In spite of his heaviness in drama, Jonson had a light enough touch in lyric poetry. His songs have not the careless sweetness of Shakspere’s, but they have a grace of their own. Such pieces as his Love’s Triumph, Hymn to Diana, the adaptation from Philostratus,
Drink to me only with thine eyes,
and many others entitle their author to rank among the first of English lyrists. Some of these occur in his two collections of miscellaneous verse, the Forest and Underwoods; others in the numerous masques which he composed. These were a species of entertainment, very popular at the court of James I., combining dialogue with music, intricate dances, and costly scenery. Jonson left an unfinished pastoral drama, the Sad Shepherd, which contains passages of great beauty; one, especially, descriptive of the shepherdess
Earine,
Who had her very being and her name
With the first buds and breathings of
the spring,
Born with the primrose and the violet
And earliest roses blown.
1. A History of Elizabethan Literature. George Saintsbury. London: Macmillan & Co., 1877.
2. Palgrave’s Golden Treasury of Songs and Lyrics. London: Macmillan & Co., 1877.
3. The Courtly Poets from Raleigh to Montrose. Edited by J. Hannah. London: Bell & Daldy, 1870.
4. The Countess of Pembroke’s Arcadia. London: Sampson Low, Son & Marston, 1867.
5. Bacon’s Essays. Edited by W. Aldis Wright. Macmillan & Co. (Golden Treasury Series.)