THE PLAYS OF GEORGE CHAPMAN. II. THE CONSPIRACY AND TRAGEDY OF CHARLES DUKE OF BYRON1. Prologus, v. 18 his country's love He yet thirsts, not the fair shades of himself; Brereton interprets v. 19 as 'the images of himself invested with royal dignity.' But is the figure not derived from the myth of Narcissus? dumque sitim sedare cupit, sitis altera crevit, dumque bibit, visae correptus imagine formae BYRON'S CONSPIRACY. (OVID, Met. III, 415.) I, i, 140 The overplus of kings, in all their might, Chapman's Aristotelianism: see note on Bussy, III, i, 62. I, i, 180 ...denies To give those of Navarre, though bred with you, Is there not here (and in Henry's first speech) an oblique reference to the influx of Scots into England in James's train? I, ii, 81 But that [sc. disloyalty] hath ever show'd so foul a monster That now to entertain it I must wholly Byron merely means that if he became disloyal he would be giving up the old formed habit of loyalty, which is called in Aristotelian language the contrary and privation of loyalty. To grow out of privation is a contradiction in terms (cf. v. 93). The rebutting argument that follows This paper uses Prof. Parrott's valuable edition and is indebted to his apparatus. A fuller account of the text of the Byron plays, by the same writer, is printed in the M.L.R. of October, 1908. Notes on Bussy and The Revenge of Bussy were published in this Review in January, 1918. Notes on other plays, to which reference is occasionally made, are as yet unpublished. Dr Henry Bradley has kindly read my manuscript, and I have had the great advantage of his comments and criticisms. is a characteristic example of Chapman's casuistry. Although it is obviously based on Aristotle's distinction between habitus and privatio (eğis and σtépnois), it is far from clear, and is such a curious patchwork as to deserve full analysis. Habit in v. 84 has the usual sense of formed moral habit, the usage found in the Ethics; in the reply of Picoté (v. 86) there is a play on habit, a garment; lastly, in the rest of the argument the word means the possession of a positive quality in opposition to its mere privation. But the argument itself is such an application of physics to politics as only Chapman can make. The habit of a servile loyalty 90 Is reckon'd now amongst privations, With blindness, dumbness, deafness, silence, death; 95 And so 'tis nothing, what shall you then lose? That is, loyalty is a negative thing, not a positive quality. This argument mimics a purely physical discussion in Plutarch's De Primo Frigido 946b, where it is asked whether there is a primary power (dúvaμis) and substance (ovoía) of cold, as fire is of heat, or whether it is a privation of heat, as light of darkness. One answer suggested is: ὅτι πᾶσα στέρησις ἀργόν ἐστι καὶ ἄπρακτον, ὡς τυφλότης καὶ κωφότης καὶ σιωπὴ καὶ θάνατος; ἐκστάσεις γὰρ εἰσιν εἰδῶν καὶ ἀναιρέσεις οὐσιῶν, οὐ φύσεις τινες οὐδ ̓ οὐσίαι καθ ̓ ἑαυτάς. Then vv. 99-103: No true power doth admit privation 100 Adverse to him; or suffers any fellow It is the nature of things absolute Compare 946 e : καὶ γὰρ ἕξεως μὲν οὐκ ἔστι μίξις πρὸς στέρησιν οὐδ ̓ ἀναδέχεται δύναμις οὐδεμία τὴν ἀντικειμένην αὐτῇ στέρησιν ἐπιοῦσαν οὐδὲ ποιεῖ κοινωνὸν ἀλλ ̓ ἀντεξανίσταται... ἡ μὲν γὰρ κατὰ στέρησιν καὶ ἕξιν ἀντίθεσις πολεμικὴ καὶ ἀσύμβατός ἐστιν, οὐσίαν θατέρου τὴν θατέρου φθορὰν ἔχοντος. This means that Byron has a dignity and power so complete that any loyalty to the king is a 'decession' from its positive character. For loyalty implies that the dignity of the man who offers it is not absolute: the two qualities are as incompatible as fire and water (see De Pr. Frig. 950-51). The word power does not mean a 'man possessed of real power' (Parrott), but the positive quality in a man; it is merely a translation of Súvapus. It is subject (which has no political significance) that refers to the possessor of the power. Cf. B. Tr. v, ii, 1381: ...these monstrous issues... That cannot bear, in execrable concord The next lines are also from the same source: be your Highness Like those steep hills that will admit no clouds, 105 No dews, nor least fumes bound about their brows, Because their tops pierce into purest air, Expert of humour2; This is from 951 b, where the subject is still the incompatibility of opposites. As there are mountains which have no cloud or dew or mist at their summits, there is such a thing as air expert of humour,' and therefore it is the condensations below that make the air a mixture of the damp and cold. The moral is that Byron should remain at his lofty station in an atmosphere unmixed with the cold privation called loyalty. The metaphor is then carried a step further by the reminder that the air first receives the light of the sun; that is, quickly changes when the noble power, the opposite of the cold and damp, appears. This is translated from 952 f. Lastly, the argument ends as it began, with a contrast between habits and privations: Hot, shining, swift, light, and aspiring things, Are of immortal and celestial nature; Cold, dark, dull, heavy, of infernal fortunes 115 And never aim at any happiness: Your Excellency knows that simple loyalty, Faith, love, sincerity, are but words, no things, The first four lines are translated from the end of Plutarch's tract, p. 955 b. To sum up: the unity of the simile, every element of which is derived from De Primo Frigido, consists in suggesting that Byron's full development is not compatible with the mere privation called loyalty to another person. We may perhaps see the association that mediated this curious use of Plutarch's physics in the phrase 'cold spirits' (v. 162). The soul of the 'complete man' is a 'very fiery particle,' and repels the cold and moist. Compare: 'drowning their eternal parts in sense (III, iii, 17), and v, ii, 83-4. II, i, 9 ......and, as 'twere, set the head 2 Like Olympus: cf. Lucretius, III, 19, and Apuleius, De Mundo, 33. I do not think that Prof. Parrott's guardless in the sense of heedless can be justified as an extension of the meaning in Iliad v, 146, where 'His flocks left guardless' means 'without a guardian.' May there not be a reference to the game of football? Compare the language in the following passage1: Let all thy bladder-blowers still inspire, And make embroider'd foot-balls for the mire, Of thy Chimera, toss'd from street to street... A closer parallel for the sense is Comedy of Errors, II, i, 83—4 : That like a football you do spurn me thus? It is tempting to note that the contemporary Italian game had an antiguardia and retroguardia, but, in default of further evidence, this is probably a coincidence. Should a change be needed, I think that the first syllable is at fault, and suggest some such word as giantlike. II, i, 24 I have devis'd the fashion and the weight; Dr Bradley writes: With the text as it stands the only possible interpretation would be "I have devised the make and the weight of the chain which you require me to forge. This is confirmed by III, ii, 1: La Fin is in the right, and will obtain ; He draweth with his weight, and like a plummet That sways a door, with falling off pulls after. Truth is a golden ball, cast in our way... Allusion to Atalanta. II, i, 156 II, ii, 35. Parrott notes that this passage is from Plutarch, Conjugalia Praecepta. The connexion in Chapman's mind is doubtless that the attempt on Byron's loyalty has just been compared to the seduction of citizens' wives by courtiers (vv. 1-24). III, i. This scene is the counterpart of I, i, 71 ff. It is,' writes Dr Parrott, 'a curious instance of Chapman's lack of consistently developed characterization that Byron in these lines and his following speech (vv. 25-46) repeats almost literally the sentiments of Picoté in I, ii, 86-136. The hero, who in the former scene had replied by a eulogy of loyalty, is here found playing the part of the tempter and preaching the doctrines of Machiavellian statecraft. Yet nothing has happened in the meantime to alienate Byron from the King. The truth is that Chapman 1 A Justification of Perseus and Andromeda, vv. 17-20. 2 Shakespeare's England, 11, 462. is more intent upon the expression of sentiments suitable to the occasion than on the harmonious development of character.' But I venture to think that these lines are a designed echo of Picoté's speech. This play is a study in the effect of flattery on a mind 'past measure glorious' (I, i, 71), a mind that needed nothing but temptation to turn disloyal. It is not necessary for Chapman's conception of the character that anything should happen to alienate Byron from the king. After his reception at Savoy's court he is ripe for treason, if skilfully handled (1, ii, 22 ff.). La Fin, the French Ulysses,' plots 'with falling off' to pull him after (II, i, 24, III, ii, 1). In II, i, Byron is so far won over as to sound La Fin, who draws off, but insinuates that the supernatural powers which he claims to have will ensure success. Then in this scene by a 'feigned passion,' 'making conscience | Of the revolt that he hath urg'd me to,' La Fin finally manœuvres Byron into plying him with all the arguments against loyalty that Picoté had instilled into his mind. Nothing could better exhibit the manner in which flattery and finesse insensibly worked upon him. In this play Byron is no man of action he is merely subjected to conflicting influences, working on his ambition or his loyalty (see also II, ii, 46 ff., III, ii, 245 ff., IV, i, 122– 223, v, ii, 50). : III, ii, 122-40. This passage is in some confusion. The Savoyards had plotted to inflame Byron's ambition by admiring 'The royal promise of his rare aspect, | As if he heard not' (v. 11). This they do in vv. 117–21. But then Roncas interrupts the flattery to tell how on his deathbed the Archbishop of Lyons, a skilled physiognomist, said 'That he had never yet observed a face | Of worse presage than this' (128-9). This is plainly out of keeping with the conspiracy to beguile so superstitious a spirit from loyalty. It is not enough to reply that this ill-omened prognostication is counterbalanced by the extravagant praise that follows; for the plotters would hardly risk reminding the credulous Byron of the verdict of an expert in the science of physiognomy. I think that the lines must have been spoken aside. In vv. 110-16 Savoy draws Byron and La Fin apart, but not out of earshot-that is part of the scheme (see v. 12). The courtiers then vie with one another in praise. But for dramatic purposes Chapman wishes to introduce a presage of Byron's end and perhaps to add a touch in this study of insincere flattery. So Roncas repeats his story in a lower tone, and then continues with raised voice: and I will swear 130 That, something seen in physiognomy, I do not find in all the rules it gives One slend❜rest blemish tending to mishap. |