, shall they not live as noysome, and loathsomely above ground, as their Authors carkasses lie in the grave? So as the return of such greatnes to the world, and themselves, can be but private reproach, publique ill example, and a fatall scorn to the Government they live in. Sir Philip Sidney is none of this number; for the greatness which he affected was built upon true WORTH; esteeming Fame more than Riches, and Noble actions far above Nobility it self.
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Greville, __A Dedication to Sir Philip Sidney_
“I conceived an Historian was bound to tell nothing but the truth, but to tell all truths were both justly to wrong, and offend not only princes and States, but to blemish, and stir up himself, the frailty and tenderness, not only of particular men, but of many Families, with the spirit of an Athenian Timon.”
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The Bumkinification of the Earl of Oxford:
Oxford hurled headlong flaming from th'ethereal Court and London, landing in a dunghill in Stratford.
Judicio Pylium, genio Socratem, arte Maronem
Terra tegit, populus moeret, Olympus habet.
Stay, passenger, why goest thou by so fast?
Read, if thou canst, whom envious death hath plast
Within this monument Shakespeare: with whom
Quick nature doed; whose name doth deck his tomb
Far more than cost; sith all that he had writ
Leaves living art but page to serve his wit.
